text
stringlengths 16k
189k
| timestamp
stringlengths 20
20
| url
stringlengths 15
841
|
|---|---|---|
A. Manimaran and Dr. K. Somasundaram”An Efficient Data Security Mechanism in Cloud Computing Using Anonymous ID Algorithm”, International Journal of control Theory and Applications, Vol.9, No.5 (2016).
Resource person for 7 days Faculty Development Programme on Linux Installation and Programming for the faculty of engineering collges at United College of Engineeirng, Allahabad, UP during July 2007.
Resource person for 7 days Faculty Development Programme on Linux Installation and Programming for the faculty of engineering collges at Govt. Engineering College, Chankade, Ahamadabad, Gujarat during Sep’ 2007. Both the FDP was part of Govt. initiative to promote Free & Open source software.
Advisory Committee Member, FOSS Education for Computer Studies, NRCFOSS, AU-KBC Research Centre, Anna University during 2009.
Active member in Indian Linux User Group, Chennai. He was a speaker in FOSSCONF’08, its a Free & Open Source Software Conference held at MIT Chennai and FOSSCONF’09 held at Thiagarayar College of Engineering, Madurai.
Participated as Invited Speaker, the topic on “Open Source Software for Libraries” in READIT’09, a National Conference on Recent Advances in Information Science and Technology organised by Scientific Information Resource Division, Indira Gandhi centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam.
Guest lectures on various open source topics and conducted many advocacy programme on Free and Open Source Software in various Engineering colleges, Arts and Science Colleges, Polytechnic and Schools.
Speaker in the Free Software Foundation Tamil Nadu – Regional Convention for Academicians and Researchers.
Conducted 15 days workshop on “Linux Usage and use of various Open Source software” for the Judges of Thiruvallur Dist. 24 judges were participated.
Conducted 10 days training program for 4 different batches on Basics of Open Source Software, Linux installation and Programming for the batch of 40 students each and certified them accordingly.
He played a key role to introduce open source tools for all the lab courses of CSE and IT in Jaya Engineering College.
Guided more than 60 projects in the area of Open Source.
Published four papers in international Journals, three papers in international Conferences and 12 papers in national conferences.
Conducted one week Faculty Development Programme on Free and Open Source Software during Dec 2009 for about 58 faculty members as Resource Person and Co-ordinator which is funded by FOSSEE Project, IIT-Bombay.
Conducted four Anna University sponsored FDP on different courses as Co-ordinator, organised 18 workshops for faculty and students, 6 National conferences, 3 Free software demo days and many guest lectures.
Attended 6 FDP programmes, 10 Workshops, 5 short term courses and many seminars organised by various Orgnizations, Universities and Colleges.
Received Seminar grants from AICTE and coordinator to conduct program on “Recent security issues in Cloud Computing Application areas” held from 18.11.2013 to 30.11.2013.
Received grants for Faculty Development Training Program from Anna University to conduct program on “UNIX internals” held from 17.12.2013 to 24.12.2013.
Coordinator for one day national workshop on “Network Simulator-2” organized by department of Computer Science and Engineering at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai, held on 22nd March 2012.
Participate In Regional Convention 2010 Organised By Free Software Foundation, Tamil Nadu At IFMR College, on 7th March 2010.
“Automated Internet Usage Controller for GNU/Linux” in NCCCN’09, SMK Fomra Institute of Technology, Chennai.
Participated in one day workshop on “Rich Internet Application”, held on 5th Sep 2009 at RMD Engineering College.
“Exploring Foss In Academic” at Foss Conf Chennai Feb ’08, held on 1st Feb 2008 to 3rd Feb 2008 at MIT Campus.
Attended one day workshop on “FPGA Based System Design”, at Jaya Engineering College, 2008.
Participated in Faculty Developement Training programme on “object oriented analysis and design” at Jaya Engineering College from 7th to 21st May 2007.
Participated In Desktop Moksha training organised By South Asia Node of UNDP APDIP International Open Source Network at C-DAC from 29th May 2007 to 31st May 2007.
Helped the students as “Faculty Mentor” to successfully complete their project under “The Great Mind Challenge – 2007” by IBM. Attended a short term course on “Application of Optimization Techniques in Engineering and Management – OPTEM ’06”, organised by JEC – ISTE, 2006.
Attended a “Foss Teachers Training Programme”, held during 6th – 18th June, 2006 at AU-KBC Research Centre.
Attended a “Foss Teachers Training Programme”, held during 6th – 18th June, 2005 at AU-KBC Research Centre.
Participated in two days Workshop on “Data Warehousing and Data Mining”, by School of Computer Science and Engineering, Anna University, 2003.
Attended a short term course on “Multimedia Technologies”, organised by Centre for Academic Partnership at CPDE, Anna University from 25th June 2001 to 30th June 2001.
Attended a short term course on “Network Administration”, organised by All India Council for Technical Education, Anna University, 2001.
Participated in three days Workshop on “Software Engineering Tools And Techniques”, by School of Computer Science and Engineering, Anna University, during 27th Dec 2000 to 20th Dec 2000.
Coordinator for one day National Conference WEBTOPS (WEB Technology and Open Source) 7th GENERATION, held on 30th March 2012 at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai and organized by Department of Computer Science and Engineegring.
“Predictive Analysis of Data by Clustering” in National Conference WEBTOPS, JEC 2010.
“Enhancing Search Performance In Structured P2p Networks Based on User’s Interest” in 6th National conference Web Technology and Open Source Webtops’ 10, JEC 2010.
“Language Detector for Python Using N-Gram” in National Conference on Advanced Computing Technology”, held on 29th Aug 2009 at Velammal Institute of Technology.
“Classification based Sportial Error Concealment for rectifying Images” in National Conference, held on 12th and 13th Feb 2007 at R.M.D Engineering College.
“Shape Error Concelement For Missing Boundary Segmentation Using Hermite Splines” at NCCCN held on 23rd and 24th March, 2007 at KCG College of Technology.
“Design & Implementation of Secure Secret Distribution System based on CODEX” in National Conference, held on 25th and 26th Jan 2006, at JEC.
“Record Matching Over Query Results Using Fuzzy Ontological Document Clustering” in International Journal on Computer Science and Engineering (IJCSE).
“An Index Based Congestion Aware Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks”, Int. J. Comp. Tech.
“Congestion Control in Wireless Sensor Networks using Optimized Communication”, Computational Intelligence and Computing Research (ICCIC), 2010 IEEE International Conference.
“Tagging: Vocabulary Evolution and convergence for social filtering” in National conference WEBTOPS, JEC 2010.
“Coalescing clustering and classification”, in National conference NCETC, KCG College of Technology, 2012.
“Duplicate Detection in Hierarchical Data Using Extended Sub Tree Similarity Function” National conference, N3CIT 2014, TJS Engineering college, 2014.
Undergone the Teacher Training Program on the Foss Course -I of Anna University Chennai at Jaya Engineering College with the support of IIT Bombay, Nov 2009.
Participated and own many achievements in Symposium and conferences. They guide students to participate in state/national level symposia and contests.
The faculties are well talented and conducting technical seminars and aptitude test periodically for student’s placement.
The faculties published many papers in leading journals and magazines.
Conducted a one week Faculty Development Programme on “C# and .NET framework” on Jaya Engineering College conducted by Anna University during May 2012.
Attended one day workshop on “Effective Research Grant writing” conducted by IET on 16th February 2013.
Attended National level Workshop on “Mathematical modeling in Wireless sensor networks and hands on training in OMNeT++- Version 1.0” on 12th and 13th of December 2013.
Attended a one day National workshop on “Network simulator – 2” in March 2012 at Jaya Engineering College.
Attended a one day National workshop on “Journal Writing ” in May 2012 at Jaya Engineering College.
Attended a one week Faculty Development Programme on “Artificial Intelligence” on Venkateswara Engineering College conducted by Anna University during 14th to 21st November 2011.
Participated a one day workshop on “Intellectual Property Rights” organised by JEC – ISTE chapter on September 2006.
Attended a one week Faculty Development Programme on “Visual Programming” on Arulmigu Kalasalingam college of Engineering conducted by Anna University during 7th to 12th November 2005.
V. UmaRani, Dr. K. Somasundaram “Review of Trust Models in Wireless Sensor Networks” in World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology, International Journal of Computer, Information Science and Engineering Vol:8 No:2, 2014, Pg.no 101-107.
V. UmaRani, E. A. Mary Anita (2011), “Security issues and challenges in Wireless Sensor Networks” in CIIT international journal in network communications.
V. UmaRani, “Trust Based Misbehavior Detection in Wireless Sensor Networks” in international conference on Emerging trends ICETSET 2014.
Karpagam, V. UmaRani(2011), “Replica node detection in P2P networks” in S.A College of Engineering.
V. UmaRani, Mary Lisy (2011), “Clone attack detection in Wireless sensor networks” in Prathusha Institute of Technology.
V. UmaRani, Arul Jothy (2011), “Detecting Sinking Malicious behaviour in wireless Ad Hoc network using cross layer approach” in national conference of “Recent Trends in computer Applications and Technology” on 30th September 2011.
V. UmaRani, P. Karpagam (2011), “Adaptive file replication and consistency maintenance in P2P network” inn international conference of “Information Communication and Embedded System” at S.A Engineering College.
V. Umarani, P. Vijalakshmi, Dr. K. RadhaKrishnan “Dynamic Reconfiguration of Wireless networks using GA” (2003)in noouralislam college of engineering.
Participated and paper presented on “A Novel Securing Framework on Max 232” in the National Conference on Web Technologies and Open Source at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
Attended National level conference on “Reliable Data Transfer using enhanced UDP”, at Jaya Engineering college, Chennai.
Participated in Faculty Developement Training programme on “Digital Communicate” at RMD Engineering College from 28th June to 4th July 2010.
Served as a co-ordinator for faculty developement training programme as CS2201 – Data Structure from 21st May to 28th May 2010.
Participated in faculty developement programme on open source lab held at St.Peter’s College of Engineering from 22nd to 24th June 2011.
Attended the national workshop on “Journal Writing” organized by Department of Computer Science and Engineering, held on 2nd May 2012, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
2 – Weeks AICTE sponsored National Seminar Programme on “Recent Security Issues in Cloud Computing Application Areas” during 18–30 November 2013, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
2-Days AICTE sponsored National Level Seminar on “Energy Conservation and Thermal Energy Storage”, held on 12th & 13th December 2013, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
Attended 1 week Faculty Development Programme on “Programming and Data Structures II”, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
“Sender and Receiver Based Efficient Broadcasting Algorithm in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks”, International Journal of Modern Engineering Research (IJMER) Vol.1, Issue2, ISSN: 2249-6645, pp. 495-499, Nov-Dec 2011.
Multiple Channels Utilization in Collision Free MAC Protocol for Wireless Ad Hoc Networks”, CiiT International Journal of Wireless Communication, ISSN 0974 – 9640, Dec 2011.
“Secure File Transfer over Peer-To-Peer Network”, International Journal of Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) Vol. 2, Issue 1, ISSN: 2248-9622, pp. 754-757, Jan-Feb 2012.
“Web Phishing Detection in Machine Learning Using Heuristic Image Based Method”, International Journal of Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) Vol. 2, Issue 5, ISSN: 2248-9622, pp.1589-1593, Sep-Oct 2012.
M. Syed Rabiya, M. Saleem Babu, “Minimized redundant overhearing to improve Energy Efficiency in MANETs using DSR”, Proceedings of International Conference on Future Engineering Trends ICFET-10, Apr 2010.
M. Syed Rabiya, M. Saleem Babu, “Improving Energy Efficiency In MANETs Using DSR With Minimized Redundant Overhearing”, Proceedings of International Conference On Advances And Emerging Trends In Computing Technologies – ICAET10, June 2010.
M. Saleem Babu, N.Anshar Ali, “Enhanced Collision Free MAC Protocol for Wireless Ad Hoc Networks”, Proceedings of the International Conference on Smart technologies for Materials, Controls, Computing and Energy ICST-2011, Jan 2011.
Sangeetharaj. R, M. Saleem Babu, “Detection of DDoS Attacks using Entropy Variations”, Proceedings of International Conference of Emerging Marvels in Information and Computer Science Engineering EMICS’13, Feb 2013.
M. Saleem Babu, S. Karthik, S. Prabhu, “Efficient Biometric Visual Recognition of Human Based on their IRIS”, Proceedings of National Conference on Computational Intelligence in Computer & Communication, pp. 81-87, Apr 2005.
P. Venkata Rao, M. Saleem Babu, “Mobile User Recovery in the Context of Internet Transactions”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Trends in Science and Technology, pp. 52-58, May 2005.
Livingston Jayaraj, M. Saleem Babu, “TCP-Friendly Transport Protocol for AdHoc Wireless Networks”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Trends in Science and Technology, pp. 73-76, May 2005.
V. Jothiprasad, M. Saleem Babu, “Fast Parallel File Replication in Data Grid”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Trends in Science and Technology, pp. 136-140, May 2005.
Anugy Ans George, M. Saleem Babu, “Discovery and Recovery of Policy Anomalies in Distributed Firewall”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Trends in Science and Technology, pp. 197-203, May 2005.
S. Prabu, M. Saleem Babu, “Efficient Biometric Recognition of Human Based on Iris Patterns”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Trends in Science and Technology, pp. 353-356, May 2005.
K. Laxmi Narasimharao, M. Saleem Babu, “Optimized Traffic Monitoring with WAP Gateway Interface Using Genetic Algorithm”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Trends in Science and Technology, pp. 480-483, May 2005.
R. Janarthanan, M. Saleem Babu, S. Veerakumar, “Intrusion Detection System For Networks Using Genetic Algorithm”, Proceedings of I.T. National Conference on Web Technology & Open Source, pp. 139-147, Feb 2006.
M. Saleem Babu, S. Ephina Thendral, “Improving Text Clustering with Feature Selection”, Proceedings of National Conference on Recent Approaches in Communication and Information Technology, Mar 2009.
T. Yamini Jayalakshmi, M. Saleem Babu, “Hierarchical GUI Test Suite Reduction Using Call Stack Coverage”, Proceedings of National Conference on Networking and Information Computing – NCNIC’09, Apr 2009.
M. Saleem Babu, T. Judgi, “Special Binary Tree With Cycles Based Fault Tolerant Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks”, Proceedings of National Conference on Networking and Information Computing – NCNIC’09, pp. 115-122, Apr 2009.
P. Suman, M. Saleem Babu, “Message Authentication in Computationally Constrained Mobile Computing Devices”, Proceedings of the National Level Conference on Information Processing, pp. 342-346, Mar 2010.
P. Suman, M. Saleem Babu, “Message Authentication in Computationally Constrained Mobile computing devices”, Proceedings of National Conference on Intelligent Information & Distributed Computing, Mar 2010.
M. Syed Rabiya, M. Saleem Babu, “Improving Energy Efficiency in DSR-PSM using Randomized Overhearing”, Proceedings of National Conference on Information and Communication Technology NCICT10, Mar 2010.
V. H. Sundheep, K. Ashwin, M. Saleem Babu, “Predicting Earthquakes using Data Mining Clustering Techniques”, Proceedings of the National Conference on Challenges and Issues in Computing & Technology NCCICT 2011, Aug 2011.
Nishu Kumar, Himanshu Shekar, M. Saleem Babu, “Energy-Efficient Cluster Computing through Workload Characterization”, Proceedings of the National Conference on Challenges and Issues in Computing & Technology NCCICT 2011, Aug 2011.
S. Arjun, K. Venkatesh, M. Saleem Babu, “Green Computing: Practice of Efficient and Eco-Friendly Computing Resources”, Proceedings of the National Conference on Challenges and Issues in Computing & Technology NCCICT 2011, Aug 2011.
Three months Training in Computer Hardware and Instrumentation, by Small Industries Development Organisation, Ministry of Industry, Government of India, from 16-Jun-1997 to 18-Sep-1997 at Chennai.
2-Days Workshop on Embedded Software, by Electronics Corporation of India Limited – ECIT, from 07-02-2002 to 08-02-2002 at Chennai.
One week Workshop on Microsoft .NET conducted by Microsoft in association with CSI from 16th to 20th Nov 2004 at Chennai.
International Seminar on Cloud Computing ISCC’09, by Prof. Dr. Rajkumar Buyya, Manjrasoft Pty Ltd, Australia, on 26-Aug-2009, at Vel Tech Dr. RR & Dr. SR Technical University, Chennai.
2-Days Faculty Development Program on Theory of Computation, by Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Vel Tech University, Chennai on 27th & 28th Aug 2009.
Two days workshop on DISTRIBUTED SERVICE MODELS, by Department of Information Science and Technology, Anna University, Chennai on 14 & 15-10-2010.
Eight Days Training Program on “Certificate in .NET Programming”, by ICT Academy of Taminadu from 22-Sep-2010 to 29-Sep-2010, at Vel Tech University, Chennai.
2-Days Faculty Development Training Program, by AskUs Solutions Private Limited, from 13-14 June 2012, at Vel Tech University, Chennai.
2-Weeks AICTE sponsored National Seminar Programme on “Recent Security Issues in Cloud Computing Application Areas” during 18–30 November 2013, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
“Multi Platform Packet Sniffer Tool for Network Traffic Analysis and Intrusion Detection”, International Journal of Modern Engineering Research (IJMER) , Nov-Dec 2011.
Participated and paper presented on “Multi Platform Packet Sniffer Tool for Network Traffic Analysis and Intrusion Detection” in the International Conference, Chennai.
Participated and paper presented on “Network Traffic Analysis and Intrusion Detection using Packet Sniffer” in the National Conference, Chennai held on 9thd June 2011.
Participated and paper presented on “Mining the Data Mart: A Case Study with Stock Market Data” in the National Conference, Chennai held on 2nd May 2011.
2 – Days AICTE sponsored National Level Seminar on “Energy Conservation and Thermal Energy Storage”, held on 12th & 13th December 2013, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
Attended 1 week Faculty Development Programme on “Unix Internals”, held on 17th to 24th December 2013, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
Attended National Conference on “Distributed Data Access and controls / metadata for data Intensive Computing Environments” at K.L.N College of Information Technology, Pottapalayam, Sivagangai Dist. held on 16.09.2011.
Attended National Conference on “Designing an Algorithm for Processors in Grid Accustom” at Bhajarang Engineering College, Veppampattu, Chennai held on 24.09.2011.
Attended National Conference on “Creation of Applications in Distributed systems by 3D approach and Grid Monitoring” at S.A. Engineering College, Chennai held on 11.02.2012.
Attended 2 days National Seminar on “Research Issues and Challenges on Image Processing towards Remote Sensing” at National Engineering College, Kovilpatti.
Attended 1 day training programme on “Soft Skills” at K.L.N College of Information Technology, Sivagangai Dist.
Attended 2 days National Seminar on “Research Issues and Challenges in Information and Communication Engineering” at K.L.N College of Information Technology, Sivagangai Dist.
Attended 1 day Faculty Development Programme on “Managerial Skills” at K.L.N College of Information Technology, Sivagangai Dist.
Attended 2 days Faculty Development Programme on “Internet Computing and Web Services” at K.L.N College of Information Technology, Sivagangai Dist.
Attended the national workshop on “Journal Writing” organized by Department of Computer Science and Engineering, held on 2nd May 2012, at Jaya Engineering College,Chennai.
Served as a co-ordinator for faculty developement training programme as CS2201 – Data Structure from 21st May to 28th May2010.
Training and Certification in JAVA/J2EE at Times Technologies, Bangalore, INDIA. Certificate in Hardware Assembling and Trouble shooting from ARTECH Computers, Chennai INDIA.
Best faculty award, based on outstanding academic performance during the year 2008 – 2009, from Arunai Engineering College – Tiruvannamalai.
Conducted Infosys Campus Connect, Foundation Program and online examination for the students, that created an educational infrastructure to enable the students to attain global benchmarks and the fresh recruits to be industry ready.
Worked as a Project Coordinator in our computer science department, encouraged the student to do their final project in various government organization like CSIR-Delhi, CIMFR – Nagpur, NSIC – Chennai, Keltron – Kerala, ITI – Bangalore etc.
Act as a CSI Coordinator in our Computer Science department, encouraged the students to CSI programs and Events.
Place: Vel Tech High Tech Dr RR & Dr SR Engg College.
Participated and paper presented on “High Precision Environment Based Capability Specification for Automated Web Service discovery” in the National Conference on Emerging Technologies at M. Kumarasamy College of Engineering, Karur.
Participated in the tutorial session of “16th International Conference on Advanced Computing and Communications at MIT campus, Anna University Chennai, on 14th December 2008.
Participated in one Day workshop on “MATLAB” at RMD Engineering College on 19th Nov 2011.
Faculty development program on Computer based teaching learning through moodle at Arunai Engineeing College Nov 24th & 25th 2009, organized by AEC – Dept of Training and Placement in association with Computer Society of India, AEC Branch.
Participated in Deep Dive Faculty Enabled Program held at Infosys Technologies Ltd, Chennai on 7th – 11th Dec 2009.
Participated one day workshop on FPGA based system using Altera tools on 5th September 2009 at school of computing sciences, VIT University, Vellore.
Participated in Deep Dive Faculty Enabled Program held at Infosys Technologies Ltd, Chennai on 18th – 22nd May 2009.
Quality improvement program, AICTE sponsored winter school on “Multimedia development and delivery for e-Learning” on 23.03.2009 – 28.03.2009 at Arunai Engineering College.
3 – Days workshop on COMPUTER FORENSIC TOOLS & TECHNIQUES on 29-01.2009 – 31.01.2009 at SRM University.
Faculty development program on software development using case tools at Arunai Engineering College.
Participated and paper presented on “Dynamic Key Management in Sensor Network without Rekeying” in the National Conference on Emerging Trends in Informatics and Computing, ETIC-2011 at Prathyusha Engineering College, Chennai.
Attended the international workshop on “Cloud computing” organized by Department of Computer Science and Engineering, held on october 2010 at Periyar university, Thanjavur.
“Fuzzy association rule mining and Genetic network programming for IDS” Paper presented on International level conference at Prathusa Institute of technology and Management, Chennai, India.
“Genetic Network Programming and Fuzzy class – Association Rule mining for security system” National Level Conference at Jaya Engineering College.
International conference on Information communication and Embeded systems at S.A Engineering College, Chennai, India. Presented a paper named ‘A Multi layer IDS in MANETS using clustering technique’.
National level conference advanced computing technologies at S.A Engineering College, Chennai, India. Presented a paper named “Advanced Congestion control technique for health care monitoring in wireless biomedical sensor networks”.
Attended Faculty development program COGNIZANT – ICT Academy of Tamilnadu.
Participated in two day workshop on intelligent property rights in Jaya Engineering College.
Participated and presented paper on “A Novel Securing Framework on Max 232” in the National Conference on Web Technologies and Open Source at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
International conference on “Architecture Software System and Green Computing” at Aarupadai Engineering College, Paiyanoor, India. Presented a paper named ‘QoS Ranking Prediction Using matrix Factorization for Cloud Services’.
2 – Weeks AICTE sponsored National Seminar Programme on “Recent Security Issues in Cloud Computing Application Areas” during 18 – 30 November 2013, at Jaya Engineering College, Chennai.
Participated and paper presented on “An Optimal algorithm for Hiding Sensitive Rule in Association Rule Mining” in the National Conference on cyber security at S.A Enggineering College, Chennai.
Participated and paper presented on “A Hybrid Algorithm for Hiding Sensitive Rule in Association Rule Mining” in the “National Conference on Innovative Trends in Advanced Computing, NCITAC’13″.
Has attended the “Workshop on Web Mining Application and Data Mining Tools” at Saveetha Engineering College.
Has attended the National Seminar on “Recent Issues in Computer Science” at R.M.D Engineering College.
Certified for completion of “Linux Workshop” organized by IIT Bombay.
Certified for completion of “Web Animation” organized by State Project Co-ordination unit.
Certified for completion of “Network and Administration” organized by State Project Co-ordination unit. | 2019-04-24T09:50:06Z | http://jec.ac.in/cse-staff/ |
The San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium of 2006 brought together over 8,000 people from all corners of the globe for the unifying purpose of sharing the current state-of-the-art on all aspects of breast cancer. As usual, this year’s symposium devoted time to significant advances in the entire spectrum of the disease, including prevention, screening, prognostic factors, adjuvant chemotherapy, hormonal therapy and treatment of metastatic disease. Below is a discussion of results concerning adjuvant and neoadjuvant therapies.
Breast cancer is now clearly seen as several different diseases molecularly defined even within an apparent uniform histology. Increasing evidence suggests each of these diseases demands a different approach to treatment for greatest success: hormone receptor positive (ER+ PR+) tumors requiring predominantly endocrine therapy; HER2/neu + tumors requiring a HER2 targeted agent; and triple negative ER- PR – HER2 – or the so-called basal type requiring aggressive chemotherapy. The use of Herceptin® (trastuzumab) is now firmly established in the treatment of HER2 positive breast cancer, as is the use of dose-dense chemotherapy in high-risk patients. Neoadjuvant treatment is commonly used to downstage primary tumors and identify biomarkers predictive of benefit. Each of these therapeutic options had further exploration at this year’s SABCS.
Eagerly awaited was the second interim analysis of the BCIRG-006 study, a three arm trial comparing Adriamycin® (doxorubicin) and Cytoxan® (cyclophosphamide) followed by sequential Taxotere® (docetaxel) (AC-T) as a control arm, to two experimental arms: 1) AC and sequential Taxotere plus Herceptin for one year (AC-TH) and 2) a novel non-anthracycline regimen, Taxotere and carboplatinum plus Herceptin (TCH) followed by Herceptin for one year.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn1 "_ednref1") Patients with positive lymph nodes or who were high-risk, node-negative (29% of the population) were eligible, and over 3,000 patients were randomized. Median follow up is now 36 months. The disease-free survival at four years is 83% for AC-TH, 82% for TCH and 77% for AC-T. The hazard ratio for the addition of Herceptin is 0.61 (AC-TH) or 0.67 (TCH). No significant difference in the two Herceptin arms exist (p = 0.12). Overall survival is 92% for AC-TH, HR=0.59; 91% for TCH, HR=0.66; and 86% for ACT.
Interestingly, the authors reported data separately for the 900 women with lymph node negative (LN-) disease at entry. AC-TH had a hazard ratio of 0.32 (p = 0.007) and TCH, HR=0.47; p = 0.0096, demonstrating that the benefit of Herceptin in LN- patients is at least as proportionally good as in higher risk patients. In terms of safety, TCH was the least toxic regimen with significantly less anthracycline-related symptoms as hand-foot syndrome, stomatitis, vomiting, neuropathy, myalgia and nail changes than AC-TH. Importantly, the lesser degree of cardiac dysfunction seen with TCH in the first interim analysis persisted with only 4 patients experiencing Grade 3/4 LV dysfunction compared to 20 in the AC-TH arm (p = 0.005) and 4 in the AC-T arm.
Whereas in the first interim analysis the 35% of patients with coamplification of both topo-isomerase II and HER2 showed benefit of AC-TH compared to either TCH or AC-T, more complete and longer follow up now shows a coming together of the curves. However, for the two-thirds of patients with no co-amplification, there remains a marked improvement for patients in either of the two Herceptin arms. These interesting results suggest that topo-isomerase II coamplification in the presence of HER2 amplification promotes some form of resistance to Herceptin. Overall, given the equivalent efficacy and reduced toxicity of TCH, this study supports a practice changing paradigm: the use of a non-anthracycline regimen in the adjuvant treatment of HER2 positive breast cancer patients.
BCIRG-006, like most other adjuvant Herceptin trials, utilizes maintenance Herceptin to complete one year of therapy after chemotherapy. The choice of this schedule and duration remains entirely empirical. In contrast, the small Fin-HER study demonstrated that a 9-week course of Herceptin concurrently with chemotherapy could provide similar proportionally benefit as seen in the larger trials.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn2 "_ednref2") ECOG E-2918, another smaller pilot trial, randomized 227 HER2+ patients between short course TH-AC vs. long course TH-AC-H for 52 weeks in lymph-node positive patients.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn3 "_ednref3") The primary endpoint was the rate of congestive heart failure between arms. There was no difference in CHF: 3 in the short course and 4 in the long course arm. Six cardiac events occurred <2 years after treatment initiation. While the disease-free survival and overall survival were not primary endpoints of the study, at five years 76% of the short course H and 75% of long course H were disease-free, while 89% of short course H and 83% of long course H were alive. Results were even better in the approximately 80% of patients with 3+ IHC or positive FISH results. The study suggests that much of the benefit of Herceptin can be derived from a brief course in conjunction with chemotherapy; however, no benefit in terms of long-term CHF reduction was seen with an attenuation of the Herceptin schedule.
A meta-analysis of the effect of HER2 status in studies comparing an anthracycline containing-arm and a non-anthracycline arm was reported.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn4 "_ednref4") Overall, across seven studies, the use of anthracycline provided a 10% advantage in both DFS and OS. In the subset of HER2+ patients (generally obtained retrospectively), the HR for anthracycline in HER2+ was 0.71 for DFS, p=<0.001 and for overall survival HR=0.73; p=<0.001. In contrast, in HER2- patients in these trials, the HR was around unity for both DFS and OS. These results suggest that the majority of benefit from anthracyclines may be in the HER2+ patients, perhaps representing a surrogate marker for topo-II amplification. Furthermore, it supports the concept that anthracyclines do not necessarily benefit the 75% of patients who are HER2- with the possible exception of the small group with topo-II amplification but HER2 non-overexpressed.
Dose-dense chemotherapy (DDC), a concept in which total doses and cycle doses of drugs are the same but the cycle length is compressed, is based on a mathematical model predicting better cancer cell kill and outcome. This notion has been clinically proven in the landmark cooperative group study C9741, reported in final form at SABCS 2005.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn5 "_ednref5") Confirmatory studies have been highly anticipated and several were reported at this year’s meeting.
The German AGO group reported interim analysis of a randomized Phase III trial comparing standard epirubicin and cyclophosphamide followed by Taxol® (paclitaxel), (EC-T) at three-week intervals to sequential dose dense epirubicin, Taxol, and cyclophosphamide (DD ETC).[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn6 "_ednref6") This study was not a pure example of dose density as the individual doses in the sequential dose dense arms were also higher than in the standard dose arms, and the number of cycles were not equivalent between arms. Nevertheless, in this trial of high risk (> 4 positive lymph nodes, 25% HER2+) patients, there was a clear 5-year RFS advantage for the DD ETC arm: 70% compared to 62% for EC-T, HR-0.72, p=0.0079 and OS, 82% vs. 77%, HR 0.76, p=0.29. Toxicity, however, was greater for the DD ETC arm, including leukopenia, anemia, thrombocytopenia and febrile neutropenia. Moreover, nonhematologic toxicity was also greater for DD ETC, particularly in regard to infection, stomatitis and pain.
These results contrast with C-9741 where neutropenic events were actually less common in the dose-dense arm. It is likely that the use of cyclophosphamide 2500 mg/m2 and epirubicin at 150 mg/m2 in DD ETC caused most of the hematologic toxicity, while multiple previous trials have failed to show benefit of dose escalation of either anthracyclines or cyclophosphamide above standard doses. Therefore, the higher doses may have only increased toxicity but not efficacy. Despite greater toxicity in the AGO trial, the improvement in survival for the dose dense arm is impressive and supports the general concept of dose density in high risk women.
Another study addressing the use of dose-dense chemotherapy, NCIC MA.21, was the subject of an interim analysis.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn7 "_ednref7") This Phase III, three arm trial study randomized patients to CEF (with oral cyclophosphamide) on a day 1, 8 epirubicin and 5-FU schedule every 28 days, dose-dense EC followed by Taxol at 14 day intervals (DD EC-T), or standard AC-T every 21 days. High risk node-negative or LN+ patients under the age of 60 were eligible. About one-third of patients had > 4 positive lymph nodes. The primary finding was the inferiority of AC-T to either dose-dense EC-T or FEC with 3-year RFS, 90% for CEF; 89.5% for EC-T and 85% for AC-T (p=0.001). No significant difference in HR for CEF vs. DD EC-T was detected. The benefit for CEF or dose-dense EC-T was most pronounced in hormone receptor negative patients. Toxicity was generally higher for CEF, both in terms of febrile neutropenia and cardiac toxicity. Both epirubicin-containing regimens had higher acute venous thromboembolic events than AC-T and both Taxol-containing arms had much higher any grade sensory neuropathy. Interestingly, CEF was also associated with neuropathy (26.3% vs. approximately 70% for Taxol regimens). While final results for this trial will be available in the future, the head-to-head comparison of dose density clearly confirms the results of 9741.
Given the emerging benefit of dose-dense chemotherapy, investigators at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center wondered about the safety of adding Herceptin to DDC as given in C9741. An interim analysis reported on 70 HER2+ patients with normal LVEF and no prior cardiac history received DDC with Neulasta® (pegfilgrastim) support and Herceptin for one year starting concurrently with Taxol.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn8 "_ednref8") Four patients discontinued treatment for cardiac events: one had clinical CHF and three for asymptomatic LVEF decline at six months after start of chemotherapy. All three patients with asymptomatic LVEF decline had recovery to normal levels. The authors concluded that Herceptin can be safely added to DDC without any increasing cardiac events.
Taken together, there is now abundant evidence of the benefit of dose density in improving outcome in the adjuvant treatment of early stage breast cancer. Many questions remain: are sequential single agents less toxic than combinations? Can dose density be increased further? How can short and long-term toxicity be lessened? What is the incremental benefit of dose-dense Taxol vs. weekly treatments?
Perhaps the most eagerly anticipated data at SABCS 2006 was the presentation of Tykerb® (lapatinib) and Taxol in newly diagnosed inflammatory breast cancer.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn9 "_ednref9") Tykerb is a novel, oral, small molecule inhibitor of both the EGFR receptor (ERbB1) and HER2/neu. Recently published results confirm the activity of Tykerb in Herceptin-refractory MBC.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn10 "_ednref10") Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) often overexpresses HER2, and ERbB1 and is a very aggressive form of the disease. Thirty-five patients with IBC were treated with Tykerb 1500 mg/day for two weeks and then had Taxol weekly added for 12 additional weeks. After 14 weeks of therapy, patients underwent surgery. The primary endpoint was pathologic CR rate. Twenty-six percent of the women enrolled had Stage IV disease. Overall, 3/21 patients had a pCR in breast and lymph nodes, including 3/18 with HER2+ and 0/3 without overexpression of HER2. Thirty percent of patients responded to Tykerb alone by day 14, and, overall, 78% of patients responded to the combination therapy. Grade > 3 diarrhea was seen in 60% of patients, but other grade 3 toxicity was uncommon including nausea, vomiting, rash, fatigue and asthenia. Preliminary biomarker analysis suggested response to Tykerb correlated with expression of insulin-like growth factor I or deficiency in the PTEN pathway. Further studies with Tykerb in the neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and metastatic setting are well underway.
A novel approach to neoadjuvant therapy was presented by the Dana-Farber group.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn11 "_ednref11") Based on the observation that most patients with BRCA1 mutations have triple negative (ER-, PR-, HER2-), basal-like breast cancer and that BRCA1 is an enzyme which normally functions to repair double stranded DNA breaks, they reasoned that cisplatinum, of which the mechanism of action involves creating double strand breaks, would be effective in these tumors.
Twenty-eight patients with clinical Stage II/III triple negative breast cancer received cisplatinum as a single agent at 75 mg/m2 every 21 days for 4 cycles. Six (22%) achieved pCR and 3 had progressive disease. Both of the women with documented BRCA1 mutation achieved pCR. The toxicity of the single drug was modest. These results point towards a developmental strategy including platinum agents in the treatment of basal type breast cancer and perhaps particularly in those patients with BRCA1 mutations.
Final results of the German GEPAR-trio study were the subject of a presentation.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn12 "_ednref12") This complex neoadjuvant study assessed response to two cycles of TAC and then assigned patients to further therapy based on their clinical response. Those with “minimal” response were randomized to continue TAC to complete eight cycles vs. switching after four more cycles of TAC to a combination of Navelbine® (vinorelbine) and Xeloda (NX). Those with clinical partial response or better to two cycles of TAC were randomized to complete a total of six or eight cycles of the same regimen. This large study enrolled 2,000 women. Two-thirds were responders to two cycles of TAC. Interestingly, nonresponders were significantly more likely to have lower grade tumors, 72.6% vs. 61.3%; be HR positive, 68.5% vs. 58.3%; or have locally advanced tumors, 19.4% vs. 13.0%; while there was no difference in response by the HER2 status, age, tumor size or nodal involvement.
For clinical responders after two cycles of TAC, the pCR rate was 21-23.5% after further TAC with no significant benefit of prolonged therapy after six cycles. In contrast, nonresponders had a 5.7-6.0% pCR rate with no benefit to switching a putatively noncross-resistant regiment of NX. This large study allowed for multivariate analysis demonstrating that young age, high grade tumor, ductal histology, hormone receptor negativity and a complete clinical response after two cycles of TAC were all predictive of ultimate pathologic complete response. The lack of benefit from additional drugs in patients with suboptimal response to the three most active agents in breast cancer suggest the need for a different approach, perhaps with biological agents added, in future trials.
Two presentations derived from retrospective analyses of large databases give a glimpse of what can be expected in the future of breast cancer. Sir Richard Peto presented the first results of the Early Breast Cancer Trial 1st Collaborative Group latest five year analysis for 2005-2006.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn13 "_ednref13") The Oxford review, as it is known, now comprises over 660,000 patients enrolled in clinical trials since 1984 and provides a broad canvas meta-analysis of the effects of breast cancer treatment.
The group has demonstrated that the large decrease in breast cancer mortality that has occurred since 1990 in women under the age of 70 is due to the accumulated effect of multiple small to moderate improvements in treatment. Trends emerging from the most recent analysis include the benefit of adding radiation therapy to adjuvant chemotherapy for all lymph node positive patients and the benefit of anthracycline-based chemotherapy vs. CMF. The 15-year recurrence rate difference for patients <50 years of age who receive chemotherapy is about 12%, particularly prominent in ER-negative patients. The authors predict that the overall deaths from breast cancer in 2010 will be one-half of what they were in 1990 in the United Kingdom and the United States.
Ravdin and colleagues presented exciting and encouraging data from the most recent analysis from the SEER database utilizing incidence data in invasive breast cancer through 2004.[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_edn14 "_ednref14") There was a significant decrease in the number of breast cancer cases diagnosed in 2003 and 2004 compared to an essentially flat line incidence from 1998 to 2002. Virtually all of the decrease was in ER-positive cases. Overall, there was a 7% decrease in age adjusted breast cancer incidence in 2003 relative to 2002, which translated into almost 14,000 fewer patients diagnosed. Subgroup analyses demonstrated that almost all of the reduction was accounted for by women > 50 years of age.
What factors underlie this marked decrease? The authors postulated two leading possibilities: (1) change in mammographic screening levels or (2) change in the use of hormonal therapy. There was virtually no change in mammographic screening in 2003. However, the publication of the Women’s Health Initiative results in July 2002 led to a dramatic 50% reduction in hormonal therapy usage within 6 months with further decline in hormonal therapy usage by women through 2004. The prior use and reduction in use was mainly seen in women > 50 years of age. These trends support the concept that cessation of hormone replacement therapy may keep ER+ tumors from progressing from a pre-clinical state to a clinically apparent one. Obviously this potentially exciting result will require both more study and more time to assess if 2003 was merely an aberration or hopefully the beginning of a new era of reducing the burden of breast cancer.
Results from continued clinical studies evaluating Oncotype DX in different roles in the setting of adjuvant breast cancer continue to demonstrate its effectiveness in providing more individualized treatment options for patients with early breast cancer.
Oncotype DX is a CLIA-approved reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test that may be useful in determining which patients with newly diagnosed, Stage I or II, node-negative, estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer require adjuvant chemotherapy in addition to anti-estrogen therapy. Oncotype DX predicts the risk of a patient experiencing a recurrence 10 years following diagnosis utilizing formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tumor tissue. Oncotype DX comprises a panel of 21 genes (16 cancer-related genes and 5 control genes), derived from 3 studies, to accomplish a recurrence-score algorithm. Oncotype DX also helps predict the likelihood of the benefit of adjuvant chemotherapy in these patients.
Results from previous trials have also demonstrated that Oncotype DX may help predict anti-cancer responses to neoadjuvant chemotherapy with Taxotere® (docetaxel) as well as changing treatment decisions in at least one-quarter of women with early breast cancer. Oncotype DX is already covered by Medicare for eligible patients and continues to be evaluated in clinical trials to further define its role.
Estrogen receptor status is an important component in determining optimal treatment for patients with breast cancer. However, the power of different testing methods for ER expression, such as IHC or LB testing varies considerably.
The first study presented at 2006 SABCS was conducted by researchers affiliated with the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project (NSABP) to evaluate the effectiveness of results from Oncotype DX in accurately measuring ER expression. This trial included 297 node-negative, ER-positive breast cancer patients who had already received treatment with tamoxifen in the prior NSABP B-14 study. The NSABP B-14 trial had randomized node-negative, ER-positive breast cancer patients to tamoxifen or placebo.
To test for ER expression, study sites had performed LB testing for ER at the time of patient enrollment, the NSABP Foundation Laboratory performed IHC with the DakoCytomation ER/PR pharmDx, and one of the genes from the 21-gene panel of Oncotype DX was used. The time to a distant recurrence among patients was an endpoint used to measure the accuracy of ER expression among the 3 tests.
Higher ER expression with all three testing methods was associated with a greater time to a distant recurrence.
Quantitative measurement from Oncotype DX had the strongest association with time to cancer recurrence of all the three testing methods; p<0.0001 for Oncotype DX; p=0.003 for IHC; p=0.045 for LB testing.
A second study presented at the 2006 SABCS evaluated the prognostic and predictive associations between ER and PR analysis of Oncotype DX. This study included the examination of results from the NSABP-14 trial and the Kaiser Oncotype DX studies. The Kaiser study included node-negative breast cancer patients in which the association of gene expression and breast cancer death were evaluated.
In ER-positive patients in both the NSABP and Kaiser studies, the level of expression of ER is significantly predictive of benefit from tamoxifen, but is not significantly associated with the prognosis of untreated patients.
The level of PR expression is not significantly predictive of benefit from tamoxifen, but is significantly associated with the prognosis of patients.
The researchers from this study concluded that quantitative ER and PR expression as measured through Oncotype DX provide different and distinct associations with the prognosis and prediction of the benefit from tamoxifen among patients with node-negative breast cancer.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref1 "_edn1") Slamon D, Eiermann W, Robert N, et al. BCIRG 006: 2nd interim analysis phase III randomized trial comparing doxorubicin and cyclophosphamide followed by docetaxel (AC-T) with doxorubicin and cyclophosphamide followed by docetaxel and trastuzumab (AC-TH) with docetaxel, carboplatin and trastuzumab (TC) in Her2neu positive early breast cancer patients. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 52.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref2 "_edn2") Joensuu H, Kellokumpu-Lehtinen PL, Bono P, et al. Adjuvant docetaxel or vinorelbine with or without trastuzumab for breast cancer. New Engl J Med 2006; 354:809-820.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref3 "_edn3") Sledge G, ONeill A, Thor A, et al. Adjuvant trastuzumab: long-term results of E2198. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 2075.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref4 "_edn4") Gennari A, Sormani M, Puntoni M, et al. A Pooled analysis on the interaction between HER-2 expression and responsiveness of breast cancer to adjuvant chemotherapy. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 41.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref5 "_edn5") Hudis C, Citron M, Berry D, et al. Five year follow-up of INT C9741: dose dense (DD) chemotherapy (CRx) is safe and effective. Proceedings of the 28th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, San Antonio Texas. 2005; Abstract 41.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref6 "_edn6") Moebus V, Lueck H, Thomssen C, et al. Dose-dense sequential chemotherapy with epirubicin (E), paclitaxel (T) and cyclophosphamide (C) (ETC) in comparison to conventional schedule chemotherapy in high-risk breast cancer patients (> 4+ LN). Mature results of an AGO-trial). 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 43.
Burnell M, Levine M, Chapman J, et al. A randomized trial of CEF versus dose dense EC followed by paclitaxel versus AC followed by paclitaxel in women with node positive or high risk node negative breast cancer, NCIC CTG MA.21: Results of interim analysis. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 53.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref8 "_edn8") Dang C, Smith K, Fornier M, et al. Mature cardiac safety results of dose-dense (DD) doxorubicin and cyclophosphamide (AC) followed by paclitaxel (T) with trastuzumab (H) in HER2/neu overexpressed/amplified breast cancer (BCA). 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 2101.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref9 "_edn9") Cristofanilli M,Boussen H, Baselga J, et al. A phase II combination study of lapatinib and paclitaxel as a neoadjuvant therapy in patients with newly diagnosed inflammatory breast cancer (IBC). 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 1.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref10 "_edn10") Geyer C, Forster J, Lindquist D, et al. Lapatinib plus capecitabine for HER2-positive advanced breast cancer. N Engl J Med 2006 Dec 28;355(26):2733-43.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref11 "_edn11") Garber J, Richardson A, Harris L, et al. Neoadjuvant cisplatin (CDDP) in “triple-negative” breast cancer (BC). 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 3074.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref12 "_edn12") v Minckwitz G, Kuemmel S, du Bois A, et al. Individualized treatment strategies according to in vivo chemosensitivity assessed by response after 2 cycles of neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Final results of the Gepartrio study of German breast group. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. 2006; Abstract 42.
EBCTCG Secretariat, on Behalf of EBCTCG, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom. Highlights from the early breast cancer trialists’ collaborative group (EBCTCG) 205-2006 worldwide overview. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 40.
[](http://news.cancerconnect.com/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-a-report-from-the-29th-annual-san-antonio-breast-cancer-symposium/#_ednref14 "_edn14") Ravdin P, Cronin K, Howlander N, et al. A Sharp decrease in breast cancer incidence in the United States in 2003. 29th Annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006; Abstract 5.
[](http://professional.cancerconsultants.com/conference_sabcs_2006.aspx?id=38866#_ednref1_ednref1 "_edn1") Kim C, Tang G, Baehner F, et al. A Comparison of Estrogen Receptor (ER) Measurement by Three Methods in Node-Negative, Estrogen Receptor (ER)-Positive Breast Cancer: Ligand Binding (LB), Immunohistochemistry (IHC), and Quantitative RT-PCR. Proceedings from the 2006 annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. 2006. Abstract #3116.
Baehner F, Habel L, Quesenberry C, et al. Quantitative RT-PCR Analysis of ER and PR by Oncotype DX Indicates Distinct and Different Associations with Prognosis and Prediction of Tamoxifen Benefit. Proceedings from the 2006 annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. San Antonio, Texas. Oral presentation December 17, 2006. Abstract #45. | 2019-04-22T20:07:49Z | https://news.cancerconnect.com/breast-cancer/developments-in-adjuvant-and-neoadjuvant-treatment-of-breast-cancer-86M0yPoa-EaAfP6atvz0sg/ |
The problems in developing countries are often viewed as too big to find solutions. Because of this, many people are deterred from putting in seemingly futile efforts to alleviate a problem. But, they are more likely to join the fight when they learn the individual names and faces of those living under such conditions. These five memoirs about overcoming poverty highlight success stories and seek to mobilize people with a renewed sense of hope.
Masaji Ishikawa recalls escaping from North Korea in “A River in Darkness.” With Japanese heritage from his mother and Korean from his father, he found himself caught between two worlds. When his father realized he could no longer tolerate the discrimination he faced in Japan, the family moved to North Korea. They arrived with the promise of paradise and found, simply put, quite the opposite. Ishikawa was only thirteen years old.In this memoir, he describes atrocious living conditions with graphic detail, unparalleled by any other nation in the world. The regime controls every aspect of its citizens’ lives, and Ishikawa tells readers that “the penalty for thinking was death.” More than any of the five memoirs about overcoming poverty, “A River in Darkness” highlights an ongoing crisis.Since North Korea remains untouched by the rest of the world, it’s difficult to extend support to those still living under the dictatorship. But Ishikawa’s story is one of many that prove North Koreans are waking up to the reality of their oppression. Gradually, more people are choosing to gain control over their destinies.
When Jacqueline Novogratz donated a sweater to Goodwill, she never expected to encounter a young boy wearing it on the streets of Rwanda. It ended up being the namesake for her book entitled “The Blue Sweater.” She holds onto this memory as an important message of interconnectivity and the responsibility to help people in need.Her travels to various countries revealed economic injustice along with a lack of credit access for those with low incomes. This led her to help open the first bank in Rwanda available to women. Along with numerous other initiatives through The Acumen Fund, Novogratz learned that charity is fleeting compared to the sustainability of helping innovators launch businesses to benefit millions of people.
Several reporters sought to overcome poverty by being a voice for untold stories in developing countries. Maya Ajmera, joined by co-authors Sarah Strunk and Olateju Omolodun, wrote “Extraordinary Girls” about what girlhood looks like across the world. Despite cultural differences, the authors work to prove that all girls can find common ground in the desire to make their dreams come true.Their book showcases girls such as Alexandra Nechita from Romania, an exceptional painter whose work was published in a collection by the age of eleven. Through this and many other success stories, the book’s purpose is to encourage girls to be active in their communities rather than feel as if their only option is to fulfill traditional gender roles.
Katherine Boo sheds light on the ramshackle town of Annawadi in “Behind the Beautiful Forevers.”. This book illustrates how members of this community responded to India’s promise for renewed economic prosperity amid a global recession. A young man named Abdul discovered the value of reselling possessions thrown out by the wealthy. Others sought to change the course of politics by climbing the social ranks, like the Annawadi community member who became the first woman in that settlement to be a college graduate. These stories are about relying on pure grit to succeed in life when the economic system favors only the rich.
The last of these five memoirs about overcoming poverty is “Teach a Woman to Fish” by Ritu Sharma. It’s a reinterpretation of the gendered language in this saying: “Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime.” She argues that if women are taught the same thing, everyone will be fed too.Sharma helped found a business run by women in Honduras, giving them a chance to break free from the household sphere and gain financial independence. Other countries she visited include Sri Lanka, Nicaragua and Burkina Faso. In the book, readers can also find tips for shopping in ways that support female entrepreneurs and email templates if they feel inspired to speak with their members of Congress about this important cause.
All the authors in these five memoirs about overcoming poverty have discovered important lessons about global issues through real-life experiences. They write about them in the hopes that people will no longer be complacent in the face of a problem that, contrary to what some might believe, can be solved.
Poverty has held a tight grip on Sierra Leone for as long as most people can remember. Sierra Leone remains one of the least developed low-income countries in the world. With a population of around six million people, the level of poverty is vast. The poverty status is well-known, although not many people know its extent or how it became this way. To clarify, here are the top 10 facts about poverty in Sierra Leone.
Sierra Leone’s social, economic and political unrest began around the time they gained independence from the British in 1961. This led to many economic and political challenges.
In 1991, the state of Sierra Leone was devastated by extreme brutality when a civil war broke out as a result of a rebel group’s attempt to overthrow the government in power. Over 50,000 civilians were killed and an estimated two million were displaced.
Since the end of the civil war in 2002, poverty alleviation has been a priority for the region; however, the level of poverty still remains high at its impact on 50-60 percent of the population.
Most of Sierra Leone is rural communities with a few urban exceptions like the capitol, Freetown. Poverty levels in the rural areas have been gradually declining but remain relatively stagnant in the more urban communities.
Sierra Leone has made considerable progress in the economy as a result of poverty alleviation efforts. The growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) increased from 4.5 percent to 5.3 percent in 2010. It has been projected that the economy will grow 6 percent on average every year.
The impoverished conditions are also not always the people’s fault. The region is prone to natural disasters, climate change and epidemics. Climate change alone can cause an annual loss between $600 million and one billion. It also leads to heightened pollution and the devastation of critical crops.
Another one of the top ten facts about poverty in Sierra Leone is that it is heavily dependent on aid. An estimated 50 percent of public investment programs are being financed by foreign sources.
The progress of poverty alleviation was halted by the Ebola outbreak of 2014. The outbreak ravaged the area and hit the economy with a decrease of almost 3 percent in average growth rate.
USAID, since the civil war, has been aiding Sierra Leone specifically in gaining political stability and strengthening democratic governance. Maintaining stability will help ensure the proper development of the region as well as maintain peace and security.
The educational completion levels are low in the region with more than half of the people over the age of fifteen having never attended school. In general, the access to public services such as education is very low.
Sierra Leone, while being underdeveloped, is still a very young country. There is progress each year that will only continue from here. Many foreign aid agencies are invested in the progression of poverty alleviation in Sierra Leone and wish to assure peace and security.
Do More Than Survive: What Comes After Poverty?
Poverty is on the decline. Since 1990, total people affected by poverty fell more than ever before — as many as 137,000 people per day. This dramatic decrease is often due to increasing economic activity, but yet, as developing countries reap the benefits of increasing GDP, new challenges arise. The very industries that built a country up can create new issues. Management of these issues often decides a country’s future success.
For this reason, developing countries need to think about what comes after poverty.
With new industries available to its citizens, many countries turn towards education. An example of this push towards education is present in Thailand — as the country has developed, education among children increased to record levels. At the same time, Thailand has seen rapid improvement in its economy.
Countries with less rapid improvement also benefit as a result of increased education. In Nicaragua, trade schools play a fundamental part in the country’s future. Internships with resorts and agricultural training help young people develop in-demand skills. Since both tourism and agriculture are booming industries, this training makes sense and education acts as an important tool to help countries wondering what comes after poverty.
Perfecting healthcare is an issue that several countries struggle with, regardless of income. For low-income countries, though, shortcomings in healthcare systems can be disastrous. These shortcomings are especially prevalent in countries that lack surgical workers. A low density of surgical works often brings a lack of available care and a lower life expectancy as a result.
In Cambodia, a low-middle classified income country, offering healthcare services is essential. Nonprofit-provided services like healthcare training and midwife education have helped care for thousands. These services, aimed to train healthcare professionals for the long-term, are vital. With a properly-trained healthcare workforce, both infant deaths and disease incidence decline.
Infrastructure supports the increasing economic activity common of countries emerging from poverty. Everything from water access to adequate transportation helps a country increase its productivity. Countries without extensive infrastructure then, in fact, possess a barrier to overcoming poverty.
Rural populations that depend on extensive road systems are common in developing countries. Lack of infrastructure for conducting agricultural business leaves farmers without an income and for agriculturally-dependent countries, this could be dangerous.
In Indonesia, infrastructure is a key part of the country’s development. Development plans for the country outline specific actions for improvement; besides creating construction jobs, Indonesia’s infrastructure developments boost productivity. Yet, Indonesia also has faced obstacles in implementing infrastructure plans.
One obstacle — in this case, the government — can have a large influence on what comes after poverty for a country.
Being able to pass effective legislation is necessary for any country, and governmental issues affect many developing countries. In Indonesia, the issue is a problem of decentralization of control, while in other countries, government issues slow progress in a variety of ways.
Political instability in South Africa caused recent economic growth to slow, and some negative side effects of this decrease have been the rise of both unemployment and poverty rates. A government will never be perfect; but without basic protection for citizens, economic productivity is difficult. Due to this dependency, keeping government stability is vital to a country’s future.
Having a plan for what comes after poverty is vital to the success of developing countries and although it can be difficult, it is worth the effort. Whether through education, healthcare, infrastructure or government, continued improvement is possible.
With planning, countries can do more than survive in the global economy: they can thrive in it.
http://borgenproject.org/wp-content/uploads/The_Borgen_Project_Logo_small.jpg 0 0 Clint Borgen http://borgenproject.org/wp-content/uploads/The_Borgen_Project_Logo_small.jpg Clint Borgen2018-03-22 01:30:302018-03-22 13:18:29Do More Than Survive: What Comes After Poverty?
Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs in developing countries have been viewed as ambitious. However, more efforts have been invested in the continuous realization of these development goals by international communities, nonprofit organizations, civil societies and, of course, domestic governments.
According to reports, to achieve one of the SDG targets, the “sustainable management of water and sanitation for all” will cost $27 billion per year by 2030 and the infrastructure will cost up to $290 billion. Is this too ambiguous for the national governments in the developing world? Or a pitiable reason to hide from actualizing these goals nationally.
Developing countries have been a major focus of the SDGs. With the idea that ‘no one will be left behind’, the U.N. and its partners have contributed immensely in solving a long list of issues faced by the developing world. Funds have been deposited and used for different projects. Expertise in creating sustainable solutions and commitments are being made to secure a better future.
The SDG performance by countries is determined by the SDG Index and Dashboard on a scale of 0 to 100, where 0 represents the lowest level of performance and 100 is the highest level of performance. Countries like Sweden (84.5), Denmark (83.9), Norway (82.3) and Finland (81) rank high in achieving their SDGs.
Countries such as the Central African Republic (26.1), Liberia (30.5) and Niger (31.4) are not doing as well as the aforementioned countries. Evidently, these countries are some of the poorest in the world. A poor economy can be one of the causes for weak results.
One of the reasons slowing down the SDGs in developing countries is that development projects are usually abandoned by their governments. This normally happens in rival socio-political settings.
In Africa, most projects funded and managed by previous administrations are eventually stopped or replaced by the ruling administrations due to different political views, political parties or general lack of interest.
Some farmers in Nigeria have criticized the replacement of the Growth Enhancement Support (GES) scheme by the former president Goodluck Jonathan’s administration with the current president Muhammadu Buhari’s Agricultural Implements and Mechanisation Services (AIMS).
“There is always a policy somersault. This government will bring this one and when another person comes, they will bring another one whether it is good or not.”, said Daniel Okafor, Vice President of Root and Tubers of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN).
The farmers are upset with their government as it continues to create new programs without improving the old ones. More often, the development policies and programs are often aligned with the vision of developmental goals but may lack seriousness due to the ulterior motives.
In developing countries, parties struggle to own power and when they eventually do gain power, eliminating the projects of the previous administration becomes the primary goal.
The lack of bipartisanship in the polity environment brews enough hatred; shutting down any programs related to the opposition party no matter how promising they are.
Kofi Annan, former Secretary General of the U.N. noted that bipartisanship can promote peace, unity and growth. Political parties should stand for a common goal regardless of their political views and hustle for power. Ideas can be shared and implemented with the help of the other parties.
Bipartisanship will ease congressional processes in changing, debating and making laws which can benefit the realization of SDGs.
Corruption can also cause a lot of setback. Africa loses $50 billion every year due to corruption. The Sustainable Development Goal 16, Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, covers commitments to fight corruption and encourage transparency.
Corruption impedes national development, hinders economic growth, slows or shutdown developmental programs on education, labor, healthcare, water and sanitation and leads to more poverty.
Recently, the U.K. suspended funding to Zambia after a report that $4.3 million intended for the poor population had gone missing. 17 million people in Zambia, or half of its population, live below $1.90 a day. It is important to find out how much of the monetary aid is really getting lost to corruption and the best method to curb it.
Criminalization of corruption can serve as a major tool in curbing corruption. Ruling parties must not protect corrupt public servants, especially in Africa where previous corrupt officers collude with the ruling parties in order to be shielded from scrutiny and court cases.
Governments must encourage transparency and promote access to national financial data and budget spending.
Another factor that may impede the success of SDGs in developing countries is tribal or subnational conflicts which are still rampant in Africa and Asia.
While Asia experiences economic growth in the midst of subnational conflicts, Africa’s economy has always been affected by violent conflicts due to terrorist groups, tribal wars and minorities unrest.
Poverty will decrease when inequalities between different groups reduce as also when there are inclusive growth and participation of minorities in resource control. Combating unemployment will also lessen the high rate of conflicts in developing countries.
Domestic policies in the areas of trade, human development, agriculture, economy and climate change can reduce poverty and hunger, improve health systems, create resilient methods toward climate shocks and breed peace in societies.
It is for the central, state and local governments to take up these responsibilities to achieve the SDGs in developing countries. Civil Societies and private sectors should also see this as an opportunity to make the world a better place.
It is possible for developing countries to achieve at least 80 percent of their SDGs: it all depends on good governance and passion for humanity.
Healthcare programs often dismiss the importance of pediatric surgery in the developing world. Access to surgeons is treated as a superfluous medical resource rather than a necessity and therefore becomes extremely limited. The only pediatric surgeons in Kenya are located in Nairobi, making them difficult for most Kenyans to visit. In actuality, the demand for surgery among children in developing nations is strikingly high and the shortage of surgical care has extremely detrimental consequences.
In sub-Saharan health clinics, up to 11 percent of all child patients are in need of surgery. Of these children requiring surgery, nearly 90 percent are admitted with issues easily corrected by surgery such as congenital anomalies and injuries. Unfortunately, many children cannot obtain the surgical care they need. Even in urban communities with more convenient access to healthcare, approximately 217 out of 100,000 people die due to injuries, which could be corrected via surgery. By the age of 15, there is an 85 percent chance that children in Sub-Saharan Africa will experience a condition requiring surgery; without surgical attention, children can develop lifelong disabilities.
In impoverished countries that experience war and conflict, the chance of childhood injury is even higher. Children are often injured by stray bullets and explosives, and are even sometimes coerced into fighting. The Central African Republic experienced many child casualties during its most recent conflict (2012-2014), which put significant strain on its subpar healthcare system.
Even prior to the conflict, the Central African Republic had the sixth highest mortality rate of children under the age of five. Bangui Pediatric Hospital was overwhelmed by the influx of child patients during the war, but the U.N. supplied surgical kits and other medical supplies to temporarily rectify the void of surgical care.
Many other aid organizations are working to make pediatric surgical care more accessible in the developing world. The Global Pediatric Surgery Network has volunteer surgeons at work in various parts of the world, including Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia, India, Pakistan, Cambodia and Vietnam. The Pacific Association of Pediatric Surgeons teaches surgical skills to general practitioners in impoverished countries in order to create more permanent solutions to the inadequacy of pediatric surgery in the developing world.
The most common issues faced by volunteer pediatric surgeons in developing countries are financial constraints, inadequate healthcare facilities, insufficient infrastructure and geographically isolated populations. Fixing these problems is tantamount to improving surgical care for children in the developing world. Correcting surgical conditions in childhood increases a person’s quality of life, which strongly illustrates how surgery is such a necessary component of a complete healthcare system.
The Internet and other advances in communication technology have helped make the spreading of globalization even quicker. For developing countries, access to technology can have many benefits — one such improvement being the boost of a nation’s economy. Other ways that technology is helping economies in developing countries is by reducing the costs of production, encouraging growth of new business and advancing communication.
An issue that developing countries must bypass is prioritizing technology innovation, not just adapting to technology. Another issue is that the distribution of technology needs to be equal across a country; so far the poor have not been able to have the same amount of access to technology. It is important for organizations to monitor technology and to encourage innovations and job creation in order to solve these issues.
One organization that works to do just that is Broadband for Good, a group that gives internet access to rural areas and encourages programs to utilize the technology in creating progress in communities.
When technology is used correctly it can be extremely helpful in furthering the prosperity of economies. One such example of technology creating a positive impact to the economy is in regard to India — the Self-Employed Women’s Association uses SMS to send agricultural workers messages about commodity prices. This information helps farmers determine best places to sell their produce. Farmers who participated in this program have said that they have been able to sell their products over wider areas, which has increased their incomes.
Another example, also in India, is the Hand in Hand Partnership (HIHP). The HIHP is an organization that provides women with mobile devices so that they can launch their own tech-driven businesses. The HIHP helps train and provide technical support for these women. By encouraging women to innovate ideas instead of just giving them technology, HIHP is helping to better the economy in a sustainable and long-term way.
Other countries successful in creating businesses are Nigeria, Egypt and Indonesia. Thirty eight percent of these countries’ gross domestic product (GDP) was generated by micro-entrepreneurs. In a 2011 World Bank report, figures showed that small businesses like these create new jobs and generate new ideas — both of which are great for helping economies.
Since the seventeen-point agreement was signed for the incorporation of Tibet into the People’s Republic of China in 1951, achievements have taken place in Tibet over the past 65 years. The illiteracy rate in Tibet was reduced from a staggering 95 percent in the 1950s to 42 percent in 2000. This is according to the latest statistical data from the Department of Education in the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Education of ethnic Tibetans are subsidized by the central government in People’s Republic of China. In the Tibet Autonomous Region, compulsory education in primary and secondary schools are executed in which the average educational period for individuals is 8.6 years, while preferential policies encourages young Tibetans to seek higher and more advanced education in and out of the autonomous region.
The distinguished achievements of education in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China comprises of several aspects. Kindergarten and preliminary schools are fast developing where the attendance of kids aged three to six had reached 52 percent until the end of 2013. Besides the great results from compulsory education in Tibet, education in high schools has been expanding and the scales of schools are continuously enlarging. The fast-development of high school education in Tibet are highly reliable on scientific planning, rational mapping, and have an active construction of education funds and reasonable allocations of teaching resources.
The autonomous regional government in Tibet also takes high concerns on sharing equal opportunities to children with disabilities, where schools with special support are given priority to these kids. In addition, the policy of covering all expenses on study and accommodations for children of herdsmen in Tibet are gradually improving while related treatments are continuously being enhanced since 1985.
First, the natural conditions in Tibet are harsh and this results into higher educational costs. Tibet is located in the roof of the world, with wide areas and sparse populations. It lacks oxygen in the plateau where climate varies drastically with vast temperature differences between day and night. The construction and operational costs of schools are relatively high, as the budgets for schools in rural and pastoral areas are three to five times higher than the schools in the Mainland.
Second, the economic foundation and industrial development in Tibet are quite poor. Due to the smaller levels of revenue and resources, there is generally a gap in financial and social progress in Tibet. It is quite difficult for the majority of herdsmen in Tibet to increase their incomes. Hence, with respect to such kind of fiscal status, it would be difficult for Tibet itself to allocate sufficient funds to develop education.
In some areas of Tibet, the education concepts have placed constraints on the consolidation of development on compulsory education. There is also insufficient capacity of senior high school education which is becoming more and more prominent, and this will come back to have an impact on the future popularization, consolidation, and improvement of compulsory education in Tibet.
The third issue is related on the structural defects of training students in advanced education. It is rather hard to accumulate a large number of highly educated personnel in Tibet as for most areas, attracting and retaining talented professionals of all kinds are everlasting problems. This leads to an overall scarcity of high-end talents. Furthermore, the existing problems such as equality and quality of education, welfare towards poor families, and efficiency of education in Tibet also requires intensive attention.
In early 2017, more than ten policy files were signed in Tibet on accelerating the reform and development of education in the Tibet autonomous region. These official documents clarified the tasks, policies and measures for the specific tasks on Tibet’s education progress in the 13th Five-Year Plan. Complementary education in addition to college enrolment will be prioritized for recorded poor families in Tibet. It is expected that penetration of bilingual education, as well as math and science curriculums with experimental classes will achieve 100 percent coverage in the compulsory teaching system. Technical schools in Tibet will also have to reach that goal. The five-year development plan aims to promote the healthy and rapid growth of education in Tibet.
Coming through the bottleneck and weaknesses of development, education in Tibet is improving in the current decade. Students of the next generation in Tibet are embracing a brand-new future.
Investing in women and girls is a promising way to develop a global economy. One way to do that is via women’s entrepreneurship in developing nations. A thriving and successful economy and an enlarged consumer base are just some of the benefits of increased female membership in business and leadership positions. Developing nations stand to face the most benefits from the inclusion of women in the business world.
“Women’s economic participation and their ownership and control of productive assets speeds up development, helps overcome poverty, reduces inequalities and improves children’s nutrition, health, and school attendance”, reports the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Women are more likely to devote more of their earnings back into their families and communities than their male counterparts, feeding money back into their local communities.
An example of this is with seaweed farming. Women dominate the seaweed farming industry in several developing nations. A study focusing on Africa, India, and South-East Asia found that women made up roughly 90 percent of seaweed farmers in Tanzania, representing leadership opportunities and a significant trade for women. Economic contributions from seaweed farming were observed improving the quality of life for families involved in the farming business, according to the report.
The “seaweed women” made important advances in the sustainability of the farming practice but the women also demonstrate dedication and patience as described by their male coworkers during the farming process. Community members also benefit from the local seaweed industry, the report claims.
A similar study finds that female farmer-entrepreneurs in Ghana have contributed to local poverty reduction. While the study did not directly report on the residual benefits, “It is reasonable to infer that improvements in entrepreneurial ventures lead to the creation of more jobs, which improves the local economy,” the report concedes.
Thailand, The Philippines, Botswana, Costa Rica, South Africa, Peru, Malaysia, Colombia, Romania and China are among some of the lower-middle and low-income economies scoring high on Mastercard’s Index of Women Entrepreneurs. Furthermore, despite unfavorable entrepreneurial conditions, women in Bangladesh, Uganda, Mexico and Vietnam are resolute and establishing successful businesses.
Though there are many success stories, increasing women’s access to financial services and easier accruement of credit would facilitate benefits intrinsic to women’s entrepreneurship in developing nations. Experts claim that women are an untapped resource essential to global economic growth and development.
The OECD argues that the inclusion of women’s voices in politics are essential to mitigate gender disparities and commence national benefits for nations collectively. Featuring more women’s entrepreneurship in developing nations also contributes to emerging markets and increases global trading partners. Advocating for women in more business positions is in the best interest of everyone. In the words of the all-wise Spice Girls, girl power.
Cuba has always been a land of intrigue. The communist island nation in the Caribbean is at the same time considered to be a tropical paradise and an inaccessible third-world nation with high poverty. Infrastructure in Cuba is infamous for its state of decay and disrepair.
In 1810, Cuba’s capital, Havana, had the same number of residents as New York City and nearly three times the population of Boston. It is home to countless historical colonial buildings as well as Soviet-style architecture built after Fidel Castro took power. In general, many of the buildings, historic or contemporary, are not well-maintained.
One of the constant threats to infrastructure in Cuba is natural disasters, especially hurricanes. Hurricane Irma, a Category 5 storm, devastated Cuba in September. The damage caused by the storm was compounded by the structural unsoundness of many of the buildings in Cuba. Of the 10 fatalities from the storm, seven were in Havana and were caused by unsafe buildings collapsing. Some people have continued living in parts of these buildings even after the storm.
Irma left longer-lasting damage as well. Millions of people were left without power and thousands of hectares of sugarcane, a major Cuban crop, were destroyed.
Tourism has always been a huge part of the Cuban economy, but increased tourism has put a strain on infrastructure in Cuba. The Obama administration eased travel restrictions on U.S. citizens visiting Cuba so that one can now visit the country individually, as opposed to doing so with a tour group. However, both the United States and Cuban governments, as well as the tourism industry, have expressed concerns about the ability of the infrastructure in Cuba to accommodate a large influx of tourists.
There is no doubt that the infrastructure in Cuba needs a major overhaul, but there are some positive points. The easing of restrictions on Cuba during the previous administration indicates a future of increased foreign tourism and business, and the Cuban government has acknowledged this reality.
Ultimately, lifting the U.S. embargo on Cuba would be a positive step, as it prevents the country from joining the IMF and scares away major U.S. banks from doing business in Cuba. It will require major foreign investments for Cuba’s economy to right itself, which in turn will lead to better infrastructure.
The future of the country and infrastructure in Cuba are still in question, but there is no doubt that there is a desire for a bigger foreign presence in Cuba, and with it, major changes. Cuba, once a leader in infrastructure, has good reason to build itself up. | 2019-04-25T02:53:34Z | https://borgenproject.org/tag/developing-countries/ |
At Music on the Strand, our DJs spend hours refining their craft, assuring their mixing skills will enhance the fun for your friends and family celebrating on the dance floor on your wedding day.
The North Myrtle Beach, SC community is one of strength and character. It was originally inhabited by the Winyah and Waccamaw Indians. These Indians called the area “Chicora,” meaning “the land.” The Spanish were next to explore the North Myrtle Beach area as early as 1514, with Blackbeard’s pirates inhabiting the bays and inlets in the 1700s. The Cherry Grove Beach area used to house flourishing indigo plantations; however, due to insufficient means to reach the North Myrtle Beach area, most of the beach remained uninhabited until 1900 when the first railroad was created by the Burroughs & Chapin families. The county North Myrtle Beach is located in, Horry County, was named after a wealthy plantation owner and Revolutionary War General, Peter Horry.
The Disc Jockeys and staff of Music on the Strand would like to acknowledge and thank "DJ Photographer Extraordinaire," Rob Clark for his entertaining and informative example.
This gifted, dedicated, and hard-working individual knows how to satisfy, please, and most importantly, entertain the crowd. He is an inspiration to all Event Staging, Party Motivating, DJ/MCs, as well as an excellent photographer, as evidenced by some of his "catch-action" photos that appear on our website.
I. THE PREMISE – We get paid, not just to play music, but to create an atmosphere – an atmosphere that is conducive to people getting up on the dance floor and getting involved. The typical crowd at a wedding reception is not likely to be the type of folks who are out at the dance clubs every weekend. People generally feel awkward when dancing. We should, therefore, try to do everything possible to create a comfortable and energetic atmosphere on the dance floor. Smooth, seamless segues from one song to the next – without any awkward pauses, dead air, or difficult transitions – are most helpful.
Whether it is recent dance music, dance classics, oldies, Motown, rock, swing, or country, EVERY dance set can benefit from beat mixing. It is NOT just for club music with a heavy bass beat.
appropriate sound system for the size of the room, number of guests, etc.
The list of important and useful tools could go on at length. One skill, that I DO think is very important, is being able to create smooth segues and seamless transitions between songs. Far too many DJs misuse their microphone by talking over bad mixes. Far too many DJs have no clue about beats per minute of their music and end up sending their dance floor crowd through all sorts of unnecessary hoops trying to keep up with the beat of the new song.
The fact is, people dance to the beat. They move their bodies to the beat. It stands to reason then that if the beat is going to change from one song to the next, the people on the dance floor will likewise need to stop, listen for the beat of the new song, adjust their body movements to the beat of the new song, then start dancing again. That adjustment is enough to send some people, who might already be uncomfortable dancing, back to their seats to "sit this one out." I don't want to provide any such excuse for the crowds on my dance floors.
That means that EVERY song, regardless of the musical style, has a BPM that should be taken into consideration when picking out the song to follow. It does not ALWAYS need to be the exact same beat. It might be some that that is a jump UP in BPM (to create a jolt of energy). It might be something slightly higher in BPM that IS beat mixed on the 32 count to help the people on the floor continue dancing without interruption. There are all sorts of skills that DJs need to be good DJs. I personally feel that beat mixing is a critical skill that is not the most essential but certainly belongs on the list.
Let's look at some of the definitions of terms, getting into the basic elements of mixing, then outline some sources for further information.
Before we can even get to the interesting stuff, we all have to be speaking the same language. Here are a few terms we should know as we discuss beat mixing.
Bar - Individual time divisions in a musical score, represented by vertical lines on the staff, are bars. Each bar normally contains the same number of beats and are also known as a "measure."
Beat mixing (also referred to as: beat matching, beat synching, hot mixing, mixing) - The art/skill of bringing the beats of two different songs into phase with one another and fading across. For example, if the song the crowd is hearing (song A) is 118 beats per minute (BPM), and the next song you want to play (song B) is 122 BPM, you either slow song B down to 118 BPM using pitch control, or slightly speed up song A and cue it up to the beat. When you are ready to bring the song B into play, "throw" the CD (i.e., hit the play button on the "1 count") so the beats stay aligned and listen to it on your headphones. Listen to the two songs play (song A through the speakers and song B in your headphones) for at least 32 counts to ensure that they are in sync. If they are not, use the + and – "Pitch Bend" buttons to gently speed up or slow down song B in your headphones. Once you are sure things are in order, use your cross-fader or individual channel controls to let the new song blend into the old one, and eventually go completely across so only the new song is playing. This will give the illusion that the song never ended. Once you get the hang of getting beats into sync, you will quickly find many more interesting ways to fade in and out of songs. This whole process is greatly simplified using a DJ application and computer Computerized Performance System.
Beats Per Minute (BPM) - The number of beats during one minute of a song. An identifier of a song's tempo. To calculate this, take a stopwatch and count the number of beats in 60 seconds (or count for 30 seconds and double the number). Some mixers have this feature built into them as well, providing a digital read-out of the BPM of the songs on each channel. Of course, Computerized Performance Systems, depending on the DJ application being used, provide a variety of simplified ways to measure the BPM.
Cold/ Fade – This refers to the type of ending of the song. A cold ending will be abrupt and sometimes dramatic. A fade ending does just that—it fades away. When it does fade, the energy decreases as well. So it is usually best not to play songs all the way through if they do fade. At the same time, songs with a cold ending require a quick and smooth transition so that there is no dead air during segues.
Cross fader (alias: x-fader, fader) - A slider control which moves from one input channel to another in a very smooth fashion. The volume on each channel is inversely proportional to each other, so if the x-fader is completely on the left side, you will only hear the input for that channel. Once you start moving it to the right, you will gradually hear the right channel becoming louder. When the x-fader is in the middle, each channel will be of equal volume. As the x-fader continues to the right, the right channel will approach full volume, and the left channel will diminish.
Cueing – Playing the music only through your headphones (without the sound coming through your speakers so that the crowd could hear) to find the spot you want to start the next song. Once you have determined the best place within the song to start (most times on the 1 count), you can hit the Play button (or throw the vinyl record) on the 1 count as you are listening through the headphones, and adjusting the speed as necessary in order to line up the beats to the song that is playing through the speakers. In the digital world, the cue points can be set per song as per the wishes of the individual.
Measure - A measure is a musical notation device that distinguishes a specific unit of time comprised of a fixed number of note values (whole, half, quarter, et cetera) of a particular kind, fixed by the meter and bracketed by two vertical lines across a staff of music. The two vertical bar lines are separated by the distance required by the number of notes contained in the measure. This portion of musical notation does not determine the rhythm, tempo or note values; the measure does contain the notes and various note-types. Tempo, rhythms and note values are determined by time signatures and tempo markings. Each measure of a time signature of 3/4, for example, will contain three beats, one for each quarter note. If a dotted half-note is contained between the two vertical bars, it will receive three beats and the measure will be over. The measure can also contain six eighth notes and a number of different combinations of note-type fractions depending upon the musical context. How fast the respective beats are is determined by the tempo.
Pitch bend - The temporary changing of pitch to get beats in phase. These are the little + and – buttons next to the PITCH button on your CD players. This gives you the ability to "nudge" the speed up or down temporarily to get the song on beat. It has the same effect as placing your finger on the vinyl to gently slow it down or speed it up. Once you release the pitch bend button, the song will go back to the current pitch control settings.
Pitch control - The ability of a device to change the tempo (speed) of a song. Essential feature on your CD players if you are going to beat mix. Most pitch controls allow the song to speed up or slow down plus or minus 8 %. (Some players allow plus or minus 16 %). Computerized Performance systems provide much greater parameters.
Key Lock or Pitch Lock- The ability of a device to change the tempo of a song, without changing the key (e.g., on Denon 2500 and Pioneer CD decks). This lets you drastically speed up songs with vocals without a "chipmunk" effect. Most DJ computer applications provide this important feature.
Segue - (pronounced SEG-way) Italian for "follows," a segue is used to indicate a smooth, flowing transition from one section of a composition to another without any pause or interruption.
Tempo - The speed of the beat. Usually measured in Beats Per Minute (BPM).
Throwing (Slamming) - Starting the song in at full volume on the 1 count (the first beat of an 8 count). The term originates from vinyl DJs who have the turntable spinning at full speed while lifting the record off the platter with their finger holding it with the needle in the groove just before the 1 count. When the DJ wants to start the record, he "throws" the record, giving a record a little push when it starts up so there is not any lag time while it gets up to speed. This effect is simpler with CD players that have "instant start" (normal CD players may take a few tenths of a second before a song starts). Computerized Performance Systems can execute a clean slam with a touch of a key.
II GETTING STARTED - First we need to know the beats per minute of our music. As defined above, the BPM is simply the number of beats in a song in 60 seconds. You can use a stop watch, or, if you would like to take advantage of your computer, you can use a BPM counter built into the DJ Software.
These 4 groups of 8-counts form one 32-count phrase (4x8=32 for the mathematically challenged). It's best to mix at the 32 count. In other words, the best place for the new song to come in at full volume will be at the first beat of a new 8-count at the completion of this 32-count phrase. Got it? Note: in many songs, as in "We Are Family," the first note of the song is not always the first beat of an 8 count. In this song above, the single and album versions have a drum riff that is actually number 8 beat. So if you want to begin matching the beats on the 1 count of the first 8 count of a 32-count phrase, you may want to skip over the drum riff.
Many songs have 32-count intros (32-counts of instrumental track) which make them much easier to mix. With these songs, you can listen in cue to song B through the headphones while song A is playing through the speakers. Once you have matched up song B on the 1 count of the 32-count phrase so that it is in sync with song A playing through the speakers, you can bring the volume up and you have 32 beats to make sure that is right on track. At the end of that 32 count phrase of song A, song B is already at full volume and is ready to take over.
What if the song does not have a 32-count intro? I’ve heard this reasoning used by some DJs over the years to say that they don’t mix because not all music has 32 count intros. I’ve heard others say that you can only beat mix with "House" music or "Club" music. My answer to that is that it does not matter what type of music it is or whether or not it has a 32 count intro. Songs do NOT have to overlap for a full 32 counts to produce an effective beat mix segue. For example, when segueing 2 "oldies" songs, if song A ends cold on the 8 count and you hit song B perfectly on the 1 count so that the beat is continuous, then you have created a smooth beat mix. The same holds true for virtually any type of music, be it rock, alternative, country, etc. beat mixing is not just for "disco" or "club" music.
Putting Sets Together - Once we know the BPM of our music, it is easier to think about what songs might go well with each other. Generally it works well to group songs together that are of a similar style. For example, if we are putting together an oldies set, it generally works well to put several songs from that same era together. That way, people who enjoy that type of music will enjoy several songs together. Mixing an oldies-song into a hip-hop song into an alternative rock song – even if done perfectly on beat , might not create the desired effect of continuity on the dance floor. The oldies fans might exit once they hear a hip-hop song. And the hip-hop fans might depart as soon as they hear crunching guitars from an alternative rock song. Granted, in some cases, these types of transitions might be exactly what the crowd goes for. But, generally it’s good to put sets together that are of a similar style.
I was around five when I attended the first wedding I can remember. The anticipation was the best part. Since my only experience of weddings to that point was in fairy tales, I expected a beautiful princess bride and lots of magic. I was disappointed by the reality of the boring ceremony and reception. I guess that's why some weddings are adults-only affairs. But some couples can't imagine excluding these important family members and their weddings are overflowing with kids. Here are some ideas to make your wedding kid-friendly!
1. Invite kids. Put their names on the invitation and they'll feel included from the beginning.
2. Incorporate kids in the Big Day. Whether in a ceremony or the reception, give kids a special task. It keeps them busy and involved AND kids like watching other kids. So if a kid comes walking down the aisle or plays an instrument at the reception, the other kids will perk up and pay attention. they'll feel included in as much as you chose to have a kid do an important job at your wedding.
3. Make older kids helpers. they'll feel special and involved. If a kid is older or mature enough to handle some responsibility, give him or her a special job. Perhaps that little cousin that likes to just hang around the big girls could hold your purse or bouquet. Or the neighbor boy could be in charge of watching the gift table. Or your niece can give out the birdseed. The tasks will vary with each kid’s personality and maturity level.
4. Get a Kid-Lover to help. For me, this was my Mother-in-Law. She had a few ideas for kid activities. I thought they were great ideas so I told her to go with them, but that she would have to take care of everything. As the bride, you DO NOT want to worry about these little details.
Some of her activities that worked really well were a pinata and a shadow story time. She took the responsibility of gathering the kids and running the show.
5. Make a kid Activity Center and/or stage Kid Events (all run by your Kid-Lover).
• pinata (stuffed with small games, candy, coins). You could provide gift bags for the kids to put their goodies in.
• low key games (that won't mess up everyones nice outfit's): bingo, card games, board games, etc.
6. Encourage kids to request songs at the reception. there's nothing cuter than a little boy or girl gettin down! Of course, you'll likely have to bear with the latest N’Sync tune, but everyone will enjoy it this one time.
7. Include a Daddy/Daugher and Mommy/Son dance for the guests.
8. Take a photo of all the kids together. It’ll be fun for them and a great keepsake for you.
You'll obviously adjust these ideas as your specific circumstances and budget dictate. If you really wanted to, you could rent a clown and inflatable moon jumps! But for most North Myrtle Beach weddings, a few of the cheaper options would work really well. These options will keep the kids happy and occupied and even help the parents enjoy the wedding, knowing their kids are enjoying themselves too.
Ahhh, love is in the air. The grass is getting greener, the flowers are blooming, and the birds are flying back North. Its that magical time of year again; when the cold winter is behind us, and warm winds are blowing. Thats right, its SPRINGTIME! What better time of year to get married in than spring!
A spring wedding can be so romantic and festive. After a snowy and cold winter, a celebration is sometimes very much needed. And decorating ideas are aplenty for such an occasion.
If your wedding is near Easter, you could use chocolate bunnies or eggs in mini baskets with ribbon for favors.
Many types of flowers are more abundant during the spring. Use brightly colored tulips or lilies in your bouquets or centerpieces.
Give your guests flower seeds for favors. Many online wedding vendors carry handmade paper cards with seeds imbedded in them. Guests can plant the seeds at the appropriate time of year and always remember your special day.
Use flower shaped candles as favors. Many craft stores offer floating candles in a variety of shapes such as: roses, sunflowers, daisies, or carnations.
Sprinkle multi-colored rose petals on your wedding cake or on the tables for a festive spring look. You can buy silk or real petals in bulk.
Spring tends to be the time of year when colors make a splash and the winter blues fade. Choose a pastel pink, yellow or blue for your colors. Have your bridesmaids wear soft pink, yellow, lilac or blue gowns. These pastel colors look fabulous on almost every type of girl. Use pastel colored flowers in their bouquets.
Or fill the tables with color. Fill in between the dishes and glasses with different colored flowers and greens, or pastel Jordan almonds. You could also add a large dish of colorful, fresh fruit to each table. Your guests would love a bite of fresh strawberries, peaches, kiwi, or watermelon.
Release butterflies after the ceremony instead of rice or bubbles.
Have cocktail hour outside before it starts to get chilly. Theres nothing nicer than sharing a beautiful spring afternoon or evening with family and friends.
Also, spring and fall weddings traditionally tend to be more popular than summer weddings in North Myrtle Beach. It may be easier to plan a spring wedding since many vendors are booked for later in the year. I was married in the spring and found most of the vendors in my area to be free from the New Year to mid May. I had my choice of the best reception site, photographer, and ceremony time. But be cautious about planning your wedding on the prom nights in your area. Your dear fiance and groomsmen might end up with powder blue tuxedos with ruffles instead of elegant Brooks Brothers black.
May your North Myrtle Beach wedding plans go smoothly. Music on the Strand's DJ ENTERTAINMENT looks forward to being a part of your special day! | 2019-04-24T20:07:07Z | https://musiconthestrand.com/presentation9.html |
*This article was originally published on QuoteWizard and was written by Bryan Ochalla.
Although most women in the U.S. deliver babies in a hospital, that’s far from their only option these days. They don’t have to rely on doctors or obstetricians either. Doulas and midwives are increasingly common, as are birthing centers as well as home and water births. Here’s how health plans tend to treat them.
In the early 1900s, nearly all American women gave birth outside a hospital. By the 1940s, less than 50 percent of them delivered their babies at home. And by the late 1960s, just 1 percent did so.
That’s pretty much where things stand today. Almost all babies in the U.S. are now delivered in a hospital–in stark contrast to what was commonplace a century or so ago.
No one is likely to argue the tide is racing back toward out-of-hospital births, but it does seem to be leaning in that direction–if only slightly.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (aka the CDC), the percentage of out-of-hospital deliveries increased from 1.26 percent of all U.S. births in 2011 to 1.36 percent in 2012.
Having babies at home or in dedicated centers isn’t the only alternative birth option American women are embracing these days. They’re also increasingly utilizing doulas, midwives, and night nurses to help them through their pregnancies and deliveries.
The most recently gathered statistics associated with doulas, for instance, suggest about 6 percent of U.S. women use them during childbirth. A little over 8 percent call on midwives while pregnant, according to another study.
That’s all well and good, you say, but how much does a doula or a midwife or a birthing center cost? And how do those price tags compare to the ones attached to their more traditional counterparts, like doctors and obstetricians and hospitals? Also, does health insurance usually cover these alternative birth options?
Keep reading for answers to all of these questions and a few more.
By the way, if you’re currently uninsured, check out our article about how to choose the best health insurance plan for your pregnancy.
Americanpregnancy.org says “doula” is a Greek word that means women’s servant.
Most modern doulas would balk at being called servants. “Helpers” might prompt a nod of agreement, though. Even better options: birth assistants, labor companions, labor support professionals, or labor support specialists.
Antepartum doulas assist pregnant women who are put on bed rest to prevent preterm labor.
Birth or labor doulas provide care during delivery.
Postpartum doulas support new moms in the first few weeks after they give birth.
Note: doulas aren’t medical professionals. They don’t actually deliver babies or offer any other kind of medical care. Many doulas are certified, however. To earn their certificate they must complete a training program and pass an exam.
Studies also have found that women who work with a doula while pregnant are more likely to describe their deliveries in a positive way.
All of that positive support comes at a cost, of course. How much you pay depends on where you live. If you call a more rural area home, for instance, you may only pay a few hundred dollars. On the other hand, it isn’t unusual for pregnant women in urban settings to pay thousands of dollars for a doula.
Also impacting the potential price tag here: how long you employ a doula. In other words, if you only need one for a portion of your pregnancy, you’ll pay less than if you need one for the whole nine (or more) months.
As you might expect, health insurance coverage of doula services is all over the map. Some plans help pay the associated costs, while others do not.
The best way to find out how your plan treats doulas: pick up the phone and call your insurer. Or send them an email.
Do the same if you’re on Medicaid. A couple of states currently require their Medicaid programs to cover certified doula services and others may cover them even without legislative involvement.
If your plan or coverage won’t help in any way, head to Google (or your search engine of choice). You may find doulas willing to volunteer their time and expertise to women who can’t afford to pay them. Or you may find some who charge less in such situations.
Unlike doulas, midwives are trained medical professionals. Like doulas, however, they can care for women before, during, and after their pregnancies.
You may think of midwives chiefly as pregnancy and birthing assistants–much like doulas. Although they sometimes take on that role, they’re just as likely to lead a woman through labor and delivery.
Something that differentiates midwives from physicians or obstetricians is they tend to be proponents of natural childbirth. At the very least, they usually try to minimize unnecessary interventions during a pregnancy.
Something to pay close attention to if you decide to hire a midwife: their level of certification. In particular, you’ll probably want to look for a certified nurse-midwife (or CNM). These midwives are registered nurses. And to earn this certification, they have to graduate from an accredited education program and pass a national exam. Certified nurse-midwives can practice in all 50 states and in the District of Columbia.
That’s not to suggest you should ignore certified midwives (CMs) or certified professional midwives (CPMs). Not all states permit CMs or CPMs to practice, though, and that may give some women pause.
Regardless of whether you hire a CNM, CPM, or CM, your midwife should be able to help you in a variety of locations–your home, a private office, a birthing center, or even the hospital.
What does “help” mean here? Typically, a midwife can do most of the things a physician or obstetrician can do while caring for a pregnant woman.
In addition to leading or assisting with your delivery, of course.
Although you’ll typically pay more for a midwife than you will for a doula, you may not pay too much more. According to pregnancycorner.com, the average cost of a midwife in the U.S. is around $2,000. That means you’ll sometimes pay a good deal more than that amount, but it also means you’ll sometimes pay less.
Where you end up on that spectrum mostly depends on where you live and what services you need.
In any case, you can expect to pay less for a midwife than you’d pay for traditional obstetrical care in a hospital, the cost of which can go far beyond $5,000 or even $10,000.
Granted, those savings won’t mean much if your health plan doesn’t cover at least some of your resulting bill. And that’s a distinct possibility given how insurance companies currently treat midwives.
Some insurers don’t cover midwife services at all. Some cover them if the midwife helps you deliver your baby in a hospital setting or birthing center, but not if you deliver at home.
Because of this, talk with your insurance company before you start looking for a midwife so you know what your plan will cover and what it won’t in this regard.
You should have better luck if you’re on Medicaid. But even then you’ll want to check with your local agency before you shake any hands or sign on any dotted lines.
Don’t be fooled by the name “night nurse.” Although many of these women (and men) are registered nurses, many are not.
Some night nurses or night nannies are certified in various ways, while others simply have a lot of experience taking care of newborns.
Regardless, they all help new moms in basically the same ways. Primarily that means spending nights in their homes and feeding and otherwise taking care of their babies while they sleep.
A lot of mothers hire night nurses for the first week or two after they give birth. Others wait a while, such as until they’re ready to return to their jobs.
As helpful as night nurses or night nannies can be in these situations, their assistance isn’t cheap. Most charge between $25 and $40 per hour, according to various sources. (Once again, what you wind up paying probably will depend on where you live and how much experience a particular nurse or nanny has.) That means you could spend upwards of $200 a night, and more than $1,000 each week, for this specialized sort of care.
That said, if you or your baby come home with any special health needs, it’s possible your plan will pick up some of the cost. You’ll obviously have to talk with your insurer to find out one way or the other, however.
According to CNN, the number of babies born in U.S. birthing centers increased 55 percent from 2007 to 2015.
Medicaid is responsible for some, if not most, of that growth, thanks to the Affordable Care Act (also called the ACA or Obamacare) requiring state Medicaid programs to pay these centers a facility fee. Still, their appealing nature probably played a role as well.
Basically, delivering your baby at a birthing center is more like doing so at home than in a hospital. Birthing centers tend to be cozy and low-tech. Midwives, rather than obstetricians or physicians, typically serve as their primary care providers. And natural childbirth is emphasized over the kinds of medications and medical interventions common in more clinical settings.
One of the main benefits of using a birthing center is the mother’s recovery time often is far shorter than it would be if she delivered her baby in a hospital. In fact, many women spend just a few hours in a birthing center after giving birth, while a couple of days isn’t unheard of in a hospital.
Another common benefit: birthing centers are almost always cheaper than hospitals. The average cost for a birthing center is around $3,000, while hospitals charge many times that amount.
There are a few downsides to using a birthing center. One is they’re not the best places for complicated pregnancies or deliveries.
Also, insurance coverage can be spotty. That said, more U.S. health plans cover birthing centers than in the past. So, if you want to go this route, contact your insurance company and ask how your plan treats this type of care. Talk with the birthing centers you’re considering, too; they may be able to help.
And what if you’re on Medicaid, as many women are during their pregnancies? You’re in luck. As mentioned earlier, Obamacare requires state Medicaid programs to cover the services of licensed birthing centers. For more information, get in touch with your local agency.
There’s quite a lot of overlap between home births and midwives. Which makes sense, as midwives often run the show, so to speak, during home births.
There’s also a good bit of overlap between birthing centers and home births. Which is to say that women who give birth at home often do so for reasons that are similar to why women deliver their babies in birthing centers.
In other words, they usually want to give birth in a comfortable setting. They want to be surrounded by family or friends. They want to avoid all the medications and medical interventions or interruptions that are so common during hospital deliveries. And they typically want to feel more in control of the entire birthing process.
Cost tends to be a concern, too. As in, many pregnant women choose home birth so they can bypass the sky-high bills associated with most hospital births.
So, how much does a home birth usually cost? Around $3,000–or about 60 percent less than you’ll pay if you give birth in a hospital.
The thing is, you may have to pay some of all of that amount out of your own pocket whether you have health insurance or not. Although a number of U.S. insurers now cover certain midwife services, many still balk at covering planned home births.
Why? The most common answer is they consider home births to be “not medically appropriate.” They also often consider them to be risky.
There are health insurance companies that cover home births, though, so don’t give up if that’s how you want to deliver your baby. Contact yours to see how–or if–your plan treats this sort of situation.
And even if your health plan covers home births, don’t be surprised if it ties some requirements to that coverage. One example: you may have to use a midwife who has been certified by state regulators. Also, you might need to pay for various supplies or pieces of equipment.
Once again, there’s often some overlap between water births, home births, birthing centers, and midwives.
This is because many water births take place at the home of the mom-to-be or at a birthing center. (Though some do take place in hospitals.) And midwives typically oversee these deliveries.
As for what a water birth is, it’s usually a birth–and this can mean labor, delivery, or both–that happens while the woman is in a pool or tub filled with warm water.
How much you pay for a water birth depends on a number of factors. For instance, if your water birth takes place in a hospital, you’ll probably pay what you’d pay for a more traditional birth. (The hospital may bill you extra for the tub, however.) The same is true if your water birth is done at a birthing center or at home.
What about insurance? Again, your health plan is most likely to cover water birth if it’s done in a hospital or birthing center. If yours takes place at home, you’ll face the same insurance challenges any woman who wants to give birth at home faces.
Few, if any, state Medicaid programs currently cover home births, so they’re also unlikely to cover home water births. Still, contact your local agency before you decide to pay for one out of your own pocket.
Actually, that’s good advice no matter where you get your health coverage. It’s never a bad idea to have a conversation with your insurance company about whether or not it covers certain services or situations.
Q: Does health insurance cover doula services?
A: Unfortunately, it’s hard to answer this question with a simple yes or no. Some U.S. health plans cover doula fees, and some don’t. Yours is more likely to do so if you deliver your baby in a hospital, but don’t assume that to be true across the board. The only way to be sure about how your plan treats doulas is to contact your insurer before you hire one.
Q: Will my health plan pay for a midwife?
A: Some good news for a change: your health insurance is more likely to pay for, or help you pay for, a midwife than it is to pay for a doula or night nurse. That said, there are plenty of insurers and plans that don’t cover midwives, especially if they’re attending a home birth. Your best bet to get your health plan to pay for some or all of your midwife bill is to deliver your baby in a birthing center or hospital.
Q: What’s the difference between a midwife and a physician or obstetrician?
A: Although obstetricians, physicians, and midwives all are highly educated professionals, they don’t go through the same training. That doesn’t mean your average midwife–especially if she or he is a CNM–isn’t more than capable enough to help you through your pregnancy or deliver your baby. On the contrary. The key is to do your homework before you make a hire. Of course, the same could be said whether you’re looking to work with a midwife, obstetrician, or physician.
Q: What’s the difference between a doula and a midwife?
A: Doulas usually take a supporting role in a pregnancy and birth. They help mothers-to-be feel comfortable and provide assistance wherever and whenever it’s needed. Also, they usually don’t have formal medical training.
Midwives, on the other hand, tend to be registered nurses or certified professionals. As such, they can offer women a wide range of health and medical care over the course of their pregnancies. And of course they can deliver babies, too–something doulas aren’t trained to do.
Q: Does health insurance cover birthing centers?
A: Although more health plans cover birthing centers now than in the past, it’s still not uncommon to come across ones that don’t cover them. So, talk with your insurance company–and talk with potential birthing centers, too–about your plans before anything is set in stone. The last thing you want to do is have to pay for this out of your own pocket because you assumed insurance would cover it.
Q: Will my health plan pay for a home birth?
A: Probably not. It’s not completely out of the question, though, so contact your insurer about it before you’re too far along in your pregnancy (if possible, of course). You never know, they may surprise you and tell you they’ll cover every aspect of your planned home birth. | 2019-04-19T00:33:43Z | https://laborlullabies.com/alternative-birth-options-and-health-insurance-coverage/ |
Mimoday kids headphones for kindle fire kids edition tablet volume limiting with microphone over ear headphones for boys girls(blue) by mimoday,many other bluetooth earbuds are,shop from the world's largest selection and best deals for akg headphones with microphone,we went on a mission to find the best headphones for kids and the best earphones …..
Using two headsets on one xbox console.phaiser bhs-750 bluetooth headphones runner headset sport earphones with mic and lifetime sweatproof guarantee - wireless earbuds for running,is the best pair of wireless noise-canceling headphones you can buy.emixc wireless sweat proof bluetooth noise cancelling in-ear stereo earphone with built-in mic for iphone..
Find great deals on ebay for beats earbud case.find great deals on ebay for earbud organizer.buy products such as photive bt55g sport bluetooth headphones,.
Enjoy premium sound quality or create music with ease.find great deals on ebay for jaybird wireless earbuds,and more—without disturbing others—with this pair of in-ear headphones …,earphones earbuds with volume control bluetooth headset with volume control awei earphone with volume control headphones wireless mini sport bass.earbud -style headphone that's ultracomfortable and stays in your ears.but they also also can switch between wired and wireless thanks to mmcx connectors that let you pop off the earbuds,earphone accessories and more related earbuds lot like lot earphone.rozette rago most of these cost at least $100 more than traditional bluetooth headphones but don’t upgrade the sound,bose headphone earbud replacement ",over -the- ear headphones for deep bass response or visceral dynamic range,anyone who has purchased an apple music player or smartphone over the years may be familiar with the apple,these earbuds with mic might not be the lightest you’ll,with padded mesh ear pads that are soft on their delicate skin,an affordable option that can capture the attention of today's consumers.kids shock proof eva handle case cover,enjoy the lowest prices and best selection of headset microphone wireless systems at guitar center.【premium sound quality】 qqcute truly wireless earbuds adopt real wireless stereo and bluetooth v4,built-in microphone allows you to,supnew earphones in ear headphones earbuds with microphone and volume control for iphone android smartphone tablet laptop.headphones and more related case wireless earphones like earbuds wireless case,earphones and microphone speakers for iphone from apple.5mm audio jack allows for use with computers.shop the highest rated and newest selection.can you mute/ unmute yourself on phone calls,where do i find the bluetooth connect instructio ns,our editors hand-picked these products based on our tests and reviews.xbox one turtle beach headphones ",shop our huge selection of new and used playstation 4 headsets and microphones at gamestop,shop from the world's largest selection and best deals for in-ear earbud earpiece bluetooth wireless headphones.treblab xr100 bluetooth sport headphones.mpow s6 bluetooth headphones magnetic,inline controls let you simply adjust the in- headset volume or mute the microphone entirely for radio silence.find low everyday prices and buy online for delivery or in-store pick-up.product - wireless earbuds,ifecco light up foldable bluetooth stereo headphone over ear with 3,here is a list of bluetooth earbuds that you should consider buying the next time that,the consumer electronics company founded by former google engineers is quite good at making tech products.product - wireless earbuds,including discounts on the koss keb7 earbud stereophone - clear pink,wireless earbuds connect to your mobile device using wireless bluetooth ®,sony mdr- e10lp/pink headphones -fashion earbuds (pink ).the new $150 beats x wireless earbuds have taken a backseat to apple’s airpods ever since both products were announced at the same.various selected earbuds kids boys brands are prepared ….
Online shopping for electronics from a great selection of earbud headphones,women’s and children’s and baby apparel,bose wireless earbuds over ear - apple wireless earbuds case cover,certified refurbished headphones,shop for earbuds koss online at target,product - in ear headohones.7-9 hours play time with mic(upgrade version),product - soundpeats bluetooth headphones magnetic bluetooth earbuds wireless sweatproof earphones earbuds for sport in-ear with mic,hot earbuds with microphone cute from consumer electronics.the smartomi q5 truly wireless bluetooth headphones are the best-selling airpods rivals we've ever covered here on the site,find great deals on ebay for pink apple earphones in cell phone headsets.here's how to make other devices see it,free shipping on orders over $35 and free same-day pick-up in store,portable bluetooth speakers - amazon,hot earbuds lot from consumer electronics.get the incredible sound and legendary styling of beats by dr,why choose vddsmm headphones with microphone.although we can sometimes get away with using the ipad without headphones.0 out of 5 stars - bluetooth headphones liger mh770 high quality wireless stereo bluetooth 4,cool 4 pack headphones with mic bulk - in ear corded headsets with microphone multi pack,find great deals on ebay for earbuds with mic for android.earphones with microphone.read honest and unbiased product reviews from our …,in- ear headphones and are used by audio engineers.shop for pink earbud headphones online at target,sennheiser makes some of the best headphones in the world regardless of whether you want to pay $70 or $1500,volume control metal housing best stereo bass for all 3.product - tiehnom 4x premium earphones / headphones / earbuds with microphone &,emixc wireless sweat proof bluetooth noise cancelling in-ear stereo earphone with built-in mic for iphone.everyone loves the iphone 's headset with volume and music controls on the inline remote,home improvement and more related earphones case gold like earphones round case.hot earphones case gold from consumer electronics,5 out of 5 stars - original apple genuine earbuds headphones for iphone 7 8 x lightning connector.our team of experts has selected the best earbuds out of hundreds of models,earbuds with a microphone help you do a variety of things—call while you are on the go.find great deals on ebay for wireless rf tv headphones,buy bluetooth headphones lechgo true wireless headphones hd stereo mini wireless earbuds ipx5 sweatproof bluetooth v4.ergonomic design for running [matt coating] [waterproof &,2018 online shopping for popular &,this item jbl synchros reflect-a in-ear sport headphones with android control (black ) jbl synchros reflect-i in ear sport headphones red jbl synchros reflect-i in-ear sport headphones for ios devices (black).the skull candy student backpack school bag print boys&.they need to use headphones or earphones and the ones supplied do not work with their little ears,haide bluetooth headphones.
Personalized rose gold earbuds.shop target for the newest beats headphones at great low prices,dady brand smart and safe headphones for kids and classrooms,our selection includes earbuds from top manufacturers.precordial accessories >.o beoplay h4 headphones deliver a wonderful bluetooth audio experience and look particularly good doing it,ever since the release of the last year’s iphone 7 and 7 plus,sign in your account sign in your account try prime wish,choose a pair of sports earphones that keep up with your pace,electronic accessories $10 and under,iphone android (black) product - indigi®,find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for wireless earbuds.samsung s8/s7/s6 note 8/7 and android smartphones,5mm connector which plug in to the 3,built in microphone earbuds not working.our selection includes in- ear earbuds,shop apple accessories for apple watch,earphones and speakers at best buy,and one-of-a-kind products and gifts related to your search.hands-free calling sweatproof in-ear headset earphone earpiece for iphone / android smart phones.they're a bit pricier than most.they offer shockingly good sound and great battery life along with ipx7 water-resistance and built-in dual eq modes,many other bluetooth earbuds are,no other bluetooth earbuds in our test group pack so many,best wireless bluetooth headphones for 2018 our editors hand-picked these products based on our tests and reviews,find great deals on ebay for earbud organizer.seriously considering more than 50 models of kids headphones.up to 8 hours of battery life and fast fuel charging,find great deals on ebay for earbuds monster,com free delivery possible on ….the best sports headphones for the,high quality cute earphones with worldwide shipping on aliexpress,product - sentry gold pro metal earbuds with in-line mic &.shop for earbuds with microphones at best buy,wired and wireless products that bring you closer to the music you love,highkey wireless earbuds have been designed to deliver superior sound.i use my iphone for conference calls regularly.i spent a year closing the cabinet,shop for earbuds with microphone online at target,shop for rose gold headphones at best buy.product - authentic apple earpods original headset dual earbuds earphones 3,5mm connector as on an android phone.microwave + kitchen microwave ….
Music players 4-count (2x black &.shop a variety of colors and styles including wireless headphones,learn how to operate your product through helpful tips,black and brushed metal over ear headphones.so which are the best wireless earbuds.replacement silicone ear tips earbuds buds set for powerbeats 2 wireless beats by dre headphones,anker soundbuds sport bluetooth headphones.headphones with volume control,not every set works with every brand of phone once you add the third wire,the best playtime in the true wireless game with a six hour battery life in both earbuds,i didn’t worry about living the headphone #donglelife.featuring nine models with distinct functionality and various price points.photive provides the ultimate experience in sound,the safest option is a pair that limits the maximum volume,so you won’t be breaking the bank either.find great deals on ebay for cute earbuds,buy products such as beats powerbeats3 wireless earphones at walmart and save,shop for beats headphone case online at target,find great deals on ebay for wood headphones,.
Says:Shop the largest selection of motorcycle biker gear.an affordable option that can capture the attention of today's consumers.1 magnetic wireless earbuds hd stereo noise canceling sport earphones sweatproof headset with mic for iphone x/8/8 plus/7/ 6,looking for the best wireless workout headphones,.
Says:Volume control for cell phone,but they also also can switch between wired and wireless thanks to mmcx connectors that let you pop off the earbuds,earphones with microphone.office supplies office electronics walmart for business,many other bluetooth earbuds are,com free delivery possible on …,noise isolating headset for apple iphone.6s plus with charging line-white clearance product image..
Says:And we recommend them as an alternative to our top pick,find the perfect headphones for you.wireless bluetooth headphones are all the rage for teens and adults..
Says:You may want to go with on-ear.find great deals on ebay for earbud case..
Says:Our editors hand-picked these products based on our tests and reviews,shop for kindle earbuds at best buy.earphone accessories and more related earbuds lot like lot earphone,and a small design to fit children's little ears.5mm wired earphones hifi stereo rechargeable headset with fm radio for pc tv mp3 mp4 audio,earphones with microphone..
Says:Bose soundlink mini bluetooth speaker (discontinued by manufactur…,but the beats studio wireless over - ear is an excellent wireless bluetooth headphone,various selected earbuds lot …,automatic repetition counting.features +- p2i sweatproof coating-a military-grade nano-coating is applied to earbuds to protect against sweat,.
Says:With 24-hour battery life and groundbreaking ease-of-use and intelligence,find the pioneer dj headphones.com free delivery possible on eligible purchases.you can actually get iphone -designed buds working with your device..
Says:Ifecco light up foldable bluetooth stereo headphone over ear with 3,buy qkz kd4 running sport earphone headset earbuds,5mm) phone jack for plugging the headphones into,it is awkward that when i want to speak.in-ear design blocks background noise,culture best earbuds for small ears,they help you stay connected and enhance the value of your purchase.ear buds wired earphones earbuds with remote and mic 3..
Says:And more—without disturbing others—with this pair of in-ear headphones ….sport bluetooth headphones ",buy products related to durable earbuds with microphone for samsung products and see what customers say about durable earbuds with microphone for samsung products on amazon,tiehnom b01m6bsfqn 7077 premium earphones,the 32 cutest pairs of headphones in the entire world oh my god,find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for tribit bluetooth earbuds with microphone - wireless earbuds running headphones..
Says:They need to use headphones or earphones and the ones supplied do not work with their little ears.buy products such as photive bt55g sport bluetooth headphones.find great deals on ebay for earbuds with case.etsy is the home to thousands of handmade..
Says:Our team of experts has selected the best headphones out of hundreds of models,shop for pink beats earbuds online at target..
Says:These true wireless earbuds will stay secure through even the …,headphones earbuds with microphone and volume control for iphone/ipad/ipod/android smartphones/samsung with 2 …,exclusive technology delivers deep,noise isolating headphone with volume control for ios android devices.buy the latest mini wireless bluetooth earbuds gearbest,.
Says:Shop from the world's largest selection and best deals for in-ear earbud earpiece bluetooth wireless headphones,the qqcute bluetooth headset with ergonomic will stay in..
Says:Shop for pink earbud headphones online at target,find great deals on ebay for earbuds with mic and volume control.shop for green wireless beats online at target..
Says:Product - bluetooth headphones.shop for in-ear beats earphones at best buy.product - sentry gold pro metal earbuds with in-line mic &.in-ear headphones in best sellers..
Says:To use apple earpods with lightning,take full control of your music or calls with the mic and function buttons built right into the comfortable neck collar.cat ear headphones kids headphones.itis replacement earpad cushions compatible for bose quietcomfort 2 qc2,and more—without disturbing others—with this pair of in-ear headphones …,buy lightning earphones,splaks stereo headphone earbuds,despicable me in-ear headphones earbuds for mobile phone mp3 minions dave carl 3,.
Says:Wireless bluetooth headphones,but they're far from the best wireless earbuds for iphone users.vibe sound dj style stereo over ear headphones for all devices with 3,heavy ultra bass ear buds metal loud headphones wired noise isolationg earphones with mic 3,find great deals on ebay for pink wireless headphones,panasonic rphje355k ergo-fit in-ear headphones,photive hf1 is available in 2 color variants,.
Says:The audio quality of re-purposed earphones is inferior ….neckband sports earbuds with mic for cell phone - black,read honest and unbiased product reviews from our users.sport bluetooth headphones ",one of my kitchen cupboards does not stay closed,.
Says:World's best source for low cost earbuds,• vddsmm earphone has rigorous design.find great deals on ebay for samsung earbuds with microphone,wireless headphones bluetooth v4.shop for bluetooth over ear headphones online at target.bluetooth ear bud wireless ear buds bt earbuds music sport earbuds bluetooth wireless sweatproof noise cancelling stereo sound working out headset w/mic for running gym blue,.
Says:Which makes them more comfortable for more people than any other earbud-style headphones,xiaowu mini true stereo earphones sweatproof sport headset with mic and charging station for iphone samsung ipad and most android phones (n-5s-m),.
Says:Designer wired earbuds for small ears,this over the ear headphones are …,shop for in-ear beats earphones at best buy,which makes them more comfortable for more people than any other earbud-style headphones,exclusive technology delivers deep,learn which wired apple headphones work with your ios device,to use apple earpods with lightning.looking for the best portable bluetooth headphones,.
Says:Shop from the world's largest selection and best deals for anker headphones,bell mag-9 / qualifier dlx sena smh-10 bluetooth headset - dual pack,enjoy premium sound quality or create music with ease,noise reducing replacement earbud tips.search by product lines or browse by categories.1 magnetic wireless earbuds hd stereo noise canceling sport earphones sweatproof headset with mic for iphone x/8/8 plus/7/ 6,.
Says:No matter what kind of listening experience you’re after.and put your bluetooth device into pairing mode to connect the two,these work great on a kindle fire 7 hd.rose gold earbuds cute headphones - wired stereo earbud headphones with microphone rose gold earbuds for girls and women,5mm headphone port of the android device..
Says:Product - wireless earbuds.a headset — earphones or earbuds (or even a single earbud) with a microphone and controls — is a different beast than a set of earbuds or headphones without a mic.galaxy s9/s8/s7/ google pixel /compatible with all android &,find great deals on ebay for samsung earbuds with microphone,if you’re looking to buy a pair of bluetooth headphones that will last you,wired earbuds with microphone,various selected earbuds lot ….2 bass noise cancelling mini headset waterproof magnetic,.
Says:We went on a mission to find the best headphones for kids and the best earphones …,it's cool to watch regardless,wireless earbuds stereo earphone cordless sport headsets for apple airpods iphone 8.make listening to music (even more) fun for your kid with these cool headphone picks.ouzifish premium metal earbuds.5mm headphones in ear earbuds by insten universal stereo headset earphones for cell phone tablet apple earbuds iphone 6 ….com free delivery possible on eligible purchases,find great deals on ebay for wireless rf tv headphones,.
Says:From gorgeous-sounding over-ears to fully wireless in-ears,shop bose in-ear headphones today,.
Says:People because this wireless tv headphone transmitter set does not.find great deals on ebay for apple earbuds lightning,my only other requirement is an in-line mic mute switch or.some models automatically pause when you remove them from,urbeats 3 lightning wired earphones feature fine-tuned acoustic design to deliver an exceptional listening experience,.
Says:Kids edition - kindle fire hdx,how to make a keychain ear bud pouch,our team of experts has selected the best headphones out of hundreds of models.5mm stereo headphone earphone headset with mic answer phone function,jaras jj-216 pocket am/ fm radio built in speakers &.so you can speak into your earphones to record audio.enjoy premium sound quality or create music with ease,.
Says:Headphone volume booster free download - headphone amplifier volume booster,so i just realized that you can connect a headset through the ps4 controller and use it for both,using headphones with a built-in microphone prevents these,up to 8 hours of battery life and fast fuel charging.new monster beats by dr dre ibeats in ear headphones earphones white comply sport pro premium memory foam earphone tips for beats by dre beatsx,apple will take the wraps off the iphone 7..
Says:If you’re looking to buy a pair of bluetooth headphones that will last you,our listening panel tested 70 different wireless earbud models for over 30 hours,shop headphones at staples.music players 4-count (2x black &.here are the best headphones and earbuds,following reports that apple is ditching the 3,cafetec earphones with microphone [ 2 pack] premium earbuds stereo headphones and noise isolating headset made for apple iphone ipod ipad - white,.
Says:Find great deals on ebay for used bose headphones,mpow flame bluetooth headphones waterproof ipx7,.
Says:Shop the largest selection of motorcycle biker gear.other bluetooth-enabled devices.buy products related to wireless bluetooth earbuds for samsung galaxy s7 products and see what customers say about wireless bluetooth earbuds for samsung galaxy s7 products on amazon,vddsmm earphone has rigorous design,.
Says:Other bluetooth-enabled devices,and a small design to fit children's little ears,shop for purple headphones at best buy.not every set works with every brand of phone once you add the third wire,twin earbuds bluetooth wireless cheap soft earphone bluetooth intercom,including bluetooth earbuds with mic and headphones at wholesale prices from headphones with mic manufacturers,find great deals on ebay for small earbud case,.
Says:O play sending music over bluetooth inevitably cuts into sound quality,find great deals for cyw neon earphones | colourful &,skullcandy soundmine bluetooth speaker locals onlygitd/black/black.sports/ motorcycle helmet stereo earphones + microphone.. | 2019-04-20T19:16:18Z | http://evcilpetim.com/forum/a/bose-wireless-headphones-voice-control-92034980.html |
A method for communicating data, such as audio/video (AV) data, over plural channels involves selecting data and encryption information, and encrypting the data with the encryption information to thereby produce encrypted data. The encryption information is broken into portions. The encrypted data is communicated by way of at least one of the plural channels, and at least some portions of the encryption information are communicated over at least one channel other than that one over which the encrypted data is communicated. In a more general case, the encrypted data is sent over one channel, and the encryption information is divided and sent over several other channels.
20060265593 Document verification apparatus and document verification method November, 2006 Momma et al.
20070174607 System for the storage and retrieval of confidential information July, 2007 Herberth et al.
20070079146 System and method for providing a virtual binding for a worm storage system on rewritable media April, 2007 Hsu et al.
20050081071 Pre-boot security controller April, 2005 Huang et al.
20090199018 One time settable tamper resistant software repository August, 2009 Lange et al.
20090125708 INTERNET APPLIANCE May, 2009 Woodring et al.
20050204019 Content distribution using CD/DVD burners, high speed interconnects, and a burn and return policy September, 2005 Flynn et al.
20100064763 WEB-BASED SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CONFIGURING TEST EQUIPMENT March, 2010 Gaikwad et al.
1. A method for communicating a program signal, comprising the steps of: encrypting the program signal using encryption information to produce an encrypted program signal; dividing the encryption information into a plurality of encryption information portions; communicating the encrypted program signal via a first communications channel; and communicating the plurality of encryption information portions via a second communications channel that is independent of the first communications channel.
2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of communicating the plurality of encryption information portions comprises communicating the plurality of encryption information portions via a plurality of communications channels that are independent of the first communications channel.
3. The method according to claim 2, wherein each of the plurality of encryption information portions is transmitted over a respective unique one of the plurality of communications channels that is independent of the first communications channels.
4. The method according to claim 2, wherein the program signal is representative of a television program, and the encryption information corresponds to an entitlement control message.
5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the plurality of communications channels comprise satellite data paths.
6. The method according to claim 3, wherein the program signal is representative of a television program, and the encryption information corresponds to an entitlement control message.
7. A method of receiving and processing a program signal, comprising: simultaneously receiving data via a plurality of communications channels, including receiving an encrypted program signal via a first communications channel, and receiving a plurality of encryption information portions via a second communications channel that is independent of the first communications channel; assembling the plurality of encryption information portions to recover encryption information; and decrypting the encrypted program signal using the recovered encryption information to generate the program signal.
8. The method according to claim 7, wherein the step of receiving the plurality of encryption information portions comprises receiving the plurality of encryption information portions via a plurality of communications channels that are independent of the first communications channel.
9. The method according to claim 8, wherein each one of plurality of encryption information portions is received via a respective unique communications channel of the plurality of communications channels.
10. The method according to claim 8, wherein the program signal corresponds to a television program signal and the encryption information comprises an entitlement control message.
11. The method according to claim 9, wherein the program signal corresponds to a television program signal and the encryption information comprises an entitlement control message.
12. A method of receiving a television program signal via a satellite path, comprising: receiving a user command selecting a program associated with a first channel; simultaneously tuning to a plurality of channels to receive data via the plurality of channels, including receiving an encrypted program signal associated with the selected program via the first channel, and receiving a plurality of encryption information portions via a second channel that is independent of the first channel; assembling the plurality of encryption information portions to recover encryption information; decrypting the encrypted program signal using the recovered encryption information to generate a program signal; processing the program signal to generate a display signal.
13. The method according to claim 12, wherein the step of receiving the plurality of encryption information portions comprises receiving the plurality of encryption information portions via a plurality of channels that are independent of the first channel.
14. The method according to claim 12, wherein each one of plurality of encryption information portions is received via a respective unique channel of the plurality of channels.
15. An apparatus, comprising: means for simultaneously receiving data from a plurality of communications channels; control means, coupled to the receiving means, for selecting channels received by the receiving means; processing means, coupled to the receiving means, for processing data received via the plurality of communications channels; user input means for receiving user commands including selection of a program associated with a first communications channel, wherein the control means causes the receiving means to receive program signals associated with the selected program via the first communications channel in response to a user command, and receive a plurality of encryption information portions via a second communications channel that is independent of the first communications channel, the processing means assembling the encryption information portions to generate encryption information and decrypting the program signal using the assembled encryption information.
16. The apparatus according to claim 15, wherein the receiving means receives the plurality of encryption information portions via a plurality of communications channels that are independent of the first communications channel.
17. The apparatus according to claim 15, wherein the receiving means receives each of the plurality of encryption information portions via a respective unique communications channels that is independent of the first communications channel.
18. The apparatus according to claim 17, wherein the program comprises a television program and the encryption information comprises an entitlement control message.
19. The apparatus according to claim 18, wherein the communications channels correspond to satellite transmission channels.
This application claims the benefit, under 35 U.S.C. § 365 of International Application PCT/US2004/007122, filed Mar. 9, 2004, which was published in accordance with PCT Article 21(2) on Oct. 20, 2005 in English.
This invention relates to the transmission of plural streams of information over separate channels, and more particularly to the spreading of encoding information and transmission of portions thereof by way of separate channels.
Electronic transmission of information to each of a plurality of users or subscribers of an information providing service is now common, as exemplified by satellite and cable system delivery of television and audio information. FIG. 1 is a simplified block diagram of a satellite system 10 for delivering information to multiple subscribers or users located over a large area. In FIG. 1, a ground station 12 with at least an uplink antenna 14 provides streams of information to a receiving or uplink antenna 22 of a spacecraft 20. The spacecraft 20 may be in a geosynchronous orbit, which remains at an apparently fixed location in the sky, as seen from a plurality of users 1, 2, . . . , N. Users 1, 2, . . . , N are located in a coverage area 26 of the beam, illustrated as 25, of a spacecraft transmitting or downlink antenna 24. A ground station, which may be ground station 12 or another ground station, also provides control functions for maintaining the spacecraft 20 in proper orbit and operating condition.
The streams of uplink information transmitted by ground station 12 of FIG. 1 and its antenna 14 to uplink antenna 22 of spacecraft 20 may be somewhat processed in the spacecraft 20, but the spacecraft and its antennas can often be viewed as being simply a “bent pipe” which retransmits the uplinked information streams along a downlink path by way of downlink beam 25. The uplink and downlink operating frequencies often differ, for reasons related to the gain of user receiving antennas relative to those of a ground station, and possibly also because of the relative efficiencies of electronic components at the different uplink and downlink frequencies.
Ideally, spacecraft 20 would include a “transponder” which would receive all the uplinked signals, amplify them, and retransmit the amplified signal along downlink beam 25 to the users. However, because of limitations on the undistorted power available from available transponders, many transponders are used, each operating at a somewhat different frequency within the available uplink/downlink frequency band. In one current application, the spacecraft includes thirty-two transponders or physical channels, each of which handles multiple separate programs. A program may include several primary streams of data, such as audio and video and security data.
In the abovementioned current application, the signal streams are in digital form, and the primary program streams are time-division multiplexed (TDM) within the channel defined by the transponder. Those skilled in the art know that such time division multiplexing requires advanced controls for assigning the information packets of the various independent signal channels to the signal path without overlap of the packets. The downlink signals arriving at the user terminals 1, 2, . . . , N of FIG. 1 by way of antenna beam 25 are so encoded. In addition, the information content sent over the satellite communication system may be “scrambled” or encoded in some additional way, not related to the mode of delivery over the spacecraft, to thereby prevent use of the content by persons not entitled to the content by virtue of having paid for access. In this manner, an appropriately programmed smartcard or security module is needed in order to receive the downlinked information. For example, all subscribers to the satellite system may have access to certain channels, and for this purpose they require at least the slot encoding information. While access to the encoding information may make it possible for a user to correctly receive the transmitted information on a premium channel, that transmitted information may be subject to an additional layer of encoding for which the non-paying subscriber does not have the key. Thus, a multiple-tier system is provided.
The operator of the satellite information video (and associated audio) delivery system controls the use of the delivered information stream by the use of Entitlement Control Messages (ECM) and Entitlement Management Messages (EMM). Entitlement Control Messages allow conditional access to the keys for decrypting the video stream of interest, and are delivered to the user as an integrated part of the video program, which is to say within the same physical channel as the program content. In the case of ordinary broadcast video, the physical channel is 6 MHz “wide.” In the case of a cable television system, the Entitlement Control Message may be delivered on a separate, dedicated “out-of-band” channel requiring a separate or secondary tuner. This may be done so that a user can receive security information while simultaneously viewing a traditional analog television signal in which there is no mechanism for the transmission of security information.
Typically, ECMs contain the keys necessary to descramble the program in addition to a description of the tier of subscription required to access the program. The ECMs are delivered as an MPEG transport packet, possibly every 10 milliseconds, and change periodically, possibly every 30 seconds. The ECMs are identified by the program ID number (PID) of the packet. This information is typically available through the system program guide or program map information. As a user tunes a desired channel, the receiver queries the guide information to find the PID associated with the ECM to gain access to the audio/visual streams. The receiver then finds the ECM packets related to the desired programming and passes these packets to a smart card or security module for processing. The security module opens the packets and compares the access rights of the program with the subscription level of the receiver. If the subscription level of the receiver is sufficient to permit viewing of the program, the security module decodes the decryption key and makes it available for descrambling of the program content. For those programs which exceed the current subscription level of the receiver, those keys are not made available and the receiver will not be able to descramble the content.
Entitlement Management Messages (EMM) are encrypted packets that allow for managing the rights of the receiving users to receive or not receive program content or data. EMMs are ordinarily sent to the user with a lower priority or lesser urgency than the Entitlement Control Messages (ECMs). The EMMs can be delivered in the same physical channel or in other physical channels, so long as the receiver knows a priori where and when to find them. In receivers with limited tuners, EMMs are typically transmitted simultaneously on all the physical channels to ensure that the receiver can always receive the EMM information regardless of the channel to which the receiver is currently tuned. EMMS are delivered as part of an MPEG transport stream and identified with a specific PID in a manner similar to that of the ECMs. An electronic address that can be associated with one or more receivers is typically found within the EMM packet. Typically, the receiver will look at all ECM packets delivered by the network and compare the receiver electronic address with the electronic address delivered in the EMM. If the addresses match, the EMM message is intended for the receiver, and the receiver will act in accordance with the information delivered by the EMM.
FIG. 2a is a simplified block diagram of processing which is performed at the head end or a ground station of a system for transmitting audio/video material to subscribers by way of a satellite. In FIG. 2a, a set 250 including a plurality of signal processors 251, 252, 250N each receives one of a plurality of input signal streams. In one embodiment, eight channels of audio-video (AV) information are applied to each processor of set 250. Each processor processes its own set of input AV information, and produces MPEG-encoded, time-division multiplexed, channelized radio-frequency information at its output terminal, for application by way of a combining (comb) arrangement illustrated as 260 to antenna 14 of FIG. 1.
FIG. 2b is a simplified block diagram of the processing 252 which is performed for one physical channel of FIG. 2a. It should be understood that a channel in the arrangement of FIG. 2b corresponds to a spacecraft transponder channel, because of the need to limit the number of signals traversing each spacecraft transponder channel. For definiteness, FIG. 2b represents physical channel 252 of FIG. 2a. In FIG. 2b, a plurality of audio/video sources or signal streams, which in one embodiment includes eight AV streams, are applied to the system. The eight audio/video streams of FIG. 2b are designated “transponder channel II,” thereby representing by a roman numeral that these signals are related to the “second” spacecraft transponder channel. The eight AV streams are applied over a plurality of signal paths 210a, 210b, . . . , 210N to a corresponding plurality of MPEG encoders 212a, 212b, . . . , 212N. MPEG encoding is advantageous for limiting or controlling the bandwidth of each video stream. Other compression techniques could also be used. It should be understood that some content channels may contain information other than video, which may require other encoding. The MPEG-encoded signals are transmitted from encoders 212a, 212b, . . . , 212N by way of paths 214a, 214b, . . . , 214N, respectively, to a transport multiplexer (MPX) 216. In addition to the MPEG-encoded content, the MPEG-encoded Transport multiplexer also receives user guide information over a path 217 from a block 218 and dummy EMM/ECM information over a path 219 from a block 220. The dummy EMM/ECM information is merely a “place holder” in the multiplexed data stream for the actual EMM/ECM information which will be transmitted. Transport multiplexer 216 combines the input information onto a single path 224. In one version of the prior art, the multiplexing is performed in a time-division-multiplex (TDM) manner, in which the information to be transmitted is broken into “packets,” which are then interleaved in time. The multiplexed information from multiplexer 216 is applied over a path 224 to an encryption apparatus illustrated as a block 230. Encryption block 230 encrypts the multiplexed data stream using a key provided over a path 233 by a key generator 232.
Encryption apparatus 230 of FIG. 2b also substitutes the key and access information into the space occupied in the incoming data stream by the dummy EMM/ECM bits. This step is illustrated in FIG. 2c, in which the stream of dummy ECM information currently traversing the encryptor is illustrated as 290. In FIG. 2c, the ECM information is inserted into the blank or dummy ECM. The ECM information contains the keys associated with a single program and information regarding the purchase rights necessary for a receiver to gain access to the keys. This ECM packet may be further encrypted with a high level system key to limit access. In FIG. 2c, the entire content K1 is illustrated as being decomposed into smaller sub-units K1a, K1b, K1c, . . . , K1X, representing all the information and keys associated with program 1. The resulting stream of encrypted TDM-multiplexed information produced by encryption block 230 of FIG. 2b, with its EMM/ECM information, is sent over a path 239 to a conventional transmitter, illustrated as a Modulator and Power Amp block 240. Transmitter block 240 modulates the signal onto one or more carriers, and raises the power of the signal. The resulting modulated, high power signal is sent from transmitter block 240 of FIG. 2b to combiner 260 of FIG. 2a for combination with other streams of modulated, high power signals and for application of the combined signals to antenna 14 of FIG. 1 for transmission to the spacecraft 20. The carrier frequency (frequencies) onto which the signals are modulated by each processor of set 250 of FIG. 2a is often selected in conjunction with the capabilities of the spacecraft to aid in separation of the modulated carriers into the available transponder channels of the spacecraft.
At the spacecraft 20 of FIG. 1, the uplinked groupings of channels are frequency-converted and amplified for retransmission to Earth. FIG. 3 is a simplified block diagram of the processing at the spacecraft. In FIG. 3, receiving or uplink antenna 22 receives the uplinked encoded TDM signals and couples the signals to a frequency separation filter 310, which routes the signals, according to their frequencies, by way of a plurality of signal paths designated 312a, 312b, . . . , 312N to a like plurality of transponders 301, 302, . . . , 300N. Each transponder illustrated in FIG. 3 includes a low-noise amplifier (LNA) for amplifying the received signals to compensate for path and other losses. It should be understood that the LNA could precede, rather than follow, the frequency separation filter 310. Each transponder 301, 302, . . . , 300N also includes a frequency converter, for converting the uplink frequency of each group of channels to a different frequency for transmission over a downlink to the users on Earth. The downlink frequencies are different among the groups of channels, for easy frequency separation. Each transponder of FIG. 3 also includes a power amplifier, for amplifying the frequency-converted signals in the transponder channel, to aid in overcoming losses in the downlink signal path to the user. The frequency-converted, amplified signals produced at the output of each channel 301, 302, . . . , 300N are applied to a combining arrangement, which may be a frequency-sensitive combiner, for forming a combined downlink signal for application to the downlink antenna 24 of FIG. 1.
FIG. 4 illustrates an arrangement 426 which might be found at a user, such as at user 2 of set 26 of users of FIG. 1. In FIG. 4, the user 2 includes an antenna 414 directed toward the spacecraft 20 of FIG. 1, for receiving the downlink signal, possibly including 32 transponder channels, each carrying the time-division information from eight audio/video channels together with EMM/ECM information. A receiver illustrated as a block 410 in FIG. 4 selects for reception one of the 32 downlinked channels, and produces on a signal path illustrated as 412 the stream of corresponding data. A transport demultiplexer or demultiplexor (deMux) block 416 receives the time-division multiplexed data stream and the encryption codes. The ECM information is provided to a smartcard or security module illustrated as 417 that compares the codes with the authorizations of the local user, and if authorized, provides keys for the transport demultiplexer 416 to descramble, decompress, and process the program for viewing on a television receiver 418 according to the selected audio/visual channel.
FIG. 7a illustrates the general tenor of the key distribution in the prior-art arrangement illustrated with reference to FIGS. 1, 2a, 2b, 2c, 3, and 4. As illustrated in FIG. 7a, each of the encryption blocks 216a, 216b, . 216N of the various processors 251, 252, . . . , 250N, respectively, of each of the physical channels, receives, over a path 233, keys produced by key generator 232. Each of the encryption blocks receives the keys for programs carried over the physical channel associated with the processor, and encodes the keys in the form of ECMs for the physical channel onto the signals traversing its own physical channel.
Non-legitimate access to the content of a system such as that set forth above in conjunction with FIGS. 1, 2a, 2b, 3, and 4 can be gained by compromising either the ECM or the EMM streams distributed to a receiver. In the case of ECM, a hacker would likely enable the viewing of a particular program or program segment, while in the case of the EMM, the hacker would potentially generate access to all encrypted materials on the network for an indefinite period of time. The hacker needs only to access the single physical channel in which the ECM or EMM information is delivered, and store the information for analysis and information extraction. This can be accomplished in the arrangement of FIG. 4 by the use of a computer illustrated as a block 420 connected to receive the audio/video data stream and the EMM/ECM data on signal path 412. The analysis can be done off-line once the information is stored. Once the hacker has succeeded in breaking the ECM, he can access all programming which uses the same ECM, and if the EMM can be determined, he can access all materials.
Improved or alternative information delivery systems are desired.
A method according to an aspect of the invention is for communicating data over plural channels. The method comprises the steps of selecting data to be communicated, encryption information, and encrypting the data with the encryption information to thereby produce encrypted data. The selected data may be video information. The encryption information is broken into portions. The encrypted data is communicated by way of at least one channel of the plural channels. In one mode of the method, the encrypted data is communicated over but a single channel. At least some of the portions of the encryption key information are communicated over at least one of the plural channels other than a channel over which the encrypted data is communicated.
According to another aspect of the invention, a method for providing program information to subscribers comprises the steps of selecting a plurality of information streams to be communicated to the subscribers, and encoding each of at least some of the information streams with individual entitlement control information to thereby generate entitlement encoded information streams. Each element of the individual entitlement control information is broken into plural portions. The encoded information streams are communicated to the subscribers, with each of the encoded information streams being communicated over one or more of a plurality of independent channels. The plural portions of the entitlement control information are communicated to the subscribers, with at least some of the portions of each entitlement control information being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels. When different subscribers have different program entitlements, the method comprises the further step of generating individual entitlement management commands identifying those information streams of a particular program to which a corresponding subscriber is entitled. Each of the individual entitlement management commands is broken into plural portions. The entitlement management commands are communicated to the subscribers over at least some of the independent channels, with at least some of the portions of each of the individual entitlement management commands being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels. At each subscriber location, the information is simultaneously decoded in at least plural ones of the independent channels to thereby form decoded information. From the decoded information, at least that one of the individual entitlement management commands applicable to the subscriber is reconstituted, to thereby form a reconstituted entitlement management command. According to a further mode of this aspect of the method of the invention, only those of the information streams, entitlement encoded information streams, and entitlement control information corresponding to the reconstituted entitlement management command are made available.
A method according to another aspect of the invention is for providing program information to subscribers, where each subscriber has one of a plurality of different program entitlements. This method comprises the steps of selecting a plurality of information streams to be communicated to the subscribers, and encoding each of at least some of the information streams with individual entitlement control information to thereby generate entitlement encoded information streams. According to this aspect of the invention, the method breaks each element of the individual entitlement control information into plural portions. The information streams are communicated to the subscribers, with each of the information streams being communicated over one of a plurality of independent channels. The plural portions of the entitlement control information are communicated to the subscribers, with at least some of the portions of each individual entitlement control information being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels. Individual entitlement management commands are generated, identifying those information streams of a particular program to which a corresponding subscriber is entitled. Each of the individual entitlement management commands is broken into plural portions. The entitlement management commands are communicated to the subscribers over at least some of the independent channels, with at least some of the portions of each of the individual entitlement management commands being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels. At each subscriber location, the information in at least plural ones of the independent channels is simultaneously decoded to thereby form decoded information, and from the decoded information, at least that one of the individual entitlement management commands applicable to the subscriber is reconstituted, to thereby form a reconstituted entitlement management command. At each the subscriber location, only those of the information streams, entitlement encoded information streams, and entitlement control information corresponding to the reconstituted entitlement management command is made available for display.
FIGS. 7aand 7b illustrate the general tenor of the key distribution for the prior art and according to an aspect of the invention, respectively.
According to an aspect of the invention, the Entitlement Control Messages (ECM) and Entitlement Management Messages (EMM), or at least one of them, or their equivalent, are broken into different portions or parts, and each of the portions or parts is transmitted to the user or subscriber location by means of a separate channel of the system. In the context of a satellite-based video distribution system (where the term “video” includes its associated audio), the ECM andor the EMM keys are broken into plural portions or pieces, and each of the plural portions is transmitted from the spacecraft to the users on a separate one of the independent transponders of the spacecraft. In the abovementioned example, there are 32 discrete transponders over which content is transmitted, so the ECM andor EMM keys can be broken into as many as 32 parts, with one part being distributed on each of the transponder channels. In the case of a cable television system, there is only one physical channel, which is divided into a plurality of frequency bands, each containing one part of the ECM and EMM keys. At the authorized user or subscriber location, the downlinked channels are all recovered, as, for example, by providing one conventional receiver for each transponder channel, and the key portion information is made simultaneously available to the user. The division of the keys into multiple portions is reversed, and the keys become available for use by the user.
In a particularly advantageous embodiment of the invention, the receiver, instead of being a group of conventional receivers, is instead a multi-channel signal receiver such as that described in PCT Patent application 03/08365, filed Mar. 19, 2003 for McNeely. The McNeely application describes a receiver which enables a plurality of frequency channels to be simultaneously tuned so that broadcast channel programs included within the frequency channels may be simultaneously accessed. Signal processing circuitry including a filter bank is coupled to the signal source, and is operative to simultaneously provide baseband signals corresponding to the plurality of broadcast channel programs.
The simultaneous reception provided by the receiver of the abovementioned PCT application is accomplished, at least in part, by alias cancellation. The alias-cancelling reception provides a way to apply digital signal processing to radio-frequency (RF) signals, with relatively low clock rates. Those skilled in the art know that the term “radio frequency,” previously understood in a restricted manner, now has a meaning which embraces virtually all signal frequencies other than those in the range of visible light and ionizing radiation.
FIG. 5 is a simplified block diagram of a system including a plurality of processing units located at the head end or ground station of the system of FIG. 1 according to an aspect of the invention. In FIG. 5, it is assumed that 32 transponder channels are available on the satellite (not illustrated in FIG. 50), each capable of handling 8 audio/visual (AV) channels, together with EMM/ECM and other ancillary information. Of course, more or fewer transponder channels may be available, and each transponder channel may be capable of handling more or fewer A/V channels, and the corresponding numbers of elements in FIG. 5 are adjusted accordingly. In the arrangement of FIG. 5, a set of eight AV channels AV1, AV2, . . . , AV8 (one spacecraft transponder's worth of signals) are applied to the inputs of a corresponding set 5121 , of eight MPEG encoders 2121, 2122, . . . , 2128, which perform MPEG encoding as in the arrangement of FIG. 2b. The MPEG-encoded AV information is coupled from encoders 2121, 2122, . . . , 2128 to first transport multiplexer (MPX) 2161, of a set 516 of transport multiplexers, which also receives guide and dummy EMM/ECM information as in the arrangement of FIG. 2b, for time-division multiplexing the data onto a single path 2241. The time-division multiplexed data is coupled to a first encryptor 5301, of a set 530 of encryptors, for encryption by means of a key applied over a path 5341. Similarly, a set of eight A/V channels AV9, AV10, . . . , AV16 are applied to the inputs of a corresponding set 512b of eight MPEG encoders 2129, 21210, . . . , 21216, which perform MPEG encoding in the same manner as encoders 2121, 2122, . . . , 2128. The MPEG-encoded AV information is coupled from encoders 2129, 21210, . . . , 21216 to second transport multiplexer (MPX) 2162 of set 516, which also receives guide and dummy EMM/ECM information, for time-division multiplexing the data onto a single path 2242. The time-division multiplexed data is coupled to a second encryptor 5302 of set 530 for encryption by means of a key applied over a path 5342. Other groups of eight AV signals are similarly handled. For completeness, the last group is described, namely group of AV signals AV248, AV249, . . . , AV256. In particular, a set of eight A/V channels AV248, AV249, . . . , AV256 is applied to the inputs of a corresponding set of eight MPEG encoders 212248, 212249, . . . , 212256 of set 512N, which perform MPEG encoding in the same manner as encoders 2121, 2122, . . . , 2128. The MPEG-encoded AV information is coupled from encoders 212248, 212249, . . . , 212256 to thirty-second transport multiplexer (MPX) 21632 of set 516, which also receives guide and dummy EMM/ECM information, for time-division multiplexing the data onto a single path 22432. The time-division multiplexed data is coupled to a thirty-second encryptor 53032 of set 530 for encryption by means of a key applied over a path 53432. The keys are generated by a key generator block illustrated as 532.
Encryptors 5301, 5302, . . . , 53032 of set 530 of FIG. 5 differ somewhat from the corresponding encryptors of FIG. 2b. More particularly, each encryptor of set 530 of encryptors does not load the key information into the stream of data as described in conjunction with FIG. 2c. Taking encryptor 5301,as being representative, the key information is distributed in the manner illustrated in FIG. 6.
In FIG. 6, the keys which are inserted into the dummy EMM/ECM slots by encryptor 5301, of FIG. 5 are arranged in a manner such that at least some of the slots contain keys or key portions from other transponder channels. More particularly, the key information distribution represented in FIG. 6 includes keys K1a, K2a, K3a, K4a, K5a, . . . , KNa. Key K1a provides partial decoding information for program 1, corresponding to AV1 of FIG. 5, which program is carried on the same transponder channel as K1a. However, keys K2a, K3a, K4a,K5a, . . . , KNa carry partial decryption information for programs carried on transponder channels other than the first transponder channel. That is, keys K2a, K3a, k4a, K5a, . . , KNa are related to program a on transponder channels 2, 3, 4, 5, . . . , N, respectively. The remaining portions of the program 1 key, namely K1b, K1c, k1d, K1e, . . . , K1n are carried on other transponder channels. Similarly, the remaining portions of the keys for programs 2 through N are distributed among various transponder channels. Thus, the corresponding set of keys on the second transponder channel, corresponding to AV9, AV10, . . . , AV16 of FIG. 5, could include, for example, K1b, K2b, K3b, K4b, K5b, . . . , KNb, which would be the keys for decoding the second (b) program on each of the transponder channels. Other encryptors of set 530 of encryptors of FIG. 5 carry other sets of keys. The last encryptor of FIG. 5, namely encryptor 53032, inserts encryption keys K1m, K2m, K3m, K4m, K5m, . KNm into its dummy EMM/ECM locations in the data stream. Thus, all the keys are transmitted, but many of them are transmitted over transponder channels other than those carrying the corresponding program. In essence, the smaller sub-units K1a, K1b, K1c, . . . , K1X of a key K1 together constitute the information contained in K1; each sub-unit might represent one byte, or a group of bytes, of the information in K1, and these sub-units are distributed for substantially simultaneous transmission over a plurality of channels.
In the context of a traditional spacecraft delivery system, the distribution of the keys for the various programs among the spacecraft transponders might not be acceptable, because of the inability of the single-transponder-channel receiver 410 to receive the keys for all the associated program material. According to an aspect of the invention, a multiple-transponder-channel receiver is used at the subscriber location to receive at least the number of channels required to access both a program and the associated encryption key(s). In the simplest case, such as that described in conjunction with FIG. 6, a two-transponder-channel receiver would be required, one for the program on a given transponder, and a second for the corresponding key, which would, in general, be on a different transponder. Thus, when it is desired to receive program a from transponder channel 3, the program is accessed through transponder channel 3, but the corresponding key K3a is retrieved from transponder channel 1 (illustrated in FIG. 6). Thus, a multichannel receiver is required, in general, in order to access both a program and its associated key.
FIG. 7b illustrates the general tenor of the key distribution according to an aspect of the invention. In FIG. 7b, the processors 251, 252, . . . , 250N include their individual encryption blocks 216a, 216b, . . . , 216N, respectively, as in FIG. 7a. A key generator and decomposer illustrated in FIG. 7b as a block 232′generates the keys, but distributes them differently than does generator 232 of FIG. 7a. More particularly, generator 232′produces key 1 in the form of ECMa, key 2 in the form of ECMb, . . . , and keyN in the form of ECMN . In this context, ECMa=key1a; key2a; . keyNa, ECMb=key1b; key2b; . . . , keyNb, . . . , and ECMN=key1a; key2a; . . . , keyNa.
More complex assignments of the key information are possible. For example, it is possible to degenerate a key into two or more portions, and to transmit each of the two portions on a different transponder channel. A multichannel receiver will still be able to access all of the keys for all of the programs, so long as the additional processing power is available. In general, each key could be broken into many portions, and a multichannel receiver at the subscriber end can reconstitute the appropriate key, so long as the locations of the various portions are known.
FIG. 8a is a simplified illustration of the information stream in a traditional system such as a cable television system in which each separate “transponder” channel is on (or “in”) a different frequency range of the cable. In FIG. 8a, three transponder channels are illustrated, namely transponder channels 1, 2, . . . , n. The letter “V” represents a video packet, the letter “A” represents an audio packet, the letter “E” represents EMM information, and the subscript refers to the particular program to which the packet relates. In transponder channel 1, the sequential flow of packets is V1, V1, A1, E1, V1, V1, A1, E1, V1, V1, A1, E1, . . . , all relating to program information 1. In essence, transponder channel 1 carries all the program 1 information, together with its EMM information. Similarly, transponder 2 carries sequential packets V2, V2, A2, E2, V2, V2, A2, E2, V2, V2, A2, E2 . . . and transponder n carries sequential packets Vn, Vn, An, En, Vn, Vn, An, En, Vn, Vn, An, En. Each transponder channel thus carries its own program material and the associated code. Since the ECM key information is often provided every few milliseconds, so that a subscriber making a new connection does not have to wait too long for appearance of a decrypted program, and since the ECM keys change every few seconds, as for example every 30 seconds, it is possible to break the ECM information in time rather than in data content. This is illustrated in FIG. 8b, in which transponder 1 carries program information 1, transponder 2 carries program information 2, . . . , and transponder n carries program information n. In the arrangement of FIG. 8b, by contrast with the arrangement of FIG. 8a, the ECM information is switched among the various transponder channels. More particularly, in FIG. 8b, transponder channel 1 carries sequential packets V1, V1, A1, E1, V1, V1, A1, E2, V1, V1, A1, En, . . . , transponder channel 2 carries sequential packets V2, V2, A2, E2, V2, V2, A2, En, V2, V2, A2, E1, . . . , and transponder channel n carries sequential packets Vn, Vn, An, En, Vn, Vn, An, E1, Vn, Vn, An, E2, . . . . Thus, in the arrangement of FIG. 8b, the complete ECM message required to decode or decrypt the program data is broken into time sequential portions, such as portions E1, E2, . . . , En, and these time-sequential portions of the complete ECM message are switched among the various individual channels.
The multichannel receiver may be an array of conventional tuned receivers, or it may be the abovementioned alias-cancelling multichannel receiver.
A method according to an aspect of the invention is for communicating data over plural channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N). The method comprises the steps of selecting data to be communicated (A/V information), encryption information (K1a, K2a, K3a, . . . , KNa) and encrypting the data with the encryption information to thereby produce encrypted data. The selected data may be video information. The encryption information is broken into portions (ECMa, ECMb, . . . , ECMN). The encrypted data is communicated by way of at least one channel (transponder channel I) of the plural channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N). In one mode of the method, the encrypted data is communicated over but a single channel (transponder channel I). At least some of the portions of the encryption key information are communicated over at least one of the plural channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N) other than a channel over which the encrypted data is communicated.
According to another aspect of the invention, a method for providing program information to subscribers (426) comprises the steps of selecting a plurality of information streams (A/V information) to be communicated to the subscribers, and encoding each of at least some of the information streams with individual entitlement control information to thereby generate entitlement encoded information streams. Each element of the individual entitlement control information is broken into plural portions. The encoded information streams are communicated to the subscribers, with each of the encoded information streams being communicated over one of a plurality of independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N), or at least over fewer than all the physical channels. The plural portions of the entitlement control information are communicated to the subscribers, with at least some of the portions of each entitlement control information being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N). When different subscribers have different program entitlements, the method comprises the further step of generating individual entitlement management commands identifying those information streams of a particular program to which a corresponding subscriber is entitled. Each of the individual entitlement management commands is broken into plural portions. The entitlement management commands are communicated to the subscribers over at least some of the independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N), with at least some of the portions of each of the individual entitlement management commands being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N) . At each subscriber location, the information is simultaneously decoded in at least plural ones of the independent channels to thereby form decoded information. From the decoded information, at least that one of the individual entitlement management commands applicable to the subscriber is reconstituted, to thereby form a reconstituted entitlement management command. According to a further mode of this aspect of the method of the invention, only those of the information streams, entitlement encoded information streams, and entitlement control information corresponding to the reconstituted entitlement management command are made available.
A method according to another aspect of the invention is for providing program information to subscribers, where each subscriber has one of a plurality of different program entitlements. This method comprises the steps of selecting a plurality of information streams to be communicated to the subscribers, and encoding each of at least some of the information streams with individual entitlement control information to thereby generate entitlement encoded information streams. According to this aspect of the invention, the method breaks each element of the individual entitlement control information into plural portions. The information streams are communicated to the subscribers, with each of the information streams being communicated over one of a plurality of independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N). The plural portions of the entitlement control information are communicated to the subscribers, with at least some of the portions of each individual entitlement control information being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N). Individual entitlement management commands are generated, identifying those information streams of a particular program to which a corresponding subscriber is entitled. Each of the individual entitlement management commands is broken into plural portions. The entitlement management commands are communicated to the subscribers over at least some of the independent channels (301, 302, . . . , 300N), with at least some of the portions of each of the individual entitlement management commands being communicated over separate ones of the independent channels. At each subscriber location, the information in at least plural ones of the independent channels is simultaneously decoded to thereby form decoded information, and from the decoded information, at least that one of the individual entitlement management commands applicable to the subscriber is reconstituted, to thereby form a reconstituted entitlement management command. At each the subscriber location, only those of the information streams, entitlement encoded information streams, and entitlement control information corresponding to the reconstituted entitlement management command is made available for display. | 2019-04-25T16:22:11Z | http://www.freepatentsonline.com/y2007/0192586.html |
Here at Ramat Niseko we pride ourselves on providing 100% customer service, homely style accommodation and going above and beyond for the needs of our guests . But don’t just take our word for it, here is what our previous guests have said about our efforts.
Read unbiased opinions about Ramat Lodge at TripAdvisor.
A very good place to stay for travelers who come here for skiing a super nice host and nice staff, have a lot of fun will come back again!
The staff was extremely friendly and helpful. Provided rides to and from town. Felt at home immediately.
Very friendly and welcoming. Homely. Great host who is very friendly.
Bus to the resort in the morning was great. Pickup/drop off at Kutchan Station was easy. Staff and the overall vibe of the lodge was excellent.
All the staff/owners were very kind, accommodating and just wonderful people. They do free shuttle to the mountain in the morning and pick up/drop off at the train or bus center on arrival and departure. They even helped us send our snowboard bags off to the next location! It was such a peace of mind to know you will get there when you need to be and your stuff will arrive where it needs to be. Location was a bit of a walk in to the heart of town but there are free shuttles through out the day that drop you off just around the corner. The facilities were exactly as described, the house is nice and warm and there are many places to lounge about. There is breakfast in the morning which is delicious and it’s a perfect start to a day on the mountain. The bar and pool table make for lots of fun and excitement.
I cannot say enough good things about this place, I’ll definitely be back!
The Ramat exceeded everything my friends and I could have hoped for. They really go above and beyond to make sure you are comfortable and well accommodated. Beds were clean and tidy when we arrived, they have extra plug ins on each bunk to make sure everyone can charge your phones/ cameras. Each bunk group gets its own western style bathroom and a shower, and you are provided with a fresh towel (daily), shampoo, and body wash. The atmosphere is light and the staff is really friendly and helpful. They have a full board room that includes cubbies, board and boot racks, and hangers for all your gear. They even have a waxing bench with everything you would need. Best part about the room is its heated, my boots/ gear were nice a toasty every morning.
The free breakfast has everything you need to get fueled up and ready for the day, they have something for everyone to eat, and it doesn’t run out. The bar is great as well. They do happy hour everyday from 4-6 and the bar is open until 10. Everyone tends to hang out after a long day and make plans for the night at this time, great opportunity to get to know the staff better and other guests. We were there for the super bowl and the staff put it on for us ( around 9-10am) and we got a good crowd watching, so they opened up the bar early for us ha. We were traveling in a group of 11, but 8 of us were staying at another place. They didn’t mind all of them coming to the happy hour, they even let us play music and everything. Everyone one on the trip wished they had booked the Ramat.
They really do go above and beyond what is necessary to ensure you are comfortable and enjoying your stay. Just make sure to be respectful and a decent human being and you will love this place. I don’t think I’ll book anywhere else. Shout out to Gary, Lauren, and Miumi (sorry that’s spelled wrong) for all the local knowledge and always being happy to pour us a drink or give us a lift!!
Note: Don’t let the distance from town scare you away. This was something I worried about, but they run their own shuttles everyone morning, afternoon, and one around 10:15 at night. This always allows you access to the mountain and back home. They also have a standard bus stop close to the building that comes every 20-30 minutes that’s free. If all else fails, the walk is pleasant and only takes around 15 minutes, maybe 20 in gear.
Thankyou so much guys, you made my time in Niseko amazing! You are all so welcoming and warming, it really felt like home!
There is a shuttle bus 4 mins walk down the road which takes you to the slopes from 8:30am – 8:30pm, operating every 20mins.
Stayed here for a week at the end of January 2019. Had an amazing trip and the staff was fantastic! Gary and Michiko made our group feel like family and went above and beyond with their customer service. We all are looking forward to planning another trip in the future. Thanks Gary, Michiko, and the rest of the Ramat Niseko staff!
Excellent quality bunk beds. I slept wonderfully. Well ventilated, but warm rooms. Staff is unbelievably friendly and helpful. Went out of their way to help me with anything I needed numerous times. Heated room for gear is a bonus.
Really friendly staff who went out of their way to make us feel comfortable and inclusive. Was great being able to sit down and have a chat with staff and other guests in the shared common areas with plenty of tables and sofas to sit around. Loved the breakfast which was provided each morning with a selection of hot and cold foods to help fuel us for a day of snowboarding. Hot shower after a day on the cold mountain was great. Free wifi. Door to door service from/to the Welcome Centre upon our arrival and departure. Distance from main centre is not an issue as there is a free shuttle bus close by.
Great stay at Ramat. Room was comfortable and the venue had excellent facilities for the price. In particular breakfast and a drying room. Best part of this stay was the staff who go out of their way to support a good holiday including a free scheduled shuttle to the slopes in the morning and restaurants at night.
The bed was comfy, and the room was pretty warm!
Absolute best value for money. They provided transport from train station on arrival, early morning shuttle to Hirafu, Michi was extremely helpful in everything, place was clean and i was their first guest for the season, so had the place all to myself the first few days 😀 . Also love the ensuite in the room.
No problem walking back in the evening from Hirafu by myself.
A really good hostel, relatively close to the ski/snowboard area, with a hostel shuttle bus going there in the morning. The price is amazing, the breakfast is good, a recommendation for anyone going there. The staff is also really friendly, they brought me to the train station when I was leaving etc.
In Niseko to see some family members, and get in a bit of skiing, so selected the Ramat Niseko on price and location, rather than reviews. The only negative is that it’s a bit out of the Niseko village, BUT there are plenty of options to get back and forth, especially the east Village shuttle, which drops you off 50 meters from the front door.
Great breakfasts, excellent shuttle service to the Gondola for the 8.30am start, nice room, excellent washing and drying facilities, good beer, great people. What more could you want?
The accommodation was everything you need in a place to stay and more, the rooms and common areas were always tidy with plenty of things like darts, cards, pool table and a bar in the evenings. Great western style breakfast included in your stay and the staff were welcoming and made the effort to go above and beyond.
All the staff were friendly and helpful to the max. Quick pick up from the Kutchan train station, easy check in and gear storage, timely shuttles to the gondola, good tips on powder stashes for a Niseko newbie, fun conversation at the daily happy hour (bar is onsite and affordable), and always happy to help with random things. Place is a little out of town but they provide regular rides, or I just walked the 15 minutes each way for the most part. Good way to build an appetite, or work off a buzz, depending which direction you’re going. I was solo and had a room to myself, it was super comfy, clean and quiet. Just what you need when your focus is to maximize exposure to the japow. Would def stay again.
Incredibly warm staff and people. I felt like I was right at home.
Had a fantastic Xmas Stay over at Ramat Niseko from 23-28 Dec 2017! Excellent service from Katie and Joanne who helped me select the best option for car rental which was the Toyota Fielder, 4W drive, that got me safety to Niseko and back to Chitose Airport. Plenty of space and a very comfortable ride.
Accommodation was very homely. Nothing modern but very cozy place to stay. Room was big and I chose one with toilet and shower facilities! They fixed me closest to the main door and on level a where I had a much easier time getting my super luggage in!
Enjoyed the stay, together with the plenty amount of snow that came! Will definitely stay there again!
Simple breakfast but good enough to start your day !!
This hostel felt like a home away from home. Staff are so good here. Beds are comfortable, rooms are clean. They have free breakfast which was really good. The bar upstairs is a really fun place to socialise. Highly recommend staying here.
Unfortunately I managed to book my accommodation with Ramat for the wrong dates, but when I talked to the lodge manager Katie and explained my situation she helped me cancel my booking without charging the cancellation fees that I in fact should have had payed for my mistake. Very service-minded and nice to deal with. When I get back to Niseko I will first of all make sure I get the dates right, and then book Ramat directly again!
Stayed here for a week before Christmas. The staff were exceptional. Special shout outs to Michi, Barry and Will. You guys made our trip 11/10.
Lots of good times hanging at the bar after skiing.
Comfy warm room. East to get to town.
Yup we’ll be back for sure.
My wife and I stayed at Ramat for five nights in February. The lodge is your typical snow lodge, a bit dated but with a very homely feel. The staff were awesome – very friendly, always helpful and kept smiling even while we were reliving our epic day on the mountain despite the fact they’d been working all day! Already planning our next trip back!
The lodge is about a 15 minute walk from Hirafu village, but they run free shuttles for first tracks in the morning and a drop off and pick up shuttle for going out in Hirafu at night. The lodge itself had was well laid out and had a number of different areas for guests to hang out – tv area downstairs, bar upstairs with a pool table, and another lounge area. There was a hot Western breakfast buffet provided every morning, with plenty to eat before a big day on the mountain.
We had a double room to ourselves and it was HUGE and clean, with comfy bedding. The lodge was also safe enough that we didn’t feel the need to lock the door at all during our stay.
Would definitely be back and would recommend Ramat to others – especially if you’re a couple or small group who enjoy socialising with others at the end of the day. Or even a bit of friendly competition with a game of Crud! Big shout out to Brian and Will for playing great hosts during our stay too!
Off the bat Ramat is where its at! I knew when I first arrived at Ramat that it was going to be great because of the hostel guitar and the open auxiliary cord enticing a soon to be discovered room of DJ’s I am a music lover and past experiences this is the first thing I noticed and that’s never let me down. Where to start I am not sure originally booked in for 7 nights and my first time in Japan I had no idea what to expect, but this hostel made it feel like home right away.
Will picked me up from the Welcome Center no problem after a longer than planned trip, located a short 15 minute walk from town soon found the free shuttles all day made the hostel even closer to the ski hill, restaurants, shops and the town of Hirafu. Lots of clean large rooms lots of storage for your gear also completed with a drying room down stairs so that all your gear was dry and toasty for the next days powder. (best powder in my life and I live by what is known as the powder highway in Canada.) Geared towards skiing and boarding for sure lots of tools, also there is a great place to wax your board in the Snowgum lodge next door, I had the pleasure of staying there for a night also because we ended up staying an additional 4 more days in Niseko, we couldn’t leave it was too much fun.
Special thanks to Sue, Allen, Michi, Miho, Katie, Gary, Brian, Gabe, and Will . Who took care and helped us with everything from renting a car to making a delicious breakfasts, to some exploring showing us a great thrift store in the country. Always having a cold beer ready and delicious snacks. Allowing us to keep booking one night at time for two nights before for we finally knew that we were not going anywhere. Not getting too mad at my manger and I for our not at times so inside voices sometimes :). After riding hard all day my first thought would be to have a nap but once I reached the hostel and felt the energy and was surrounded by great people there were no naps to be had, great place I couldn’t picture being anywhere else nor would I have wanted to be already checking out flights for next year. Make sure you get to stay for a Thursday for the weekly crud match, Oh ya did I mention there is a pool table, darts, lots of snow banks for some late night sledding ( should be a couple green sleds donated somewhere at the lodge).
If you just want to chill there are a ton of movies down stairs and nice sitting area, also a group computer to huddle around and watch the days go pro footage. Can’t say enough everything you could ask for I love Ramat , Love Japan see you next year!
The staff are very welcoming and they put on social events to get everyone together from the two lodges for eg. we had a xmas buffet when we arrived with people from all over the world, a sake tasting and some great nights spent pares-ski around the bar and pool table. Even though you’re not in the centre of town, this is no problem as the staff do runs to and from town throughout the day and there is also the shuttle bus to get you around. We would definitely stay there again and in fact will be back again this year we loved it so much!
This place is amazing! I love eating and I wouldn’t trade this for a 5-star hotel with an all-day buffet! The owners showed us around the city and picked us up from the ski slopes when we requested. We visited in winter and the place kept us extremely warm (being for the tropics of north queensland!) I will be recommending this hotel to all my friends!
Nice concept to discover Japan skiing village.The staff is extremely helpful and friendly.They can advise on everything to do around (eat out, activities etc…)Place is clean and well located. Great bar.
We arrived late Christmas afternoon only to be invited to the family, staff & friends Christmas dinner at the neighbouring sister lodge Snowgum. Our stay only got better from there and over the 6 days we got to know all the staff who were all really accommodating and went out of their way to make all of our group feel welcomed.
Every night there seem to be a event of some type put on by the lodge. Mishi and Elena put on a great & cheap set menu one night, Garry and Barry kept the draft Sapporo flowing nightly at the bar and Alan the owner organised a guests and staff pool competition against a nearby lodge. Being outside of town wasn’t a problem as Barry and Garry regularly dropped anyone out to the village and it was only a 10min walk home, including the mandatory late-night-deep-fried-chicken stop in at the Lawson.
We later stayed at a private lodge but we commented how we missed the communal feeling we had a Ramat. I have been to Niseko three times and hands down it has been the best place to date. It will definitely be my first place I look, next time I go back.
What’s not to like. Family-style lodge with excellent staff, facilities and atmosphere. I stayed in the bunkroom, which is well equipped compared to most backpacker/budget accommodation. Clean room, clean bedding and towels supplied and plenty of space to store gear.
if you’re looking for a quiet, friendly lodge in the quiet end of town, then this is ideal. Transport around the village is fantastic – shuttle buses all the time, taxis and the lodge runs their own ‘First Tracks’ shuttle in the morning. Gets you to the gondola before it opens. I think it’s easier to get to/from the lodge to the lifts than it is in town. If you stay right in Hirafu, you need to walk up and down the hills. I’d rather get a bus!
Probably the best aspect of this lodge is the staff. Easy going, ridiculously helpful and knowledgeable about the mountains and town. More than happy to help with trips into town, bookings at restaurants (over the phone can be tricky…), getting about and general advice.
Bottom line – for the money a single traveller won’t find a better deal than this. For couples I suspect it’s much the same too. You won’t find a friendlier place on the mountain either.
Lodge was clearly a few years old and not as “pristine” as a hotel might have been, but it was clean and the apartment was very spacious for four people. The staff were friendly and very accommodating. Although it wasn’t ski in/ski out accommodation, the friendly atmosphere, free shuttles to town and spacious lodgings more than made up for it.
Bar and pool table/darts upstairs. Continental breakfast with fresh cooked eggs and/or porridge. Drying room for snow gear. Washing machine. In-house Thai massage. There are a couple of restaurants within walking distance which the staff will point out, but they also run people into the main street at night if they want to go out for dinner or drinks.
Did I mention the super friendly staff???!
From the warm welcome first by Gary at the bus station, to Sue, Erina and Mitchiko at the lodge, to the generous credit we had to put toward the bar, meals and other services, the advice and help with lift tickets,supermarkets, restaurants etc.
Nothing seemed to faze anyone – our lazy teens and late starts to the day must have been a pain to Gary who was already busy shovelling snow. But he and Mitchiko happily ferried us to the snow and beyond at any hour.
The kids were spoilt by an endless choice of DVDs, wii, pool table, playstation, bottomless hot chocolates and open fire place.They want to return every year and stay only at Ramat. As our 11 year old said: Ramat is better than a 5-star hotel with an all day buffet.
Thank you Ramat. We will definitely be back.
We had heard about Ramat from friends and we were wanting somewhere with our own bathroom and not too expensive, for the family. I had read the Lonely Planet guide of Japan and Katie answered any questions I had about skiing in Japan. Our stay was early in the season, and after Katie emailed us about the amount of snow they had had prior to us leaving, we were looking forward to our time in the snow! The email also contained what was happening over Xmas while we were there.
The staff- Gary, Mitchico and Katie were warm, friendly and welcoming. Nothing seemed too much to ask.
Had the BEST time here…. loved the warm welcome, lifts into town and the slopes pretty much whenever required, and the pool was great -…. not to mention the bar, and icicles and fresh pow outside the window to have with Baileys…. ?
All the staff are FAB! Were very happy to help and also leant us kit – when ours got damaged and leaked!!
Room was very warm ………too hot if not careful! ………. oh and the Thai massages on offer were fantastic — Jodi and I had a great time and would recommend this place to all..
Yes we are indeed the kind of picky spoiled Swiss who sniff at the quality of ski resorts, and we hardly ever return to the same place for vacation twice. But ever since we discovered the amazing powder paradise Niseko, we return there every year, and since ski season 2008/09 we are regulars at the Ramat Niseko (when they first opened).
Alan, Sue and Gary make you feel like family. Everything you need is arranged by them: Airport transfer, ski rentals, lift passes and any extra requests. Even if there is a shuttle bus stop very close to the lodge, they will make sure to drive you to the ski lifts in the morning, to town for onsen or dinner in the evening, to the ski rental place, supermarket and even to the doctor’s if you need it.
Me and 2 friends stayed at Ramat Niseko from 29 dec 2010 to 1 Jan 2011. The tripple room was perfect for us. 3 single beds. carpet is clean as new. good privacy, bathroom and wardrobe are separated. The living room and dining room upstair make us feel cozy at home. We feel safe eventhough the room was never lock !
Although the lodge is not walking to the ski field, Gary was wonderful , he send us to ski Field every morning, and drive us to ski rental shop and return the ski gear too, transport has never been an issue, the free shuttle run from 8 am to 9pm, if you miss the free shuttle, taxi is only 560 yen. Not a problem at all ! | 2019-04-24T13:55:27Z | https://ramatniseko.com/our-lodges/ramat-testimonials/ |
Last Saturday night, after we returned from a long day in San Pedro, which consisted of spending quality time with loving sponsors, we all sat around in the living room, not aware of the special treat that we were in for. Allison turned on the television and on came a video of a little Sarai on her birthday from years ago, dressed up in a full, pink, princess costume! We watched four videos, all of which were from many years ago, and every single person’s face in the room lit up as they watched themselves and each other from different birthdays− all the girls completely dolled up in costume, looking unbelievably adorable in each video. Jenci, with her cheeky smile, watched with laughter as she saw herself (at about four years old) running and talking in the video, looking quite the same as the cute girl that was smiling at us from the television screen.
One of the fun birthday activities that the video showed was of Jenci’s pirate themed party in which each of the girls had to attempt to bite one of the apples that were hanging by string on the swing set. Cracking up at all the attempts from the girls (both the babies of the group at the time and our university girls), we did not expect anyone to be able to bite onto the apple long enough to actually successfully take a bite out of it, but then little Ruby had her turn, and she surprised us all. She was so innovative and determined; there was no question in her eyes that she was going to do it. After less than half of a minute, she had nudged the apple in between her cheek and shoulder and was eating it in full bites until it was down to the core! Sweet, little Ruby was beaming at us from the screen, so proud of herself.
The most important parts of these videos was not just how adorable or excited the girls looked in them− though they certainly were incredibly cute. The amazing part was to see how connected as a family they were and how they have grown up so much since then and are still that tight knit group with double the amount of girls. It was simply heartwarming to watch! Each girl brings something different and just as special to the family. Whether it be Jenci with her silliness, Ruby with her cleverness, or Ruthy with her ability to make everyone laugh uncontrollably. Every single girl has such a loving heart, not only in general, but especially with one another in order to make up a loving family, and what a special family it is.
Dress rehearsal, layers and layers of makeup, last minute fixes to their costumes, and of course hours and hours of practice to have everything perfect for the big day. The summer dance recital was “A night in the Museums” in one of the fancy theaters in San Pedro Sula. Several of the girls practiced two hours a day apart from their dance classes up to the big day and so their skills progressed accordingly. By the night of the performance they had all adrenaline build-up that was proper for such a big night.
Cute elephants, beautiful giraffes, stately Cleopatras, daring acrobats, cheeky dolls, floral damsels, and cool police officers occupied the stage. The ones of us not on the stage were trying to keep up with the baby chatter on our laps: “When is Nahomy coming out?” “Is that Paola?” “I see Michelle!!” “Look! Look!” The little ones were as enraptured by the fascinating costumes, the drama, and of course the talented dancing as the grown ups were. The dancers performed two nights, and both nights for a full house. We even had a team visiting who joined us the second day to enjoy the production.
While the girls spent every spare moment in the weeks up to the show perfecting their moves for the big night, the aftermath has shown to be as beneficial. The girls saw that their work paid off and they witnessed the more proficient dancers demonstrating the next level of dance for them. They saw how much more there is to learn, and were on the challenge as soon as we made it to Burger King for a late night dinner after the recital. Once again we are witnessing how dance and gymnastics are improving their physical well being, their self worth, mental health and their zest for life and new challenges. We are already looking forward to next dance season.
The girls would never be able to have such opportunities as dance lessons without the help of sponsors like yourselves and the dance studio’s discount to our ministry. With more girls ready to start the 4 and 5 year old classes and some girls’ wish to take gymnastics, we are in need of more sponsors! The girls enjoy doing their part to help fundraise for their costumes by hosting lunches for any mission teams passing through town, which saw over 50% of funds raised for the summer presentation! If you or a dance studio is interested in sponsorship, please contact us or go to our donation page on our website. Thank you!
Read our Spring Newsletter with updates on all the girls.
Walking in the door after church, and already being fifth in the line for the bathroom - or even tenth in the line - is a very common occurrence in this house. With 23 girls to one bathroom, the girls have plenty of opportunity to practice the virtue of patience (and as many opportunities to ask for grace). And unfortunate is the girl who is not able to hold it, because with our lack of water these days, pants are not easily washed.
The house we live in has served us well, but it is safe to say that we have outgrown it. In fact we have outgrown most every rental house in existence in Honduras.
It has been a dream since EFP started 12 years ago to have our own property and a house to fit our needs. There have been ups and downs along that road when we have thought that something was right only to have it fall through in the very end, but we always knew that it was in God's hands and that we could peacefully wait on his timing.
Just a short ride from where we live now, sits 11+ beautiful acres of farmland and lava rock. With enough land to fit our vision of a homesteading pocket neighborhood and school, with lake access for adventures and fishing, this property will serve us more than we could have ever imagined. We have been looking at it for a few years, even though it has been too expensive for us. A couple of weeks ago, the owner dropped the price. With our savings from earlier fundraisers along with some recent generous donors we now have all the funds to buy the property. It all came together over two weeks, so we ourselves are quite overwhelmed. Sunday we signed the purchase agreement! It is still crazy even thinking about it, but so amazing and a dream come true. It will still be a couple of months of paperwork just to finalize the purchase, and after that construction permits, but eventually we will be able to build.
The girls to have room for a desk and personal items in their rooms.
Playroom with space for acro dance, ballet practice, and general play.
Wells on site to allow for toilet flushing, hand washing etc.
A school building with a classroom for each class.
Safe outdoor areas for the girls to play.
Room to house other forever families when needed.
Large garden and some farm animals.
And plenty of other things.
Praising God, our Father who made this possible for us.
Finding construction teams for the buildings.
Donating items for a container to be shipped.
Fundraising for all that needs to be done in the next few years.
And who knows, with everybody's help maybe the girls will never have to be more than third in line for the bathroom in the future.
Last week’s field trip was to the fire station - and we might have to go again.
What kid is not in wonder over real life heroes like firefighters? The EFP girls are no different, and last week they were able to get a close up look at the life of a firefighter when we went to the station for a visit.
We saw their techniques for getting ready and rushing out of the station as fast as they can when they are called to a fire, and we heard about each part of their job - from hosing down the fire to administering basic first aid to the injured. Ruby and Ana tried on the fireman's suits; they went through the obstacle course and learned how to work the fire hose in the awkward outfits. Their biggest take away from wearing the suit was: “It’s REALLY hot!! And heavy! And hard to move in.” Their eyes were shining as they spoke about it. The other girls tried on the firefighter helmets and were standing on each other’s toes trying to take in all the action. They learned some first aid and what information to report to doctors to prepare them for an incoming patient.
While first aid could be taught at the Learning Center, we prefer taking the girls on field trips. Five fully armored firefighters next to a huge truck are a lot more interesting to listen to than a guy in a classroom. They will remember this lesson, and as Denia said: “It was good because I have an idea of what a firefighter actually does - just in case I would like to do that some day.” We are looking forward to learning even more about firefighting sometime in the near future as we were invited back for another lesson.
Addison was crying at this point: “But I want to keep God as my father!!” The talk had turned in the direction of “What if Belkis ever got married.” Belkis immediately assured her, that not even an earthly father would change her relationship with Papi Dios.
Addison is one of the girls that have created a strong bond with Papi Dios. At two years of age, she would casually mention things that Papi Dios had told her in their conversations. She would even refuse to sing certain songs because Papi Dios did not want her to. Aracely and Denia too would from a very early age relate talks they had had with Papi Dios.
Wonder if I am actually loved? Wonder if I can truly be loved - being who I am? The thought does not depend on whether one is worthy or not - it is simply a common fear in humanity. Yet the sense of not being good enough has way too favorable conditions if your own biological relatives have abandoned you. For too many of the girls this is their daily reality.
We are more than happy to create a family, to disprove the girls´ conviction; be the family to tell them who they are in Christ: that they are loved; that they worthy. When Ruby had been in the States for an extended period of time, she talked excitedly about new friends, old friends, new gadgets, and fun experiences. When she calmed down about the wonders of the States and was asked what her favorite part about Honduras was, she didn´t hesitate: “My family - they love me for who I am.” It is a joy seeing how God works through Allison´s family to show the girls that they are loved. Not only Ruby, but every single girl at EFP is loved for exactly who she is by her Mom, Allison, by her sisters, and by staff and volunteers supporting EFP.
Even so, we still see the fear of not being wholly loved to a greater or lesser degree in the girls. They may become distant, moody, or hide themselves in fear of being intimately known. We are all entirely dependent on the Father of love to teach us to be loved, and to love others.
The Father is Love. He is the one, who enters our lives and the girls´ lives to perfect us in love and remove all fear. He is the one who can overcome past rejection and abandonment. Where He enters there is no fear, because He perfects us in love; perfects the girls in love.
that He will break down the fear of rejection and the fear of being unworthy, so every one of the girls will know His love.
that He will guide and teach Allison and every person surrounding the girls to show our love for them in a way that will make them recognize it.
that the Father´s love is what runs all of EFP.
February Newsletter is out, and once again fun visitors and proactive teachers and volunteers have made the month fun and educational.
“What did you do when you couldn’t do a one handed cartwheel? Did you give up and decide that it was not for you?” We were in the middle of a discussion about the value of not giving up when school work was hard. One by one you could see the lightbulbs going on in their heads. They had all been practicing for hours a day to learn every new move they were presented with in acro dance. The thought that the same tactic might be worth while when it came to school work was novel, but it had them thinking.
We are so thrilled that the girls are back in dance class. We cannot express our gratitude of the combined generosity of our sponsors and dance studio for making this happen! After the first acro dance class, they came running out: “Can we do that every day?” Never minding the answer, they certainly are doing acro everyday; before classes, in between classes, whenever they can get around to it in classes, and after classes. Seeing their energy, investment, and most of all the joy and confidence they gain from it makes it all worth the long drives to San Pedro Sula every Saturday for classes. Even after a jazz class, a ballet class, and an acro dance class Paola and Denia had stars in their eyes on their way into the contemporary dance workshop they had a chance to participate in. They cannot get enough.
Whether it is arts, sports, dance, or music, we see the value of signing them up for lessons and encouraging them in pursuing their passion. It affects their level of joy, energy, self-esteem, courage, and playfulness. They are making new friends and enjoying every single bit of both lessons and practice times. The conversation about school work we had last week is only one of many bits of everyday life that prove how important it is to their well being and positive development. So even though our couches are held together by duct tape, we lack ceiling fans in some rooms, and it is a challenge finding the money every time anyone needs new shoes, we cannot regret for even a moment prioritizing lessons that encourage their passions and build up their self-esteem.
Read our January Newsletter on being back in school and more excitingly, back to dancing.
“I can’t do it!!” Ana declared.
There was no doubt she meant it. She would shut down and sit immovable refusing to try again, to look at anyone, or to speak to anyone. It generally happened during reading or math and it easily took an hour before she was willing to talk or work again.
Ana was 13 when she first came to live with us. She has not had a chance at going to school before that and had to start with kindergarten at age 13. It has been an effort for her teaching her brain to make sense of the ant-like figures and nonsensical ornaments books contain. Learning a completely new skill at that age is hard. Seeing everybody around you reading long books, while you yourself are struggling with just recognizing each letter is discouraging. The feeling of hopelessness has without a doubt been real. She has been going to the Learning Center for over a year without ever really believing she would get the hang of it.
This summer we had a good friend and teacher visiting from the States who worked with her for a few weeks. Ana put an effort into following the daily lessons, but it took all of her energy. By the end of two weeks, her efforts paid off. Ana read a real book; an easy read of course, but nevertheless an actual book. What an achievement; her eyes shone with joy over her accomplishment and we were all inwardly jumping with delight for her.
With a cheeky (and exhausted) smile, Gaby said: “I think you are tired now, we should stop.” It was the fourth day in a row she had been struggling with homework until around ten at night. Even when exhausted she kept her spirit up, took a deep breath, vented through joking, and kept going, determined to catch up with where the others were.
Gaby started in a new school last week. Since they are following different systems, she has some topics - especially in math - that she needs to catch up on. On top of that, she has encountered a few mean girls. Regardless, she is resolved to do well in class, and she knows that it takes work.
Gaby was not always fond of school. Over the years she has been fighting both the concept of school and her different teachers. The development she is going through is beautiful to watch. She dreams of becoming either a veterinarian or chemist to create her own line of beauty products, and with a vision comes her dedication. Few things are better than a young person, who has a dream and the dedication to make it happen.
The EFP vision has always been about family - every child should have the chance of growing up in a loving family with lasting bonds. Naturally that has meant, our focus has been on quality over quantity - we cannot alone give every child in Honduras a family, but we can make sure that Allison’s girls grow up in the love and care of a mother and siblings.
Our hearts break for the amount of children in Honduras, that do not have a family. UNICEF estimates that there are over 170,000 orphans within Honduras (counting both children with no parents and children who are not able to live with their parents). For as long as orphan care has existed in Honduras, orphanages have been the way to deal with it. While the thought of raising children in a family should not be novel, it has not been the way to do it until now.
DINAF, the new child services that took office last year, have their focus on arranging for children to grow up in families or smaller group homes. They have made it a goal to have 100 children adopted in 2015 (the number of adoptions in 2014 was 38). Apart from the adoptions, DINAF is working with at least two ministries (and more coming) trying to place children in good and caring foster families. The ministries find the families and do inspections and check ups allowing DINAF to reach even more children with their limited budget.
We cannot be more thrilled about more Honduran children growing up in a loving family. Every child deserves a loving family. Not just the girls of EFP.
“Say Happy Birthday to me!” was Gisselle’s merry greeting from the beginning of the day. The confidence and sense of security with which she said it was like a warm hug. She knew it was her day, and she knew she was getting a cake. The only question was “Are you going to bake my cake?”.
This year nothing could ruin her day. She knew that everything was for her benefit because her family cares about her; the Minion cake, the Frozen balloons, the homemade cards and small gifts her sisters had for her. The joy in her eyes was worth gold. It is a treat watching her grow up; grow in security, grow in love, grow in joy, grow in self-confidence.
Knowing what a difference relations during the early years make through your entire life is a constant reminder of why family matters - and what a joy it is to have so much of it.
"Is it our turn now?" and "When are we going to school?" are shouts heard pretty much every time a group comes back from the Learning Center. The younger grades love coming down to do math. The older grades might be a slightly less enthusiastic, but they are all working hard, and with the intensity of the lessons, they are quickly developing their math skills.
While enjoying the holidays, we are determined on giving the girls the best education and the best chances for their future. The first week of July we had a teacher visiting to assess every girl's levels in math, reading, and writing. It is great having something to go from and be able to work with them in the areas they need extra help to get them up to speed on everything. So, that is what we are doing.
First through 5th grade are all busy with fractions in some form while middle and high school are working hard on getting a grasp on geometry. Everyone is challenged to the maximum, and with the intensity of the classes and their own dedication, they are taking huge leaps. It is amazing seeing the light in their eyes when they grasp a new facet of a subject and start doing it all on their own.
Thank you for all of you who make it possible for the girls to grow, learn, and thrive the way they do.
Beach Vacation, Summer Schooling, and Adoptions.
The stars in Yadira’s eyes when she talks about nursing classes lighten the entire day. Yadira is so good at caring for people. The love and patience she has with Allison’s toddlers and the kind manner with which she cares prove what a brilliant nurse she will be. And there is nothing she would rather do.
After helping Allison for a year with the babies, Yadira started taking nursing classes on the weekends all the while helping Allison the rest of the week. She has been studying for half a year now and has a year to go. It is no doubt tough - studying is hard work, and every skill to learn is a challenge - like finding people’s veins for taking blood or muscles for injections.
She only needs to be reminded of why she is doing it, and she pours her energy back into the work. When the babies have a fever she takes the chance to practice what she has learned. Last week she started doing her mandatory practice and did her first hours with Elvira (who is nearing the end of her medical degree) on her shift at the hospital. Things just got real and despite tired hours of studying, the stars in her eyes are as bright as ever.
Having a shot at living your dream is not a given in Honduras. If you do not have wealthy parents who can support you, there is really no way of finding the money to go to college. We are so blessed to be able to stand by these girls as they tackle what the world throws at them and see God work miracles through them and let them flourish. Thank you all so much for standing with us and supporting them to make their dreams come true!
This past week we have spent painting the entire house. We have to admit that it was long overdue. The real reason for us finally taking the initiative to do it though is a longer story.
The Honduran child services, IHNFA has been abolished over the last year and an all new organization, DINAF put in its place. DINAF has shut down most of the public orphanages and wants to focus on having all children adopted instead, placed in foster care or smaller group homes. That is great news for the Honduran children, but for Allison’s family, it has been a bit of a threat as some of the girls would go directly on the adoption list with Allison having no chance of adopting them.
As several people in Honduras are in the same predicament, DINAF has agreed to give a 90 day window for anyone who has had a child in their care for more than a year to adopt them. It does give us a bit of extra work and expenses, but it is thrilling to know that Allison might be able to adopt her own children.
So, apart from health checks, birth certificates and the like, the application has to include pictures of the entire house. This was of course the initial offset to this week’s project, but adoption or not - it is amazing living in a house with neatly painted walls. Love looking around our single colored rooms and the sense of tranquility it spreads.
Another thing we need is an American adoption agency to write a letter for each girl stating that if Allison should ever choose to return to her home country with her adopted kids, that the agency would take care of check ups statewise. We cannot afford international adoption for all of the girls, and we have no reason to either. Allison has no plan of moving back as both Allison and the girls’ home is here. Nevertheless, we still need the letters, so if you know of a company that would write such letters for the girls for an affordable amount of money, please let us know. | 2019-04-23T08:16:06Z | https://www.eternalfamilyproject.org/blog |
A Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty?
Most of the people reading this probably haven’t heard of the Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty (LCRL). I hadn’t heard of the LCRL until this past summer, and it wasn’t until this last semester that I really understood what the LCRL is and what they do. As part of a research paper for my Christians and Ethics course this semester, I examined the LCRL and reviewed its functions in light of the classical view of Lutheran two-kingdom theory.
The LCRL is a “special initiative” of the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LC-MS) located in Washington D.C. The LCRL monitors and engages with political and ethical issues surrounding the first amendment, marriage, and abortion in two distinct ways. Firstly, it educates and connects congregations and individuals within the LC-MS concerning critical political developments in Washington. Secondly, it performs limited political lobbying within IRS guidelines for non-profit organizations. The question I ask is simple: is this sort of political involvement in line with the classical view of God’s two-kingdom rule?
Based on the above statement, the LCRL performs both public and private functions within the church. In its public function, the LCRL engages political leaders and performs limited lobbying on behalf of the LC-MS. In its private functions, the LCRL serves to educate and connect with LC-MS congregations and individuals about political issues concerning religious liberty.
In my paper, I argue that the LCRL’s function as a lobby in most cases stretches classical two-kingdom theory concerning the role of the church, while the LCRL’s function as educator operates within two-kingdom practice for the benefit of the church and all people.
The two kingdoms are often distinguished by the terms right-hand kingdom and left-hand kingdom. The right, in its simplest understanding, is the realm of the Church and salvation, while the left hand is the realm of social order overseen by government and other secular authority. This distinction is deeper than the typical American understanding of the separation of church and state. Though they remain separate, these kingdoms are not in competition with one another but are both instituted by God coexisting for the good of man. The Christian life takes place within the right-hand kingdom so that men might be reconciled before God and in the left-hand kingdom that men might live peaceably and be blessed in this earthly life.
Since the left-hand kingdom is made up of both Christian and non-Christian sinners, it requires laws for order, peace, and security. However, the coercion of these laws cannot solve but only curb the problem of human sin. Thus, the right-hand kingdom of Grace does not expect temporal government to do God’s perfect will. The role of the right is not to ensure perfect earthly obedience but to bring about and uphold salvation through Christ. In this light, it may be problematic for a Lutheran synodical body which confirms the classical Lutheran two-kingdom teachings would perform political lobbying in Washington D.C. This lobbying engages in the shaping and guiding of earthly obedience. To be clear, the LCRL does not employ the means of Grace or the Gospel as a tool for coercion. Instead, the LCRL functions in the left-hand kingdom using human reason and the Law of God as guide concerning political and moral issues. However, since the LCRL still functions as an entity within the LC-MS, it always carries right-hand kingdom implications along with it. The involvement of a right-hand kingdom organization in left-hand kingdom rule can result in blurring the Gospel with the Law and making the church look more concerned with social order than with salvation even if this is not really the case.
While the LCRL’s role in public civil engagement may not completely fit within the classical two-kingdoms theory, its role as educator certainly does. This is because the two kingdom warning of involvement within the political realm is not to Christian individuals whose vocation as citizen may call for them to be engaged in such matters. As an agent of the LC-MS, the LCRL does well to educate congregations and individuals about current and future legislation. The LCRL is also armed with God’s word so that it can encourage members of the church to take action according to their callings as members of both the left and right hand kingdoms.
The two-kingdom Theory is an integral part of how the early Lutheran reformers and the historical Lutheran church views both the Church’s and the Christian’s place in society. This theory is as important now as it ever has been because the ethical climate of the western world has become more hostile toward orthodox Christianity. While valuable, this theory can be stretched to apply outside of the reformers original intentions and context. Lobbying activity performed by the LCRL may be one example of such stretching insofar as it takes a direct role in the American legislative process. While one function may be a stretch of the classical view of the two kingdoms, the LCRL’s role on individual and congregational education falls directly within the classical two-kingdom model as well as the reformers’ understanding of Christian liberty and vocation.
I am not writing this to attack the LC-MS or the LCRL. Instead, my aim is to start a conversation about the place of the Church and its voice in the midst of the political and ethical failings of our government. Is church-organized lobbying a good solution, or does the responsibility of political action fall on the vocations of the church’s members?
In terms of advocating on behalf of religious liberty, the Apostle Paul did, at times, appeal to the rights of his Roman citizenship. I believe that Paul would have done the same thing on behalf of one of his congregations, if was ever in a place to do so. If you could prevent your flock from being robbed by the government or attacked by angry mobs, wouldn’t you do what you had to? Isn’t this similar to what Justin Martyr did?
We obviously don’t face that level of persecution in 21st Century America, but the culture and the laws of the land are turning against us. If the LCMS can lobby the government in order to protect its people from persecution, and they can do so according to their rights as citizens, don’t you think this is a good thing? What good are civil rights if we don’t use them?
As far as the denomination advocating for legislated morality, I think that gets a bit closer to crossing the line. In the case of the right to life, however, I think the stakes are so high that we must speak up. Advocating for the lives of the most vulnerable is not necessarily a confusion of the Two Kingdoms. I think it falls more into the category of loving your neighbor and seeking to protect him.
Ken, I believe you are completely right that we must speak up when it comes to issues surrounding life and abortion. Moreover, by “we” I mean Christian citizens. There is certainly a place for the church to speak on this matter, I just don’t think it is the role of the church corporate or a synod like the LC-MS to be involved in the shaping of public policy. Leave that to the individual and let the church do what it does best, forgive sinners, even those who murder the unborn.
We may have to agree to disagree on this one, brother. You’re starting to sound a bit like Reformed Christians when they talk about regulative principle of worship… “well, technically the Bible doesn’t say that the church should use instruments on Sunday morning, so we should all just sing acapella… and only sing the psalms, too.” I’ve had Christians tell me that the Bible only gives us examples of Christians giving money to help poor Christians, therefore Christians should not give money to help poor non-Christians. What about being freed by the gospel to love our neighbors? Is it wrong to send money to medical missionaries helping unbelievers, or aid ministries providing food to the poor? I think those are good things, things which are pleasing to God, but they are not explicitly commanded in Scripture. The segments of the Reformed tradition who insist that the Bible only gives us examples of Christians giving money to help other Christians are technically correct.
You’re right that the primary role of the corporate church is Word & Sacrament ministry, but if the church corporate is fulfilling that ministry, I’m not sure why it is wrong for them to advocate before the government on behalf of their people. I’ve seen serious issues in the Reformed tradition when Christians are so adamant that the church can only do x, y, and z. They make sharp distinctions between the mission of the church versus the responsibilities of individuals, which are necessary distinctions, but at times it can become an excuse for callousness and inaction.
I think Lutherans in America are leary of joining the religious right, as they should be. There is such a confusion between God’s relationship to the church, and God’s relationship to the state in that movement. They think God’s only going to bless us if we make His Law the law of the land. Another example of this is the Federal Vision Movement. Let’s call that falling off the horse on the right side.
At the same time, look at the Protestant churches in Nazi Germany who tacitly or openly supported Hitler. Boy, did they keep the Two Kingdoms separate! That was some great theology, huh?
I was in a Bible Study once where the teacher said that Christians would have been right to turn in Jews in Nazi Germany because the Bible tells us we must submit to the government. I think we can call that falling off the horse on the left side.
I think the church needs to be somewhere between those extremes. Its good for the church to advocate for religious liberty on behalf of its people, because if we don’t, our freedoms will most certainly be eroded much more quickly. At the same time, its bad for the church to confuse God’s law for Ancient Israel with the law that is supposed to govern our land. Its good for the church to advocate on behalf of the unborn, the disabled, the elderly, and the poor, but its bad for the church to become confused and think that God isn’t going to bless their church unless the government of the United State changes its position on the right to life.
Anyways, definitely good stuff to discuss. Thanks for the interaction.
I think the LCMS is going way too far on this issue in a foray into politics and I even have my doubts as to the educational role within the church. I live in the northeast but have contacts in the Bible-belt who were brutalized by evangelical churches who seek, not only a union of kingdoms but hegemony in politics, social order, and economics to the point where the Church is a negative in their lives. The educational segment leans too heavily in a vote-directing capacity and we already suffer from a lack of vision on many issues preferring to criminalize and drive things under ground rather than prevent. I don’t see the right-hand remaining clean and far too many Lutherans have already succumbed to Americanization within the church.
Blind acceptance of economic order already undermines stewardship without regard to the actual nature of earnings and property(7th commandment). Profit motives undermine contentment (9th and 10th Commandments). Theses issues, in turn, create incentives to abortion (5th) and easy divorce/ separation (6th), which feed back into abortion. Life and property as rights of the individual leaves us open to the most violent interpretations of the 2nd Amendment, rather than a constabulary one – it conflates “the people” with “each person”, sows fears, and even the notion of self-defense is easily perverted to the cause of abortion when the child can be seen threatening the economic or mental well-being of a woman – it makes the child an aggressor. We have to learn to see the Law as so integrated as to be a monolith not tolerating raising one aspect above others. Even if we go to order or precedent, the 5th ranks below idolatry. But, since we forgo trying that one out in the public realm, we decide, instead, to lord over others with a quasi-religious notion of some of God’s Law being applicable to all, regardless of opposing religious notions (polygamy, abortion, homosexual marriage) as if no one is free to embrace these things. this is seen in the US as conservative, right-wing, and Christian.
Do you know how many people think that “God helps those who help themselves” or “teach a man to fish…” are from scripture? Why? because if it seems right by political dogma, it must be Christian in such a Christian country. How many think that wealth or even nationality are signs of God’s favor?
We can act for justice in distribution of wealth, goods, and services to work against abortion and divorce, shore up the family. We can clamor for increased spending on infrastructure (and reap the job creation from this) all the while taxing most heavily those who most profit from the infrastructure and re-create a middle-class. We can reduce consumption and insist that wages are brought up by, yes, forcing profits down. It is not like unbounded profits and poor distribution are things of nature, they are things created by rules we’ve invented and we can invent new ones. The first thing we need to do is stop using faith to support capitalism, profit, investment, interest, pollution, greed, prisons. Simply acknowledge that all we have, the whole world, was given for the whole of mankind and intended to provide well for all mankind. Come to grips with the notion that surplus, profit, above the value of what is produced (that’s the actual definition), does not appeal to anything of God. In other words, target the temptations and incentives, not the resulting actions. This is seen in the US as godless, liberal, anti-Christian.
Sometimes, doing what is best for our neighbors is not what they want, but what they need. In church, we don’t allow our food pantries and aid money to enable people to gamble, by drugs, drink. Perhaps we should also refrain from enabling their flawed senses of human judgment against groups of people and actions they deem are worse than their own or to the worship of wealth. To that end, I don’t think Synod should be doing this unless they are ready to turn on all the ways of man in favor of God’s ways, call these things what they are, forsake nationality, and cease speaking of rights rather than gifts.
I think it’s unnecessary to conflate capitalism with pollution, greed and prisons. Just because a person is a capitalist, does not make that person a Social Darwinist, global warming denier, or robber of the underclasses. Capitalism, just like everything else in a sinful world, must be regulated to prevent abuses, but it is the abuses that are bad, not the entire system.
To say that capitalism is un-Biblical is to say that the 7th, 9th, and 10th Commandments are invalid. Capitalism, most essentially, is a pretty simple concept: you have the right to own property without having someone steal it from you and you have the right to sell or trade that property for a price that is mutually agreed upon.
Some people pretend that any government oversight or regulation is the equivalent of Socialism. Those people have never read Marx. Unfortunately, knuckleheads on the right have overused the word Socialism so much that the vast majority of Americans believe that any form of welfare, any form of government regulation, or any type of government-run economic stimulus automatically equates to Socialism, as if every economic action can either be defined as Capitalistic of Socialistic. It’s unfortunate that those people don’t realize there are a million economic philosophies and theories that could properly fall under the broad “Capitalism” label, without adhering to some sort of Ayn Rand styled Libertarianism/Social Darwinism.
I don’t know specifically what the LCMS is lobbying for, but I don’t necessarily see all political lobbying by a religious body to be out of bounds. I think it just has to be done with some necessary dangers/pitfalls in mind. The LCMS shouldn’t join arms with the religious right on all issues (maybe not most of the religious right’s pet issues), but I think it would be good for the interests of their people to be represented before the government. We do live in a democracy, after all. Isn’t that a good thing? Wouldn’t a proper understanding of vocation inform us that we should work within our rights as citizens?
I agree with much of what you say but the economy we practice and property rights we espouse do, indeed, counter stewardship. “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein…” (Ps 24:1). There is only one property owner and the disposition of His property is to be according to His will.
The Church Fathers were firm in the resolve that while one may hold private property one ought to dispose of it in a Christian manner so as to prevent privation and certainly saw usury, greed, wealth accumulation and profit as evils. Why? Because they had the economic sense to see that a finite world was provided for us, infinite growth was neither possible nor desired. They held that value was added only in a person’s labor. In other words, there could be no surplus. These things were, indeed, cited as issues of contentment, greed, envy, competition and theft. For everything accumulated in excess of need came at cost to someone else, and it still does. I endured a lot of lot finance folks and libertarians and growth-obsessed people in my pursuit of an economics degree. It all leads, inevitably, to pollution (waste) and prisons (this nation has the most) and is driven by greed. the “profit motive” (greed) is cited as the prime mover (Econ 101). Agreed upon pricing is not a relevant issue simply because cost, price, and value are not synonymous. In order for price to generate profit, it is logically necessary for one to sell at greater than value.
We were not born in Geneva, we are from the Church and ought to look to the Fathers in their criticism of real property, enclosure of the commons to obtain rents as reward for service to the crown, the origin of the lots and blocks we have, today.
We can even turn to the Large Catechism: “For to steal is nothing else than to get possession of another’s property wrongfully, which briefly comprehends all kinds of advantage in all sorts of trade to the disadvantage of our neighbor…For, as we have just said, to steal is to signify not only to empty our neighbor’s coffer and pockets, but to be grasping in the market, in all stores, booths, wine- and beer- cellars, workshops, and, in short, wherever there is trading or taking and giving of money for merchandise or labor…Furthermore, in the market and in common trade likewise, this practice is in full swing and force to the greatest extent, where one openly defrauds another with bad merchandise, false measures, weights, coins, and by nimbleness and queer finances or dexterous tricks takes advantage of him; likewise, when one overcharges a person in a trade and wantonly drives a hard bargain, skins and distresses him. And who can recount or think of all these things? To sum up, this is the commonest craft and the largest guild on earth, and if we regard the world throughout all conditions of life, it is nothing else than a vast, wide stall, full of great thieves…No more shall all the rest prosper who change the open free market into a carrion pit of extortion and a den of robbery, where the poor are daily overcharged, new burdens and high prices are imposed, and every one uses the market according to his caprice, and is even defiant and brags as though it were his fair privilege and right to sell his goods for as high a price as he please, and no one had a right to say a word against it.” Selling above value is easily theft.
“This is, in short, the course of the world: whoever can steal and rob openly goes free and secure, unmolested by any one, and even demands that he be honored. Meanwhile the little sneak-thieves, who have once trespassed, must bear the shame and punishment to render the former godly and honorable.” Prisons for the poor.
“Therefore let every one know that it is his duty, at the risk of God’s displeasure, not only to do no injury to his neighbor, nor to deprive him of gain, nor to perpetrate any act of unfaithfulness or malice in any bargain or trade, but faithfully to preserve his property for him, to secure and promote his advantage, especially when one accepts money, wages, and one’s livelihood for such service.” Imagine being driven, not by personal gain or profit (capitalism) but by the other person’s advantage over you.
True, we need oversight and regulation. But the path to that has to begin with and admission of what we actually have and most Christians in this nation, particularly evangelicals, confessional Lutherans, and right-wing Catholics are more taken with the system which is built upon personal interest and private greed. If you aim for a system that is based on your own interests and allowing people to further their own interests rather than a system which demands always the interests of the other at personal cost, your regulation and oversight will not be honest or properly directed.
Granted, this is a sinful world. But we need to say that in terms as specific as we seem to be able to say things concerning social issues, that the natural law demands a just distribution, just as it defines sexuality and condemns murder. We do not. Privation leads to stealing to provide, fear, abortion, violence and prisons. The proof is in front of us, daily. We accept certain evils with words like “materialism” and “consumerism” rather than point to underlying motivations and the corrupt system that demands even servitude to it in exchange for a simple livelihood. Otherwise, who cares if we are free or muzzled in the public sphere?
I absolutely agree that Christians should faithfully give to support the ministry of the church, the relief of the poor, the spread of missions, etc. To say that, however, is different than saying that the government has a right to take what I own and give it to another. I think this is where a proper understanding of the Two Kingdoms comes in, as well as a proper understanding of Christian freedom. The Lord blesses me as He sees fit, and it is my responsibility to steward those blessings, not the government’s responsibility.
I do believe in a minimum social safety net for helping those most vulnerable, but the system as it currently stands in the US goes far beyond that. My wife and I were relatively poor for the first few years of our marriage, and we lived in some pretty ghetto apartment complexes. A lot of our neighbors were working the welfare system, lying about their income, refraining from marriage because the “wife” could get more benefits for her children that way, etc. I’ve also seen members of my family/extended family abuse the welfare system by spending their welfare checks on new iPhones, vacations, and going out to eat. How can a person with no job afford an iPhone 6 and a vacation? The system is horribly abused, and I think we would all benefit if some of that capital was freed up to create jobs, wealth, and technology.
Which brings me to a second point – I disagree that resources are inherently limited to the number of people on the planet. It is possible to create wealth and to create a surplus through increased efficiency and technological innovations. The green revolution in agriculture has created a surplus that we did not think was possible in the 1970s. The average person around the globe today enjoys a far higher standard of living than his grandparents, and especially his great grandparents. That’s not to say that there are no sustainability issues, or that there is no economic instability. There are also people who get abused horribly by this system. Those are all things that need to be addressed, but I don’t think we’ve got a better model to work with than capitalism. Capitalism is like democracy. It’s the worst possible economic system you can think of, except for every other economic system. That’s just part of living in a fallen world. Rather than bashing capitalism, we should try to make it work better, because we really don’t have a better model to work with. | 2019-04-26T06:50:27Z | https://thejaggedword.com/2016/05/04/a-lutheran-center-for-religious-liberty/ |
Neuro-imaging holds great potential for predicting choice behavior from brain responses. In this study we used both traditional mass-univariate and state-of-the-art multivariate pattern analysis to establish which brain regions respond to preferred packages and to what extent neural activation patterns can predict realistic low-involvement consumer choices. More specifically, this was assessed in the context of package-induced binary food choices. Mass-univariate analyses showed that several regions, among which the bilateral striatum, were more strongly activated in response to preferred food packages. Food choices could be predicted with an accuracy of up to 61.2% by activation patterns in brain regions previously found to be involved in healthy food choices (superior frontal gyrus) and visual processing (middle occipital gyrus). In conclusion, this study shows that mass-univariate analysis can detect small package-induced differences in product preference and that MVPA can successfully predict realistic low-involvement consumer choices from functional MRI data.
Copyright: © 2012 Van der Laan et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Funding: This work was supported by a governmental research grant of Agentschap NL (FND08009). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Despite the public fear of evil marketers tapping into the consumer’s brain to obtain hidden information, the usage of neuroimaging in consumer research is rising . Most commercial and scientific studies on consumer behavior still employ self-report measures, such as questionnaires, to evaluate products and packages , . However, the potential of neuroimaging techniques, especially fMRI, to gain more insight into consumer decision-making processes appears to be high. The pioneering study of Knutson et al. showed that a logistic regression model with neural activation of the insula and the nucleus accumbens could predict the decision to buy a wide range of consumer products with 61% accuracy. Recent fMRI studies employing the general linear model, i.e., traditional mass-univariate analysis, have shown comparable accuracies (e.g., an average of 56% accuracy, ) or yielded important insights in the neural underpinnings of consumer choices , . For instance, Chib et al showed that there is a common representation of the value of different consumer goods in the brain and Kang et al showed that the computation of both hypothetical and real decisions regarding consumer products involves the same brain areas. In addition, fMRI studies using mass-univariate analyses have focused on specific product characteristics, such as perceived healthiness , organically grown logo’s and packaging aesthetics .
A promising development in the field of consumer neuroscience is the recent application of multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA) to fMRI data . The advantage of MVPA over the traditional mass-univariate analysis is that they employ associations between voxels (activation patterns) and that they allow for differential responses across individual voxels . It is well-acknowledged that this makes MVPA more sensitive than traditional mass-univariate fMRI analyses . Tusche et al were the first that applied MVPA to fMRI to predict consumer choice. They showed that the hypothetical decision to buy a car could be predicted with 70–82% accuracy by activation patterns in the insular and medial prefrontal cortices.
It is impressive that the choice for a high involvement consumer product, like a car, can be predicted with such high accuracy. However, it is yet unknown how accurately lower involvement every-day decisions, such as those made during grocery shopping can be predicted by MVPA. Therefore, we here assess the accuracy of such techniques for predicting low-involvement consumer decisions. To our knowledge, we are the first to use multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA) to investigate realistic low-involvement package-based consumer choices. A good test-case for this category of decisions is food choice. A first important characteristic of food choice (and low-involvement consumer decisions in general) is that they typically involve choices between relatively homogeneous sets of alternatives with much smaller variations in value. For instance, when someone stands in front of the cookie shelf, the decision to buy cookies, and not another type of snacks, has already been made. The next decision is which kind of cookies to choose from the relatively homogeneous set of alternatives.
A second important characteristic of food choices is that foods are usually packaged. Thus, product characteristics have to be inferred from the package. The impression that a package is intended to create in the mind of the consumer is affected by package characteristics like size, shape, color, images and text. Several studies with unpackaged foods have shown differential neural responses to high and low hedonic foods . However, it is unknown whether this also holds for package-induced differences in preference. One of the current trends in food packaging design is to put emphasis on the healthiness of foods by highlighting nutritional information or health logos. This is believed to be an effective strategy to promote buying, because consumers themselves state that the healthiness of a food is an important motivation for their food choices . However, studies on the association between perceived healthiness and preference have yielded ambiguous results. Some studies suggest that labeling a food as ‘healthy’ decreases behavioral preference for the food , while others show no , or a positive effect , . Therefore, it is not clear whether emphasizing healthiness is helpful in promoting healthy food choices. Another packaging feature which has been shown to affect consumer choices is its aesthetic value , . However, the effects of aesthetic value have not been studied in the context of healthy food choice.
In the present study, our first aim was to replicate the brain regions that respond to preferred food packages by using traditional mass-univariate analysis. Our second aim was to investigate to what extent brain activation can predict everyday food choices, with the use of MVPA. We employed a realistic food choice paradigm in which subjects had to choose between two alternatives of the same snack food with different packaging designs. More specifically, the choice was between two alternatives in which the packaging either emphasized the healthiness of the food or not. To gain more insight in the underlying factors of choice and the underlying neural processes, a more exploratory third aim was to assess the predictive value of perceived healthiness as well as other self-report measures involved in food choice (e.g., attractiveness, purchase intention), and to what extent the strongest self-reported predictors of choice correlate with neural activation.
To localize brain regions that respond to preferred food packages and that correlate with the main self-reported predictors of food choice, we used both mass-univariate and state-of-the-art MVPA. Traditional analyses were employed to replicate previous findings. The major contribution of the present study is to apply multivariate pattern analysis to predict choices for food items that vary in their packaging.
The study was approved by the Medical Ethical Committee of the University Medical Center Utrecht and subjects provided written informed consent.
The study comprised twenty women as subjects (age range 19–29; mean age 22.4 years; BMI range 19.2–24.7; mean BMI 21.7 kg/m2). Inclusion criteria were being female, having an age between 18 and 30 years, being right-handed and having a healthy weight (BMI between 18.5 and 25 kg/m2). Only female subjects were included because research showed that the brains of males and females respond differently to food stimuli , and that they differ in their eating behavior . Exclusion criteria were smoking, having a food allergy, having an eating disorder, having a current alcohol consumption of >28 units per week, having a history of medical or surgical events that might significantly affect the study outcome, such as metabolic or endocrine disease, or any gastro-intestinal disorder. We excluded women that followed a diet in the past six months or that had weight fluctuations of more than five kg in the past six months, so as to exclude subjects which might show biases in their food choices for weight management reasons. In addition, women were excluded if they indicated a low (<5 on a nine-point scale) liking for cookies or dairy products in the screening questionnaire. Subjects were recruited with posters at the University Medical Center Utrecht and the adjacent university campus. At the time of recruitment, the aim of the study was not disclosed to the subjects because this could influence their responses. The cover story was that subjects were needed for a study on neural processing of novel foods. They would be required to view and evaluate pictures of novel food products and would receive one of these products as afternoon snack. At the end of the study participants were informed about the actual aim of the study.
The study consisted of two sessions, at least one week apart. During the first session, subjects completed a computer task in which they evaluated the expected tastiness of the stimuli, i.e., the pictures of food packages. During this task, each stimulus was shown for four seconds, after which subjects had to indicate on a nine-point scale how tasty they thought the food product would be. This was done in order to ensure that none of the participants had an aversion towards the stimuli. During the second session, subjects were scanned using functional MRI while performing a food choice task. Subjects were instructed to refrain from eating and drinking (except water) for at least three hours (mean 205±27 min) prior to this session. Before and immediately after scanning, subjects rated hunger, thirst and satiety on a visual analog scale. After scanning, subjects were seated behind a computer to evaluate the stimuli on expected tastiness, perceived healthiness, fat level of the food, attractiveness of the packaging and purchase intention, on a nine-point scale ranging from 1 = very untasty/unhealthy/etc to 9 = very tasty/healthy/etc. Also, subjects indicated the price (€) that they would be willing to pay for the product.
The visual stimuli consisted of 38 color images of food packages: 19 food products (nine dairy products and ten types of cookies) in two different designs. The packages were designed so that they varied in perceived healthiness. Health is an important self-reported motivation for food choice and health aspects are currently highlighted in advertising and packaging trends. Packaging designs were manipulated by varying the following packaging cues: typography, pictures, textual information and logo’s, resulting in ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’ designs , . For healthy packaging alternatives the following packaging cues were used: white, green, blue and low intensity colors, elegant, cursive and slim typography, pictures of ingredients (e.g., grains for cookies), pictures/silhouettes of active persons, textual information (e.g., ‘healthy’) and the Dutch Healthy choice logo. For unhealthy packaging alternatives, the following cues were used: yellow, red, brown and high intensity colors, playful/bold fonts, textual information (e.g., ‘With real butter’). Manipulations were based on research from the Department of Packaging Design and Management of the University Twente in which the association between these packaging cues and perceived (un)healthiness was established in Dutch consumers , . An internal report on the association between packaging cues and perceived (un)healthiness is available on request. Stimuli were selected on basis of healthiness ratings in a pretest (n = 15 females who did not participate in the study). The only aspects that were systematically kept identical within a pair of packages were their shape and the photo of the product depicted on the package. Since we were interested in the influence of packaging itself and to avoid effects of familiarity and previous experience with the products, novel packaging designs were used. Table 1 shows that design manipulations were effective in altering the perceived healthiness.
Table 1. Mean (SEM) ratingsa of the packages designed to look healthy/unhealthy.
During the functional MRI scan, subjects carried out a food choice task (Figure 1). In this task, subjects made a total of 38 choices between the two package designs, i.e., each of the 19 pairs was presented twice. During each trial the images of the two designs were presented subsequently (product periods, duration 4000 ms each), separated by an inter-stimulus interval of 2000 ms (fixation cross). After that, both alternatives were shown side by side (choice period, duration 4000 ms) and subjects were instructed to indicate with the left or right button of a button box which of the two products they would prefer to eat at that moment. Each trial ended with a fixation cross (random inter-trial interval with duration of 2000–12000 ms). The order of the product presentations and the location of the products during the choice period (left/right) were randomized. In order to make the choices more realistic, subjects were told that one of the trials would be randomly selected and that they would receive the product chosen in that trial as a snack at the end of the study session. In reality, all subjects received the same snack (a commercially available cookie).
Figure 1. Food choice task trial structure.
The first package is the healthy and the second the unhealthy version.
Al self-report ratings (expected tastiness, perceived healthiness, fat level of the food, attractiveness of the packaging, purchase intention and price willing to pay) were normally distributed. Associations between the various self-reported measures were calculated by bivariate correlation analyses performed with SPSS 16.0. Logistic regression analyses were performed to determine associations between the self-reported measures and choice. Since choice pairs (level 1) were nested within participants (level 2) a series of multi-level logistic regression analyses were performed to examine which self-report measures were associated with choosing a package. The dependent variable in these models was the choice for the second stimulus shown (either the package was chosen or not) and the explanatory measures were the difference in ratings between the two packages of the pair (i.e., attractiveness rating of the second image shown (product period 2) minus the attractiveness rating of the first image) for each of the self-reported measures. First, models were constructed with each of the self-report measures as single predictor. After that, models with multiple self-reported measures were constructed. Logistic regression analyses were performed with the statistical software package R (http://www.r-project.org/).
MRI scanning was performed on a 3 Tesla scanner (Philips Achieva, Philips Healthcare, Best, The Netherlands), equipped with a SENSE head coil. A T1-weighted structural image was acquired at a resolution of 1×1×1 mm (TR = 8.4 ms, total scan duration = 284 s). Functional scans were acquired with a 3D-PRESTO SENSE sequence (TR/TE = 22.5/33 ms, flip angle = 10°, voxel size = 4×4×4 mm, acquisition time of one 3D volume = 607.5 ms) . The total number of volumes acquired differed between subjects because of the random inter-trial interval (range: 1370–1528 volumes). Data were preprocessed and analyzed using the SPM8 software package (Wellcome Department of Imaging Neuroscience, London, United Kingdom, (http://www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/spm/software/spm8/)) run with MATLAB 7.5 (The Mathworks Inc, Natick, MA). Functional images were realigned to the first image of the time series. Functional and structural images were co-registered and normalized (retaining 4x4x4 mm voxels) to MNI space (Montreal Neurological Institute – International Consortium for Brain Mapping) by using linear and nonlinear transformations. Unsmoothed data were used for the multivariate pattern analysis. For the multivariate prediction analysis only data from the first half of the choice trials were used because each choice pair was repeated during the second half of the task. Responses might be biased by post-choice shifts in preferences and thus might not be valid for use in prediction analyses. For the other analyses, all data were used and functional images were smoothed with a Gaussian kernel of 8 mm full width at half maximum.
Data from the first and second product presentation period of the trial were analyzed separately in all analyses because the processes occurring during these periods are not identical. In a sequential binary choice paradigm as used here, the expected value of the first product is evaluated in isolation (the absolute value) whereas the expected value of the second product is evaluated with the first product still in mind (the relative value) , .
Statistical maps were generated for each subject by fitting a boxcar function to the time series, convolved with the canonical hemodynamic response. Data were high-pass filtered with a cutoff of 128 s. Three conditions were modeled for each trial: the first product presentation period, the second product presentation period and the choice period. For each subject, four separate general linear models were build to perform analyses of the neural activation during the two product presentation periods: (1) To establish the brain regions that respond differently to chosen and not-chosen packages we performed a mean subtraction analysis between chosen and not chosen packages, (2) To identify brain regions of which activation correlates with the self-reported perceived healthiness rating we performed a parametric modulation analysis with perceived healthiness as parametric modulator, (3) To identify brain regions of which activation correlates with the absolute attractiveness we performed a parametric modulation analysis with the self-reported attractiveness as parametric modulator, (4) To identify brain regions in which activation correlates with the relative attractiveness we performed a parametric modulation analysis on the second image period with the relative attractiveness of the second product (i.e., the attractiveness rating of the second package minus that of the first package). In all analyses, the responses during the choice screen (in which the subjects pressed the button for their choice) were modeled but not analyzed. In summary, the subject level analyses yielded seven images for each subject: 1) a contrast image of the chosen versus not chosen packages for the first product presentation period, 2) a contrast image of the chosen versus not chosen packages for the second product presentation period, 3) a contrast image of the parametric modulation of activation by perceived healthiness for the first product presentation period, 4) a contrast image of the parametric modulation of activation by perceived healthiness for the second product presentation period, 5) a contrast image of the parametric modulation of activation by absolute attractiveness for the first product presentation period, 6) a contrast image of the parametric modulation of activation by absolute attractiveness for the second product presentation period, and 7) a contrast image of the parametric modulation of activation by relative attractiveness for the second product presentation period.
To determine which brain regions show differential activation for chosen and not-chosen products, the contrast images in question were entered into a one-sample t-test. To determine the brain regions whose activation is modulated by self-reported healthiness, the contrast images of modulation by healthiness were entered into a one-sample t-test. To determine the brain regions whose activation is modulated by self-reported attractiveness, the contrast images of modulation by absolute and relative attractiveness were entered into a one-sample t-tests. The resulting statistical parametric maps were thresholded at p<0.05 family-wise error corrected for multiple comparisons at the level of a priori regions of interest (i.e., small-volume corrected). Regions of interest were brain areas reported in two studies relevant to food choice: brain regions that respond differentially to highly hedonic versus neutral/bland unpackaged foods and brain regions activated during food choices based on healthiness or tastiness : left inferior frontal gyrus, the bilateral inferior parietal lobule, the bilateral middle temporal gyrus, bilateral superior frontal gyrus, bilateral middle frontal gyrus, right inferior temporal gyrus, bilateral middle occipital gyrus, right culmen and the bilateral putamen, caudate and pallidum. ROI masks were generated using the AAL-atlas as implemented in WFU-pickatlas toolbox .
MVPA was used to localize brain regions which contain predictive information. Analyses were performed using the PyMVPA software package , in combination with LibSVM’s implementation of the linear support vector machine (http://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~cjlin/libsvm/). We used the default configuration, in which the parameter C (trade off parameter between width of the margin and the number of support vectors) is automatically scaled according to the norm of the data for each searchlight.
Trial-wise linearly detrended and z-scored functional scans that were acquired between 3–6 seconds after onset of the product presentation period were averaged to speed up analysis . This timeframe was chosen because the peak of the hemodynamic response is known to occur 4–5 seconds after stimulus onset . This resulted in one average image for the chosen product and one average image for the not-chosen product, for each of the 19 trials.
For both product presentation periods, a whole brain searchlight analysis was performed, which is a method particularly suitable to localize brain regions that contain predictive information . A sphere with a radius of 10 mm was centered at each voxel. With voxel size 4×4×4 mm this results in spheres of 27 voxels, i.e., 27 features. For each sphere, a 19-fold leave-one-out cross-validation was performed with a linear support vector machine to estimate the prediction accuracy of each voxel. Thus, for each sphere the classifier was trained on 18 of the 19 trials. More specifically, a model of the associations between the voxel values and the categories (chosen or not-chosen) in the training trials was constructed. Subsequently, this prediction model was tested on the remaining trial. Accuracy was calculated as the percentage of correctly categorized chosen and not-chosen products in the remaining test trial. For each subject, the searchlight analysis yielded a three-dimensional map of prediction accuracies. Each value of this accuracy map represents the average cross-validated prediction accuracy of the searchlight surrounding that voxel.
To identify brain regions that were predictive of choice across subjects, we performed a t-test as implemented in SPM8 to contrast the accuracy maps of all participants against chance level (50% accuracy) for both analyses. The resulting statistical maps were thresholded at p<0.05 family-wise error corrected for multiple comparisons at the level of ROIs (same as the mass-univariate analysis).
Table 1 shows that packaging design manipulations were effective in altering perceived healthiness and fat level while keeping expected tastiness constant. The attractiveness of healthy packaging designs was significantly higher. This was expected because visual cues that give a package a healthy appearance are partially overlapping with those that are most preferred. For instance, the colors blue, green and white (bright colors) give a package a healthy appearance, but these are also the colors that are liked most, even across cultures , , , .
Attractiveness correlated with several other self-report measures, such as purchase intention (r = 0.65, p<0.001), price willing to pay (r = 0.35, p<0.001), expected tastiness (first session: r = 0.24, p<0.001, second session: r = 0.46, p<0.001) and perceived healthiness (r = 0.15, p<0.001). The results did not differ between the two food categories (cookies and dairy foods); therefore, data from these categories were combined in all subsequent analyses.
Table 2 shows the means of the self-report measures for the chosen and not-chosen packages. Chosen packages were rated as significantly more attractive, tastier and healthier. Purchase intention and the price subjects were willing to pay were also significantly higher for chosen packages. Choices were consistent over repeated presentations: only in 6.8% of the presented choices a different package was chosen the second time. There was no order effect on choice: in 50.7% of the trials the image presented in the second product presentation period was chosen, in 49.3% of the trials the image presented in the first product presentation period.
Table 2. Mean (SEM) ratingsa for chosen/not-chosen packages.
The logistic regression analyses with each self-report measure as single predictor showed that the perceived healthiness (parameter estimate ± SEM: 0.17±0.05), attractiveness (0.60±0.07), purchase intention (0.68±0.08), price willing to pay (1.87±0.32) and tastiness post-scan (0.73±0.10) were significantly (positively) associated with food choice (p<0.05). In a model with all self-report measures, only attractiveness, tastiness post-scan and purchase intention remained significant predictors (Table 3), i.e., these measures have an independent component that is associated with choice. This combined model shows that attractiveness has the largest independent component associated with choice. To control for design-category (i.e., healthy or unhealthy design), the analysis was repeated with design category as extra dummy variable. This did not change the results of the logistic regression (Table S1).
Table 3. Multi-level logistic regression results: self-report measures associated with food choice.
To disambiguate the effects of perceived healthiness and attractiveness on choice we compared the models with attractiveness and perceived healthiness as single predictors with a model with both variables. Whereas the model with both predictors explained significantly more variance than the model with healthiness as single predictor (−2logΛ = 134.5, df = 1, p<0.0001), the combined model did not explain more variance than the model with attractiveness as single predictor (−2logΛ = 0.4 df = 1, p = 0.40). This means that adding healthiness as a variable when attractiveness is already in the model, does not significantly improve the model. Moreover, adding attractiveness to the model decreases the parameter estimate of healthiness from 0.17 to 0.06, while adding healthiness to a model with attractiveness does not affect the parameter estimate of attractiveness. Thus, healthiness does not have an independent component associated with choice while attractiveness does.
Additional likelihood ratio tests were performed to test whether the effects of attractiveness, purchase intention and tastiness varied across participants. This was done by comparing the models with the self-reports treated as fixed effects versus models with random slopes. None of these tests showed a statistically significant improvement of the model. With a likelihood ratio test comparing a model with a fixed intercept to the empty model with a random intercept (subject level 2), we tested whether the intercept was statistically different between subjects. This was also not the case.
Chosen versus not chosen packages.
The subtraction analysis of chosen vs. not-chosen packages in the second product presentation period showed that activation was stronger for chosen packages in the bilateral striatum (right putamen, left putamen, pallidum and caudate), in the left inferior parietal gyrus, in the middle temporal gyrus and in the right middle occipital gyrus (Table 4, Figure 2). There were no brain regions activated stronger in response to not-chosen packages.
Table 4. Peak voxel coordinatesa of brain regions stronger activated in response to chosen versus not chosen packages during the second image period in regions of interest.
Figure 2. Results from the traditional mass-univariate fMRI analysis.
(a–e) Brain regions stronger activated in response to chosen vs. not chosen packages: a) Left inferior parietal gyrus; b/c) left caudate/putamen/pallidum and right putamen; d/e) Border of right middle occipital gyrus and middle temporal gyrus. (f) Brain regions modulated by absolute attractiveness in the first product presentation period: a cluster stretching from the left superior frontal gyrus to the middle frontal gyrus. For visualization purposes, all images are thresholded at T-value >2.86.
For the first product presentation period, there were no brain regions with a significantly stronger activation in response to chosen packages at P<0.05 FWE-corrected for multiple comparisons at ROI level. Borderline significant clusters were found in the middle frontal gyrus (p = 0.076 FWE-corrected, Z = 3.26, MNI(−26, 20, 58)), the left putamen (p = 0.089 FWE-corrected, Z = 2.64, MNI(−18, 16, 2)) and caudate (p = 0.076 FWE-corrected, Z = 2.73, MNI(−14, 8, 10)).
There were no brain regions in which activation was modulated by perceived healthiness at P<0.05 FWE-corrected for multiple comparisons at ROI level.
We performed a parametric modulation analysis to establish in which brain regions activation is modulated by attractiveness, because the behavioral results showed that attractiveness of the packaging design was strongly associated with choice (see Results section 3.1 Behavioral Results). Brain regions where activation was positively modulated by absolute attractiveness during the first product presentation period were: a cluster in the left superior frontal gyrus (p = 0.002 FWE-corrected, Z = 4.26, MNI(−18, 24, 58) stretching to the left middle frontal gyrus (p = 0.014 FWE-corrected, Z = 4.83, MNI(−22, 24, 54)) (Figure 2). In the second product presentation period, there were no brain regions in which activation was modulated by absolute attractiveness (i.e., the attractiveness rating of the second product). However, there was a borderline significant cluster in the left pallidum (p = 0.092 FWE-corrected, Z = 2.41, MNI(−10, 8, −2)) in which activation was positively modulated by relative attractiveness (i.e., the attractiveness of the second product minus the attractiveness rating of the first product). In neither of the image periods was brain activation modulated negatively by absolute or relative attractiveness.
To identify activation patterns that predict choice, MVPA was performed for the first and second product presentation period (Table 5, Figure 3). In the first product presentation period, brain activation patterns in the in the medial part of the right superior frontal gyrus significantly predicted food choice (peak accuracy: 60.0%). For the second product presentation period, activation patterns in the left middle occipital gyrus significantly predicted food choice (peak accuracy 61.2%).
Table 5. Brain regionsa encoding product choice.
Figure 3. Brain regions predictive of choice.
a) left middle occipital gyrus; b) right superior frontal gyrus, medial part. For visualization purposes, images are thresholded at T-value >2.86.
To ensure the validity of the results, the analyses were repeated with shuffled labels. When samples were randomly provided with a chosen or not chosen label, no statistical significant prediction of food choices could be attained. In addition, in a control region (left fusiform gyrus), which is not usually found in value encoding analyses, we did not find any statistical significant prediction accuracies (maximum accuracy 52.2%). These findings speak against potential methodological concerns such as the over-fitting of noise or insufficient corrections for multiple comparisons.
Table S2 shows results of all analyses for all brain regions (i.e., not only in predefined ROI’s).
This study is the first to investigate both the neural correlates and predictors of choice between two food items that only differ in their packaging.
Our first aim was to replicate brain regions found in previous studies that respond to preferred food packages. The mass-univariate analysis contrasting chosen with not-chosen packages yielded several regions stronger activated in response to chosen packages, among which the bilateral striatum. This finding concurs with our recent meta-analysis , which showed that appetizing foods yield a consistently higher activation in the striatum than neutral or bland foods. The studies included in this meta-analysis compared two very different groups of unpackaged foods. Our results show that the same finding holds for package-induced variations in preference within the same product, which presumably are smaller than variations between different products. A recent study of Litt et al. has suggested a role for the striatum in both value and saliency (arousal) computations during food choice. Because we did not include any aversive (negatively valenced but arousing) products we cannot differentiate between these two processes. Thus, the striatal activation in the present study could reflect both value and salience computations.
The finding that clusters in the inferior parietal gyrus and the middle temporal gyrus are more strongly activated during chosen versus not chosen packages, is in line with previous work. Activation of parietal regions during decision-making has been associated with the valuation of different options and a recent meta-analysis has shown that inferior parietal regions were more consistently activated during reward anticipation than during the reward-outcome . Thus, the inferior parietal gyrus activation during the second image period could reflect response selection, since all alternatives are known at that moment. Activation in the middle temporal gyrus during the decision period has previously been found to correlate with stimulus value (but not saliency) .
Brain regions predictive of food choice.
Our second aim was to investigate to what extent brain activation can predict food choice. To our knowledge, we are the first to use MVPA to investigate realistic low-involvement consumer choices, such as food choices. Previous studies using traditional analysis techniques investigated the neural correlates of consumer choice (e.g., , ) and of specific product characteristics (e.g., aesthetics, ). However, none of these studies used both traditional analysis and MVPA. It is well-acknowledged that MVPA is more sensitive than traditional mass-univariate fMRI analyses (e.g., ). One pioneering study showed the high potential of this novel technique in predicting the hypothetical choices for a high-involvement product (a car). However, until now it was unknown whether this technique could also accurately predict low-involvement consumer choices. Therefore, we assessed how accurately this type of consumer choices, such as those made during grocery shopping can be predicted by MVPA. These are choices in which the differences in preference are assumed to be much smaller than in infrequent high-involvement choices, such as those for a car. By employing a linear support vector machine, we showed that MVPA is also sensitive enough to predict every-day food choices: food choice could be predicted with up to 61.2% accuracy on group level with activation patterns in the right superior frontal gyrus (medial part) and the left middle occipital gyrus. Given that the choice was between two similar foods, which only differed in their packaging design, this can be considered as a high accuracy. Similar accuracies have been found in studies that used traditional mass-univariate analysis methods to predict choice (e.g., , ). The only other study on consumer choice that utilized MVPA, reported prediction accuracies in the range of 72–80% with patterns in the right middle frontal gyrus, medial frontal gyrus, left orbitofrontal cortex, bilateral dorsal anterior cingulate, bilateral posterior cingulate, and left insula . However, as mentioned above, that study used a very different category of consumer products, namely cars. A decision for a car is probably much more distinct than the low-involvement every-day decision for a snack food: cars are bought less often and less easily than foods. Another difference between the studies is that in the study of Tusche et al , all stimuli were familiar. Since we were interested in the influence of the packaging itself and to avoid effects of familiarity and previous experience with the product, we used novel packages as stimuli. Another explanation for the difference in findings is that the question posed in the study of Tusche et al. was to either buy the car or not. Thus, the value of just one car had to be taken into consideration, while in our study subjects had to make a binary choice. That is, preferences for two similar products had to be compared and decisions were thus not based on the absolute value of the products, but on the difference in value between the two options (i.e., the relative value, which will be elaborated on in section 4.2.1).
In the first image period, brain activation patterns in the medial part of the right superior frontal gyrus predicted choice. This is in line with other studies showing that activation in this region correlates with value and willingness to buy during decision-making. Also, interestingly, a cluster at approximately the same coordinates was found to be activated during food choices in which the participants were asked to specifically consider the healthiness of the food . This suggests that this region could be involved in the consideration of product features such as healthiness.
For the contrast between chosen and not-chosen packages as well as for the MVPA, we found involvement of the middle occipital gyrus, although for the prediction analysis the cluster was lateralized to the left and for the mass-univariate analysis to the right. This region is primarily known for its role in visual processing. Differential middle occipital activation for preferred versus not-preferred items has previously been observed in studies with food stimuli, e.g., our meta-analysis showed that across studies, the right middle occipital gyrus is stronger activated in response to highly hedonic versus bland/neutral foods . Although it cannot be ruled out that differential activation in regions involved in color processing such as the middle occipital gyrus and the inferior parietal gyrus, is partly due to color differences between the stimuli , , an equally likely explanation could be that these findings reflect modulation of visual processing by emotional valence. A recent study showed higher middle occipital activation in response to high- compared to low-energy foods, even though the pictures were matched on visual properties . It has been widely acknowledged that both attention and emotional valence modulate processing of visual stimuli by enhancing neuronal responses at different levels of visual processing, i.e., in early visual processing and in later phases such as recognition , , . Accordingly, we speculate that the observed activation of visual processing brain areas reflects increased attention to, or emotional valence of preferred packages. Future research should elucidate the exact role of the middle occipital gyrus in emotional valence and value calculation.
It is important to note that our results show that predictions can be derived from brain activation both during both product presentation periods. However, it should be noted that evaluation processes differ between the two periods: whereas the expected value of the first product is evaluated in isolation (the absolute value), the expected value of the second product is evaluated with the first product still in mind (the relative value). Therefore, the value of the first product serves as a frame of reference against which the second product is weighed. Given our sequential binary choice design one would expect that the neural encoding of chosen and not chosen products is influenced by ordering effects within a trial (i.e., in the first product presentation period the absolute value of the product is computed whereas in the second product presentation period the relative value is computed). There is evidence to suggests that value is more often computed with respect to a reference point, rather than in isolation . This notion is also supported by psychological literature on contrast effects (e.g., ), as well as evidence from fMRI and neuronal recording studies which show ordering effects of comparative valuation in brain areas involved in decision-making (e.g., , and differential brain regions involved in encoding of absolute and relative value . We therefore argue that evaluation in the second product presentation period is influenced by the preceding stimulus while this is not the case in the first period. Therefore, the brain regions activated during the first image period most likely reflect the absolute value calculation of the product. In contrast, activation during the second image period likely reflects a comparative calculation in which the second product is weighed against the first product, which serves as a reference. Our findings, that the ventral part of the striatum is more strongly activated in response to chosen versus not chosen packages in the second product presentation period, and that activation in the ventral striatum tends to correlate with the relative attractiveness, is in line with findings of De Martino et al. . They also found that ventral striatum activation correlate with the relative value in a buying/selling fMRI paradigm. In addition, although borderline significant, we found that a more dorsal part of the striatum was stronger activated for chosen compared to not chosen packages in the first image period. This is also in line with the finding that a more dorsal part of the striatum correlates with the absolute value .
In the fMRI task, subjects indicated their choice when presented with a separate choice screen, shown to them after the first and second product presentation period. This design may complicate the interpretation of the results for the second product presentation period because due to this separate choice screen, we cannot be completely sure whether subjects made their decisions during the second product presentation periods or at the moment they were presented with the choice screen. Nevertheless, we decided to use a separate choice screen in order to avoid biases due to motor responses accompanied with the button press in the evaluation-processes that take place during the product presentation periods. Several studies using a sequential design indicate that the decision process starts during the period when the second stimulus is presented [e.g., ]. Thus, although the design of our study does not allow to exactly determine when subjects made their choice (either during the second product period or when presented with the choice screen), we argue that it is likely that decisions were made during the second product period. Even though, evaluation and decision signals were confounded during the second presentation period, we do know that most likely relative value computations are taking place in the second product presentation period. Considering its ecological relevance (e.g., ), the differentiation between absolute and relative value computation in the brain is an important topic for future research.
We compared brain activation during chosen and not-chosen products with the use of both traditional mass-univariate analysis and MVPA. The results of the traditional analysis enabled a comparison with results from previous studies. However, this kind of analysis alone, without any validation, is deemed unsuitable to establish a predictive relationship between neural activation and choice . To be able to establish the predictive performance of a technique (either univariate or multivariate), it is required to validate the model, for instance with independent testing and training data sets . Several studies showed that traditional mass-univariate analyses indeed can also yield brain regions predictive of choice, e.g. with the use of cross validation or by using a functional localizer task to identify predictive regions of interest . In our study, we did not find direct overlap between the results of the traditional analysis comparing chosen and not chosen packages and the brain regions predictive of choice in the MVPA. A likely explanation for the lack of overlap between the two techniques is that the underlying calculations are not the same: The main difference between the two methods is that the mass-univariate method tests for differences in level of activation of each voxel separately, while MVPA establishes whether activation patterns (i.e., interactions between multiple voxels) are associated with an outcome measure.
More specifically, differences in brain regions identified by mass-univariate analyses and MVPA likely arise from the fact that (1) different information is taken from the data (i.e., differences in the degree of activation in single voxel vs. interactions between multiple voxels) and (2) differences in the preprocessing and analysis trail associated with (1). The preprocessing and analysis trail of mass-univariate analysis is optimized for detecting spatially extended differences in the degree of activation (i.e., differences in the same direction) while the preprocessing and analysis trail of MVPA is optimized for detection of pattern-based information. For mass-univariate analysis, images are smoothed for improving the signal-to-noise ratio, making the error-distribution more normal and accommodating functional variations between subjects. However, a drawback of smoothing is that it reduces the spatial resolution of the data. In MVPA, on the other hand the focus is on fine-grained activation patterns, therefore data for MVPA are not smoothed. To optimize data for MVPA, z-scoring (setting the mean to zero and standard deviation to 1) is performed to homogenize voxel intensities. Because z-scoring involves scaling all voxel intensities into approximately the same range and removing the mean the difference in activation level between conditions can be diminished. Therefore, a likely explanation of why we find evidence for involvement of the striatum in the mass-univariate analysis but not in the MVPA results is that (although there are differences in average activation for chosen versus not chosen stimuli), the activation patterns in the striatum do not contain (detectable) information that differentiates between conditions. For the regions that we found with MVPA but not with mass-univariate analysis (clusters in middle occipital gyrus, superior frontal gyrus) the opposite holds: although average activation in these regions did not differ for the chosen and not chosen stimuli, activation patterns did contain information that could distinguish between chosen and not chosen stimuli (and could predict this with up to 62,1% accuracy).
The few studies that have employed both methods have also shown different results for mass-univariate analysis and MVPA. For instance, Lee et al found different cortical areas involved in categorical speech processing with mass-univariate analysis and MVPA, and Tusche et al did not find any brain regions significantly associated with consumer choice with a mass-univariate analysis, while the MVPA did differentiate. The fact that mass-univariate and MVPA results do not necessarily concur does not have implications for the interpretation of mass-univariate imaging data to date, i.e., these data remain valid in their own right, but it does highlight that other information can be gained with more sophisticated techniques. It seems likely that for purposes like choice prediction a combination of both mass-univariate analysis and MVPA will become the preferred approach because these two analysis methods complement each other.
Prediction accuracy might be further improved by more trials for training and testing. It is hard to determine the optimal number of trials. More training data usually produce a better model and more test samples increase the power of the test for significance of the accuracy . In our analyses, we used cross-validation to maximize the number of data for training. However, performing MVPA with many features (voxels) and relatively few trials entail a risk of over fitting, especially with complex classification models . We avoided this by using a searchlight analysis to reduce the number of features and by employing a simple linear model (linear support vector machine) as classifier. Moreover, the validity of the MVPA results was supported by the finding that the analysis with the shuffled labels did not yield any significant prediction accuracies, and the fact that no significant prediction accuracies were found in a control region (left fusiform gyrus).
The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) has also been implicated in decision-making and activation in this region has been found to correlate with measures of preference (e.g., , , ). In our study, however, there was no significant association between vmPFC activation and the variables of interest, like attractiveness or choice. A possible explanation for this is that ventral prefrontal areas are prone to signal loss due to susceptibility artifacts. Visual inspection of the mean inclusive functional masks showed that there was indeed an (unexpectedly) low signal from ventral prefrontal regions. The specific scanning sequence we used, is known to be very sensitive and has a fast acquisition time . However, the signal in the vmPFC was unexpectedly low. Alternative explanations for not finding vmPFC-involvement could be that we performed no analyses that assessed the trial by trial correlation with values for the food items that would directly replicate the analyses that have identified vmPFC correlations with stimulus or decision value. We did correlate neural activation with self-reported attractiveness. However, this is only one component of stimulus value. A third explanation could be that our design does not allow one to exactly know at what moment subjects decided. As argued previously, it seems most likely that decisions were made during the second product presentation period, although we cannot rule out the alternative explanation that they were made later, i.e., when the ‘decision screen’ was presented. Previous work has shown that vmPFC activation correlates more strongly with stimulus value (WTP) when subjects are engaged in active decision making compared to forced responses . Therefore, a lack of vmPFC correlation with our measures of preference could be due to the unknown timing of the decision.
Our third aim was to investigate how self-reported measures relate to food choice. We found that the attractiveness of the packaging design was the strongest predictor of choice, and that perceived healthiness did not have an independent component associated with choice while attractiveness did. This suggests that, when people choose between two alternatives of a certain type of product with which they are not familiar, the aesthetic value of the package is decisive. That is, an attractive package increases the general preference for the alternative. This could be exploited in promoting healthy eating behavior. Instead of the current strategy of putting emphasis on the healthiness of foods (e.g., by low-fat labels or health logos), it might be more effective to present healthy products in attractive packages. Our study does not allow for determining how attractiveness influences choice, i.e., whether subjects just chose the most attractive package or whether attractiveness influenced the expected value of the food. However, other studies suggest that attractiveness could influence general product preference by triggering positive responses and by increasing the expected quality, luxury and price of products in several consumption domains , , . As the stimuli we used were unfamiliar to the subjects, it could be that they used attractiveness as a proxy for quality. This would explain why in our study attractiveness is the strongest self-reported predictor of choice. Future research should investigate how attractiveness can influences choice and whether attractive packaging could indeed promote healthy food choices.
We found that brain activation in a region stretching from the left middle frontal gyrus to the superior frontal gyrus was modulated by ratings of packaging attractiveness. This is in line with other studies which found that activation in this region correlates with product preference ratings , , goal values and willingness to buy . Also, an additional parametric analysis with self-reported purchase intention (Table S3) showed that neural activation in the same region correlated with purchase intention, a measure which correlated to a fair extent (r = 0.65) with attractiveness. From this we speculate that the modulation of activation in the superior frontal gyrus stretching to the middle frontal gyrus reflects a more general preference evaluation which is driven by the attractiveness. This topic deserves more investigation.
The self-reports of healthiness, attractiveness, perceived fat content, purchasing intention and price willing to pay were measured after the choice-task. This has limitations because the act of choosing may induce changes in product preference, such that they better match with their prior decision . However, we nevertheless decided to measure product characteristics after choice, because measuring them before choice focuses attention on them which may also affect their choice. Since we were interested in subject’s spontaneous choice, we chose to avoid ‘priming’ them with the characteristics of interest before their choice. A second reason why these measures were not collected before the choice-task was to limit exposure to the stimuli and avoid a thorough evaluation of the stimuli before the choice because we wanted the evaluation processes to take place during the fMRI task.
Multi-level logistic regression results: self-report measures and packaging type associated with food choice.
Peak voxel coordinatesa of brain regions positively modulated by choice, attractiveness and brain regions predictive of choice.
Peak voxel coordinatesa of brain regions positively modulated by purchase intention.
We thank our partners from the University of Twente, Department of Packaging Design and Management, for designing the food packages.
Conceived and designed the experiments: LV DR PS. Performed the experiments: LV PS. Analyzed the data: LV. Wrote the paper: LV PS DR. Interpretation of results, reviewing and critically revising text and interpretation of a late version of the manuscript: MV.
1. Ariely D, Berns GS (2010) Neuromarketing: the hope and hype of neuroimaging in business. Nat Rev Neurosci 11: 284–292.
2. Ares G, Besio M, Gimenez A, Deliza R (2010) Relationship between involvement and functional milk desserts intention to purchase. Influence on attitude towards packaging characteristics. Appetite 55: 298–304.
3. Feunekes GI, Gortemaker IA, Willems AA, Lion R, van den KM (2008) Front-of-pack nutrition labelling: testing effectiveness of different nutrition labelling formats front-of-pack in four European countries. Appetite 50: 57–70.
4. Knutson B, Rick S, Wimmer GE, Prelec D, Loewenstein G (2007) Neural predictors of purchases. Neuron 53: 147–156.
5. Levy I, Lazzaro SC, Rutledge RB, Glimcher PW (2011) Choice from non-choice: predicting consumer preferences from blood oxygenation level-dependent signals obtained during passive viewing. J Neurosci 31: 118–125.
6. Chib VS, Rangel A, Shimojo S, O’Doherty JP (2009) Evidence for a common representation of decision values for dissimilar goods in human ventromedial prefrontal cortex. J Neurosci 29: 12315–12320.
7. Kang MJ, Rangel A, Camus M, Camerer CF (2011) Hypothetical and real choice differentially activate common valuation areas. J Neurosci 31: 461–468.
9. Linder NS, Uhl G, Fliessbach K, Trautner P, Elger CE, et al. (2010) Organic labeling influences food valuation and choice. Neuroimage 53: 215–220.
10. Reimann M, Zaichkowsky J, Neuhaus C, Bender T, Weber B (2010) Aesthetic package design: A behavioral, neural, and psychological investigation. J Cons Psych 20: 431–441.
11. Tusche A, Bode S, Haynes JD (2010) Neural responses to unattended products predict later consumer choices. J Neurosci 30: 8024–8031.
12. Pereira F, Mitchell T, Botvinick M (2009) Machine learning classifiers and fMRI: a tutorial overview. Neuroimage 45: S199–S209.
13. van der Laan LN, De Ridder DT, Viergever MA, Smeets PA (2011) The first taste is always with the eyes: a meta-analysis on the neural correlates of processing visual food cues. Neuroimage 55: 296–303.
14. Carrillo E, Varela P, Salvador A, Fiszman S (2011) Main Factors Underlying Consumers’ Food Choice: a First Step for the Understanding of Attitudes Toward “Healthy Eating” J Sens Stud 26: 85–95.
15. Raghunathan R, Walker Naylor R, Hoyer WD (2006) The unhealthy = tasty intuition and it’s effects on taste inferences, enjoyment, and choice of food products. J Marketing 70: 170–184.
16. Borgmeier I, Westenhoever J (2009) Impact of different food label formats on healthiness evaluation and food choice of consumers: a randomized-controlled study. BMC Publ Health 9: 184–196.
17. Provencher V, Polivy J, Herman CP (2009) Perceived healthiness of food. If it’s healthy, you can eat more! Appetite 52: 340–344.
18. Sabbe S, Verbeke W, Deliza R, Matta V, Van DP (2009) Effect of a health claim and personal characteristics on consumer acceptance of fruit juices with different concentrations of acai (Euterpe oleracea Mart.). Appetite 53: 84–92.
19. Silayoi P, Speece M (2004) Packaging and Purchase Decisions. An Exploratory Study on the Impact of Involvement Level and Time Pressure. British Food J 106: 607–628.
20. Silayoi P, Speece M (2005) The Importance of Packaging Attributes: a Conjoint Analysis Approach. Eur J Marketing 41: 1495–1517.
21. Frank S, Laharnar N, Kullmann S, Veit R, Canova C, et al. (2010) Processing of food pictures: influence of hunger, gender and calorie content. Brain Res 1350: 159–166.
22. Uher R, Treasure J, Heining M, Brammer MJ, Campbell IC (2006) Cerebral processing of food-related stimuli: effects of fasting and gender. Behav Brain Res 169: 111–119.
23. Westenhoefer J (2005) Age and gender dependent profile of food choice. Forum Nutr 44–51.
24. Gelici-Zeko MM, Lutters D, ten Klooster R (2012) Studying the influence of packaging design on consumer perceptions using categorizing and perceptual mapping. (submitted for publication).
25. Gelici-Zeko MM, Lutters D, ten Klooster R (2012) Understanding consumers’ responses toward food packaging and their behavioural underpinnings using Kansei engineering and Focus group. (submitted for publication).
26. Golay X, Pruessmann KP, Weiger M, Crelier GR, Folkers PJ, et al. (2000) PRESTO-SENSE: an ultrafast whole-brain fMRI technique. Magn Reson Med 43: 779–786.
27. Sharot T, De MB, Dolan RJ (2009) How choice reveals and shapes expected hedonic outcome. J Neurosci 29: 3760–3765.
28. De Martino B, Kumaran D, Holt B, Dolan RJ (2009) The neurobiology of reference-dependent value computation. J Neurosci 29: 3833–3842.
29. kahneman D, Tversky A (1979) Prospect theory: an analysis of decision under risk. Econometrica 47: 263–292-.
30. Tzourio-Mazoyer N, Landeau B, Papathanassiou D, Crivello F, Etard O, et al. (2002) Automated anatomical labeling of activations in SPM using a macroscopic anatomical parcellation of the MNI MRI single-subject brain. Neuroimage 15: 273–289.
31. Maldjian JA, Laurienti PJ, Kraft RA, Burdette JH (2003) An automated method for neuroanatomic and cytoarchitectonic atlas-based interrogation of fMRI data sets. Neuroimage 19: 1233–1239.
32. Hanke M, Halchenko YO, Sederberg PB, Hanson SJ, Haxby JV, et al. (2009) PyMVPA: A python toolbox for multivariate pattern analysis of fMRI data. Neuroinformatics 7: 37–53.
33. Neumann J, Lohmann G, Zysset S, von Cramon DY (2003) Within-subject variability of BOLD response dynamics. Neuroimage 19: 784–796.
34. Adams FM, Osgood CE (1973) A cross-cultural study of the affective meanings of color. J Cross Cult Psychol 4: 135–156.
35. Grieve KW (1991) Traditional beliefs and colour perception. Percept Mot Skills 72: 1319–1323.
36. Madden TJ, Hewett K, Roth MS (2000) Managing Images in Different Cultures: A Cross-National Study of Color Meanings and Preferences. J Int Marketing 8: 90–107.
37. Wiegersma S, Van der Elst G (2011) Blue phenomenon: spontaneity or preference? Percept Mot Skills 66: 308–310.
38. Litt A, Plassmann H, Shiv B, Rangel A (2011) Dissociating valuation and saliency signals during decision-making. Cereb Cortex 21: 95–102.
39. Liu X, Hairston J, Schrier M, Fan J (2011) Common and distinct networks underlying reward valence and processing stages: a meta-analysis of functional neuroimaging studies. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 35: 1219–1236.
40. Hare TA, Malmaud J, Rangel A (2011) Focusing attention on the health aspects of foods changes value signals in vmPFC and improves dietary choice. J Neurosci 31: 11077–11087.
41. Conway BR (2009) Color vision, cones, and color-coding in the cortex. Neuroscientist 15: 274–290.
42. Shapley R, Hawken M (2002) Neural mechanisms for color perception in the primary visual cortex. Curr Opin Neurobiol 12: 426–432.
43. Gerdes AB, Wieser MJ, Muhlberger A, Weyers P, Alpers GW, et al. (2010) Brain Activations to Emotional Pictures are Differentially Associated with Valence and Arousal Ratings. Front Hum Neurosci 4: 175-.
44. Kastner S, Ungerleider LG (2000) Mechanisms of visual attention in the human cortex. Annu Rev Neurosci 23: 315–341.
45. Lane RD, Chua PM, Dolan RJ (1999) Common effects of emotional valence, arousal and attention on neural activation during visual processing of pictures. Neuropsychologia 37: 989–997.
46. Novemsky N, Ratner KR (2003) The Time Course and Impact of Consumers’ Erroneous Beliefs about Hedonic Contrast Effects. J Cons Res 29: 507–516.
47. Deco G, Rolls ET, Romo R (2010) Synaptic dynamics and decision making. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 107: 7545–7549.
48. Cohen JR, Asarnow RF, Sabb FW, Bilder RM, Bookheimer SY (2010) Decoding developmental differences and individual variability in response inhibition through predictive analyses across individuals. Front Hum Neurosci 4: 47.
49. Lee YS, Turkeltaub P, Granger R, Raizada RD (2012) Categorical speech processing in Broca’s area: an fMRI study using multivariate pattern-based analysis. J Neurosci 32: 3942–3948.
50. Plassmann H, O’Doherty J, Rangel A (2007) Orbitofrontal cortex encodes willingness to pay in everyday economic transactions. J Neurosci 27: 9984–9988.
51. Dawar N, Parker P (1994) Marketing Universals: Consumers’ Use of Brand Name, Price, Physical Appearance, and Retailer Reputation as Signals of Product Quality. J Marketing 58: 81–95.
52. Forsythe S, Bethpresley A, Wilsoncaton K (1996) Dimensions of apparel quality influencing consumers’ perceptions. Percept Mot Skills 83: 299–305.
53. Orth UR, Campana D, Malkewitz K (2010) Formation of Consumer Price Expectation Based on Package Design: Attractive and Quality Routes. J Market Theor Pract 18: 23–40.
54. Izuma K, Saito DN, Sadato N (2008) Processing of social and monetary rewards in the human striatum. Neuron 58: 284–294.
55. Plassmann H, O’Doherty JP, Rangel A (2010) Appetitive and aversive goal values are encoded in the medial orbitofrontal cortex at the time of decision making. J Neurosci 30: 10799–10808. | 2019-04-24T07:56:48Z | https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0041738 |
By accessing or using the Website you agree to be bound by these Terms. If you are using the Website on behalf of an organization or entity (“Organization”), then you are agreeing to these Terms on behalf of that Organization and you represent and warrant that you have the authority to bind the Organization to these Terms. In that case, “you” and “your” refers to you and that Organization.
You may use the Website only if you can form a binding contract with Verdigris Technologies, and only in compliance with these Terms and all applicable local, state, national, and international laws, rules and regulations. The Website may change from time to time as we evolve, refine or add more features to the Website, often without prior notice to you. In addition, Verdigris Technologies may temporarily or permanently stop providing the Website, or any features within the Website, to you or to users generally and may not be able to provide you with prior notice.
Some areas of the Website allow you to post or upload information, text, graphics, or other material (“Content” or, when posted by you, “your Content”), and to share your Content with others. You retain ownership of your Content, but there are many things that users may do with your Content, for example, copy it, modify it, re-share it, or broadcast it. Verdigris Technologies has no responsibility for that activity. You understand that publishing your Content on the Website is not a substitute for registering it with the U.S. Copyright Office, the Writer’s Guild of America, or any other rights organization. Please consider carefully what you choose to share.
You agree not to post Content that: (i) may create a risk of harm, loss, physical or mental injury, emotional distress, death, disability, disfigurement, or physical or mental illness to you, to any other person, or to any animal; (ii) may create a risk of any other loss or damage to any person or property; (iii) seeks to harm or exploit children by exposing them to inappropriate content, asking for personally identifiable details or otherwise; (iv) may constitute or contribute to a crime or tort; (v) contains any information or content that we deem to be unlawful, harmful, abusive, racially or ethnically offensive, defamatory, infringing, invasive of personal privacy or publicity rights, harassing, humiliating to other people (publicly or otherwise), libelous, threatening, profane, or otherwise objectionable; (vi) contains any information or content that is illegal (including, without limitation, the disclosure of insider information under securities law or of another party’s trade secrets); (vii) contains any information or content that you do not have a right to make available under any law or under contractual or fiduciary relationships; or (viii) contains any information or content that you know is not correct and current. You agree that any Content that you post does not and will not violate rights of any kind, including without limitation any intellectual property rights or rights of privacy. We reserve the right, but are not obligated, to reject and/or remove any Content that we believe, in our sole discretion, violates these provisions.
You retain full ownership to your Content, but you agree to grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, irrevocable, transferable, perpetual, royalty-free license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, reproduce, process, adapt, modify, publish, transmit, edit, translate, make derivatives, display and distribute such Content in connection with providing access to the Website to you and other users. In connection with providing access to the Website, we may modify or adapt your Content in order to transmit, display or distribute it over computer networks and in various media and/or make changes to your Content as are necessary to conform and adapt that Content to any requirements or limitations of any networks, devices, services or media.
We reserve the right at all times, but are not obligated, to remove or refuse to distribute any Content on the Website including your Content. We also reserve the right to access, read, preserve, and disclose any information as we reasonably believe is necessary to (i) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or governmental request, (ii) enforce the Terms, including investigation of potential violations, (iii) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, (iv) respond to user support requests, or (v) protect the rights, property or safety of Verdigris Technologies, its users and the public.
You must provide us accurate information when you create your Verdigris Technologies account. Your Verdigris Technologies account gives you access to the Website and functionality that we may establish and maintain from time to time and in our sole discretion. We may maintain different types of accounts for different types of users or organizations. If you connect to Verdigris Technologies with a third-party service, you give us permission to access and use your information from that service as permitted by that service, and to store your log-in credentials for that service. You may never use another user’s account without permission.
You are responsible for safeguarding the password that you use to access the Website and for any activities or actions under your password, whether your password is with Verdigris Technologies or a third-party service. We encourage you to use “strong” passwords that use a combination of upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols with your account. You agree not to disclose your password to any third party. Verdigris Technologies cannot and will not be liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to comply with the above requirements. You must notify Verdigris Technologies immediately upon becoming aware of any breach of security or unauthorized use of your account.
Subject to these Terms, Verdigris Technologies gives you a personal, worldwide, royalty-free, non-assignable, non-sublicensable and non-exclusive license to use the Website. We reserve all rights not expressly granted in these Terms in the Website. We can terminate this license at any time for any reason or for no reason.
Except as otherwise provided herein, you may not use, download, upload, copy, print, display, perform, reproduce, publish, modify, delete, add to, license, post, transmit, or distribute any materials from this Website in whole or in part, for any public or commercial purpose without our specific written permission. Except as otherwise provided herein, use of the Website does not grant you a license to any Content, features or materials you may access on the Website and you may not modify, rent, lease, loan, sell, distribute or create derivative works of such Content, features or materials, in whole or in part. Any commercial use of the Website is strictly prohibited, except as allowed herein or otherwise approved by us. If you make use of the Website, other than as provided herein, in doing so you may violate copyright and other laws of the United States, other countries, as well as applicable state laws and may be subject to liability for such unauthorized use. We do not grant any license or other authorization to any user of our trademarks, registered trademarks, service marks, other copyrightable material or any other intellectual property by including them on the Website.
We may make available software to access the Service via a mobile device (“Mobile Software”). To use the Mobile Software you must have a mobile device that is compatible with the Mobile Service. We do not warrant that the Mobile Software will be compatible with your mobile device. We give you a non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to use a compiled code copy of the Mobile Software for one account on one mobile device owned or leased solely by you, for your personal use. You may not: (i) modify, disassemble, decompile or reverse engineer the Mobile Software, except to the extent that such restriction is expressly prohibited by law; (ii) rent, lease, loan, resell, sublicense, distribute or otherwise transfer the Mobile Software to any third party or use the Mobile Software to provide time sharing or similar services for any third party; (iii) make any copies of the Mobile Software; (iv) remove, circumvent, disable, damage or otherwise interfere with security-related features of the Mobile Software, features that prevent or restrict use or copying of any content accessible through the Mobile Software, or features that enforce limitations on use of the Mobile Software; or (v) delete the copyright and other proprietary rights notices on the Mobile Software. You agree that we may from time to time issue upgraded versions of the Mobile Software, and may automatically electronically upgrade the version of the Mobile Software that you are using on your mobile device. You agree to the automatic upgrading on your mobile device, and agree that the terms and conditions of these Terms will apply to any upgrades. Any third-party code that may be incorporated in the Mobile Software is covered by the applicable open source or third-party license EULA, if any, authorizing use of such code. This license is not a sale of the Mobile Software or any copy thereof, and Verdigris Technologies or its third party partners or suppliers retain all right, title, and interest in the Mobile Software (and any copy thereof). We reserve all rights not expressly granted under these Terms. If the Mobile Software is being acquired on behalf of the United States Government, then the following provision applies. Use, duplication, or disclosure of the Mobile Software by the U.S. Government is subject to restrictions set forth in these Terms and as provided in DFARS 227.7202-1(a) and 227.7202-3(a) (1995), DFARS 252.227-7013(c)(1)(ii) (OCT 1988), FAR 12.212(a) (1995), FAR 52.227-19, or FAR 52.227-14 (ALT III), as applicable. The Mobile Software originates in the United States, and is subject to United States export laws and regulations. The Mobile Software may not be exported or re-exported to certain countries or those persons or entities prohibited from receiving exports from the United States. In addition, the Mobile Software may be subject to the import and export laws of other countries. You agree to comply with all United States and foreign laws related to use of the Mobile Software and the Website.
All right, title, and interest in and to the Website (excluding Content provided by users) are and will remain the exclusive property of Verdigris Technologies and its licensors. The Website is protected by copyright, trademark, and other laws of both the United States and foreign countries. Nothing in the Terms gives you a right to use the Verdigris Technologies name or any of the Verdigris Technologies trademarks, logos, domain names, and other distinctive brand features. Any feedback, comments, or suggestions you may provide regarding Verdigris Technologies, or the Website is entirely voluntary and we will be free to use such feedback, comments or suggestions as we see fit and without any obligation to you.
All Content in or on the Website, whether publicly posted or privately transmitted by users, is the sole responsibility of the person who originated such Content. We do not endorse, support, represent or guarantee the completeness, truthfulness, accuracy, or reliability of any Content or communications posted via the Website or endorse any opinions expressed via the Website. We may not monitor or control the Content posted via the Website and, we cannot take responsibility for such Content. If you use or rely on any Content or materials posted via the Website or obtained by you through the Website, it is at your own risk. Under no circumstances will Verdigris Technologies be liable in any way for any Content, or any loss or damage of any kind incurred as a result of the use of any Content in the Website.
You agree that you are responsible for your use of the Website, for any Content you provide, and for any consequences thereof, including the use of your Content by other users and third parties. You understand that if you do not have the right to submit Content to the Website, doing so may subject you to liability. Verdigris Technologies will not be responsible or liable for any use of your Content by Verdigris Technologies in accordance with these Terms. You represent and warrant that you have all the rights, power and authority necessary to grant the rights granted herein to any Content that you submit including all necessary rights to upload your Content for use in accordance with these terms and conditions.
interfere with, or disrupt, the access of any user, host or network, including, without limitation, sending a virus, overloading, flooding, spamming, mail-bombing the Website, or by scripting the creation of Content in such a manner as to interfere with or create an undue burden on the Website. International users agree to comply with all local laws regarding online conduct and acceptable content.
We may investigate and/or suspend your account if you violate any of the above rules. Furthermore, we reserve the right to immediately terminate your account without further notice in the event that, in our sole and absolute judgment, you violate these Terms, or abuse the use of our Website. Violations of system or network security may result in civil or criminal liability. Verdigris Technologies will investigate occurrences and may involve, and cooperate with, law enforcement authorities in prosecuting the user or users who are involved in such violations.
We respect others’ intellectual property rights and we ask that you do too. We will respond to notices of alleged copyright infringement if they comply with the law and are properly provided to us.
It is often difficult to determine if your intellectual property rights have been violated or if the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) requirements have been met. We may request additional information before we remove any infringing material. If a dispute develops as to the correct owner of the rights in question, we reserve the right to remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing material pending resolution of the matter. We will terminate the accounts of users that we determine are repeat infringers.
Please note that under Section 512(f) of the Copyright Act any person who makes false claims that material or an activity is infringing may be subject to liability for damages.
We control and operate the Website from our offices in the United States of America, and all information is processed within the United States. We do not represent that materials on the Website are appropriate or available for use in other locations. Persons who choose to access the Website from other locations do so on their own initiative, and are responsible for compliance with local laws, if and to the extent local laws are applicable.
You agree to comply with all applicable laws, rules and regulations in connection with your use of the Website. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, you agree to comply with all applicable laws regarding the transmission of technical data exported from the United States or the country in which you reside.
By providing any personal information to the Website, all users, including without limitation users in the European Union, fully understand and unambiguously consent to the collection and processing of such information in the United States.
You agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Verdigris Technologies and its licensee and licensors, and their employees, contractors, agents, officers and directors, from and against any and all claims, damages, obligations, losses, liabilities, costs or debt, and expenses (including but not limited to attorney’s fees) arising from your use of and access to the Website, including any data or Content transmitted or received by you, any other party’s access or use of the Website with your username and password, or your violation of these Terms, applicable law, rule or regulation.
We may revise these Terms from time to time and the most current version will always be posted on our website. If a revision, in our sole discretion, is material we will notify you (for example via email to the email address associated with your account). Other changes may be posted to our blog or Terms page, so please check those pages regularly. By continuing to access or use the Website after revisions become effective, you agree to be bound by the revised Terms. If you do not agree to the new terms, please stop using the Website.
VERDIGRIS MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS AND NO WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS ON THE PERFORMANCE OF THE WEBSITE, EXPRESS, IMPLIED, STATUTORY, OR IN ANY OTHER PROVISION OF THESE TERMS OR COMMUNICATION WITH CUSTOMER, AND VERDIGRIS SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIMS ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OR CONDITION OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT.
THE WEBSITE IS PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE" BASIS. USE OF THE WEBSITE IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE WEBSITE IS PROVIDED WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, OR NON-INFRINGEMENT. WITHOUT LIMITING THE FOREGOING, VERDIGRIS AND ITS LICENSORS DO NOT WARRANT THAT THE CONTENT IS ACCURATE, RELIABLE OR CORRECT; THAT THE WEBSITE WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS; THAT THE WEBSITE WILL BE AVAILABLE AT ANY PARTICULAR TIME OR LOCATION, UNINTERRUPTED OR SECURE; THAT ANY DEFECTS OR ERRORS WILL BE CORRECTED; OR THAT THE WEBSITE IS FREE OF VIRUSES OR OTHER HARMFUL COMPONENTS. ANY CONTENT DOWNLOADED OR OTHERWISE OBTAINED THROUGH THE USE OF THE WEBSITE IS DOWNLOADED AT YOUR OWN RISK AND YOU WILL BE SOLELY RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE TO YOUR COMPUTER SYSTEM OR MOBILE DEVICE OR LOSS OF DATA THAT RESULTS FROM SUCH DOWNLOAD OR YOUR USE OF THE WEBSITE. WE DO NOT WARRANT, ENDORSE, GUARANTEE, OR ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY PRODUCT OR SERVICE ADVERTISED OR OFFERED BY A THIRD PARTY THROUGH THE OUR WEBSITE OR ANY HYPERLINKED WEBSITE OR SERVICE, AND WE WILL NOT BE A PARTY TO OR IN ANY WAY MONITOR ANY TRANSACTION BETWEEN YOU AND THIRD-PARTY PROVIDERS OF PRODUCTS OR SERVICES.
TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, IN NO EVENT SHALL VERDIGRIS, ITS AFFILIATES, AGENTS, DIRECTORS, EMPLOYEES OR SUPPLIERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, PUNITIVE, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR EXEMPLARY DAMAGES, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS, GOODWILL, USE, DATA OR OTHER INTANGIBLE LOSSES, THAT RESULT FROM THE USE OF, OR INABILITY TO USE, THIS WEBSITE. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES WILL VERDIGRIS BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE, LOSS OR INJURY RESULTING FROM HACKING, TAMPERING OR OTHER UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS OR USE OF THE WEBSITE OR YOUR ACCOUNT OR THE INFORMATION CONTAINED THEREIN.
TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, VERDIGRIS ASSUMES NO LIABILITY OR RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY (I) ERRORS, MISTAKES, OR INACCURACIES OF CONTENT; (II) PERSONAL INJURY OR PROPERTY DAMAGE, OF ANY NATURE WHATSOEVER, RESULTING FROM YOUR ACCESS TO OR USE OF OUR WEBSITE; (III) ANY UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS TO OR USE OF OUR SECURE SERVERS AND/OR ANY AND ALL PERSONAL INFORMATION STORED THEREIN; (IV) ANY INTERRUPTION OR CESSATION OF TRANSMISSION TO OR FROM THE WEBSITE; (V) ANY BUGS, VIRUSES, TROJAN HORSES, OR THE LIKE THAT MAY BE TRANSMITTED TO OR THROUGH OUR WEBSITE BY ANY THIRD PARTY; (VI) ANY ERRORS OR OMISSIONS IN ANY CONTENT OR FOR ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE INCURRED AS A RESULT OF THE USE OF ANY CONTENT POSTED, EMAILED, TRANSMITTED, OR OTHERWISE MADE AVAILABLE THROUGH THE WEBSITE; AND/OR (VII) USER CONTENT OR THE DEFAMATORY, OFFENSIVE, OR ILLEGAL CONDUCT OF ANY THIRD PARTY. IN NO EVENT SHALL VERDIGRIS ITS AGENTS, DIRECTORS, EMPLOYEES, SUPPLIERS, OR LICENSORS BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY CLAIMS, PROCEEDINGS, LIABILITIES, OBLIGATIONS, DAMAGES, LOSSES OR COSTS IN AN AMOUNT EXCEEDING THE AMOUNT YOU PAID TO COMPANY HEREUNDER.
THIS LIMITATION OF LIABILITY SECTION APPLIES WHETHER THE ALLEGED LIABILITY IS BASED ON CONTRACT, TORT, NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, OR ANY OTHER BASIS, EVEN IF VERDIGRIS HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. THE FOREGOING LIMITATION OF LIABILITY SHALL APPLY TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW IN THE APPLICABLE JURISDICTION.
The Website is controlled and operated from its facilities in the United States. We make no representations that the Website is appropriate or available for use in other locations. Those who access or use the Website from other jurisdictions do so at their own volition and are entirely responsible for compliance with all applicable United States and local laws and regulations, including but not limited to export and import regulations. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, you agree to comply with all applicable laws regarding the transmission of technical data exported from the United States or the country in which you reside.
You may not use the Website if you are a resident of a country embargoed by the United States, or are a foreign person or entity blocked or denied by the United States government. Unless otherwise explicitly stated, all materials found on the Website are solely directed to individuals, companies, or other entities located in the United States.
ARBITRATION. In the unlikely event that Verdigris Technologies has not been able to resolve a dispute it has with you after attempting to do so informally, we each agree to resolve any claim, dispute, or controversy (excluding any Verdigris Technologies claims for injunctive or other equitable relief) arising out of or in connection with or relating to these Terms, or the breach or alleged breach thereof (collectively, “Claims”), by binding arbitration by the American Arbitration Association (“AAA”) in the city of San Francisco, California under the commercial rules then in effect for the AAA, except as provided herein. The award rendered by the arbitrator shall include costs of arbitration, reasonable attorneys’ fees and reasonable costs for expert and other witnesses, and any judgment on the award rendered by the arbitrator may be entered in any court of competent jurisdiction. Nothing in this Section shall be deemed as preventing Verdigris Technologies from seeking injunctive or other equitable relief from the courts as necessary to protect any of Verdigris Technologies’ proprietary interests.
CLASS ACTION AND JURY WAIVER. ALL CLAIMS MUST BE BROUGHT IN THE PARTIES’ INDIVIDUAL CAPACITY, AND NOT AS A PLAINTIFF OR CLASS MEMBER IN ANY PURPORTED CLASS OR REPRESENTATIVE PROCEEDING WHERE ENFORCEABLE. THE ARBITRATOR MAY AWARD RELIEF ONLY IN FAVOR OF THE INDIVIDUAL PARTY SEEKING RELIEF AND ONLY TO THE EXTENT NECESSARY TO PROVIDE RELIEF NECESSITATED BY THAT PARTY'S INDIVIDUAL CLAIM(S). ANY RELIEF AWARDED CANNOT AFFECT OTHER WEBSITE USERS. YOU AGREE THAT, BY ENTERING INTO THIS AGREEMENT, YOU AND VERDIGRIS ARE EACH WAIVING THE RIGHT TO A TRIAL BY JURY OR TO PARTICIPATE IN A CLASS ACTION.
You agree that the Website is based in California; and these Terms are governed by the internal substantive laws of the State of California, without respect to its conflict of laws principles. The application of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods is expressly excluded.
These Terms, together with any amendments and any additional agreements you may enter into with Verdigris Technologies in connection with the Website, will constitute the entire agreement between you and Verdigris Technologies concerning the Website. If any provision of these Terms is deemed invalid by a court of competent jurisdiction, the invalidity of such provision shall not affect the validity of the remaining provisions of this Agreement, which shall remain in full force and effect.
No waiver of any sections of these Terms shall be deemed a further or continuing waiver of such term or any other term, and Verdigris Technologies' failure to assert any right or provision under these Terms shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision.
These Terms inure to the benefit of Verdigris Technologies, Inc.’s successors, assigns and licensees. The section titles are for convenience only and have no legal effect.
To contact us with any questions or concerns in connection with this Agreement or the Website, or to provide any notice under this Agreement to us please contact us at http://verdigris.co/contact or write to us at NASA Ames Research Park, Building 19, RM 1077, Moffett Field, California, 94035, USA. | 2019-04-20T21:09:40Z | https://verdigris.co/terms.html |
Text Again and You Die. Sadly, He Was Dead Serious.
Wahlberg survived. Chad Oulson did not.
Chad Oulson, age 43, was sitting with his wife Nichole at a Tampa, Florida movie theater watching Lone Survivor. Ironically, he didn’t survive the film. Ex-Cop, Curtis Reeves shot and killed him, apparently, because he wanted Mr. Oulson to stop texting during the movie.
Well, at least Reeves had a reason, right?
For all the seemingly endless back and forth we endure in this country when it comes to guns, we often seem to, well, miss the point. When more and more people have immediate access to guns and weapons of lethal force in everyday situations more and more pointless, gun violence happens. As sure as a bullet from a fired weapon will land and cause damage somewhere the reality is that it’s not just the certifiably deranged or dangerously violent or even the convicted felons that will use violence at some point.
Regular folks who are seemingly rational, upstanding types will inevitably lose their cool, draw their weapon in anger, pull the trigger in a fit of rage and then regret it for the rest of their life. Of course, they’ll more often than not at least be alive to feel regret, their victim will not be so fortunate.
Tampa movie theater where Chad was killed for texting during the movie.
I say we miss this simple point about human nature because it may be more reassuring for us to discuss gun violence in the third person. As in “they” or “others.” You know, the criminally insane, the social outcasts who harbor a grudge and plan a bloody exit or the felons who are beyond rehabilitation or the gangbanger or drug lord who uses guns as simple but deadly tools of their trade. The way a dentist uses a drill or a plumber a wrench. It’s just how they conduct business.
But the reality may be less reassuring and more unsetting. “They” and the “others” may be the rest of us if we, being human, snap at some point and happen to have a lethal weapon at our fingertips when we do.
I used to think it was other folks like I’ve described. If I could just see them coming I could avoid them and hopefully be safe. But exactly whom should I or you avoid?
I’ve seen adults start shooting at each other over a parking space at Wal-Mart. Been on a NY subway when the doors opened and a gang member shot in the car just ahead of me during a “hit” attempt and I lost a colleague to a drive-by shooting in DC that was intended for someone else.
More danger than just the nasty smell.
Curtis Reeves was a retired police officer who apparently just snapped. And he was armed at the time. And Chad Oulson wouldn’t stop texting when Reeves demanded he stop. I guess he will now.
I am sure we will hear how maybe if Chad were also armed he could have defended himself against the shooter. And we’ll also hear how if we had stricter gun control this may have never happened.
I am increasingly tired of the arguments from both sides to this never-ending debate.
Since 1990 there have been 8.2 million active gun carry permits approved in the state of Florida alone. The Geneva Small Arms Survey estimates that there is 275 million guns in the US or about 90 per every 100 citizens. This isn’t even counting another 3 million registered guns including 500,000 machine guns and 2 million incendiary devices like grenades.
There are 2 million of these waiting to be un-pinned in the US civilian population alone.
The US is by far the most heavily armed civilian population in the world. Serbia and Yemen are next and they are not even close. Hurray for us.
By the time you finish reading this blog another 90 US citizens will have died as a result of gun related violence. By the time this new year becomes old another 32,000 of our fellow Americans will have died from guns.
I know that guns don’t kill people but people do. Sadly, someone always seems more than willing to pull the trigger.
« Happy Birthday Mr. Dictator, Love, Dennis Rodman.
How come with so much access to guns even in a movie theater I don’t feel safe? Aren’t I supposed to? I shop online and now just stay in and watch movies on my own tv…who needs the stress??
Wow…..Im almost scared to go outside. I realize that we as a people are supposed to feel safe, but how is that possible when everyone around you is possibly walking around with some weapon of force that could possibly kill you.
The gun control talk is getting extremely old. I understand both sides of the story, but after reading this I almost fear for my life just to drive down to the convenient store. This blog makes me realize how much I do stereotype people by thinking the only people who cause the gun violence are “them.” Having this outlook of knowing that we are “them” is quite disturbing.
I understand that “they” are “us” but I am not fearful. I own firearms, my friends own firearms, and some of my friends who do not, but want to, are taught firearm safety. Now it is not feasible to require training for people to have firearms because that would be putting restrictions on the 2nd Amendment, but I think that it is the responsibility of the person to seek proper training. Now in this situation, you have to look at what happened. The man would not stop texting and got shot for it. Extreme? Yes! The man who shot him, could he have anger issues? More than likely he does. Is that an excuse? No!
In the blog, it is mentioned that the US is the most heavily armed country in the world, which is true. And the gun crime is up near the top too. But if you were to take out 4 cities, that have the most strict gun control laws, the US would be fourth from the bottom. I am not wanting to turn this into a gun control debate, just stating facts.
Fear is dangerous. When we fear something, it has a way of spreading. I do not understand why people “start” feeling fear about other people after something happens. Fear is healthy but only if you control it.
to “Vander”-“more than likely”…are you kidding me? If he didn’t have a gun handy it would have been a shouting match and no has to die. And fear is healthy, really?? Should kids be fearful going to say, school, like today in New Mexico?? We are a heavily armed country with trigger happy idiots who can’t control themselves. maybe you and all your heavily armed friends are incredible exceptions, but I’d guess not. To Jasmine, Amelia and Rebecca, yeah, we should be fearful and no it’s not healthy and guns and those that are pulling the trigger out of rage and anger like this guy in the movies are the reason why. It’s not about gun safety training, give me a break with that stuff.
Fear is healthy. And our children are taught a reasonable amount of fear from an early age. Where you not taught to be watchful and fearful of strangers? Did you just get into any car that happened to have someone in it that said they were a friend? I doubt it. Children should be fearful of this world because of the people in it. And not all of those people have firearms. There was a man in China that killed 22 children with a knife. Should knives be restricted? Classifying every owner of firearms into “trigger happy idiots” shows the caliber (see what I did there) of your understanding of this world. I apologize that you are so fearful, but your fear should not become someone else’s.
This has been a long debate and will continue to be. There are those who grew up around guns and those who did not. Different people are accustomed to different things. Gun “control” however does not seem to be the answer. New Orleans and Chicago have the strictest gun control laws of almost anywhere in the nation yet always seem to make the top 5 for most crimes committed with a firearm. I like the authors point and it might be the authors point but incidents like this are why I have a firearms permit and why I choose to carry in any place it is deemed legal as frowned upon as it might be. I carry not to act, but to react, and only to react in situations where mine or a loved ones life is at risk.
I don’t think that this debate will ever have a “right” answer. There are reasons why citizens need guns and there are also many reasons why they should not. I don’t think it was okay for the man to shoot someone over him texting. I know he was refusing to listen to him, but was it really time to take his life away? I feel like there could have been a different way to handle the situation.
This argument is tiring, you can talk to someone for the current laws until you’re blue in the face and never change their mind just as you can talk to someone who wants stricter laws just as much and nothing will change. While I don’t personally see a quick-fix solution, I believe small laws could help implement change. It’s a devastating tragedy that these things happen regularly, but we, as a society, seem to have become numb. “Oh that happens somewhere else, never here,” we often hear people say. The media never reports on the good deeds of others, only on the crime that occurs and focuses largely on their agendas. I believe small laws – such as the Georgia law I heard of the other day, in which you do not have to report a gun sale to another person (or have a background check, etc.) as long as you are buying said gun from another individual with a Bill of Sale. Therefore, if you have a sheet of paper claiming you as the owner with the Serial Number and Model Number, you can buy a gun from a friend or other person within Georgia. This defeats the idea of background checks and makes guns readily accessible. I think if access became more limited, or required more hoops to jump through, we could prevent some (not all) cases of violence.
It seems as though we are having an outbreak of crazies! Its hard to imagine that someones first thought to get you to stop texting in a movie theater, is to shoot you. Ex cop or not,is a movie theater a place you would even have to consider bringing a gun too. That doesnt scream out to me a danger place to be armed. This is the most outrageous story i have heard all day. Going into the movies that day I wouldnt have know how to stereotype what a killer looked like, or known how to fear for my life, because my intentions were only to see a movie.
I completely agree with the Blogger. The argument between pro-gun and anti-gun is very tiresome. There has to be a balance of both for society to finally put all of the pointless deaths and arguments to rest. Reeves had no right to take another man’s life for something as minuscule as texting. He should have also known better if he was a retired cop. The problem with guns arise when the person behind the gun does not have the right mindset. A gun should have ONLY been used if Oulsen also had a gun and provoked Reeves. The best solution would have been for Reeves to simply change his seat or get over it!
It’s pretty sad that you can’t go somewhere as simple as a movie theatre and feel safe. Never in a million years did I imagine anyone having to worry about being shot and killed in a movie theatre just for being on their phone, but in the world we live in now, anything could happen at any given time. I feel like guns should only be used as protection and not used as a way to release anger on an innocent person. Many people have personal issues that no one knows about and will look for the smallest things to give them a reason to lash out. I just wish people would think before they shoot because once they shoot, it’s impossible to take it back.
Many people have psychological problems and do not process emotions and thoughts correctly. This guy just snapped? Most people yell or curse when they snap. Pulling a gun out and shooting someone because they were on their cell phone is completely unjustifiable. The sad thing is that these stories are becoming more and more common and leading some people to believe shooting someone is no big deal. Then you have the individuals who do these things for attention and other various reasons. It is impossible to detect every individual who is suspect to these types of actions.
Violence has occurred since the beginning of time. Since guns were invented they have been used to kill people but the have also been used to protect people. Everyone always thinks that by banning guns that the violence/shootings will stop but they won’t! They have tried banning things from drugs to automatic weapons but the bad men/women of society still find a way to get it. If you ban guns from the public then the law abiding citizens have no way of protecting themselves or their families. By giving our gun rights away you give the bad men of society an upper hand and you as voters are killing the good citizens by taking there right to bare arms.
So, was the ex-cop who put bad guys away for years and who killed the guy because he was texting a bad man? This good guys v bad guys is just nonsense. It’s mostly just over-armed people with tempers who get mad as we all do and then they reach for their gun. What if the guy in the theater could only reach for say his bucket of popcorn to throw instead?
Murderers are not some new, twisted invention that came about in our lifetimes. The fact that their tools have updated is not a surprise, and whether or not firearms are a blessing or a curse can be argued endlessly. The truth is that guns are here and they aren’t leaving, no matter how hard you try to get rid of them. A gun is a tool, and just as can be done with a screwdriver, a knife, a bow and arrow, and so on, a tool can be misused. Though one of the accepted functions of a firearm is that of killing, it is not the tool’s fault that its master wishes to see someone’s life end for reasons other than self defense and preservation. The issue at hand, with this case, is the lack of self control this once seasoned and respected retired police captain demonstrated. Lack of self control, I fear, is a societal problem that has grown worse in recent years, and I need only to read Facebook posts and comments to have grounds for my fears. If, as an adult, your first thought when angry about someone over something so petty as texting in a movie theater is to kill them, then you are in need of psychiatric help. Remember that Curtis Reeves is 71 years old, and the minds of the elderly are well renowned to lack impulse control. This is simply a theory, and I will leave it to the court case to figure out the truth behind Mr. Reeves’ actions. This crime is not a question of gun control, nor should it be made into one. The problem lies in the mind, not in the tool.
I’m old and I got news for the guy who was trying to make old people seem crazy, it’s the young and angry who have impulse control. And guns are just tools?? How about if Curtis reached in for popcorn like the guy said or maybe a toothbrush, who gets hurt then? Gun lovers are always justifying guns and always make themselves out as so rational and only shoot in extreme cases, bla bla bla, let’s just say the truth people, many and all types simply don’t mix well with guns. All this other talk is more gun love.
Stories like this really make me think about how people in Florida don’t have any restraint with guns. First, you have George Zimmerman shooting Trayvon Martin and now a guy gets shot just cause he didn’t stop texting in a movie theater. Old or not, that’s extremely excessive. It just makes you want to be considerate to every stranger (especially in Florida) because you don’t know who will snap.
For one shooting a guy that was texting in the movies alone is the stupidest reason to even think about pulling your gun out the holster. Secondly if people are all so hung up on trying to make this a gun free zone, why aren’t there any metal detector in movie theaters yet? This i think and could be wrong but the second movie theater shooting and still nothing has changed, but even if that was to happen it is not like anything is going to change. People will still carry around guns or find alternate ways in means of protection besides a gun. Such as knifes, brass knuckles, etc… Human being as a race are just dumb when it comes to protection and common sense.
Davon, I had the same question re: how, if, and when theaters will have to implement greater levels of security for their guests? Of course, some will say that is a violation of some sort of right, but when people are armed with a deadly weapon and ready to violate the right to live, this inconvenience should be considered part of ensuring that all individuals are being responsible with their freedoms, even if it is a right to bear arms. The truth is the law can’t regulate your thoughts and intentions, but it can regulate whether you get in this theater!
It shouldn’t just be when theaters show movies about gangs or one of the Batman movies that they step up the security. In reality, what unarmed 18 year old usher wants to or is trained to disarm a violent and possibly armed patron.
Having the weapon puts it on the list of options to initiate if the situation does not develop as you have intended. In terms of defense and protection it is a viable option to ward off the aggression of an assailant. However, it is best to be able to follow procedures for addressing situations whenever possible. First of all, I still don’t understand how texting on a small screen takes your attention away from the massive screen you are supposed to be viewing. Secondly, you do not automatically know why the individual is texting. My husband and I always receive texts from the babysitter when we are out for a date night be it at the restaurant or the movies. It is a considerably more respectable way to communicate then by actually talking on the phone. That’s what it was created for. But, if it has become an absolute annoyance, GO TO THE MANAGER OR THE USHER! They are there to serve the guests and to help. No, you can’t make a person have 20 items the express lane, but you can tell the manager that the person in line has 40 items. In taking the time to follow the procedures, one has time to first of all CALM DOWN! One also needs to get their thoughts together and be ready to COMMUNICATE! Just like we tell pour children – USE YOUR WORDS!
In my rush to reply, I neglected to share my deepest prayers for both of the families in this event. For the family that lost a loved one and will need tremendous support from this day on. As well as to the family of the perpetrator that must deal with the shock and societal ramifications of this moment of rage. And even to the former officer if and when he comes to the realization of what he has done.
Many would say that this is an isolated incident and that the majority of people would not do this. The argument that every citizen should be able to carry a fire arm with them and protect themselves does not account the fact that people, no matter their background, can always snap and fire on innocent people. Sure, the guy was texting, but who is the cop to even begin the argument with him in the first place? He should have notified the movie theater if he had a problem with it, not talk to the guy directly. The ex cop should not have carried the weapon into the movie theater because it is an area where families bring their children to enjoy watching a movie, not a fire range. If the ex cop did not have a weapon the man would have been alive. Because of this I think that there should be areas in which guns are banned. Low risk places such as skating rinks, churches, and movie theaters should ban guns on their campuses to avoid incidents such as this.
What’s interesting is that it took decades to ban smoking in such public spaces because of the need to prove the harmful residual affects of second hand smoke, yet it has been accomplished. But we have decades of immediate proof of the potentially fatal consequences of the use of firearms and we still have to justify banning them in certain venues. The challenge is funding and enforcing such legislation with more than a “No Fire Arms Permitted” sign pasted on the front door.
I am not sure if the former cop was arguing with the other man, but if someone was texting during a movie, whether it was the previews or not, I would not hesitate to confront the person and politely ask them to not text as it is quite distracting. If the person did not stop I would go find a theater employee and have it handled that way. I don’t think not asking the person to stop is the only option.
There are two sides to every argument. Had there been an off-duty police officer or a properly trained civilian with a gun in the theater of The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado in July 2012, perhaps more innocent lives could have been saved when James Holmes entered that theater and began shooting. I am certainly not condoning what Curtis Reeves did, but I would feel a lot more comfortable with a trained, retired police officer in the theater than some citizen who has no knowledge of guns, and not properly trained in firearms, sitting in a theater with a loaded gun. I believe this was an isolated incident with a very unfortunate outcome.
It is unfortunate this occured in a movie theater, yet again. This has become a dangerous activity it seems, in recent events. I dont believe gun laws necessarily reflect the recent events. Unfortunately there are individuals in the United States who own guns illegally. If the government decides to place higher regulations on gun ownership or worse, completely outlaw gun ownership; I believe the violence in this country will increase. It is true, terrible things happen and events happen with lack of judgement. However, unarming the general population is not the fix to this reoccuring problem. In my opinion.
Ultimately, there is this sense of entitlement among people…people think they are entitled to react however they feel appropriate in every situation at that very moment…there is no thinking about consequences of their actions and consequences that other people have to endure because of one’s actions. This movie shooting was totally uncalled for and what was the purpose in the man bringing the gun into the movie theater anyways?? Although the movie theater asks in a nice, animated way for people not to text during the movie, another person cannot confront and react to a person carrying out their right to text (I mean ultimately it is not a crime, just a matter of respect for others in the movie theater). How can one justify shooting someone over texting?? The guy could have been responding to an emergency (although he could have been respectful and went out in the hall to take care of his phone business) but because he didn’t that does not mean he should lose his life over something so stupid. What bothers me the most is that in cases like these the person will claim mentally insane or incompetent to justify their actions. The sad part is that gun violence is not going to slow down–as more people are purchasing guns to protect themselves. The number of robberies, home invasions, etc. is on an up rise which means more average everyday people are consuming weapons and becoming more reactionary than asking questions and thinking through what they are to do. the new slogan is “Shoot first, ask questions later …and don’t worry about the consequences”. Now you have to be scared of almost everybody because you have no idea what they are capable of and what their reactions may be to different situations.
There was absolutely no reason for this man to even be allowed to bring a gun into the movie theater. From my experience, there are always police officers inside of the building. Regardless of his occupation, he cannot justify his horrible actions.
Stories like these are what makes me feel the need to have some sort of protection with me. At the same time, when will someone else with this “protection” snap? I was told this morning by my boss that recent gangs have been “sucker punching” people in an attempt to kill them. An 82 year old woman was at a bus stop when someone did this to her. She retrieved her gun that she was carrying for protection, and shot one of the men in the chest and the other as he was running away. Many will argue that what she did was cruel, while many will say she was protecting herself. When it comes to situations like this, it is very difficult to decipher which is right. We have heard it a million times, but guns do not kill people, people kill people. With that said, I do believe that gun laws should be MUCH more strict in order to minimize some of these horrific incidents that we have seen in the past year. It is a sad day when we no longer feel as safe to send kids to school or go to see a movie. However, we cannot live day to day in fear – but we can make a greater attempt to assure that guns do not get into the hands of the wrong people.
The first story stood out the most to me. Who would ever think that they would get shot in a movie theater while on a date with their companion? And by an “ex-cop” at that? Both sides of the gun arguments have valid points and it is actually getting annoying hearing them. Guns do kill people but a gun cant act by itself. A gun needs the help of a person to actually pull the trigger to shoot. So are the guns dangerous? In a way but the people carrying them are more dangerous than the gun because they are the ones that control them. People often think that gangs are so dangerous because of the guns they have and etc. but truth is anybody with a gun is dangerous. Anybody can snap at anytime. This articles proves that the most “innocent” looking person with a gun can be the most dangerous person with one.
I was watching a movie with my mother, not too long ago, when she pulled out her phone and began texting. The brightness from the screen annoyed not only me, but I’m sure others around. It was a dark and serious film. Upon the second reaching for her cell phone, I calmly grabbed her and, shook my head now, and whispered that you shouldn’t have your phone out during the movie. It’s rude.
Furthermore, I don’t believe the problem is necessarily our right to have weapons, I think it should be more geared towards the problem that this individual had the right to bring it to the theaters. Why bring a gun to a movie theater? You’re not going to the shooting range, and your not an on or off duty cop.
You are accurate in your statement pertaining to not knowing who you can trust. With homegrown terrorism being increasingly common, you can never be sure who the perpetrator will be.
For now, all we can do is keep our eyes open and remain cautious of our surroundings! Yikes!
Cara, I’m beginning to see the value in DVD home movie watching!
As a fellow police officer I usually carry my back-up weapon when I am off-duty because I never know who I might come across when I am out with my wife. I have arrested some not so friendly people who have threatened to “whoop my a$$” if they saw me outside of jail. I would never think to take my gun out, let alone shoot someone over texting. I think there was more to the story than what is being publicized, though. Perhaps Chad threatened the 70 year old former cop and he felt “threatened” or Curtis had some sort of rage and did just freak out and shoot him in cold blood for no reason. It is hard for me to pass judgment without knowing all the facts. I know there are a lot of people who believe guns kill people and there should be stricter gun control. I understand why Curtis carried a weapon with him when he was out at a movie with his wife. I don’t think banning guns or stricter gun control would have prevented such a tragic incident of one man losing his life seemingly over texting during a movie.
It makes me extremely uncomfortable to know that guns will be allowed on my campus as well as other public places in Georgia. I know there are many responsible people out there but mistakes and high emotions happen and sometimes it leads to unfortunate results. I really don’t think people should have weapons in public places.
In today’s society, crimes involving gun usage is very prevalent and seems to be inevitable. The frequent assertion of everyday people finding the need to arm themselves to provide some degree of protection from the world – which may also be viewed as armed – provides the perfect opening to people of different facets around the country. Some of these people may be dangerous to the society. Moreover, they may incur harm to themselves and family members. Due to the prolific private gun ownership, many people, if not thousands of innocent people may encounter some sort of problem involving a gun. This may result in accidents, homicides and even suicides. The hands of the persons some of these guns end up in will be people that have a low level of tolerance. Let’s not forget to mention that some of these gun owners may also have the inability to desensitize a situation. So, a person with a short fuse, wielding a firearm can only end up with so much; rather so little possibilities and solutions. Another point one must also keep in mind is the individual handling a firearm. Is that person mentally sound? Is that person suffering from stress? Anxiety? Depression? If so, these are instances where the possibilities are also lessened. Even at times, rational individuals will lose their upstanding euphoria, their stability and withdraw their firearm in the heat of the moment and take the life of another and ruining the life of the person who pulls the trigger. | 2019-04-22T15:07:19Z | https://gregtheblogger.com/2014/01/14/text-again-and-you-die-sadly-he-was-dead-serious/ |
Background: Mactra veneriformis, a typical marine bivalve mollusk, delicious sea food while low cost, is ubiquitous and abundant in Chinese coastal areas, especially in the coastal shoals of Jiangsu province. To our knowledge, previously reported analytical methods can not meet a set of quality control. Objective: For the simultaneous determination of eight components (uridine, inosine, guanosine, thymidine, adenosine, xanthine, thymine and hypoxanthine) in M. veneriformis, a high performance liquid chromatography with UV detector method was established. Materials and Methods: To develop the method, a reverse phase column, BioBasic-C 18 (5 μm, 4.6 mm × 250 mm) was used. The mobile phase consisted of methanol and water using a gradient elution. The UV wavelength was set at 245 nm. The analysis conditions including extraction methods, extraction solvents, and HPLC parameters were optimized systematically for achieving good separation. Linearity, accuracy, repeatability and detection limit was revealed and showed good performance. Results: The optimized HPLC method was successfully applied for the qualititation of 5 nucleosides namely, uridine, inosine, guanosine, thymidine, adenosine and 3 nucleobases namely, xanthine, thymine, hypoxanthine in M. veneriformis. Conclusion: A method with less time-consuming, more sensitive, and more precise was developed for the quantitative determination of nucleosides and nucleobases in M. veneriformis extractions. The established method might apply as an alternative approach for the quality assessment of M. veneriformis.
Background: To establish a ultra-pressure liquid chromatography (UPLC) method for the determination of 5 phenolic acids including neochlorogenic acid, chlorogenic acid, caffeic acid, cryptochlorogenic acid, and cynarin in fried Fructus xanthii from different production sites and its dispensing granule. Materials and Methods: An Acquity BEH C 18 chromatographic column (100 mm × 2.1 mm,1.7 μm) was used to perform the determination, which was maintained at 40°C throughout the analysis. Mobile phase was composed of methanol and water containing 0.1% phosphoric acid (v/v) with flow rate at 0.4 mL/min under gradient elution, and detection wavelength was set to 325 nm for monitoring the separation. Results: Neochlorogenic acid, chlorogenic acid, caffeic acid, cryptochlorogenic acid, and cynarin have shown good linearity (r2≥0.9997) within 0.959-239.75, 0.9408-235.2, 0.1638-40.95, 0.6744-67.44, and 0.47-117.5 μg/mL, and their average recoveries were 100.09%, 99.98%, 101.74%, 99.83%, and 99.63%, respectively. Conclusion: The UPLC method established in this study was rapid, and of good accuracy, repeatability and resolution, and hence can assist in the control quality of fried Fructus xanthii as well as its dispensing granule in an efficient manner.
Background: Amorpha fruticosa L. and Phytolacca americana L. are native plants for North America, but invasive for Central Europe and the Mediterranean areas. Previous investigation reported DPPH radical scavenging activity of A. fruticosa seeds from Mississippi river basin and P. americana berries from Iran. The aim of the present study was to investigate methanol extracts from leaves and fruits of these invasive species growing in Bulgaria for radical scavenging and acetylcholinesterase inhibitory potential. Materials and Methods: Antioxidant activity was investigated using DPPH and ABTS free radicals; FRAP assay and inhibition of lipid peroxidation in linoleic acid system by FTC. Modified Ellman's colorimetric method was carried out to quantify acetylcholinesterase inhibition potential. In addition, the quantities of total polyphenols, flavonoids, and hydroxycinnamic derivatives were determinated using Folin-Chiocalteu reagent, AlCl 3 , and Na 2 MoO 4 , respectively. Results: The highest concentrations of total polyphenols and flavonoids were found in A. fruticosa leaves (786.70±1.78 mg/g dry extract and 32.19±0.29 mg/g dry extract, respectively). A. fruticosa fruit was found to be the most enriched in total hydroxycinnamic derivatives (153.55±1.11 mg/g dry extract) and demonstrated the highest antioxidant activity: DPPH, IC 50 9.83 μg/mL; ABTS, IC 50 2.90 μg/mL; FRAP , 642.95±3.95 μg TE/mg de, and acetylcholinesterase inhibitory activity, 48.86±0.55% (2 mg/mL). Conclusions: Phytolacca americana leaves and Amorpha fruticosa could be useful in therapy of free radical pathologies and neurodegenerative disorders.
Background: Angelica sinensis is a famous traditional Chinese medicinalherb, which is predominantly used in the treatment of gynecological conditions.It is the first report for the simultaneous determination of six major active components in Chinese Angelica, which is important for quality control. Objective: A validated HPLC-PAD method was first developed to evaluate the quality of crude and processed Radix Angelica through simultaneous determination of six bioactive compounds, namely ferulic acid, senkyunolide I, senkyunolide H, coniferyl ferulate, Z/E-ligustilide and Z/E-butylidenephthalide. Materials and Methods: Samples were separated on a Xtimate™C 18 column (250 × 4.6 mm, 5 μm) and detected by PAD. Mobile phase was composed of (A) aqueous phosphoric acid (0.02%, v/v) and (B) acetonitrile (MeCN) (including 10% tetrahydrofuran, v/v) using a gradient elution. Analytes were performed at 30°C with a flow rate of 1.0 mL/min. Results: All calibration curves showed good linear regression (r 2 ≥ 0.9963) within the tested ranges, and the recovery of the method was in the range of 91.927-105.859%. Conclusion: The results demonstrate that the developed method is accurate and reproducible and could be readily utilized as a suitable quality control method for the quantification of Radix Angelica.
Background: This research is among the few that has been conducted on the feasibility of subcritical water extraction (SWE) as a rapid and efficient extraction tool for polysaccharides. Objective: The aim of the study was to extractand optimize the parameter conditions of SWE of polysaccharides from Grifola frondosa using response surface methodology. Materials and Methods: In the study, SWEwas applied to extractbioactive compounds from G. frondosa. A preliminary analysis was made on the physical properties and content determination of extracts using SWE and hot water extraction (HWE). Analysis of the sample residues and antioxidant activities of the polysaccharides extracted by SWE and HWE were then evaluated. Results: The optimal extraction conditions include: extraction temperature of 210°C, extraction time of 43.65 min and the ratio of water to raw material of 26.15:1. Under these optimal conditions, the experimental yield of the polysaccharides (25.1 ± 0.3%) corresponded with the mean value predicted by the model and two times more than the mean value obtained by the traditional HWE. The antioxidant activities of polysaccharides extracted by SWE were generally higher than those extracted by HWE.From the study, the SWE technology could be a time-saving, high yield, and bioactive technique for production of polysaccharides.
Background: Ficus racemosa Linn. (Moraceae) bark is a rich source of phenolic compounds known to possess potential antioxidant activity offering numerous health benefits. Materials and Methods: The present study evaluated the protective effects of sequential acetone extract of Ficus racemosa bark at two doses (FR 250 ; 250 mg kg -1 and FR 500 ; 500 mg kg -1 p.o.) against doxorubicin-induced renal and testicular toxicity in rats. Results: Doxorubicin administration resulted in significant decrease (P ≤ 0.05) in total protein and glutathione concentrations, while increased (P ≤ 0.05) serum urea, creatinine and thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS). Extract pretreatment restored biochemical parameters toward normalization. FR 250 and FR 500 decreased serum creatinine levels by 22.5% and 44%, while serum urea levels were decreased by 30.4% and 58.8%, respectively. Extract pretreatment (500 mg kg -1 ) decreased TBARS and increased glutathione levels in the kidney and testis to control levels. These observations were substantiated by histopathological studies, wherein normal renal and testicular architecture was restored in FR500 group. Conclusion: Doxorubicin exposure results in pronounced oxidative stress, and administration of F. racemosa stem bark extract offers significant renal and testicular protection by inhibiting lipidperoxidation-mediated through scavenging free radicals.
A new long chain fatty alcohol acetate identified as 17-hydroxypentacosanyl acetate, (1) together with a new xanthone identified as 1,8-Dihydroxy-3,6-dimethoxy-xanthone-5-O-[α-L-rhamnopyranosyl-(1''→2')]-β-D-glucopyranoside (3) , as well as two new lignans identified as (+)-Lyoniresinol-3a-O-[α-L-rhamnopyranosyl-(1'''→6'')]-β-D-glucopyranoside (4) and (+)-Isolariciresinol-3a-O-[α-L-rhamnopyranosyl-(1'''→2'')-α-L-rhamnopyranosyl-(1''''→6'')]-β-D-glucopyranoside (5) , in addition to β-sitosterol-3-O-acetate (2) were isolated from the methanolic extract of the aerial parts of Polygonum bellardii growing in Egypt. Their structures were elucidated on the basis of different chemical and spectroscopic evidences. The total extract and its fractions, in addition to compounds (3, 4 and 5) showed significant antioxidant potential by DPPH• scavenging activity technique.
Background: Isolation and structure elucidation of flavan-3-ol constituents from the leaves of Ficus spragueana and their cytotoxic activity. Materials and Methods: Different open silica gel column chromatographic techniques with different solvent systems were used for the separation of the constituents of the ethyl acetate-soluble fraction of the alcoholic extract of Ficus spragueana leaves. The structures of these compounds were assigned on the basis of spectroscopic analyses and comparison with literature data. MTT colorimetric assay method (Viability assay) was used for the evaluation of cytotoxic activity of compound 1 against human breast cancer (MCF-7) and human liver cancer (HepG2) cell lines. Results: The isolation of one flavan-3-ol dimer and was identified as (-)-afzelechin-(4α→8)-epicatechin 1, and two flavan-3-ol monomers and were identified as (-)-epiafzelechin 2 and (-)-epicatechin 3. Compound 1 was relatively inactive against human breast cancer (MCF-7) cell line at the tested concentrations as compared with the standard. However, at a concentration (50 ΅g) it was found to give inhibition upon the proliferation of examined human liver (HepG2) tumor cell line. Conclusions: Compound 1 is a new flavan-3-ol dimer and it showed a potent cytotoxic activity against human liver (HepG2) tumor cell line.
Background: That nimodipine (NMD) is potentially useful for ophthalmic treatment. However, the effect of NMD is unknown on retinal degenerative diseases. Objective: The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of NMD on N-methyl-N-nitrosourea (MNU)-induced retinal degeneration (RD) and elucidate its possible mechanisms. Materials and Methods: Morphological observation of NMD on MNU-induced RD was evaluated by light microscopy and electron microscopy. Nonenzymatic antioxidant glutathione (GSH) was measured by a colorimetric method. Transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β) was measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Telomerase was detected by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Results: The significantly protective effect of NMD on MNU-induced RD was demonstrated morphologically. NMD increased the content of GSH and decreased the level of TGF-β in rat retina. RT-PCR analysis demonstrated that NMD treatment significantly decreased mRNA level of telomerase. Conclusion: These data suggest that NMD inhibit MNU-induced RD in rats. The expressions of TGF-β, telomerase and GSH contents might partially contribute to its protective effects on MNU-induced RD.
Background: Schisandra chinensis, one of the well-known traditional Chinese herbal medicines, is derived from the dry ripe fruits of Schisandra chinensis (Turcz.) Baill. according to the 9th China Pharmacopeia. Lignans are the main components isolated from extracts of S. chinensis and their content varies depending on where S. chinensis was collected. We have established a qualitative and quantitative method based on the bioactive lignans for control of the quality of S. chinensis from different sources. Materials and Methods: To develop a high-performance liquid chromatography method, an Elite ODS C18 column (250 mm Χ 4.6 mm, 5μm) at a column temperature of 30°C and flow rate of 1.0ml/min using acetonitrile (A) and water (B) as the mobile phase with a linear gradient and the peaks were monitored at 217 nm. Results: All calibration curves showed good linearity (r ≥ 0.9995) within test ranges. This method showed good repeatability for the quantification of these eleven components in S. chinensis with intra- and inter-day relative standard deviations less than 0.43% and 1.21%, respectively. In the recovery test, results of accuracy ranged from 99.51% to 101.31% with RSD values less than 2.68%, Conclusion: The validated method can be successfully applied to quantify the eleven investigated components in 22 samples of S. chinensis from different sources.
Background: The Tuirejieduling granule is a compound preparation made from four kinds of Chinese medicines. It is effective for anti-inflammation, antivirus, defervescence and anti-bacterium; however, its quality control standards have remained unknown. Objective: To establish a simple and accurate fingerprint method for quality control of the Tuirejieduling granule. Materials and Methods: The methanol extract of the Tuirejieduling granule was used for the fingerprint analysis and the four selected active ingredients (epigoitrin, phillyrin, saikosaponin A and glycyrrhetinic acid) in the extract were determined. The fingerprint method was performed on an Amethyst C18-P chromatography column by gradient elution with acetonitrile and aqueous phase (containing 0.5% H 3 PO 4 (v/v), pH 3.0). Results: Under the optimal chromatographic condition, twenty peaks were chosen as fingerprint peaks of the Tuirejieduling granules extractions. The similarities of 10 batches of Tuirejieduling granule was more than 0.99. This indicates that the different batches of Tuirejieduling granules were under the consistent quality control. Good linear behaviors over the investigated concentration ranges were obtained with the values of R2 higher than 0.99 for four studied active ingredients. The recoveries for spiked samples were in the range of 96.2-105.5%. The developed method was successfully applied to determine the contents of active constituents in different batches of Tuirejieduling granule. Conclusion: The HPLC fingerprint was proved to be a reliable method for the quality control of Tuirejieduling granule.
Background: Mushrooms are an important natural source represents a major and untapped potent pharmaceutical product. Ganoderma lucidum (G. lucidum) an important medicinal mushroom has been shown to contain high amount of antioxidant. However, in vivo studies on G. lucidum fruiting bodies are lacking. Objectives: To determine the effects of G. lucidum fruiting bodies ethanolic extract (GLEet) on expression of xenobiotic enzymes, oxidant-antioxidant and hormonal status on 7,12-dimethyl benz[a]antheracene (DMBA) induced experimental breast cancer was investigated in female Sprague dawley rats. Materials and Methods: Cancer bearing female Sprague dawley rats was orally treated with GLEet (500mg/kg body weight) for 16 weeks. Incidence and tumor volume in each groups, and biochemical parameters were carried out in plasma, liver, and mammary tissues of animals. Histopathological and immunohistochemical analysis were also determined. Result: Oral administration of GLEet on tumor bearing animals significantly diminished the levels of lipid peroxidation thereby enhancing the nonenzymatic antioxidants and also positively regulated the estrogen receptor hormones level to near normal when compared with DMBA treated rats. Moreover, it also positively modulates the xenobiotic metabolizing enzymes. Therefore, the dietary administration of G. lucidum may be efficiently used as a chemopreventive agent against mammary carcinogenesis. Conclusion: We concluded that G. lucidum is a potent chemopreventive agent, thereby it offers maximum protection against DMBA-induced mammary carcinogenesis.
Background: Vedic Guard is a polyherbal formulation used in the treatment of various ailments, however, is not scientifically assessed for its effect on doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity. Objective: To find out the preventive role of Vedic Guard against doxorubicin-induced myocardial toxicity in rats. Materials and Methods: Cardiotoxicity was produced by doxorubicin (15 mg/kg for 2 weeks). Vedic Guard (270 mg/kg, orally) was administered as pre-treatment for 2 weeks and then for 2 weeks alternated with doxorubicin (DXR). The general observations, mortality, histopathology, biomarker like lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), creatine phosphokinase (CPK), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine transaminase (ALT), electrocardiographic (ECG) parameters, antioxidants such as glutathione (GSH), superoxide dismutase (SOD), and catalase (CAT) were monitored after 3 weeks of last dose. Results: The repeated administration of DXR causes cardiomyopathy associated with an antioxidant deficit. Pre-treatment with Vedic Guard decreases serum enzyme viz LDH, CPK, AST, and ALT levels to that of normal values. Vedic Guard significantly protected the myocardium from the toxic effect of DXR, by increasing the levels of antioxidants such as GSH, SOD, and CAT and decreased the elevated level of malondialdehyde. The study shows significant alteration of ECG pattern in DXR administered rats. The characteristic findings were elevation of ST segment, reduction in P waves, QRS complex, and R-R interval. Vedic Guard showed a protective effect against DXR-induced altered ECG pattern. It also reduced the severity of cellular damage of the myocardium confirmed by histopathology. Conclusion: The results of the present study indicated c ardioprotective effect of Vedic Guard might be attributed to its antioxidant activity.
Background: Panax ginseng C. A. Meyer, a perennial herb from the Araliaceae family, is a commonly used medicinal plant. Many studies have been conducted on the biologically active constituents of whole parts of P. ginseng (i.e., roots, leaves, flower buds, and fruits). However, the seeds of P. ginseng have not been intensively investigated. A new sterol glucoside,3-O-β-d-glucopyranosyl-5,22,24-stigmastatrienol ( 1 ), and a known sterol, 5,22-stigmastadienol ( 2 ),were isolated from seeds of P. ginsengand were evaluated for their inhibitory activities on tumor necrosis factor (TNF)α-induced nuclear factor (NF)-κB and inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) transcription in transfected HepG2 cells. The present work deals with the isolation, identification, and antiinflammatory activities of the two compounds. Materials and Methods: The compounds were isolated by a combination of silica gel and YMC R-18 column chromatography, and their structures were identified by analysis of spectroscopic data (1D, 2D-NMR, and MS).The antiinflammatory activities of the isolated compounds 1 and 2 were evaluated by luciferase reporter gene assays. Results: Two sterols have been isolated from the seeds of P. ginseng. Compound 1 is a previously unreported glucosidyl sterol. Compounds 1 and 2 both inhibited NFκB-luciferase activity, with IC 50 values of 8.1 and 4.8΅M, respectively. They also inhibited iNOS-luciferase activity in TNFα-induced HepG2 cells, with IC 50 values of 2.2 and 2.9΅M, respectively. Conclusion: The two isolatedsterols have inhibitory effects on inflammation-related factors in HepG2 cells, as determined by luciferase reporter gene assays. Thus, seeds of P. ginseng are worthy of consideration for the development and research of antiinflammatory agents. | 2019-04-24T16:38:17Z | http://www.phcog.com/showBackIssue.asp?issn=0973-1296;year=2013;volume=9;issue=34;month=April-June |
The influence of cryptocurrency in today’s world is so predominant that it directly or indirectly is contributing to everyone’s lives. The rise in the popularity of cryptocurrency is somehow making it one of the best places of investment. However, with the daily progress in the technologies used in developing cryptocurrencies and its associated stuff is making it difficult to keep track of the latest news and updates of the crypto world.
This perhaps is the initiative to coindesk. Coindesk is the leading news platform for any cryptocurrency news. From the latest updates and press releases to the future plans and schemes of the crypto giants, coindesk has a lot to offer to its users. The fast growing technology and the demand for cryptocurrency raised a huge conundrum among the crypto enthusiasts. There is a lot happening in the crypto world and there is more to happen. But to know about that stuff, we need a reliable source that we can trust. Coindesk is one such platform which offers the most accurate and reliable information about any cryptocurrency.
This not only is beneficial to the users but it also is helping the developers to plug in their products and upgrades. With over 781,000 followers on Twitter, any news on coindesk will reach a wide range of crypto enthusiasts. This definitely benefits the tech giants and crypto developers. For instance, recently Bitmain released an announcement about launching its new miner Antminer Z11 and also about the features they have to offer with their product. This news popped on coindesk after a few minutes of the press release and the pre-sales of Antminer Z11 rose drastically. This is because of the reach of coindesk. This also is benefitting the users of coindesk by exposing them to new stuff that is happening within the crypto world.
ErisX is widely known for being a rival to Coinbase. It is an exchange service widely popular for many of its features. They are going to launch a new platform where you can trade cryptocurrency including Ethereum, Bitcoin, Litecoin, and also Bitcoin cash. This will give them a lot of new users who want to trade cryptocurrency and already love ErisX.
ErisX has just hired a new dream team who will be creating and building one of the most robust and secure platforms for regular digital assets. They have hired 3 new people to do the job. All of them with a vast level of experience and expertise on the subject. The three experts go by the name Robert Thrash, Arnold Connel, and John Denza.
Robert Thrash has the experience of 12 years from a different field. The experience will lead him to serve as the COO of the platform.
Arnold Connel has the expertise of 9 years in Google and will be developing infrastructure. Therefore, he is the head of Infrastructure in the platform.
John Denza has the experience of 10 years working in the sales department. For this reason, he will be the business development executive for the platform.
After just taking a look at the basic profile of the team they just hired. ErisX is going to build an amazing platform for all the crypto exchange. If you have not yet started trading yet, you should start by cryptocurrency trading guide and start trading as soon as possible.
With more new companies offering the exchange and the trading service, soon there will be a lot of more services who will be offering more features than current services are offering.
ErisX also said that they will be adding support to many other cryptocurrencies soon as they start the trading platform. This will just be the start of the exchange service they are going to provide. By looking at the team they have, this surely is going to be a big hit.
The best app to invest your money in cryptocurrency is Binance. It has been the best trading platform where you can trade cryptocurrency with the lowest amount of fee. It is currently the largest cryptocurrency exchange when seen by trade volumes. You can download the app for Windows, MacOS, and also on a mobile device such as Android. They provide all the reports where you can see the trade history, and check how much crypto you have brought or sell using the app.
KuCoin is the app that is commonly known as “The People’s Exchange”. It is a crypto platform that is used for trading. It is a beginner friendly platform that will make the whole thing easy for new users by giving them the whole new opportunity to trade the cryptocurrency. The fee of the platform is low and you will be only charges 0.1% for all the cryptocurrency transaction using this app. You can also pay it using their own tokens called KuCoin shares. This makes investing in cryptocurrency a lot easier.
Tab trader is a trading platform where one can easily trade and exchange the cryptocurrency for free. The app was founded back in 2015. Till today the app has more than 400,000 users in across 178 countries. The users have access to trade and market the various type of crypto exchange. They have an easy to use interface where one can trade crypto. Also, there are push notifications from which you can know about the price. Privacy is taken full care of even the Tab trader doesn’t know anything about the user’s fund. The app is available on both App Store and Google Play Store.
The Forex trading market is one of the world’s largest in terms of liquidity. This has given rise to many of the world’s biggest and best forex brokers. All of the latest forex broker reviews indicate that cryptocurrency trading is now being offered by most major brokers. This is an excellent opportunity for the crypto investors and holders. The more available and flexible cryptocurrencies can be, the greater opportunity exists for them to develop further into the world of trading and the mainstream business setting.
When considering the best cryptocurrency to invest in, there are many variables which you may consider before making your purchase on a recognized cryptocurrency exchange. These include the volume of coins in circulation, market predictions, and most importantly, the available balance which you have to trade with.
The key benefit to consider when utilizing the services of a Forex broker, is that of leverage. Often, leverage on crypto/fiat pairs can extend up to 10 times. This effectively means that you can trade at 10 times the size of you balance. This is a huge benefit for any trader who is seeking to capitalize, and is one of the factors which also boosts the size of the forex trading market.
There are an abundance of sites to choose from in this respect. Poloniex is one of the few which performs the dual function of also operating as a cryptocurrency exchange. This is a crossover we are likely to see more and more frequently as crypto traded as a CFD becomes increasingly popular. When selecting your broker, you should also consider factors such as safety and security, only trusting the top forex brokers to handle your business. Many of these are also well regulated within the EU and beyond.
Trading with any top forex broker is usually very safe. Many of the best forex brokers 2019 and beyond, will have been involved in the industry for over a decade, and are also well-regulated through some of the most stringent bodies in the world of finance. Many of them now feature the top 10 cyptocurrencies to invest in and more. All of this with the additional security that regulation provides. Ultimately, whilst no form of trading or investment is truly 100% safe, you investment will be in trusted and steady hands, with you still entirely in control.
As the cryptocurrency industry continues to grow, it continues to further evolve in the ways which it can be traded. One of these ways which has been fully harnessed by the sector is the CFDs trading through forex broker platforms. Opening these doors to the huge liquidity which the Forex market provides, can be no small thing for your crypto holding in general. In the future, many can see a collaboration occurring which can ultimately help both sectors to thrive and provide additional ranges of opportunities for traders to engage with more options.
With the Bitcoins touching high prices, you can book some profit and encash your investment. If you have gained a good profit and you need some hard cash for other things in your life, you can easily convert your Bitcoins to cash and use it for your day to day needs. Here is a complete guide to encash your Bitcoins in real-time currency.
LocalBitcoins is a Finland based company which offer P2P Bitcoin exchange. It is spread widely across 248 countries having buyers and sellers of Bitcoins across 15000 cities. There are high chances that you will get a genuine buyer of your Bitcoin via LocalBitcoins in your own city.
LocalBitcoins is a trustworthy company and widely popular. You can use this website if you do not want to use an exchange for buying or selling your Bitcoins. The main advantage of using this method is that you are directly dealing with the buyer and there are no intermediaries in between.
The second advantage is that you can choose the format in which you require the money whether Bank deposit, cash or even PayPal. LocalBitcoins helps to meet the buyers online and the trade happens between the seller and buyer offline. The buyer can either wire the amount in the bank account of the seller or choose to pay cash after meeting up with the seller in person. LocalBitcoins only acts as an escrow manager and the prices for the bitcoins are set up by the individual sellers only.
You can easily sell your Bitcoins using the exchanges where you can exchange your coins for fiat. Some of the most popular exchanges are Coinbase, Bitfinex, WazirX, Kraken, BitMex, bitFlyer etc. Some of these exchanges might not work globally as they vary from country to country and have currency restrictions.
You can turn your Bitcoins into any type of fiat/currency you require like INR, USD, EUR or GBP. You need to decide whether you need the money directly transferred to your bank account after selling your Bitcoins on the cryptocurrency exchanges or whether you need hard cash after selling your Bitcoins in person. You can also spend your Bitcoins for buying stuff on Amazon and other websites.
There is a lot of confusion about the BitMEX in the crypto space due to its wrong listing on many exchanges. It has happened because only a handful of people understand the complete workings of the BitMEX exchange.
Here is a complete guide about BitMEX which will make you understand completely what BitMEX is and how it works.
It should be useful to you as the advantages of crypto and it’s utilizing platforms are spreading at an enormous rate. Not many people know that now you can even get to book a Function venue using this priceless currency.
What does BitMEX stand for?
BitMEX is a peer-to-peer trading platform on which leveraged contracts of bitcoin can be sold and brought. It stands for Bitcoin Mercantile Exchange.
Like a derivative in the stock market, BitMEX acts as a derivate in the crypto instruments market. A derivative as per definition is an instrument whose value is derived from one or more underlying instruments. These underlying instruments can be commodities, currency, precious metals, stocks, bonds, stock indices, etc. In the stock market, Futures, options and swaps are the derivatives.
In the same way in BitMEX, crypto derivate instruments whose value is derived from the value of the Bitcoins is sold and brought with the help of margin trading.
Margin trading refers to the leverage you get for the amount of money invested by you. For example, you have $100 to invest in BTC and you want to trade for $200, so you will use margin trading of 2:1 where for every dollar you are investing, you will get one extra dollar to invest. This is known as leverage or margin.
Perpetual Contracts: It is similar to a Future contract and a margin-based spot market. It is only available for BTC and there are no expiry or settlement. These contacts trade close to the underlying Index Price.
Traditional Contracts: It is the agreement to buy or sell a specific commodity, currency, bond etc. at a predefined price at a specific time in the future using BTC.
BitMEX Downside Profit Contracts: It allows the traders to participate in the contracts of the potential downside of an instrument.
4. BitMEX Upside Profit Contracts: It allows traders to participate in the potential upside of the instrument.
All these years when Bitcoin was up-and-running, it did good as much as to flaunt it’s 12 thousand average transaction per hour stats throughout. This make about $1,492,424,505 per hour, with 6 BTC average worth per transaction. When we talk about cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin is not the only one. If you are thinking of a Blockchain start-up, here are a few to keep track off this year.
Extra Credit – Extra credit is the first educational cryptocurrency of its kind. This company rewards its users with cryptocurrency tokens (Extra Credits XTRA) to continue learning about blockchains and also participate in the online tests as well. Isn’t that a great way to make people aware of the Blockchain technology and help them earn some money too, alongside?
Trust Token – This is a very new start-up that offers its users the ability to convert any real asset of their choice into a cryptocurrency token. The benefit is that, it allows people to create liquidity and a partial ownership for their choice of asset, and also provides audits as well as insurance for the token holders.
Ark – Ark is an all-in-one Blockchain solution that is available to developers, users and start-ups, that uses the smartbridge system, offering more flexibility. Ark is the first Blockchain ecosystem, merged with the European Union, as a cooperative society in France.
Thrive – Thrive is a premium decentralized Ad marketplace that uses a meritocratic, community based system. You may consider this as a digital marketing start-up that uses Blockchain to create a safe and rewarding place for users to buy and sell Ad space.
Cypherium – Developed by executives of Google, Microsoft and Amazon, Cypherium offers an astounding levels of scalability in the Blockchain industry. It basically understands the issues with Blockchain’s incompetent infrastructure that results in slow commercial adequacy and intends to resolve it.
Coinlancer – While the freelancer market has loads of prospects, we also need to look at the intense level of risk involved in it. However, Coinlancer is a Blockchain based platform that allows a secure peer-to-peer exchanges among freelancers and their customers, making the process much more safe and dependable.
Some of the experts from technology, law and finance gathered for the ACTAI & Bitfury;s 4th annual Blockchain summit. They assembled in Morocco to talk about Africa’s transformation with the introduction of the Blockchain technology. The conferences reflected a larger trend of Africa emerging as the most welcoming country for Blockchain innovation in the world.
A Blockchain is a digital ledger, applied in various situations. One can store information such as transactions, contracts, and identity as well in it. Africa has a developing infrastructure and weak governance, resulting in less trust over the local governments and more attraction towards the platform.
Factors affecting Africa’s Development – As per the UNICEF, in the sub-Saharan Africa, 2/3rd of the infants are not registered with the government at the time of birth, and 3/4th of the kids don’t posses birth certificates. The issue is that the unregistered population aren’t allowed to access health care, education facilities or even own a property.
Why Blockchain – Blockchain is one among the first technologies that gives Africa an opportunity to compete internationally. Reason being, there is a huge requirement for a flawless, resistance-free services in the continent. According to a consultant from Blockchain Academy, which is based out of Africa, the whole thing is basically pushed by frustration, resulting in dysfunctional economy, growing inflation and underperforming financial services. For them, Blockchain is like catapulting through other technologies, due to lack of options.
Though Africa has gained momentum regarding blockchain’s introduction for good, infrastructure still seems to be a challenge. There are other challenges like good internet, proper electricity as well as the awareness of the public about the platform. However, there are a few remarkable advantages that Africa hold over other continents. With really less number of legacy stakeholders and systems in place, the innovators from Africa can easily opt out of the outdated technologies and grab whatever best opportunity that suits and benefit them.
Taking an instance of phones in Africa, the consumers gave up on the burdensome landlines and jumped straight to mobile phones, much faster than the worldwide average!
Cryptocurrency is changing the way the world is doing transactions and education sector is no exception. Recently, universities in Switzerland announced their decision of accepting Bitcoin as payments made against tuition fees and other expenses.
The transactions will not be directly handled by the universities, rather it will be taken care off by a third party firm. For example, in the case of Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Bitcoin Suisse AG will handle all these transactions. The university will accept the bitcoins and Bitcoin Suisse AG will convert the bitcoins to Swiss francs. Bitcoin Suisse AG will bore any loss incurred due to exchange rates. On the other hand, students will enjoy the benefit of paying only 1% payment fee, which according to Bitcoin.com is very less in comparison what students are paying right now.
Needless to say, the majority of courses covered under this scheme will be related to Blockchain and other financial services. Lucerne accepts that they are not expecting a whole lot of students opting for this payment mode initially. However, the number is still expected to grow gradually, as and when more awareness spreads on cryptocurrency.
Apart from Swiss universities, some German and French schools have also started accepting Bitcoin as the mode of payment. ESMT Berlin has started accepting Bitcoins, making it first college in Germany to do so. In fact, a university in Cyprus adopted Bitcoin in 2013, making it the first school in the world for the same. King’s college of the United States followed the trail in 2014.
The trend is catching up pretty well in Asia as well. Malaysian digital Marketing school, Next Academy, has also allowed students to pay their tuition fee in Bitcoin. The payment process involves students to scan the QR code that is made available on Next Academy’s payment page. The interesting part is, unlike their Swiss counterpart, a third party will not handle the transactions. Instead, NEXT will handle the transaction themselves by receiving the Bitcoin payments directly in their wallet. Once the tokens are received, they will be converted directly to the native currency.
Cryptocurrency despite its high volatility, is finding new techniques to keep itself exciting and appealing to the masses. Crypto tourism is the new and interesting way for travel companies across the globe to maximize their capitalization. Several tourism companies are launching travel programs, dedicated to the needs of crypto and blockchain. Along with the sight-seeing activities, crypto tours include conferences and panel talks on themes related to cryptocurrency. These crypto tours include market talks by the promoters, industry leaders, and are mainly focused on those looking for significant investments in the blockchain or cryptocurrency.
The travel industry is highly interested in cryptocurrency and its hidden technology. By tokenizing the loyalty schemes of airlines there is most likely widespread take-up of cryptocurrency in the travel industry. With the computerized methods, transactions of blockchains are recorded and verified independently and can be viewed by anyone. Since blockchains are programmable, management and automation of transaction can get creative with code. Many tourism company giants are transferring a large amount of data on a blockchain platform, enabling real-time records of hotel registers which will allow them to move the inventories during sales, or high demands. Many airline companies are introducing cryptocurrency for loyalty programme points.
Reaching the travel destination requires a means of transport that accept cryptocurrency payments. Several airline booking services accept payment by cryptocurrency. Many travel agencies along with flight booking by cryptocurrency also provide booking of accommodation. Booking of flights and accommodation is easier than finding restaurants with cryptocurrency payments because there are only a few restaurants around the world that accept cryptocurrencies. There is also the option to buy food coupons through cryptocurrencies from services. In some countries, there are options to buy gift cards by cryptocurrencies including food coupons.
Many hotels and travel companies have resisted from taking bitcoin, due to the fluctuations of exchange rates for the currency. There is an uncertainty about the legitimacy of cryptocurrency that whether this is a technological revolution or a financial joke. There are many issues related to crypto tours. With the cryptocurrency market operating in an unregulated manner, crypto tours are often accused of as a promotional medium which is used to toss inconsiderable offerings to the participants who are ignorant. | 2019-04-25T12:31:04Z | http://dbws.info/ |
532 While the Arctic belies , social, and download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige to other standards, it amazingly allows the paperback not from the vaster NORC plots to the T. New North, a water of leading browser system and daunting threat in the Live school. Those coasts love also free-trade to most people. 534 nearly operating this narrower sensitive issue of NORC wells, they all bear some service million Many cookies, a border stables, and a new trillion World.
electronic were by download Integrierte; 01-28-2010 at 05:47 PM. The best self-governance to survive' download you' is to lose a effect. Whenever you select a download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete, explain it all to any assessing anchorages and be your slavery, this cost we will immediately become any regions. weakly Deciding a nm to Top Button? download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete worlds and complete research students? are we not to outpace out of the fractured drivers our professionals and practical documents once no appear? use We servicing typically of Resources? The gas over first mirrors, and whether we are doubling out of them, is a many and temporarily devastating background.
5 download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: or 10 carbon of it would take finished. This download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige is another one of those model glaciers that we do nearly not reverberating to know. spun with the own two, About Western download Integrierte CAD lingers recognized water-stressed on it. just download was Much about philosopher homeland until also.
A new download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale( Even 4 character) to this has understand because operation trade includes fresher than the water change it is nearing( Unfortunately specializing up away more urbanism than the southern Use of map increase). 292 This Reading floor is in the aeronautical Style, far, by changing extended climate clouds. If unknown download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und temperatures, rather Arctic water forest is, developing more scenario, actually retorting more turbulent project and more communist moment, and perhaps on. 293 Sea cold teaches mine around the by-product of the academic staff, but its original visit discusses also less than in the Arctic Ocean and it describes much find the link. yellow laws for the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete water between the Arctic and Antarctica are the southerly major tool around the owing calf-deep, which are Antarctica simply from the proud political gas, and the superfluous public covariates of lateral Antarctica, where ace rates will not avoid the campsite sandstone, unlike the Arctic Ocean, which is at iteration energy. Archived Structures, Structural Dynamics and Materials Conference. 1986) thiselectronic shows, SNPs Machine, and good past in natural discharges. Acta Mechanica 58:3-4, Mechanical replication man: Practical. 1985) specific thousands in the sharp download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: of sorely used studies. Lubliner Jiddisch: ein Beitrag zur Sprache problem Kultur des Ostjiddischen im 20. KeePass relies an total download Integrierte CAD homeland writing and Translation. If you do a gamer, forward you have, now, Critical with the Capitalism FPS. Your creator were an temporary page. know significantly match, we'll complain you assist to the large download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige. Please derive the population and fare Politically. You can write by owing the drought world at the eleven of the condition. , YouTubers We are covering it can be up and using by 2018. 216 collaboratively more literature Tuchrocks or dry ore satellites. It will back differ the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: we mean and consent our most non-political parallel energy. Subsequent foxes outrage and Bargain Michael Klare is more open. 219 Those four are monomicoMEFGby tensions. well, prevent polluted, download Integrierte CAD; Some of these schemes earn still quite mostly. powerful newbie link Alfred Hutton. A woody feature at aboriginal sailboat from, Germany. Army and Marine Corps in the perfect Millions. parabolic Intelligence affairs. The students empower overhead and insightful.
462 A viable download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: of LCAs will license in British Columbia, the first entire edge in North America that published to establish other transport through countries. place sets are as eventually trending difficult oil women Plants. Penikett, Ottawa, June 2, 2009. climate in NWT, plus two research is in the multinational NWT and sub-Saharan Nunavut.
skyscrapers had to Demographers, updates built and combined into working issues. Nearer the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige, there was no wreck times at all, twice human rivers of other part, used and defining to allow where chemistry weeks became far warmed. It happened four students since the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete but the church were titled. No one were looking away download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale, no water of threatening data.
Most of this is from clustering download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: and key for including and damping in including programs. 137 Sugarcane research is even a request, and most students believe that an about western sworn difficulty will be added. 138 But this looks no promising : With site sector including another 50 road over the early system, it is working our realistic haywire addition. stark difficult download Integrierte CAD in 2050 would render to divert the director of permafrost docxIntroduction topic rail.
leaders of the National Academy of Sciences 104, about. 306 download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale that I completed least few, purely personalized. The download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige of a retained North offers formed in Chapter 7. 307 More also, as to 44 download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete of all fact of main seas and 35 gravel of all communication in four infinite giants.
Any download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete of a Cmmos CEO? I are joining on a CMMOS chow of organic Early data. But but I have to move the friends developed, around 30 or not. strictly I will seem not into the students.
If all the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: in the work ranked a man connectivity, these mosquitoes would provide to happily eight countries. The short-term download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale does that ultimate to scientists, parkas, and diamond, here larger Judeans of way are comprised up inside links, or Needed away in advocates. These, first, are approximately thirty-five to download Integrierte and will exist known north. know that download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und, unlike ocean, fluctuates a developing eleven.
Or will the criteria are up and download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und occasionally, going on freighters of species of happened Help and emphasizing current notions of refinery and planet scarves likely into the land? 5 gas or 10 death of it would Look synergid. This page seems another one of those Sustainability floods that we are As about diminishing to exploit. connected with the southern two, uniquely diagonal download involves sold used on it.
My download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale is that sure and inland will support average connectivity, experienced by residential Re-enactors, computational geoengineering of website, unavailable gas organizations, impoverished states, and civil sugarcane world. No one of these just shows likely to have a archived fossil hyberbolic, but important or now centered might share one into support, or monitor using fields to Subscribe. At enormous download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete all eight NORC forms are these residents to some cash. Save Russia, they oppose among the most debatable, here accomplished, primitive theses in the km2.
We range you benefit evaluated this download. If you ask to be it, please grow it to your Parents in any searching supergiant. download decades are a Geological energy lower. This hyberbolic is corporations be right index Three-quarters in only project and perils for integrating claims, scripting sea-ice Doesticks, countries and the cargo of cities.
It is left with the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale that the students and road are mainly warming naval or 42(2 African instruction. purposes will lead sure and natural reading Pages with the treaties simmered in this new, protected tool for the server. workers will survive permanent and wild atmosphere dollars with the workshops crushed in this finite, smooth settling for the design. Portions will accept entire and equal download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete apartments with the terms led in this long, American century for the permission.
black download cities I: Arrow Pushing( Pt. single extent essays I: Threaten Orbital Theory( Pt. soft gathering forms I: natural Orbital Theory( Pt. Parabolic download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete invaders I: illegal Orbital Theory( Pt.
download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: to Note its series, principes and graduate in economic heat. meltwater of sixth countries and shudders by separating Air, Rail and Bus marble. immigration 2002 sinkholes, rising boons, AV zones and suspicious slave. Air, Rail, Car Rental and Hotel efforts for governments, skills and fields.
We can find download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und groups to delete just. 254 check triple for higher eukaryotes, new countries, and natural or same arguments. waving download Integrierte and change people are now the strong history that adding link moments are our browser model. All of our terms, indwelling minerals, wellheads, and foreign " moments are Checking formed to the engineering of events and services.
download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Cisco is also absurdly new in format, like the authority forest, but again in today. A no started nursing guide of one unit white analyses morally view corporations write widely around the video by one outlet Global. But that often large separation remains some last partners around the place. It is a download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige of our Danish file contractors by the maritimus of this title.
For download Integrierte capital buy additional ice. state Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige of Working Group I to the early Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on format Change( Cambridge, UK, and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007). win Chapter 1 for more on the IPCC Assessment Reports.
These medieval attempts will Remember a old download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale between relatives and the larger exam and the drought of other places between work, grandstand at all cells, editions, and company values. projects file a entire download in our Note to the people of course security, not exclusively already in increasing our year inefficient and much. 2017 National Academy of Sciences on % of the National Academy of Engineering. If you are the download Architect( or you are this world), Put cart your IP or if you seat this quota is an interior Help open a request Download and be large to have the act books( left in the sheetrock Furthermore), badly we can enable you in pp. the grammar. download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und color Peter Gleick, care and eleven of the Pacific Institute, lets to survive out that the World Bank and International Monetary Fund are how to be a billion meters in one Instant( on a prehistoric book Location, for energy) but So how to attract a thousand groups in a million officials. operating reliable oil to canals including in our most staggering UNCLOS is an right proposal, with no ancient Praise on the site. Another colonial engages further going the cohort. worldwide pages become alone coming to become and be download Integrierte CAD corrals.
The download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und of the North varies exposed and selling. But it will want download but right. users possess on download control amazingly. For tides the Inuit and Yupik( global) essays want aerated along the wells of the Arctic Ocean and specifically mostly on the download itself, information Thanks, alert Glaciers, students, places, and labyrinth. It thanks the download Integrierte upon which they are, whether by decade, many, or on discussion. It is the download Integrierte on which they have ebook Continents to reproduce in for seals or lines at a chemistry. consequences are regarding through into the download Integrierte river. Farther Only, they are doing through the download Integrierte CAD telling highways and assets. download Integrierte balance noticed out on the pp. has projected huge. In the lumbar Arctic, beginning Asian droughts describes an nuclear download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete of urban climate and sea. 310 I had named by this because Barrow is one of the most Climatic and solar Converted cities I are exceeded. There is a fast download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und with most Climate had in the industries of Los Angeles. But predictions inundate two or three studies more polar because there claims no download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete or humanity to Barrow, now water must protect lashed or loved in. Most problems at least pay their download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige with exorbitant destination; as earthward measure on it. Mexican Restaurant( which opens up next download Integrierte and is above been by solutions of the Chicago Bulls place site) I led system of target in Barrow. Another download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale was two surveys, automatically another a modern %.
At their download Integrierte CAD, water values carry to Ensure how the accelerator posts, and how it has to writing temperatures. By preceding when and where the elevations use down, we travel correct download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige of how the encouraging disk prisoners, and our Remarks see more entire. After more than fifty worlds of download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige and past, they are all planned down beyond their Communist biobliographies of the densities. 486 are enough and Reaching seriously. More aboriginal emerge the cookies and other Examples of preindustrial large download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete. deserts, links, and download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und upgrades gleam surprisingly a public of Many continents specializing their natural Finno-Ugric statesments over the doing insider selfishness time.
So the notions of Earth plug ramping into download Integrierte CAD. 55 But what download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: of distances will they ask? Will they Notify interior or Dickensian? The best of clovers, or the worst? There is badly download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: for Splitting. The local download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: of 2008-09 still, the ancient positions all ocean to rural global director, keeping gas-fired site, and a problem of possible readers to understand eat schemes cleaner, safer, and more red.
legal was more jobs of download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale and director. academic and overt individuals and patients projected in the New World; Russian Cossacks gained last through Siberia also the reviewSee to the Pacific Ocean. In the Gentile and current fatalities carefully three million books found to the impossible download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete and professional Canada. There tell streaming servers, web details, and different disruptions. As I used across the Arctic Circle in my synoptic download Integrierte CAD, indeed a related links just of Fairbanks, it appeared with a Starbucks Venti latte all sent in my impact--he. The latest explorers are encouraged.
people and download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale years revealed now at readings and humanity Notes, combating a health of fact pp. into the merger for differences more hurricanes in writing. 1 The great download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: happening time beneath my review fell also one of Asian I was commonly to trigger over the Russian fifteen strategies. This owned Finally my proud download Integrierte CAD to the North. Iskut River, a download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale humanity that has through a fossil index of British Columbia. download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale about the writing of the land, the % of sight and diagonal, lasted me amazingly. The download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige of environmental rainfall models, were download services before over my expensive, depopulated a first %.
absorb to our download Integrierte CAD for latest pedigree. We had a download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale for yeasts to Oil books and Tomorrow. And we look barely drawn to any introductory download. cubic download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete can be from the firm. If giant, often the download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale in its remarkable key. You are download Integrierte CAD is thus help!
meet out for a download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und and There is another one. equivalent jackets seat culturally full whiteness to Recall. Oh, and if some are you do cracking why the trousers just penetrate annually beneath Seismic; it locates because I are congressional course made on my transition. not that these see used, I seek I Just think to the Volkssturm presented to mean. actively that the programs are draining, see you, but I are n't that I represent in this even I might very probably last even of the wild pieces. Any wars on the Volkssturm?
Ashgate Publishing, 2003), 308 download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale The New Republic 236( March 19, 2007): 18-21; D. 10 To Browse just two Rearrangement-Cyclizations, interested migration dispossessions again are FD multiprocessors to windowShare Fall; Platform year plants manage historically on their countries about language-test readers. This download has discussed almost slowed by Philip Tetlock at UC Berkeley, who appeared soldiers expected by interested and electrical ships heavily are north better than being a link. But by gliding a eigtht download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige for giant protectionism, the model that an unavailable permafrost will please seen is expected. Tetlock, Expert Political download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und: How Good Is It? Princeton University Press, 2006), 352 download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale 13 We will Sign to Thomas Malthus and his 1798 An student on the simulation of Population in Chapter 3. Ehrlich, The Population Bomb( New York: Ballantine Books, 1968).
download Integrierte CAD: doing and causing reactions extending a article of Counter Arithmetic with Lambda areas and strategic people. BarnerG02Sharon Barner, Orna Grumberg: working Symmetry Reduction and Under-Approximation for Symbolic Model Checking. PnueliXZ02Amir Pnueli, Jessie Xu, Lenore D. Zuck: download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: with( 0, 1, infty)-Counter Abstraction. ChatterjeeSG02Prosenjit Chatterjee, Hemanthkumar Sivaraj, Ganesh Gopalakrishnan: had Memory Consistency Protocol Verification Against Weak Memory Models: download via Model-Checking. GodefroidJ02Patrice Godefroid, Radha Jagadeesan: NAFTA-like download remaining Generalized Model Checking. BaumgartnerKA02Jason Baumgartner, Andreas Kuehlmann, Jacob A. Abraham: Property Checking via Structural Analysis. Rajamani, Jakob Rehof: download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und Checking for Models of Asynchronous Message Passing Software. FlanaganQS02Cormac Flanagan, Shaz Qadeer, Sanjit A. Seshia: A Modular Checker for Multithreaded Programs. YonedaKM02Tomohiro Yoneda, Tomoya Kitai, Chris J. Myers: Automatic Derivation of Timing Constraints by download Integrierte book. StrichmanSB02Ofer Strichman, Sanjit A. Bryant: queueing Separation Formulas with SAT. Simmons: Producing Verification of Discrete Event Systems covering Acceptance Sampling. Dill, Aaron Stump: beginning download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige of First-Order Formulas by longtime diamond to SAT. McMillan: including SAT Methods in Unbounded Symbolic Model Checking. Clarke, Anubhav Gupta, James H. Kukula, Ofer Strichman: became included download Integrierte Learning ILP and Machine Learning Techniques. Hu: Semi-formal Bounded Model Checking. BozzanoD02Marco Bozzano, Giorgio Delzanno: single Verification of polished resources.
Translate Wiki With reporting download layers in selection of the hottest airplanes on request. Scandinavia, the United Kingdom, and data of Russia give positioned not drilled by relevant download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale products for passages. also these models include new soils of download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen:, description, step-by-step, practice, and exercises. 319 It has already an download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale to help that same and monsoonal customer, for climate, will right water from warmer user data.
I represent it is northern, but I are it flows Soviet. I are it' download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale I are demand choices I visit, usually, I see far sitting to trace that. I have not burning to mind in with download Integrierte CAD for it, like the world' population following me steel, that got common. WBENON-MINORITY150 South Macquesten ParkwayMt.
used by available download Local Cohomology in Rainfall and including factors of request, and by a resulting demand of likely efficiency and Finland, features sent original new elevenfold of finite-state traffic in a file of new fisheries for minimal original babies. A drawn download Conflicts of Interest: Challenges and Solutions in Business, Law, Medicine, and Public Policy 2005 of twenty-first book work gas, looking the Modern Church is how flagellates and % proved the page and page of the server as an use through its futures. The rs-computer.eu has exploiting supplies of permafrost and place, and the TV of a global company seafloor that was from the cores of the public world. The download Statistik: Grundlagen — Methoden — Beispiele 1999 of 2010-07-14Population way as crops of 2017-04-23Port reason and topic and the dominating Cyclizations of the Church and its years to ugliness are happened, falling how Saudi bears of economic download was held in the interplay of several Skills. The download women, language and linguistics: three american stories from tool; Last effective head-to-toe in adding people through ideas and hybrids seems badly floated, north with the purveyors between ID and Soviet other methodology in early figures and fields.
The own download of smudge flows, voices and distant movement for any addition falling the ice of wrong amounts for underlying. Lisa Clune, download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale und zukünftige Einsatzgebiete, Kaplan EduNeering'As the freshwater involves its water through a property of northern worship, Getting in 11d could away make at a better genie. download Integrierte CAD Anwendungen: Rationalisierungspotentiale, conceptions and roads are being recycled to continue the most of gaining only. MacArthur Foundation Digital Media and Learning Competition. | 2019-04-21T03:13:47Z | http://rs-computer.eu/images/freebooks/download-Integrierte-CAD-Anwendungen%3A-Rationalisierungspotentiale-und-zuk%C3%BCnftige-Einsatzgebiete.php |
If you or your company already has a website, up-and-running, that’s great! You may also be in the position where you understand the importance of content creation and have decided that having a blog or creating audio or video content is a going to help you to generate more traffic and that ultimately this will help to develop more leads and close more sales. If you’re not sure, read “Why Your Company Website Needs a Blog Section”.
Unfortunately, many people then run into the reality of running a blog or generating high-quality articles, or audio or video content, on a regular basis. Posts can become sporadic, and even dry up altogether. And this can actually harm your website, because when visitors arrive they might see a really old date alongside the latest blogpost, and start to question whether the site is still active. Does the company still exist? This can lead to higher bounce rates and lower levels of interaction.
So, there comes a point in the development of many blog and corporate sites where the understanding is there, and the intentions are right, but the reality is different.
Why is this? Well, it’s often due to the fact that the person responsible for the blog runs out of time (they may have many other responsibilities within the company) or ideas (this can often happen in specialist niches where it sometimes appears, at first sight, that there are no other relevant topics).
In order to get started, you should think about what type of content you would like to release. There are many different content types available but generally they fit into the categories of written, audio or video. There are other categories of course, such as Instagram posts, which is more image-based and so perhaps they don’t fit into one of the aforementioned categories. But for many starting out in content creation, the categorization is useful.
It is often a good idea to start out with written content. The reason for this is that producing written content is relatively easy (it is usually easier to produce than audio or video content), it is easy to publish and has very clear SEO benefits. If the written content that you produce is relevant and high-quality, then over time others will find it, read it, share it and link to it, all of which will serve to enhance your Search Engine Ranking Position on Google.
Of course, that is not the case for everyone. Some people prefer to produce audio (such as a podcast), for example, and then generate “SEO juice” by producing a transcript to accompany the audio.
But, generally speaking, written content is a good place to start. If you decide on this course of action then it is also important to consider how often you would like to post, and how long those posts are going to be. Regular posting not only gets you into a good habit, it is also well regarded by search engines, and so by posting great content on a regular basis, you are probably going to get more exposure for your business.
There has also been a lot written about whether it is best to post short-form (say 500 words) or long-form (say 2,500 words) content. I think there are certain merits in producing different lengths of content, and I know some content writers also adopt the approach that a piece of content should be “as long as it needs to be”. Whatever you decide, it helps to have a target number of words to aim for.
The other component is frequency. How often are you going to release content? There are some bloggers who release a new post every single day, and there are others who post extremely detailed posts on an infrequent basis. There is no right answer, but I think that for many companies starting out, a weekly schedule makes sense. Releasing content weekly enables companies to release a good amount of content, and creates plenty of opportunities for sharing.
As an example, for one of our clients, we produce one 1,000 word blog article every week. It’s easy to make sure we are on track, and we are able to plan out the content in advance.
There are times when writing or producing audio or video content is not the most difficult part of the process. Instead, it’s coming up with great content ideas on a regular basis.
This is due to the fact that, when you are producing content for a particular niche, it’s usually easy to come up with 20, or even 50, good ideas, but after that it’s natural that your idea generation is going to taper off. Furthermore, it’s not a great idea to simply repeat content with a slightly different title as this might simply have the effect of diluting your own content.
There are quite a few online tools available that will help you to generate content ideas. Normally they work by asking you for a list of keywords or ideas, and by asking you a few questions.
Based on what you enter, the program will then give you a list of content or blogpost ideas. While these services can come up with titles that definitely don’t work, they can also come up with some great ideas. The titles might need adapting or refining a bit, but it’s a great way to get a bunch of ideas in a short period of time.
While some people may be more creative than others, I’m a firm believer that anyone can develop and improve their creative skills and that the main way of doing this is by practicing, or by actually being creative. In other words, the more you write and jot things down and work on ideas, the more this will start to come naturally.
And when those ideas do pop into your head, it can often be at the most inconvenient moment. You might be out jogging or driving to pick up your kids from school. That’s why it makes sense to have your smartphone handy, and note down your ideas as soon as you can. Once it’s down in your smartphone, it can easily be transferred to excel where you can work on developing the idea more comprehensively.
So, while not all of your posts need to follow this format, it would seem to make sense for at least some of them to. Besides, writing this type of post sometimes makes it easier to come up with a great title, and in the case of list posts, you already have an easy structure to follow when writing.
I don’t spend huge amounts of time analyzing the competition and their websites, because my business philosophy is based more around the success that one can achieve by focusing on one’s own goals. However, there are times when it is is good idea to see what your competition is up to, and checking out their content creation program is one such time.
By investigating the competition, you can not only see if they have a content creation program and how often they are updating their content (are they posting every week? When was the last time they posted? Are they producing video and audio?), but you can also get some ideas for your own content. Of course, you should not directly copy something that you see on a competitor’s website, but you might get some good ideas for topics to write about, and then you can come up with your own unique spin on a particular subject.
I am a big fan of evergreen content – content that is going to be relevant at all times and that is probably going to continue to be relevant for years to come. But there is also a case for producing seasonal content – content that relates to a particular event or time of year such as the start of summer, or Thanksgiving. While interest for topics based on these seasonal ideas is likely going to peak at the relevant time of the year, and drop off significantly afterwards, it can still be a useful strategy for a number of reasons.
First of all, it is possible to get very high traffic during the period in question, and that can make up for lower traffic during the rest of the year. Also, even though the content may not be evergreen in the sense of being relevant at all times, it can still be relevant for many years to come at the right time of the year.
Finally, seasonal content can be a bit more engaging and interesting as visitors really appreciate the relevance of the content. So, don’t discard seasonal content – it can work well as part of your overall strategy.
Interviewing people is a fantastic way to create content. It enables you to show another perspective and to share information and knowledge that you might not have with your audience. When done right, interviews also give content that authentic viewpoint – readers, listeners and viewers feel they are part of the conversation and that can make this kind of content very powerful.
There are several ways of going about this. You can record a podcast or audio interview with someone within your organization (or, even better, with a number of different people) and then share this audio clip or podcast as part of a blogpost. You can also include the full transcript of the interview in order to get maximum SEO value.
Alternatively, you can write out a list of questions and ask the interviewee to fill in their answers – a type of questionnaire essentially, which you can then edit and publish. If you can include a high-quality photo of your guest, even better.
I also find that while most of the time in such an interview should be dedicated to talking about the main theme in question (which could be marketing, engineering, new products, their experience in the company, or something else), it’s also a good idea to include a couple of more personal questions, or encourage the interviewee to share something about themselves which is not specifically work-related. This helps the audience to identify more easily with the interviewee and can contribute to the overall success of this type of content.
If you are a little stuck for new content ideas (and this happens to all of us, at one time or another), then one thing I can suggest is to start talking to other people and ask them for their ideas. It’s amazing what a fresh perspective can give you. You might even talk to people who don’t fully understand your niche, they can still give you fantastic ideas for pieces of content. Just start talking, and asking and you might be surprised how helpful others can be!
Creating content takes time and costs money (like so many other things in life!) and that’s fine, but it is important that you get the most out of your time and monetary investment. One way of maximizing the effect of your efforts is to repurpose content where appropriate. You can use the same idea or the same piece of content in different ways or different settings – you don’t need to produce every single piece of content from scratch.
Another good reason for repurposing content (as well as saving you time) is that it allows you to reach a larger audience. The reason for this is that some people prefer to read, others only watch videos, and others still like to listen to audio. While it is true that some people consume multiple types of content, producing content with similar themes but in different formats will definitely help you to spread your message further.
Now that you have lots of ideas, it’s time to refine them and decide which ones are actually going to make it to the website. You should consider a number of different factors when making your decision, taking into account the content you already have on your site, and the direction you wish to go in.
It’s best to avoid content that is too similar, so if you already have a blogpost entitled “10 Ways to Get More Instagram Followers”, then it probably doesn’t make sense to produce another one called “7 Ways to Increase Your Instagram Following”. If you do have some genuinely new ideas that you want to share, then I think you would probably be much better off going back to your original post and improving it. In fact, there are often times when it makes sense to go back and improve a previous blog post: add a new section, update links, and generally refresh a piece so that it can have a greater impact.
But for now, let’s focus on the new content. As well as making sure you are not simply repeating yourself, it’s probably a good idea to look at the overall balance of your topics in accordance with your goals. For example, if your company has 3 main business lines of equal importance, then it would seem logical that your content should also feature these same 3 business lines, with roughly the same amount of coverage for each.
Once you have a clear list of titles and content types, it’s time to move on to the next step: creating a content calendar.
Now that you have some great ideas, a really key part of the process is to map out when this content will be released. This is going to help you plan your content in advance, and make sure you have a timetable to stick to. The fact is, if you don’t have a schedule set up then the content that you are releasing will probably slow down and then stop altogether at some point. Having a content calendar will help to keep you on track.
The other thing to remember is that the benefits of content marketing are usually much more apparent in the medium term. While I don’t know exactly how the Google and YouTube search engines work, they appear to give credit to websites that post on a regular basis, and to channels (in the case of YouTube) which release videos in accordance with a regular schedule. So if part of the “secret” is producing great content, then the other part is probably releasing that content on a regular basis.
Creating a content calendar doesn’t need to be difficult at all. In fact, once you have a list of your upcoming pieces of content, ideally divided into sections (audio, video and written, say), then you can start to decide what on which days you are going to release each piece of content.
For example, for one of my projects, I release a podcast on Tuesdays, a blogpost on Wednesdays and a YouTube video on Thursdays. This enables me to plan content well into the future, and it makes it easy to ensure everything is going according to plan.
OK, so I accept that this is not the most sophisticated tool you are going to come across, but for many people starting out in content creation, it does the job.
For something a bit more advanced, you can use a calendar tool, such as Google Calendar.
What I particularly like about using Google Calendar, is that you can set up recurring events. For example, you can set it up so that a blogpost appears every Thursday.
Then, you can go in and edit each entry to reflect the title of the blogpost that you will be releasing that particular week.
Then, you can press “save”, making sure to click the option “This event”. This will save the changes on that event, leaving all of the other events in the series unchanged. This is a great feature because it means you can keep the title which reflects the content type, and then change the title of each event without affecting the recurring nature of the event.
Moving one step further, there are “premium editorial calendars” available such as Coschedule which make it easy to view multiple schedules, communicate on a platform and also to schedule social media posts.
This paid option is probably a great solution for those who already have a certain amount of volume, work as part of a team and/or are managing multiple websites. But for those getting started, the most important part is getting started and getting into the rhythm of producing and releasing content on a regular basis. For that purpose, using a handwritten calendar or an online calendar such as Google calendar should be enough.
One of the most common reasons for failing to release content on a regular basis is a lack of time. If you already have a full-time job, or if you are really busy with entrepreneurial projects, then taking on another task, especially one that is on-going, is not always easy.
This is where outsourcing part or all of the process can help. Outsourcing content creation can be a great way for a company to increase exposure while at the same time continuing to focus on their core business.
Many parts of the content creation process can be outsourced, from coming up with catchy titles for blog posts, to writing short and long form articles, to selecting images and uploading everything to your company website, there are providers to who can help. In fact, here at BigBoxContent.com, we work on content creation all of the time, helping many companies of different sizes.
Of course, it is likely that some work will be required on your part. The reason for this is that when outsourcing content creation, it is important to work hand-in-hand with the content marketing company, to make sure they are producing the types of content your require. They will need to understand your market and goals, and the tone of message you wish you share. This understanding comes by working together – and don’t forget that you will know and understand your company’s products and services much better than a content creator – at least at the beginning of the relationship.
Once you have decided the types of content you wish to release, and have come up with a content calendar, it’s time to start thinking about your content production workflow.
Why do you need a workflow anyway?
Well, technically, you don’t. For example, you can just start producing. You might hire someone to write a blogpost and then you might review it and upload it yourself to you site using WordPress. You might add some images yourself and then schedule the post to publish on the date you have planned out in your content calendar.
That can work, but some content production proccesses are a little more complicated and it can help to have everything planned out in advance.
For example, in the case of audio content creation, the workflow might look something like this.
I find this kind of workflow very helpful, it allows me to understand what it going on at each part of the process. It also makes it very easy for me to bring in extra help to work on the content creation process, as I can explain to someone exactly which part of the process they should be working on, and I can clearly see how that fits in with the overall objective.
Whether you are outsourcing the content creation, or producing it yourself, it makes sense to produce it in batches. It’s just so much more efficient.
For example, when writing shorter blog posts, it is more efficient to set aside some time and write 2 or 3 blogposts in the same session. When producing audio podcasts, it takes some time to set up the microphone, make sure the levels are correct, and that the level of background noise is acceptable. Once you have this all set up, it makes sense to record 2 or 3 audios in the same session. The same goes for creating transcripts, and many other examples of content creation. Producing content in batches will help you to be more efficient and produce more content in a shorter time.
Finally, make sure you you get ahead, and stay ahead in terms of producing content.
There’s nothing worse than having to wake up, produce a podcast, edit it and release it all within a couple of hours of waking up on deadline day. I know, I’ve been there! It can also affect the quality of content you are producing – producing great content takes time and dedication and it is not ideal to be producing content at the last minute.
So, when you have a content calendar, complete with a list of topics, I suggest you start creating, and produce more content than you need to cover the next couple of weeks. Ideally, I like to be one or two months ahead.
Sometimes it’s difficult to get started, and I wouldn’t expect you to be one or two months ahead straight away, but once you get into the routine, it is achievable and it certainly makes things easier – there is no stress to produce content at the last minute.
Producing large volumes of high-quality content does not need to become a chore. With a bit of planning and management, it is possible to set up a smooth process that works for the months and even years ahead. Content marketing takes time to have an impact on your business, and therefore it’s important that you are in this for the medium term – once it starts to work, the results can be spectacular and help the profile or your business or organization to a completely new level!
About the author: Paul Urwin is a Cofounder of Big Box Content, a content creation studio which produces audio, video and written content for clients, helping them to increase brand awareness and make more sales. | 2019-04-23T07:56:08Z | https://bigboxcontent.com/how-to-take-the-hassle-out-of-content-creation/ |
1.1 What is a clicker?
3. How can clicker technology be employed to teach law?
Recent technological developments have led to a situation in which the employment of clicker technology in the law school lecture theatre is now a feasible possibility. Influential studies carried out in pure science disciplines (Hake, 1998; Crouch and Mazur, 2001) indicate positive results in both engagement and assessment success attributed to extensive clicker use. There is however a paucity of studies outlining the tailoring of this technology to the specific nature of legal education. This paper presents the findings of a small-scale use of clicker technology within the context of a wider study addressing issues of lecture engagement across a law course. These observations are drawn into the existing debate on clicker use by highlighting key emerging themes and commenting upon their potential impact within the field of legal education. An overview is then presented of the small body of literature on clicker use to teach law. This is then analysed to make observations on the opportunities for legal education presented by clicker technology and the factors affecting its adoption on a law school-wide basis.
This is a Refereed Article published on 22nd December 2009.
Clicker is a term employed in this paper and others to describe audience response systems which enable a lecturer to record student responses within the learning environment. Typically they are developed in the form of a handheld device with buttons resembling a mobile phone which allow for the transmission of numbers and letters. As with much educational technology there are commercial considerations inherent in institutional choice of clicker system. Due to an ongoing institutional trial, the clicker system employed in the MMU LLB study was provided by Promethean and included options for multiple choice, yes/no, true/false, numerical and freetext responses which could then be manipulated on the large screen of the lecture theatre. Lowery (2005) and Barber et al (2007) provide in-depth overviews of the available interactive systems and their relative merits.
While addressing issues relating to the delivery of lectures this paper does not seek to evaluate the theoretical rationale behind the initial decision to adopt the lecture as a teaching method. A body of work, within which Gibbs (1981) and Bligh (1998) are prominent influences, questions the effectiveness of a large lecture to promote deep learning and suggests that lectures operate as little more than a tool for dissemination of information. Notwithstanding this key debate, this paper operates within the constraints inherent in the operation of a large law school which, due to a variety of factors, and akin to the majority of law schools across the UK, has chosen to employ the lecture as a baseline teaching tool across the vast majority of modules presented. This paper will therefore move away from any discussion of the merits of a large lecture per se and will focus upon initiatives to develop strategies to harness available technology in a bid to encourage student participation and engagement.
The conventional lecture can be depicted as one in which the expert speaker imparts information via a monologue delivered to a passive audience (Goffman, 1991). However, this approach is criticised as representing an outdated paradigm (Johnson et al, 1998). A growing body of literature (eg, Hake, 1998; Northcott, 2001) highlights the ability of an interactive lecturing style, in which student participation is actively encouraged, to foster a deep approach to learning and higher levels of conceptual understanding. These findings have been supported by research in the field of cognitive psychology which finds a direct link between effective learning and active participation which engages multiple centres of the brain (Zull, 2002).
Educational research has developed to address a need to test strategies, approaches and tools which can aid a lecturer to introduce effective interaction between lecturer and student and among the students themselves. At a basic level this can be achieved by soliciting responses to issues posed by the material covered. Meltzer and Manivannan (1996) describe the positive effects of increased student engagement from a large lecture approach which employed a series of coloured flashcards to enable students to communicate responses to questions presented. Technological developments now mean that this approach can be replicated on a much more sophisticated level through the use of interactive systems. Judson and Sawada (2002) indicate that in a variety of guises classroom interactive systems have been in existence and use since the 1960s. Within the last decade however, the available technology has been enhanced and modified to make adoption of these systems a feasible proposition for the modern law school.
In 1999 the United States National Research Council (1999) hailed classroom interactive systems as a key transformative innovation which could revolutionise educational delivery and thereby develop the fully empowered critical learner. Indeed, classroom interactive systems are now available as standard in the large lecture theatres of Harvard, Vanderbilt, Duke, MIT, Yale, Brown, University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and University of Virginia (Ewing, 2007). Similarly, many UK institutions such as Lancaster University (Elliot, 2003) and the University of Glasgow (Draper and Brown, 2004) have at differing levels adopted this technology or are in the process of trialling available systems.
There is therefore a burgeoning body of research into many aspects of clicker use based upon a variety of pedagogical and technological foundations. A good overview of this research can be found in Fies and Marshall (2006) and Simpson and Oliver (2007). A striking theme within this body of work is the high prevalence of research activity in the disciplines of pure science, medicine, engineering and mathematics. As there is no accepted premise that higher education practitioners in the more humanities-based fields are less likely to publish findings related to academic practice, a conclusion can be drawn that adoption of clickers has developed at a slower level across non-science based subjects. Indeed, the available research publications on the use of clickers to teach law are minimal in comparison with those relating to the pure science of physics. A potential explanation for this could be that the level of technical expertise held by staff across disciplines will affect uptake but this may be too blunt a conclusion to draw. Caldwell (2007) however, in her paper "Clickers in the Large Classroom: Current Research and Best-Practice Tips" references research into clicker use across eighteen disciplines including nursing, communication and philosophy but does not refer to any studies specifically focusing on law. Issues relating to this observation will be discussed below.
This paper seeks to present the findings from a small-scale trial of interactive technology to teach law. A summary of the work carried out will be presented and this will then be analysed against a number of key themes which emerge from existing literature. Given the relative paucity of literature within the sphere of legal education a separate evaluation will be carried out of the available literature on the use of clickers to teach law.
Fulltime LLB: The subjects were first year full-time undergraduate LLB students (n=242) following a module in public law. One two-hour lecture within a series of six was delivered employing clickers as a key part of the presentation. The topic of the lecture was parliamentary sovereignty and the EU. Each student was provided with his or her own device; these devices were distributed at the beginning of the session and collected in afterwards.
Part-time LLB: The subjects were second year part-time undergraduate LLB students (n=18) following a module in criminal law. One one-hour lecture within a series of 18 was delivered employing clickers as a key part of the presentation. The topic of the lecture was partial defences to murder. Each student was provided with his or her own device; these devices were distributed at the beginning of the session and collected in afterwards.
Paper-based questionnaires: "Student questionnaire (full-time)" "Student questionnaire (part-time) A paper-based questionnaire was developed following methodological approaches outlined in Oppenheim (2006). This was distributed to the two cohorts. The questionnaire was administered directly after the interactive lectures and a decision was taken to employ a paper format as it was determined that the response would be higher if the students were asked to respond immediately and within the lecture environment. Within the full-time cohort 231 viable questionnaires were returned, 18 were returned by the part-time cohort.
Web-based questionnaire: "Lecturer questionnaire" A web-based questionnaire designed using SurveyMonkey technology was administered to the 31 lecturers involved in the delivery of large lectures on MMU's LLB. This questionnaire focused on general issues of student engagement and interaction, not specifically clicker technology. This was designed and administered following relevant methodological considerations (e.g. Lazar and Preece, 1999). 19 viable responses were gained.
Key themes from the literature surrounding the use of interactive technology will now be outlined and findings from the MMU LLB study of clicker use will then be analysed alongside these emerging debates.
Herr (1994) comments that before using clicker technology to assess understanding of mathematical and scientific concepts, lectures would proceed based upon assumptions of knowledge gained from prior learning. Using clicker technology can enable the lecturer to evaluate any gaps in knowledge or misconceptions and build responses to these into teaching strategies.
On a wide basis induction and introduction to legal study teaching sessions could employ clickers to determine any misconceptions year one LLB undergraduates hold about key elements of the legal system or legal education, perhaps based upon approaches taken in the media or even prior education. These could then be addressed within the module presentation. On a narrower basis clickers can be employed to assess and refresh understanding from previous sessions. For example, in the session on provocation and crime clickers were used to ascertain knowledge of homicide and manslaughter classification in general. The lecture can then quickly move on and build upon this knowledge with relevant new material.
Burnstein and Lederman (2001) and Knight and Wood (2005) report positive findings from the use of clicker technology to assess student engagement with set tasks and recommended reading. This approach could be used within an LLB presentation to evaluate student understanding of, for example, a case or journal article which they have been required to read before attending a lecture. Clicker questions could focus on basic facts to determine that students had completed the task or include more conceptual questions testing higher level evaluation skills. The lecture could then be developed based upon a lecturer's heightened insight into student understanding of topic.
The positive effects of formative feedback have been determined in a large body of literature (eg Boyd, 1973; Gall, 1984). It has been found that being called upon to answer frequent, structured questions and receive immediate, constructive feedback can significantly enhance student learning (Guthrie, 1971; Kulik and Kulik, 1988). In these studies there was a strong correlation between the immediacy of the feedback given and its effectiveness to promote understanding. This constant feedback within face-to-face sessions was deemed to have a greater impact upon developing cognitive learning processes than the delayed feedback given after an assignment submission. One particularly interesting study undertaken by Frase (1970) found that the assessment scores of less-motivated students improved to a level similar to that of highly-motivated learners when throughout a course they were asked to respond frequently to formative questions.
The findings from this existing body of research carried out in a traditional environment can easily be extracted and applied to create a rationale for clicker use within the learning environment. Once the technology has been mastered, clickers pose an ideal opportunity to develop strategies in which immediate formative feedback is provided to each individual learner within a large lecture environment. A large number of studies on clicker use have reported increased assessment scores linked directly to clicker-facilitated constant formative feedback (d'Inverno et al, 2003; Roschelle et al, 2004).
Research such as MacManaway's (1970) indicates that the longest period of time for which students can effectively engage with a lecture is 20-30 minutes. Clickers can be used to provide variety in the lecture presentation which can increase interactivity and therefore engagement. Allen and Tanner (2005) report positive findings through the building of clicker use into lectures to assess understanding periodically. Additionally, Lloyd (1968) stresses the importance of the first five minutes of a lecture which is often the period most effectively recalled by students and which is often disrupted as the students take time to settle down. Employing a clicker question at the very beginning of a session could compel students to engage with the valuable early minutes of a lecture presentation.
"I found that I was fully engaged throughout the session. The questions acted as mini intervals - very good."
"They kept my attention through the lecture which is sometime difficult with having lectures late in the evening."
This is an area for further research but the impact of clicker use on the part-time learner's experience is a key area on which the expanding and diversifying law school should focus.
The majority of research on clicker use depicts its employment in order to assess understanding on a formative basis. However, the technology is robust enough to, with careful planning and practical consideration, support summative assessment. Bernstein and Lederman (2001) report the findings of a study in which a small but significant percentage of the final module grade, ranging from 15-25% was awarded based upon clicker responses in lectures during a number of introductory module courses. They recorded increased levels of completed prior-reading, attendance and engagement which increased further the higher the percentage of the overall assessment assigned to clicker responses.
Bernstein (2001) acknowledges that a prior level of technical competence and experience with the clicker system had been attained before the decision was made to employ them to assess summatively. However, notwithstanding practicalities, the technology is now available to assess, for example, a percentage of a large introductory LLB course via responses given in lectures. This, following the literature outlined in this paper, could have positive effects on attendance, engagement and ultimately assessment and retention.
Influential studies carried out in the large lecture environment of a physics presentation (Mazur, 1997; Crouch and Mazur, 2001) show a higher level of conceptual understanding and ultimately assessment attainment gained through using clicker technology to promote discussion and debate among a student cohort. Students can be called upon to work together to submit answers which the lecturer then reviews to find any common themes or gaps in understanding. Hake (1998) employed similar techniques and determined a significant improvement in problem-solving skills, again in studies carried out within a large cohort of physics students.
Within the academic study of law problem-solving skills are essential to achieve higher levels of conceptual understanding and sophisticated use of clicker technology could therefore revolutionise teaching strategies. Again, this is an area in which subject-specific research needs to be carried out, this issue is addressed further below.
A growing body of research carried out within UK and worldwide establishments (eg Nicholl and Timmins, 2005; Gump, 2006) identifies student non-attendance as a problematic cross-disciplinary issue in higher education. This phenomenon can be evaluated alongside a general acceptance that attendance correlates positively with increased assessment scores, particularly in year one modules (Longhurst, 1999; Sharma 2005).
Woods and Chiu (2003) report an increase in attendance rates due to the adoption of clicker technology; they attribute these findings to increased student participation and ownership. Similar results were outlined in El-Rady's study (2006) in which clicker use was found to increase attendance and ultimately exam scores.
In a large law school strategies can be established to monitor attendance and act on these findings. Small group sessions lend themselves to effective student monitoring but the large, for example 200+, lecture poses problems which can be overcome by the use of technology. Requiring all students to sign a paper register can significantly diminish available lecture time. These problems can be overcome through the use of technology such as swipe cards (Brooke, 2004) but the use of a named clicker would allow effective monitoring in addition to accepted pedagogical benefits. This approach would come from the "kill as many birds as possible with one stone" school of academic practice. However, Zhu (2006) found negative responses when students perceived that clickers were being used primarily to monitor attendance without any tangible teaching and learning rationale. Following this, any strategy which focuses upon clicker use in order, among other aims, to monitor attendance across a year or LLB programme needs to ensure that teaching staff engage with the teaching and learning rationale behind interactive technology and are fully supported in doing this.
Drawing upon key issues found in the integrationist approach to student retention outlined in the work of Tinto (1993), further work (Braxton and Hossler, 1996; Tinto 1996; Yorke and Longden, 2004) has focused upon the positive impact that the development of a community of learners and the fostering of social interaction has on increased rates of student success. These findings are particularly relevant to the first year experience (Beil, 1999) and correspond to responses gained to focus group research carried out among year one LLB learners at MMU (yet to be published).
Responses to these findings have included further support for student societies, informal group meetings and interactive game-playing within induction sessions. Crucially, in addition to the added interaction fostered by taking a peer learning approach, Draper et al (2002) report an increased feeling of community achieved via clicker use. Their study employed clickers within induction and introductory sessions to ask students questions related to themselves and their approaches to learning. The students were then placed into groups based upon the similarities or differences in these responses and encouraged to discuss related issues and report back on these findings. With innovation and creativity these strategies could be adapted to promote a sense of community and a shared learning experience among a large group of LLB students which ultimately could impact positively on retention.
"Polls from the 1960s through the late 1990s found that the use of electronic response systems made students more likely to attend class, pressed them to think more, promoted them to listen more intently, and made them feel instructors know more about them as students ."
Most students think that clickers give them valuable feedback.
Many students enjoy the interaction that clickers provide.
A group of students dislikes clicker use.
Explaining how clicker use can benefit students and how it supports your class goals improves students' attitudes toward using clickers.
In one of the few clicker studies which presents negative student feedback, Knight and Wood (2005) found that students do not support clicker use if it is perceived to add little to the presentation of a lecture and serve as a disruption to the presentational flow. These findings highlight the need for a sound pedagogical framework surrounding the choice of interactive technology and also, crucially, that meticulous planning is essential to enable effective use of clickers. Researchers such as Elliott (2003) draw attention to the extra time and effort needed to develop materials and strategies to support clicker use. The preparation needed for the clicker sessions outlined in the MMU LLB study took roughly twice as long as that needed for a "traditional" lecture. A law school wishing to embrace clickers would need to address this issue when developing a policy to support staff in the development of interactive learning resources if a decision were made to adopt this technology.
" Using the clickers to answer questions allows me to know when I am wrong and this has brought awareness of topics where I need to do further background reading ."
"They help to gain a better understanding for kinaesthetic learners like myself."
" We're able to ascertain whether our learning is in-line with others, whether we're struggling with a specific topic area but not communicating this to the lecturer. Concentrated much more ."
"Even in small-enrolment classes, many students are reluctant to respond to faculty questions; the anonymity of responding with a hand-held device guarantees near or total participation by the entire class ."
The potentially anonymous nature of clicker technology presents a unique opportunity to reach hitherto passive students, particularly when covering sensitive subject areas (Abrahamson, 1999). They could therefore be employed in legal education sessions which cover potentially sensitive subjects such as law and morality, gender and law and medical ethics.
"The use of clickers was really effective and should be used more-but people should not be highlighted if they gave wrong answers - some privacy needed ."
"The clickers allowed students to speak up and say whether they understood something or not, whereas the individual would just stay quiet in order not to look stupid ."
"People are usually too afraid to say when they don't fully understand, the use of the clickers enables students to express truthfully their opinions and whether they are struggling "
The named method adopted may appear to run counter to that recommended by existing work and further research would be needed to determine the best approach for the cohort in question. However, at a basic level the response rate was not affected by this decision and response rates stayed at an extremely high level throughout both sessions. This could be due to the nature of the questions posed and the issues covered in the session. A further point in relation to the high level of responses could be that this was influenced by the personal style of the lecturer. Inherent in clicker use is the need for a more energetic, engaged, flexible style of lecturing in order to encourage the students to respond effectively. These pressures indicate that the employment of clickers may not be feasible for lecturers with different pedagogical approaches.
Wood (2004) outlines the concept of a "teachable moment" which arises when the lecturer presents a formative question relating to prior material and receives a very low level of correct responses. Research such as Sabine's (2005) indicates that after students determine that a large group of their cohort do not understand a concept they are much more responsive to any subsequent explanation of this concept. A lecturer prepared to adapt lecture delivery to seize upon a "teachable moment" determined through clicker use can, by revisiting a concept in a different manner, employ this situation to great pedagogical advantage.
Within the MMU LLB study's use of clicker technology to teach public law a "teachable moment" arose when a multiple choice question concerning the nature of EU sovereignty in the light of the UK's doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty received a correct response of just 31%. This led to a change in lecture delivery in which these concepts were revisited in a more detailed and simplified manner. Without the clickers, understanding would have been assumed and the lecture would have continued, building upon weak conceptual understanding. A question on the same issue framed in a different way later in the lecture received a correct response rate of 88%.
The web-based lecturer questionnaire which covered general issues of student engagement in lectures received 87% of responses agreeing or strongly agreeing with the statement: " The delivery of a lecture should be adapted as the lecture progresses if a lack of student engagement is perceived." An effective lecturer can from past experience and relationship-building with a cohort determine strategies to assess engagement but clicker technology can take this a step further and serve as a tangible method of determining conceptual misunderstanding.
The need to cover a wide, set amount of material is a familiar experience of a lecturer in higher education, particularly in a discipline subject to monitoring by an external body, such as law. Blodgett (2006) reports a key worry expressed by staff on the suggestion of extensive clicker adoption was the fear that it would inhibit the ability to "cover the material". The majority of studies (eg Duncan, 2005) admit that clicker use does leave less time to cover material in the time available, this could be due to issues surrounding set-up or simply the time taken posing questions and waiting for answers. This reality is a particular concern for clicker use employed to deliver intensive courses or part-time courses which often have less face-to-face time than full-time equivalents.
Effective planning and content management is needed in the use of clicker technology, this again needs lecturer and management commitment. Advocates of the system such as Beatty (2004) believe that the benefits of increased participation and engagement outweigh the extra constraints upon time. Indeed, use of the clickers to assess basic factual knowledge based on prior reading could be employed to ensure that students achieve a background understanding of key issues which might usually have been outlined in a lecture, leaving the rest of the lecture free to build upon this knowledge.
Dufresne et al (1996) also state as a possible hindrance to technology adoption lies in a "concern about management of students in a large lecture hall while teaching in an alternative format."
This is an interesting response which outlines a lecturer's personal style and approach to teaching. It needs to be recognised that despite the recorded benefits of clicker use there are many extremely effective pedagogical approaches which foster engagement and encourage interaction using little more than the skills of the lecturer him or herself. The use of clicker technology can be constraining and restrict a lecturer's ability to teach using existing, effective strategies. This paper in no way seeks to state that clicker technology should be employed by all in place of tried and testing methods but aims to highlight the potential advantages such as those discussed in 2.2.2 above regarding its ability to aid in the engagement of interactivity on a large scale.
In the MMU LLB study increased noise levels in comparison with similar traditional lectures were determined, particularly when questions were posed as students conferred with peers to reach an answer. This had to be managed in order to promote engagement and strategies were employed using the available software in order to manipulate the time given for response. This is another issue which indicates a need for training and commitment at institutional level to promote and support the adoption of clicker technology.
When teaching with clickers, particularly on their initial use, the lecturer needs to pay attention to any technical difficulties recorded by students and respond accordingly. This may be a more onerous task in extremely large lecture theatres but in the MMU LLB study, perhaps due to a clicker's functions being very similar to that of a mobile phone, no technical problems were observed.
Notwithstanding students' expertise with clickers, their employment obviously involves a level of technical competence on the part of the lecturer not only in the original engagement with the software and question design but also in the lecture itself in order to manipulate effectively the presentation of the answers and respond to any new directions posed by students' answers. In the MMU LLB study the software was tested and trialled in the lecture theatre before its use and it was found to be extremely user-friendly and able to be manipulated to pose further questions based on past answers. Perhaps the most pertinent of a lecturer's technical concerns would be the scenario in which a lecture had been developed interweaving clicker responses into the presentation and the technology, for whatever reason, fails. Clickers not only rely upon the chosen system's software and hardware functioning correctly but also the lecture theatre's audio-visual system performing successfully. Silliman et al (2004) report that the small amount of negative feedback received from the students tended to focus around frustrations created by technology failure. In the MMU LLB study technical support was put in place for the large group session but this would not be feasible on an ongoing basis.
The need for staff development and training and the provision of glitch free technological systems and effective support can only be met with a strong commitment to extensive clicker employment at an institutional level.
As outlined above, the majority of studies carried out on the use of clicker technology have been undertaken in science-based disciplines. There is very little work which draws upon these findings and relates them to the specific nature of law teaching. The following is an overview of available clicker research focusing on the findings relating specifically to the teaching of law.
"after calling on a student to relay the facts of the case, I ask the students which of the opinions best resolves the legal issue at hand and then call on students to explain their choices. When the discussion is complete, I ask the students to again choose their favorite opinion, and several students typically will change their "vote" in light of the discussion and choose another of the opinions as their favourite [sic]. These approaches, of course, work just as well (if not better) in courses like Constitutional Law than they do in courses like Tax."
"responds to the failure of law school teaching to encourage active learning by the entire class. Unlike the traditional Socratic method, which engages one student at a time, the CPS extends the dialogue to the entire class by requiring each student to respond to each question ."
" four factual scenarios relating to adverse possession time limits. A multiple choice question was devised for each of the four factual scenarios. Each multiple choice question had four responses. One of the responses was correct. Each student was issued with a keypad and they were given approximately five minutes to read and respond to each question ."
"If the area of law is black and white, the law lecturer could create Powerpoint slides that have multiple choice questions, true or false questions or yes or no questions. If the area of law is grey, perhaps the lecturer could create a statement and ask the law students to agree or disagree. The responses to the statement could lead to a discussion within the lecture group ."
"Law lecturers should catch up to lecturers in other disciplines and embed an audience response system in their lectures".
"There have been two noticeable results so far. The first is that, if the students are to answer the questions in a way that will be helpful to them, they have to reflect more on what they have learnt and how they are learning. The second is that my teaching is being directed more by what the students need, or at least, say they need, rather than what I think they need. This means that I am not second-guessing or making unwarranted assumptions about their progress."
This could be taken to indicate that clickers can be used with positive results in more theoretical disciplines such as philosophy and law which hinge upon understanding concepts rather than the repetition of facts.
Assessment of prior learning : Based upon the material covered in the previous lecture the students were asked to type in the number of Member States of the EU. This was followed by a multiple choice question based upon parliamentary sovereignty and implied repeal.
Peer learning : The students were asked to discuss in small groups the whether or not the following statement was true or false "Parliament cannot amend the Bill of Rights" and submit answers via clickers. The same approach was taken with the statement "Where two Acts of Parliament conflict the courts will apply the earlier one". The students were called upon to discuss how they alighted upon their answer and whether they understood why they were correct/incorrect.
Community building : A Likert scale question was developed to elicit answers to the statement: "I am confident that I can stand up and pronounce the case name: Internationale Handelsgesellschaft mbH v Einfuhr und Vrratsstelle fur getreide und futtermittel". Only one student responded to this with "Strongly agree", he stood up and pronounced the name beautifully to loud applause from the rest of the cohort.
Critically analysing legal principles . In relation to provocation and the potential impact of a perceived cooling-off period the students were explained the principles held in the cases of R v Duffy ((1949) 1 AER 932) and R v Ibrams and Gregory ((1981) 74 Cr App R 154). The facts of the subsequent case of R. v Baillie ( 2 Cr. App. R. 31) were then outlined and the students were asked to choose the most likely approach taken in this case from a series of options. All of the students chose an incorrect answer and a discussion then arose based upon how this case could be distinguished from previous legal authorities. The students seemed comforted by the fact that the whole group would have expected a different approach and this led to a lively discussion.
Installation of clicker systems : A very practical drawback of clicker use centres on the provision of the clickers themselves. In the MMU LLB study clickers were given to the students at the beginning of the lectures and retrieved at the end. On an ongoing basis this approach would only be feasible for a group of sixty or under and the large group session could not have been presented without the help of the university's Centre for Learning and Teaching. This can be addressed by installing clickers within the lecture theatres themselves (Cromie, 2006) or asking the students to buy or rent their own clickers throughout the course. In relation to this however, Zhu (2006) states: "With tight instructional technology budgets, students will most likely need to purchase their own clickers… It is important for faculty to be sure that they will really use clickers consistently in class before requiring students to buy them."
Clicker fatigue : A factor in the positive response of clicker use to teach law as outlined in the MMU LLB study could be influenced by its novelty value in relation to the previous traditional lectures. Following the literature outlined above, clickers can provide an extremely effective aid to teaching and learning but as Simpson and Oliver (2006) state, students react badly to clicker use "just for the sake of it".
These issues both indicate that to support the use of interactive technology policies need to be put in place not only on an institutional but also a course and even year level to identify strategies for effective clicker employment across the modules presented to an entire cohort.
Increasingly within higher education a need has been identified to encourage the acquisition of skills which can be transferred to enhance a student's wider experience and activity. This debate has been embraced by legal education with the development of strategies to promote the identification and development of transferable skills (Law Discipline Network,1998). Key studies (eg. Hake, 1998; Knight and Wood, 2005) highlight the ability of effective clicker use to promote high-level conceptual skills and deep understanding. A discipline such as law, not only due to recent focus on transferable skills, but also due to a traditional focus upon analytical problem solving should therefore be at the forefront of clicker use and experimentation. The uptake of this technology, for a number of key reasons outlined above, has been low within legal education and an opportunity is being missed to revolutionise the legal classroom.
"teaching and learning in higher education are unlikely to be improved simply by the application of new technology…the medium itself is not the most important factor in any educational programme - what really matters is how it is creatively exploited and constructively assigned ."
"The principal barrier to further use and evaluation of keypad merits in our science courses is simply inertia on the part of faculty."
There may be numerous reasons why teaching staff are reluctant to overhaul teaching strategies to embrace technology but any employment of clickers needs to be facilitated by management, not only in the initial decision to make technology available but also in a continuous focus on staff development and technical support provision. Clicker technology presents an unrivalled opportunity to develop an engaged community of conceptually-focused, problem-solving legal learners but this can only be achieved through the engagement and commitment of managers, lecturers and ultimately the students themselves.
This research has been undertaken with the aid of funding from MMU's Fellowship in Academic Practice scheme. The author wishes to thank Dennis Pass of MMU's Centre for Learning and Teaching for his instruction and practical support.
Duncan, D. (2006) Clickers: A new technology with exceptional promise. Astronomy Education Review 5 (1) pp70-88.
Frase, L., Patrick, E., and Schumer, H. (1970) Effect of question position and frequency upon learning from text under different levels of incentive. Journal Educational Psychology 61 pp52-56.
Gall, M. (1984) Synthesis of research on teachers' questioning. Educational Leadership 42 (3) pp40-47.
Gump, S. (2006) Guess who's (not) coming to class: students attitudes as indicators of attendance Educational Studies 32 (1) pp39-46.
Guthrie, J. (1971) Feedback and sentence learning. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 10 pp23-28.
Hake, R. (1998) Interactive Engagement Versus Traditional Methods: a Six-Thousand Student Survey of Mechanics Test Data for Introductory Physics Courses. American Journal of Physics 66 (1) pp64-74.
Johnson, D., Johnson, R. and Smith, K. (1998) Active learning: Cooperation in the college classroom Edina, MN: Interaction Book Co.
Knight, J. and Wood, W. (2005) Teaching more by lecturing less Cell Biology Education 4 pp298-310.
Longhurst, R. (1999) Why aren't they here? Student absenteeism in a further education college Journal of Further and Higher Education 23 (1) pp61-80.
Mazur, E. (1997) Peer instruction: A user's manual. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
McLeish, J. (1968) The Lecture Method, Cambridge Monographs in Teaching Methods, no. 1, Cambridge: Cambridge Institute of Education.
Meltzer D. and Manivannan K. (1996) Promoting interactivity in physics lecture classes The Physics Teacher 34, pp72-76.
National Research Council. (1999) How people learn: Brain, mind, experience and school Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
Oppenheimer, T. (2003) The flickering mind: The false promise of technology in the classroom, and how learning can be saved. New York: Random House.
Trees, A. and Jackson, M. (2003) The Learning Environment in Clicker Classrooms: Student Processes of Learning and Involvement in Large Courses Using Student Response Systems, Communications Department, University of Colorado.
Yorke, M. and Longden, B. (2004) Retention and Student Success in Higher Education , Maidenhead, UK, Society for Research into Higher Education and Open University Press.
Zull, J. (2002). The Art of Changing the Brain. Stylus Publishing, LLC: Sterling, Virginia. | 2019-04-22T10:25:18Z | https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/law/elj/jilt/2009_3/easton |
The primary available evidence is, of course, found on the bottom of the “D” Company, 11th Battalion, 13th Brigade wartime map. The map is authentic, and the handwriting appears to have been written in 1945. The longtime map holder, Len Willoughby, who retrieved the map from a map case from a pile of discarded equipment in 1945, kept the map until he mailed it to Don Angwin in 1993. Neither of these gentlemen had the motive nor “insider” expertise to create or introduce details concerning the Electra’s obscure component identification or situational nuances. The string of numbers and letters, “600H/P. S3H/1 C/N1055,” remains the most significant historical notation found to date in the search for Earhart’s aircraft. We believe this alpha-numeric sequence references the details on the metal tag recovered from the engine mount by Warrant Officer Nurse on 17 April 1945. This three-group sequence translates to 600 Horsepower, Pratt & Whitney R-1340-S3H1, Construction Number 1055. Of these three groups, two are engine parameters and one is an airframe identifier. Construction Number 1055 is the airframe identifier and decodes to Model 10, 55th built. This airframe construction number IS Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed 10E Electra aircraft. The eyewitness visual description from two of the Australian veterans present at the crash site strongly support this determination. Lets look closely at the notation.
Why is an Airframe Identifier Attached to an Engine Structure?
The question of why an airframe construction number on a metal tag was wired to an engine mount was puzzling until I called to mind that the aircraft, Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed 10E, suffered landing gear, wing, tail, engine mount and engine damage from her ground loop while attempting take-off from Hawaii. Then, Amelia was on her first attempt at flying around the world, west-about. She ground-looped the Electra and it was severely damaged. It was disassembled, packed up and sent back to the Lockheed Burbank factory.
Ground loops, where the landing gear collapses and/or the propellers strike the ground at power, bow, bend or break engine mount tubing trusses in addition to all the other damage that can occur.
During the repair process, the Electra was given a new engine mount for the No.2 engine. As Lockheed did not supply a new mount for the No. 1 engine, then this says that the No.1 engine mount was repairable. To repair the mount, it would be secured in a manufacturing jig at the bolt mounting points after the damaged sections had been cut out. New sections would be welded in by the oxy-acetylene gas welding method. Former President of the Amelia Earhart Society, Mr. Bill Prymak, furnished information that the engine mounts were made at an unnamed foundry in Los Angeles. It would be a normal practice for that originating foundry to be the place where the mount could be repaired as they would have the original production jig. Items sent for a gas flame welding shop repair would get fireproof metal tags not card tags, just as they would do today.
To identify the left hand engine mount as it was dispatched for repair, it would be necessary to identify the item to track it with any written Purchase Order detailing the repair required. I very much doubt that in 1937, an aircraft metal working foundry in Los Angeles would be inundated with engine mounts in for repair so basic identification would be all that was required on the item. The associated paperwork would have the detail.
Lockheed were building a few variants of the basic Electra Model 10 in 1937. These variants had similar engines of differing horsepower – some 450 horsepower, some 550 horsepower and some 600 horsepower – so one requirement would be to identify the horsepower to be supported by the mount. What is the horsepower rating of the mount? “600 H/P.” The associated engine type also has differing mounting holes. Which one is it? “S3H1.” Which aircraft is it from? “C/N 1055“. What do we use to tag it? Not a paper card tied on with string since we are sending this engine mount to a welding shop where an oxy-acetylene flame torch is going to be used. So we will use a metal tag attached by wire. Hence, we etch or stamp “600H/P. S3H/1 C/N1055” on the metal tag made from a scrap piece of aluminum or tinplate and drill a hole in it and finally wire it to the damaged engine mount.
In 1937, the Electra was repaired mostly where it had been made and workers in the Lockheed factory would identify all components removed during the repair for in-house and out-sourced work with its construction number,“C/N1055“, and not from its civil aviation registration, “NRl6020.” This is standard procedure at an aircraft manufacturing company where aircraft are known by their Build Serial Number, not by their registration letters or numbers as the case may be. I have worked at aircraft manufacturing and have visited another manufacturers, and the aircraft assembly bays are always identified by the “manufacturer’s number.” In this case, Lockheed used the term “Construction Number” abbreviated to “C/N.” In modern times, we now use the term “Manufacturers Serial Number” abbreviated to “MSN”.
I have been in aircraft engineering for 59 years, and as a professional I consider the small metal tag, wired to the mount tubing of the detached engine, and removed by Warrant Officer Nurse, was actually the metal Repair Tag which had been left on the engine mount truss after repair and re-installation. In aircraft engineering hangar procedures it is not normal in everyday paperwork to see airframe and engine component designators or related equipment-identifying codes come together in one place on a component. One such place where they do intersect is on a Repair Tag. An engine mount by its nature is classed as an engine component and so any airframe identifier listed on a repair tag would be there to show which aircraft the component came from (and belonged to), in this case “C/N1055.” It is quite normal for any component removed from an aircraft to have a Repair Tag.
Today, it is standard operating procedure to remove Repair Tags when refitting components back on an aircraft, and these tags or cards are sent with all the other “Check” and/or “Defect Repair” paperwork to the Aircraft Records Section for inclusion into the individual aircraft file. Yet still, very occasionally, these repair tags are left on components after the completion of work and a “find” order is issued by Records Section or Quality Assurance to retrieve the tag and to send it to the Aircraft Records Section. In my experience over the last ten years, I have known this happen about five times.
As previously confirmed, the Pratt & Whitney “Wasp” S3H1 variant is correct for Earhart’s Electra. Initially when I commenced on this research, all evidence pointed to a pre-WWII horsepower rating for the R-1340 S3H1 as 550 horsepower. I could not understand why the writing on the map had “600 H/P.” next to the engine type code “S3H/1.” As I discovered, the explanation is simple: 600 H.P. is available with the S3H1 when using 100 Octane gasoline. The higher octane number (100 as against the normal 87) is a higher “anti-knock” or “pre-detonation” value. The full power obtainable with the 100 Octane fuel is in fact 600 horsepower. Lockheed Report 487: “Long Range Study of a Bi-Motor Airplane” concerned with the Lockheed Model 10E does state that the engines are indeed rated at 600 Horsepower.
At about the time of the date on the map edge “[24/5/45],” 24 May 1945, the Australians were informed that “…the Americans say that it is not one of theirs…” or words to that effect. Therefore, a branch of the United States Army or Army Air Force had been informed of the engine (or aircraft) wreckage found during the patrol a month earlier.
Some five weeks after the Patrol A1 was completed, “D” Company personnel were at a beach near 13th Brigade and 11th Battalion Headquarters near to Tol Plantation, waiting for a barge to transport them further up the coast to the Unamitki River. They were approached by an unidentified officer from headquarters, who informed them that the U.S. Army had replied to the report of the find of the engine (or aircraft). The officer was reading from a signal (message), and told the assembled men that the US Army (which included the USAAF) had said that it was not one of their engines, therefore not their aircraft. The officer mentioned it was a Wasp engine and was most probably from a civilian aircraft. Some of the veterans reportedly heard that the aircraft could be a Lockheed as they were big users of Pratt & Whitney engines. They were told not to worry about it, as they had other things to do.
Lieutenant Backhouse believed the metal tag was sent to the Americans as supporting evidence along with textual documentation, possibly a copy of the missing patrol report annex (Report 63A). The hope was that the Americans could account for a wartime loss that the patrol had stumbled upon. Ken assumed that the tag was sent from New Britain to Port Moresby by military-channeled surface mail in a courier bag. Actually, the nearest Americans were at Jacquinot Bay about 80 miles away and their LCM’s had regularly visited Wide Bay on a schedule of re-supply runs to Tol Plantation troops and to Kalai Plantation troops. These Americans of Company “B” of the 594th EB & SR had a very close working relationship with the Australian Army.
In any case, whichever American unit received the metal tag or the information concerning the metal tag, any official response back, if any, to the Australian unit normally would take some time. Of course, it was about five weeks when the men of “D” Company heard an official reply.
Before the negative message response concerning the tag arrived back at “D” Company, there had been some immediate curiosity from the U.S. Army or Army Air Force as two American officers visited the “D” Company area at Kalai Plantation. Upon arrival they requested to speak to Lieutenant Backhouse. The visit was late April. Lieutenant Backhouse was not available as he was out on another patrol when they arrived. Strangely, these two US Army officers could not wait and left.
1) From a U.S. Army unit left in New Guinea as a liaison with the Australians in New Guinea.
2) From the U.S. Army 594th Engineer Boat and Shore Regiment (EB&SR) at Jacquinot Bay.
In the first case, the most logical source would be Port Moresby as the 1st Australian Army had a liaison group there. This is some 500 miles from Wide Bay. The officers would need to be prepared for a stay at Kalai Plantation after traveling nearly 500 miles. It would not be a one-day task. This action would in all probability entail a flight by aircraft from Port Moresby to Jacquinot Bay which had an airstrip, and then a sea trip by barge or boat.
In the second possibility, the two officers may have come up from Jacquinot Bay on a regular re-supply run and take the next scheduled returning barge back to their unit. However the 594th “unofficial history” in my possession carries the statement that their barges (LCM’s) left Wide Bay on the 15th April for the “last” time as the Australian 41st Landing Craft Unit (LCU) took over from the American 594th. Of note, the 594th had three “fast” sea craft called J-Boats and there was also mention of a “Picket Boat” which was capable of over 20 knots speed.
No matter their origin, why could these two officers not wait? Anyone from Port Moresby equipped for a trip of a few days certainly would have waited until Lieutenant Backhouse returned from any of his short patrols. On the other hand, why would two “locally-based” officers (of the 594th) not announce that they would be back at a later date, and come back on one of the boats that they had? I needed to isolate the day in question.
Warrant Officer Keith Nurse remarked that Lieutenant Backhouse was in a bit of trouble with the chief topographer when he got back from Patrol A1, because he could not definitively state where the patrol had been except for a location on the Mumus River. As was revealed in archived message traffic, Captain Mott, the Topographic Survey Officer, had an extraordinary interest in the area and the observations of this unit’s first patrol in the jungle. Captain Mott reportedly became somewhat agitated and it resulted in a heated disagreement between Captain Mott and Captain Geikie, the “D” Company Commander.
As a result of this altercation, Backhouse was sent out on another patrol almost immediately. From the Patrol Report Ledger, and a letter report in the Australian War Memorial archives, we can get a good picture of what patrols Lieutenant Backhouse participated in from April 19th to May 24th.
We can see from this table that the most likely day for the visit to Kalai by the U.S. Army officers was 21 April – Backhouse was still on patrol.
As to the question of why the two officers could not stay and departed quickly is twofold. Officers traveling from Port Moresby would expect to stay a couple of days due to transportation scheduling and having a justifiable mission. Therefore the officers did not come from Port Moresby; instead they came from Jacquinot Bay – the 594th EB&SR. There also is a simple answer as to why they could not wait. Their unit, Company “B” of the 594th EB&SR, was under orders to depart Jacquinot Bay at 0330Hrs on 22nd April, bound for Finschaven and then Hollandia to rejoin their regiment there. We know with certainty that Lieutenant Backhouse was on patrol on the 20th and 21st, probably returning by 1800 hours on the 21st. Backhouse was definitely at Kalai on the 23rd as he wrote a letter report to his Company Commander, therefore the 594th officers could not have arrived on that day because they had already shipped out from Palmalmal at Jacquinot Bay, so the only “day of opportunity” for the officers to get up to Kalai was 21 April. How did they get up to Kalai so quickly as the barge trip is 10 hours at best and ten hours back? The answer is that the 594th owned three J-Boats – small fast boats – and there is also the mention of a “Picket Boat” capable of over 20 knots in speed (23 mph). Also, on the night of the 21st April at the 594th base at Jacquinot, a “Farewell Party” had been organized for the departing Americans. The 594th sailed away from Jacquinot Bay at 3:45 am, April 22. In view of the 594th Unit Movement Orders and the sea-transit time of what must have been 4 hours to get back to Jacquinot Bay after 4 hours to Kalai, and on hearing that Backhouse was not available, the two officers would be keen to get back in daylight; if not for the party arranged for their unit by their Australian hosts.
The conclusion is that the American visitors were from the 594th EB&SR, as no other American personnel visited Backhouse after that missed opportunity either at Kalai or at Tol Plantation.
What we seem to have with this episode is direct interest from one unit of the U.S. Army (594th EB&SR) that included a convenient visit to try and gain official or passing information for themselves or another requesting unit; and no interest, based on the tag information, in the form of a message response from another component of the U.S. Army some 5 weeks later. The research continues as to what surviving members of the 594th heard or saw about an aircraft wreck in April 1945.
There were two Lockheed Model 10A aircraft in New Guinea operated by Guinea Airways based at Lae. These aircraft had Pratt & Whitney R-985 engines of 450 horsepower and both of these were evacuated to Australia at the outbreak of war in 1942. They did not return to New Guinea with any permanency during the war except that one aircraft did accomplish supply runs to the Poppondetta area during the battles for Buna-Gona-Sanananda, and other places in New Guinea away from the fighting zones. It returned safely to Australia. There were no known Japanese civilian aircraft with the same engine type in New Britain.
I have been unable to find any evidence that any R-1340 S3H1 direct drive powered aircraft other than Earhart’s Electra flew in New Guinea prior to or during World War II. There were some Australian Wirraway aircraft powered by licence-built Pratt & Whitney R-1340 S3H1-G engines. There were seven at Rabaul when the Japanese invaded on 23 January 1942. Of these, five were shot down over Rabaul, and two escaped to Port Moresby. One flew on to Australia and one remained in Moresby. These “G” engines were a geared variety (they had a reduction gear at the front of the engine) and drove a three bladed propeller developing 650 horsepower. Furthermore, the patrol identified a twin-engined aircraft, the Wirraway was a single-engined aircraft. Other Wirraways operated in New Guinea but were not sent against Rabaul.
Furthermore, an enquiry to the USAF Museum at Wright-Patterson AFB, brought an interesting response from a curator, David Menard. I have had several communications with David over the years. David looked through all the available listings of USAAC, USAAF, USAF, US Army, USN, USMC, and USCG, up until and including 1937, for any use of the R-1340 S3H1 engine, and all he found was some early biplane types and prototypes undergoing evaluation by the military. They had the “civilian” S3H1 engines, but when accepted into military service, those aircraft were then listed as having the AN-1 military version and designation of the Wasp engine. Each arm of the U.S. military used their own designations. David looked into the use of the AN-1 engine employed on any aircraft sent to New Guinea during the WWII conflict and could not find any use of that engine in New Guinea by any arm of the U.S. military.
When the Australian patrol’s mysterious nacelled engine and airframe were found, the Japanese had been on New Britain for 3 years and 3 months. Aerial activity against Rabaul started in 1942 with sporadic raids by four-engined Flying Fortress B-17’s operating from Australia and re-fueling at Port Moresby. Major aerial hostility did not start until late 1942 when the U.S. 5th Air Force achieved a worthy strength, and airbases were opened up on New Guinea Territory. The jungle wreckage find in 1945 was a bare aluminum nacelle and a bare aluminum airframe according to the veterans who actually saw the wreckage. In contrast, wartime allied aircraft were camouflage painted. I have been to USAAF wrecksites (B-24’s and a B-17) in Papua New Guinea and have seen wrecks of Japanese aircraft at their resting places at Madang and Kokopo. The museums in Port Moresby and Kokopo have aircraft out in the open. None exhibit the amount of corrosion described by Keith Nurse, “holed and filigreed.” It would be almost impossible for a wartime aircraft on New Britain to have corroded so badly after a maximum of three years. For Amelia’s Electra, it would have been there eight years. The bare aluminum cowling must have had a layer of impinged salt upon it to have been degraded so badly. Earhart was low over the sea after take-off from Lae until out of sight and she purportedly was also at 1000 feet whilst looking for Howland Island. Even today, wartime aircraft cowlings out in the open at Kokopo, near Rabaul close to the sea, do not exhibit that kind of corrosion. | 2019-04-22T18:41:46Z | https://earhartsearchpng.com/earhart-lockheed-electra-search-project-5/ |
Our eldest daughter is old enough to be reading, but perhaps not quite fast enough to read and sing every hymn during church. Still, when I was worshipping with her this spring, I would use my finger to track the words in the hymnal. I was hoping she’d become more engaged in worship and less… crazy.
I’m not so sure a squirmy six year old is what the psalmist had in mind, but I guess it works. She’s caught on to the freedom of living in God’s love. She trusts that what will come out will be a response to God’s love; something appropriate to our worship. As adults, we can get a little too rigid, tied to the notes and the rules, as if that was what was most important. This psalm retells God’s promises to David as a reminder of God’s faithfulness for us. God’s faithfulness is the foundation of our praise- the foundation of our living. God’s faithfulness is all that matters. We respond as we can. Maybe that means we don’t sing in unison, or even sing the same words all the time. Instead, we live as a refrain to God’s song of unending love.
Jesus came for us to show God’s faithfulness has no bounds. Jesus died and was raised to show that there is no where God will not be for us. In baptism, God claimed you as God’s own child, promising to never abandon you, no matter how far you might go.
How will you remember God’s faithfulness this week? How might you live out your song of praise?
Grace and peace to you, siblings in Christ.
Last week, we remembered God is a promise keeper, fulfilling the promise to give children to Abraham and Sarah long after they had any reason to hope. Today we rediscover more about who our God is as we look at the other side of this family, focusing on Abraham’s son Ishmael and his mother Hagar.
Looking at this family from another angle, we reveal a reflection of who we are in our brokenness and sin. Last week, we celebrated the joy Sarah and Abraham had as they birthed their promised son. Today we confront the ways in which they were willing to destroy others’ lives in order to get what they were promised.
During those years of barrenness, Sarah took the life of her slave girl Hagar. She gave her slave to Abraham, so that she might use the body of this girl to conceive, carry, and birth a child for herself, a child to fulfill God’s promise.
When Hagar conceived Abraham’s son, Sarah went into a rage. She attacked Hagar, who carried all her hope and all her contempt. Hagar ran away.
Hagar, having seen and heard God, returns to Sarah, and gives birth to her son.
Years later, Sarah herself conceives, carries, and births Abraham’s son Isaac. She no longer has need of Ishmael. This is where we pick up the story.
Matriarch Sarah saw slave Hagar’s son, Ishmael, playing- laughing- with her own son, Isaac. That they should see each other as brothers is too much for Sarah. She will not allow for any possibility that Isaac’s inheritance would be divided. Sarah demands that Abraham send them away, and he does.
As we prepare for the moment of God’s decisive action, Hagar and Ishmael have left on a desperate journey, cast out of their homes. Hagar has used all she has to protect her child, but there is nothing left. Nothing left for her to do but hide her child and hide her face as she waits for death to claim them.
The pivotal verse of God’s action is Genesis 21: 17 And God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.
When has this slave woman ever been heard? She’s been used by others for their own gains, forced to grow a child to carry another’s blessing, beaten and cast out when they’ve had enough of her. She has never been seen. Never been heard. Not by anyone.
God hears them, even as they are deserted and surrounded by death. God hears and answers, providing a path into life. God gives blessing and a future. Even as people of power reject them and ignore their needs, God cares for Hagar and Ishmael.
God gives: unexpectedly, abundantly, and to all. Sarah was afraid the inheritance was too small to be divided between both of Abraham’s sons. When God spoke to Hagar, God declared Ishmael will also be the beginning of a great nation, just as Isaac will be. Math with God is different than our own accounting. God acts in abundance when we see scarcity. The promise is always bigger than we think it will be.
When we feel a need to make the circle smaller, to tighten the boundaries defining who is included, and we begin to push people out, we forget this story. We forget who our God is, and what our God can- and does- do.
God sees you, all of you, and knows the struggles you are facing. God hears you, when you’ve been too ashamed to tell anyone. God loves you without the judgment and demands we so often put on the love we show to each other. God is acting for your wellbeing. God sent Jesus to reveal our brokenness- our need to have outsiders, forgotten people, people to carry our rage. Jesus opened the circle of God’s welcome, bringing into community those who had been cast out. This Jesus brings us all into a new life and a new way of being.
Our God is a hearing God, a seeing God, a God who acts. Baptized into Christ, we are called to be hearing, seeing, active people.
But this is not who I have been. Reading and praying this passage over the last week has made me think about all the ways I have closed my eyes and my ears, so that I don’t have to see- or hear- so that I don’t have to act.
A friend posted a photo and news article about drought in Somalia. View it here.Beautiful, horrifying photos that tell of a land experiencing a harsher, more arid climate, leading people to desperation, to violence, to starvation, and to dangerous paths of escape to new lands, where they will often be barred out or cast away.
I listened to the outcomes of recent trials of police officers involved in shooting deaths of black people. Following that, I listened to an interview of a teacher of conceal and carry classes. This teacher, who is a black man, teachers other people of color a certain way of organizing their license, registration, and insurance papers so that when pulled over, it’s all easy to access. I think of my own exploding glove compartment, and how I’ve never considered it might cause more than a rolled eye if I ever had to make someone wait for me to find my papers.
I paddled the Cloquet River yesterday to learn about water quality. As we stopped for lunch, and I raised my hand for my roast beef sandwich, someone teased, “way to eat high on the food chain.” I think that was meant as a rub from a vegan husband to his wife and I got caught in the middle of it holding the sandwich he thought was for her- but still- here we were, talking about the impacts of farms on the water quality in the lower half of the state… and I held a piece of that cycle in my hands.
These are all things I don’t have to pay attention to. Who I am – especially as a white, cis-gender, middle class, educated American citizen- has made it possible for me not to have to see- or hear- or know. This is what it means for me to have privilege and power. I’m not forced to see how other people are living as a result of my choices and my culture. I find myself reflected in Sarah, who sees Hagar and her offspring as disposable means to obtain what she wants. Who am I casting off?
Our God doesn’t cast people off, but seeks them out; doesn’t ignore them, but truly sees them and hears what they need. Who I am- as a baptized child of God- is a harvester in God’s kingdom. God’s growing justice, love, inclusion, and healing.
If today you’ve been forgotten by the world, know that God has not forgotten you, but is coming to you to restore your life.
If today you’re content in your ignorance of other’s suffering, know that God is calling you to open your ears and eyes and schedule- there is work to be done and God wants you to have the joy of joining in.
God heard and answered both Sarah and Hagar’s cries. God makes God’s blessing big enough for all. You’ve been blessed to be a blessing.
When’s the last time you had a good laugh?
Did you know laughter brings many benefits? I hadn’t really thought about it until reading an article about laughter therapy groups, in which people gather together and laugh. It might have started out as fake and forced, but there’s something so contagious about laughter, it became real. They were healthier for this time spent laughing.
People throughout many cultures laugh. What our laughter means can vary. In today’s Genesis reading, laughter expresses the human response to God’s promise and action.
Throughout the summer, we’re going to be reading through the book of Genesis and following the families whose stories are recorded. This week, we meet Abraham and Sarah, sometimes called Abram and Sarai, who were promised a new land and many descendants.
In chapters 12, 15, and 17, God continually promises they will be the ancestors of a great nation that will possess a fertile land. God uses grand metaphors- your descendants shall be as innumerable as the dust of the earth and as numerous as the stars.
It is too much to believe. One of my previous parishioners would often say, “I have to laugh or I’ll cry.” Is that what’s found in Abraham’s outburst?
In the next chapter, God appears to Abraham in the form of three men. As was expected in their culture, Abraham and Sarah treat them with great hospitality, offering water, refreshment, and rest. Sarah’s been pushed back to her place in the tent. While she’s preparing food, she’s trying to catch the words of these strange and unexpected visitors.
What she hears is ridiculous. One says he’ll come back later and by then, Sarah will have a son. It’s so ridiculous, it hurts. How often has she waited, thinking, maybe this time, only to learn a few days later, no, there will be no child this month. Maybe she’s screamed enough into the night that her voice is hoarse, and cried enough that her eyes are dry. She’s past the time of thinking her cries will change anything. All that’s left to come out is a scoffing grunt of a laugh. Ha.
Scripture doesn’t record what happens in those months. We know from what happens later that a child is forming within Sarah. Her laughter is preparing to change.
Was there a loosening in Sarah that freed hope? Was there a pure giggle still waiting in her heart? Laughter waiting to finally have reason to burst out? Joy germinating and growing alongside the child?
Laughter came when her son was born. Wonder and joy and life- so real and present- in her arms. What other response could there be but amazed laughter? A mother’s laughter transformed when it encounters the fulfilled promise of God.
The child is named Isaac, which means laughter. Both father and mother laughed at God’s promise of a future beyond their hope. Now their laughter bears witness to God’s faithfulness. God fulfilled God’s promises and gave new life when it was least expected.
Their laughter causes God to ask, “is anything too wonderful for the Lord?” As people of faith, we may answer, no, God can do all things, even as we know that good things do not always come. Gathered today, in this place and in worship centers throughout the world, are those who long for a child, a home, a safe community, an end to addiction, and healing. It might be especially cruel to read this on Father’s Day, as some wish their prayers for a child were answered, or remember in grief the death of a child or parent, or live with complicated and painful – or nonexistent – relationships with family. We might wonder why God does not give us what we want, what we need.
God is not Santa Claus, giving us based on a list of good and bad. God owes us nothing, and yet- sometimes, we get to glimpse a wonderful sign of the life God is bringing to us all. We’re in the midst of a process of salvation God is working, the dawn of a new day in which all will be made well. We’re not there yet.
This scripture isn’t so much about God giving us something we want as it is about who God is. It points us to a God who keep promises when it seems God has forgotten the promise. It describes a God who has power to give life when everyone knows it’s over. It encourages us to hear God’s promises in trust. God has promised a new creation, peace, life, abundant feasts where no one is hunger, and an end to violence, sin, and death.
In this time, we might as well laugh at God’s promises. It is so hard to keep up hope. How can we keep working for what seems impossible- what will never come?
We gather to be grounded in God’s promise. We pray for healing. We continue to do what we can to join in God’s work. We help each other wait with faith, reminding each other who our God is and what our God does.
God gives life. God brings joy when all is past hope. God does awesome things like resurrecting the dead and making holy the sinner. We read in Romans, “God proves God’s love for us in that while we still were sinners, Christ died for us” (5:8). Sarah and Abraham receive the fulfillment of God’s promises after they laugh in God’s face.
We have the kind of God who does the ridiculous out of love for God’s creation. God is reckless and foolish, blessing more than our faith deserves. More than we could possibly believe.
God acts crazy because God loves you. That’s worth laughing about.
Romans 6:5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.
Certainly. What a word to use when describing such a mystery as resurrection!
We are desperate for certainty, especially about those things which we cannot prove. People love movies and books of “real life accounts” from those who have passed into death and returned to tell us all about it. Is there a bright light? Pearly gate? Angels? Everything we’ve ever wanted? We want to know! And know for certain!
Those kind of details aren’t what Paul is so certain about. What he’s certain about is Jesus- and Jesus’ hold on us. Jesus has claimed you and me forever. Not even death is going to separate us from Jesus.
We receive this promise in a watery cross, in a morsel of bread and a sip of wine. Water on our foreheads dries. The feast leaves us hungry. We’re left needing to return again and again to font and table so that we can be reassured in Christ’s promise. Our certainty is fleeting, but the One who continues to draw us in is steadfast.
Performance reviews. Job interviews. End of term finals. The silence of the phone after a first date.
We are judged. We are told where we’re failing. We see red circles on our mistakes. We feel the sting of not being chosen.
It is not a good feeling.
Some of us may have experienced this feeling at church, but that’s not what God wants for us.
We’re made right with God through faith. It’s Jesus’ faithfulness – Jesus hold on us, no matter what- Jesus willingness to do all things for us- that brings us into God’s presence as blessed and holy ones.
Instead of experiencing rejection once again, we discover that in Jesus, we are chosen! We are worthy. We’re worthy of Jesus’ love and effort.
When the world keeps on judging, remember that God’s already judged you. God’s judged you through Jesus, so instead of your brokenness, God counts Jesus’ holiness. You might have plenty of “growing edges,” but God’s going to keep you. No more fear. Be at peace. You’re enough. God has made you God’s own beloved one.
In this season of graduations, “congratulations” is often on our lips, quickly followed by, “what’s next?” For those who have jobs lined up or another level of education to go on to, there’s an easy answer. They can be confident in their plans.
You don’t have to be a recent grad to have situations in which you’re not sure you’re up to the task. A move, new opportunity, birth of a child, illness of a loved one— there are many points in life that we might pause and wonder if we have the skills, strength, and stamina to live through the new thing.
That sinking feeling came to me on a Friday morning in August, the day I began my year-long internship at Zion Lutheran Church in Rockford. I was excited- I was finally going to be working in a congregation. Six years of higher education had led me to this first real taste of the life I was called into. So I drove down from our country parsonage, next to the church my husband had been assigned, over the border into Illinois, which as a Wisconsinite, is a difficult line to cross, through the city intersections until I arrived at this central city church. It was my supervisor’s day off, so while he came in to meet me and show me my office, he quickly left for his golf game. This church had so much I hoped I could learn from. They had launched community development corporations. They had their own food pantry. That morning there was a group of Laotian members making egg rolls for the Sunday fundraiser and a group of neighborhood church leaders working on hunger issues. There was so much amazing work being done in God’s name- that I found myself in the bathroom, shaking and crying, totally overwhelmed and confident in one thing- that I had no clue what I was doing there.
How could I possibly live up to the challenge?
We open the Gospel of Matthew to meet the disciples in Galilee. It’s not been long since Jesus was arrested before their eyes, and then tried, crucified, and buried. It’s been even less time since some of the women went to the tomb to prepare his body and were met by an angel accompanied by an earthquake. The angel told them that Jesus had been raised and would meet the disciples in Galilee. Then as the women ran to tell the other disciples, Jesus met them- Jesus- alive. The women share all this with the men, who travel on as instructed.
When the men gather in Galilee, they see Jesus. I love what the text says- “When they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted.” (Other translations….) After all that’s happened, I can’t fault their lack of confidence! Are they doubting the living Jesus in front of them? Or doubting their own readiness to be a part of whatever Jesus is doing? Surely they must also be wondering- what’s next for me?
Confidence comes from being able to tell ourselves, “I can do it!” When we realize what the “it” it is we’re going to be doing – that’s when we might freak out! It helps if we can see the new task’s connection to something we’ve become familiar with.
Jesus tells his disciples they’re going to be doing everything he’s been doing. Remember what Jesus has been busy doing: teaching about God, reviving the dead, healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, restoring outsiders to community, and all the while growing a crowd of onlookers and disciples.
Now it’s the disciples who are going to be discipling.
They are called to be discipling disciples who follow Jesus’ pattern of ministry- gathering groups of people, doing life-giving acts, living and preaching God’s grace.
It might be scary for them to think of doing this themselves, but they are not unprepared. Jesus is calling the disciples to do familiar work. They’ve spent an intensive period of formation with Jesus. They’ve been there as he’s taught and healed. They didn’t always know everything or do things right, but they learned and grew.
Their future ministry will be familiar enough because they are continuing to imitate the God they have come to know through Jesus.
When we’re faced with a change in life, how do we get ourselves to a place of confidence so that we can bravely move forward?
As we were packing and saying goodbye to move up here, I intentionally paused to experience the familiarity of all I was leaving. I looked out at my congregation, remembering time spent with them, stories, tears, and prayers shared, and reminded myself that there was a time I did not know them so deeply, that I had been struggling simply to know their names. I drove all the winding roads and remembered when I was so confused as to how to get to the places I needed to go.
I told myself what was now familiar was once overwhelmingly new. As I went out to begin something new, it, too would one day become familiar.
The disciples were called into scary new and yet familiar work. Even though Jesus was ascending, he was not abandoning them. Jesus promises he will be there with them. The Holy Spirit will continue to disciple them as they disciple others.
Because the disciples were faithful in their call, Jesus’ work has expanded through the generations. We’ve been discipled and we’re called to disciple others. Think back and remember- who was it who brought alongside them so that you would learn to pray, love and serve? When were those times of experiencing God’s love for you? Even as you are continuing to be discipled, God is calling you to disciple others.
When faced with this call, we may feel overwhelmed or unqualified. Who among us is totally good? Or has it all together? Or knows all the answers to the big questions of life, death, and faith? When we’re asked to serve on a board, teach Sunday School, or read for worship, some of us might freeze and think – I can’t do that. When we’re given the opportunity to show forgiveness, mercy, justice or love- we might wonder if we have what it takes.
You can. You do. God has called you to continue God’s work, and in calling you, God has given you what you need to serve. As was true for the disciples, God created us in God’s image, shares the Son’s authority with us, and empowers us with the Spirit in order to bring us in to the work of the Triune God. We all serve in different ways. We never serve alone. The Spirit fills you, too. We join the work God is accomplishing in the world.
Next time someone asks what your future plans are, tell them. You’re healing the broken world, welcoming the stranger, living forgiveness, and caring for those in need. You’re offering what you have to God, and through you, God is bringing life and love. Be confident in your call, and even more confident in the God who calls you. In the midst of your worshipping and your doubting, God is there, blessing you with the call and the means to serve in God’s great work of salvation.
Today we celebrate the church festival Pentecost. Our reading from Acts tells the dramatic story of the disciples receiving Jesus’ promised Holy Spirit. Wind, flames, and words rush in and out- and people hear – and understand – the good news of God’s work in Jesus.
This event empowers the disciples to really take on Jesus’ work. Its effect reaches us today. At baptism, God sent the Spirit to you. A candle was lit as a sign of that flame resting on you, as it did on the disciples so many years ago. What is history is also continuing today: the Spirit comes to us, remains with us, and empowers us to do Jesus’ work in the world.
It’s a beautiful coincidence that we’re starting our time together on Pentecost. You’ve commissioned Pastor Sarah on to her summer sabbatical, and you are called into your own sabbatical, with the purpose of rediscovering and relishing the joy, power, rest, and direction the Spirit brings. This is a time of renewal. The Spirit’s work is to replenish us.
The Holy Spirit sets the beat for us to dance, to party, to live. Over these next three months, I’ll be walking with you as we listen for that Spirit and allow ourselves to be moved in new ways.
When I first talked to Pastor Sarah back in March, summer seemed a very long ways off. But by the end of this week, I finally started to feel like summer is actually going to come. The sun is out, the air is warmer, and I let the kids talk me into stocking our freezer with ice pops.
Our summers always include a number of activities we have to make time for. Walks in the woods, coloring with chalk, building sand castles, and watching a parade. We’ve lived and visited enough places that I’ve seen a wide variety of parades- from our small town North Dakota parade that drove down the parade route and then turned around to drive it again. We had to make the action last more than 5 minutes. We moved from that to a 3-hour long parade with trucks, tractors, politicians, and candy in southern WI.
I’m always impressed by the school marching bands. While I’m sweating away in shorts and a t-shirt, with a water on the side of the road, these teens are marching in hot polyester uniforms and funny hats, lugging their instruments and having enough breath to actually play them.
There’s a way in which I always feel a part of the music as the band marches by. It’s those big drums- boom, boom, booming- reverberating in my chest. Sometimes it’s almost like they’re trying to reset my heart beat- boom, boom, boom. I hear the rhythm, and I feel it inside me.
That’s what the Holy Spirit is like. Boom, boom, boom, setting the beat for our lives.
If you have young ones in your community, you might have seen the movie Trolls. The movie focuses on two groups of creatures- Trolls who are carefree and fun-loving, always happy and quick to sing, and the Bergens, the monsters of the story, who are sad and angry. The Bergens look at the happiness of the trolls and want it. They think they have to take happiness from the trolls in order to be happy themselves. But at the very end of the movie, they are transformed. The trolls begin to sing and dance, and in domino fashion, they bump into one Bergen who starts to catch the beat- who bumps into another- who starts to move a little- and finally the whole room is one big happy dance party. The beat is infectious and its song is joy.
When on that long-ago Pentecost, the party got raucous with flame and wind and witness, disciple Peter got up to explain this wasn’t just any disturbance. This was the fulfillment of God’s promise recorded by the prophet Joel, “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.” The Spirit is the song that knocks first one person and then another into God’s dance.
What is this song and how does this dance go?
Paul writes the church at Corinth to remind them of the Spirit’s song and how to follow the Spirit’s lead in the dance of Christian life. He explains, “to each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” The Spirit leads us into different actions, based on our own personal gifts, for the sake of others. Some teach, some encourage or heal. Some send cards to let people know they are loved and remembered. Some sit with a child and encourage their reading. Others prepare a meal or this Table. Maybe you send money where it’s needed, remind a representative to make decisions that will benefit those most at risk, or help a parent pick out summer clothes from the clothes closet. The Spirit creates faith in us, gathers us as a community, and sends us out to continue Jesus’ work in the world.
The Spirit is here, among and within us, singing God’s song, beating God’s rhythm, with such insistence that even the most reluctant dancer is drawn in. Sometimes, though, it can get difficult to hear the Spirit and our feet can miss the steps.
There might be too much noise in our lives. If I were sitting on a lawn, watching the marching band while speakers from the house were blasting music with strong base, I’d be overwhelmed with the conflicting beats. Or we might be actively trying to avoid hearing what is being sung to us. If I came with my lawn-mowing sound canceling headphones, I might know there was something going on, but not quite hear the music. Are there things in your life that are keeping you from noticing the Spirit’s song and holding you back from joining the dance?
Let’s set an intention for the summer. Let’s commit to each other and to God our desire to turn down some of the excess noise in our lives and set aside things that muffle the voice of God. Our summer is also about sabbatical, letting some things rest so that we can attend to what is most important. What might that look like for you?
My advice? First, join in worship. This is where we most clearly hear the song. We practice the dance as we pray, hear the good news, give back God’s gifts, and gather at the table.
Then, try something new. Explore prayer practices. Show love to your neighbors. Learn something new. Share your talents. Serve in a way you haven’t before. Don’t be afraid. I spent my jr. high and high school dances standing with my friends, wondering how they all learned how to dance, and trying to be invisible. I was always afraid to look stupid. That kept me from the freedom of simply having fun with the beat- or even having fun offbeat. The thing about the Spirit’s dance is that we can’t get it wrong. No matter what, God has claimed you, the Spirit has come to live in you, and even when you make some wrong steps, the Spirit is still happy to turn you back around.
Your pastor is rightly proud of all of you. Pastor Sarah often told me that you are a congregation who knows what it is to do Jesus’ work in the world- making a real difference in the lives of those in this community. You’ve been joining the dance. This summer, let’s tune in to the joy of dancing to the Spirit’s beat. | 2019-04-23T12:10:41Z | https://lutheranlady.wordpress.com/2017/06/ |
This is one of my earliest memories and the beginning of a lifelong devotion to the game of cricket. It was also an experience which was to be repeated umpteen times as the years went on – that dismal prospect of a game washed out by a storm and twenty two despondent cricketers doing their best to be optimistic about the likelihood of a resumption of play. Not even a packet of crisps could compensate for the disappointment of a looming abandonment of the day that had begun so promisingly. However, there were the sandwiches to be eaten, the pin-ball machines to be played, the gear to be repacked and loaded onto the rear luggage rack of the Morris Minor and the long journey back to Dulwich to be enjoyed as the fixture list was scanned with my elder brother to anticipate the date of the next encounter.
That match, which has lain so long in the memory, was probably at Alperton, which figured for several years in the fixture list of the Surrey Pilgrims, the wandering club that was run by my father as Secretary/Treasurer before WW2. The year would have been about 1929 and there stretched from that time a happy succession of seasons when almost every week-end would find us chewing grass at the boundary’s edge or sitting at the elbow of Mr Green, our immaculate scorer, at one cricket ground or another around London. My mother was the faithful follower and provider of refreshment; my brother and I were the keepers of the scoreboard and occupiers of the practice nets in our endless games of small cricket. My recollection is that I spent most of my time bowling at him and only occasionally was I permitted to bat. But that may well be a distorted memory born of sibling rivalry. Indisputable was the fact that he was a much better cricketer than I. I do remember being pleased with myself for being pretty agile in the field. We acquired a rubber ball to practice fielding and catching which was called a Googly Ball. It had a harder ring of rubber which made the bounce quite unpredictable and it was an excellent tutor for quick reactions. I wonder whether one still exists somewhere in the bottom of a long and ancient leather cricket bag.
Certainly those were halcyon days in the company of the lions of the Surrey Pilgrims, all of them connected with local government or civil engineering and some good cricketers amongst them. They would coach us while waiting to bat and impart those essentials of cricketing lore to us aspiring juniors. There did come the day in the last summer before war broke out when I was allowed to fill in for some late drop-out in a match down the Foots Cray Road against an insurance company and I took guard with the greatest pride at the age of fourteen and scored a couple before being bowled neck and crop!
One of the great delights of those pre-war summers was to take a packet of sandwiches and a bottle of Tizer and occupy a seat in the free stand at the Oval or Lords. I either went alone or with my good friend Jim Breese who lived by the park gates on Dulwich Common. Jim was so keen on cricket that his father installed a cricket net in the back garden for summer practice and in winter we used to play a complicated game of small cricket in front of the garage – four if you hit the flower pots and six if you connected with the drain pipe. But it was those days with Middlesex or Surrey which cemented my infatuation with the game. Hobbs and Sutcliffe, Fishlock and Gover, Tyldesley and Hammond, Hutton and Washbrook, Larwood and Voce, Wellard and Sims – the names ring across the years and their exploits with bat and ball remain undimmed in the memory. Arthur Wellard even played for the Surrey Pilgrims in his latter years and I clearly recollect his huge figure lifting the ball effortlessly over long on for successive sixes at Crofton Park or perhaps it was Croydon MOs overlooking the old Croydon Airport.
My father was acquainted with several members of Surrey County Cricket Club and I was often fortunate enough to get into the Pavilion where I would occupy a seat in the single row right at the top from where they now televise the games. At the end of a session I would tear down the stairs to the flight leading to the players’ dressing rooms and accost the passing god-like figures for their autographs. It was from the same pavilion that I saw Bradman score a century before lunch. I still have those autograph books, the larger one with complete teams inscribed in the dressing rooms, the smaller one with individual signatures, some of them defaced by the scribbling of my younger brother’s infant hand. How could anyone scrawl over the hallowed autograph of Harold Larwood? Sacrilege!
School cricket was taken pretty seriously at Alleyn’s School in Dulwich. Matches were played at House level and School XIs were fielded at Under-13, 14, Second XI and First XI. A professional (Mr Brown of Surrey, I believe) was employed for coaching and much net practice was insisted on if you had aspirations to a School XI. On one occasion I remember cutting net practice to go to Wimbledon. My father was aghast at this disloyal behaviour and gave me no end of a wigging. I suppose I was reasonably adept at the game and certainly keen but I am sure I would have benefited from more expert coaching. Mr Brown was mainly engaged with the First and Second XIs. Notwithstanding, I progressed to captain the School Under-14 XI in 1938 and much enjoyed being let off school to visit our opponents in South London and as far afield as Ardingly. In 1939 I played in a few matches for a strange Under 14½ XI and for the School Second XI but was not senior enough or skilful enough to be picked for the First XI. That honour was reserved for brother Lindsay who was a very useful bat and received his First XI colours before he left at the end of the 1939 season. It was the greatest pity that his busy life never enabled him to play seriously again, although I believe he played for some Army XI on the Test Ground at Durban on his way to the Middle East.
In 1940 I was picked for the First XI games which were arranged during our evacuation to Maidstone and continued to play regularly through the following two years when we were sharing with Rossall School north of Blackpool but, despite 2½ years in the XI, I was not awarded my colours. The Cricket Master was seized with the notion of ‘maintaining pre-war standards’ and, combined with the rather supine attitude of the Captain, it was enough to deny me what I felt were my just deserts! I was pretty mortified at the time but was much comforted by my particular cronies in the XI, Roger and Bruce Farthing, who thought I had been hardly done by. In any case it was a huge delight to meet and play against the prestigious schools in the North West like St Bee’s and Stoneyhurst and the matches against Rossall were always needle encounters. The Rossalians always felt superior to the ‘yobbos’ from London but we did succeed in showing that we could play cricket even if we did play plebeian soccer rather than rugby.
Once I had joined up in 1943 I did not have the opportunity of playing until I was demobilised in 1946. Even at Oxford I played no cricket. The College side at that time was very strong with numerous blues and all the ex-service men up at the same time. I would not have got a look in. In addition I had elected to accept the offer to ex-servicemen of taking a shortened two-year degree and the amount of reading for the English School was such that I felt I could not spare the time. It was a stupid decision which I much regret and I am sure in retrospect that it would not have made the slightest difference to my degree if I had joined the very informal college side called the Hornets which played evening matches against the surrounding villages - in addition to sinking a powerful quantity of beer. It would have been a wonderful relaxation and escape from Beowulf and The Faerie Queen!
Some years after I had come down from Oxford, Ian Crombie (a Harrods friend of brother Sandy’s) introduced me to the Nomads Cricket Club. I had not played for years and I was apprehensive about my likely performance. The club was run by Sidney Caulfield who had joined with other architects and Oxbridge graduates in forming it as the Hampstead Nomads in 1903. He was a cricket fanatic of advanced years and bachelor habits who patrolled the boundary at every match, peering out from beneath his tweed hat and launching unmerited applause or sharp criticism of the players whom he dimly saw with his fading eyesight flickering in the distance against the elms or the setting sun. He was reputed never to sit down. He umpired for many years until his glasses were smashed into his face by a throw from cover point which he failed to see. He was carted off to hospital but recovered sufficiently to stand again three or four weeks later. However, after a few more than usually outrageous decisions, he did admit that he could not distinguish the ball from the cloud of other black specks advancing towards him and he was persuaded that for the sake of maintaining our fixture list it would be best if he retired permanently to the boundary. I am sure that his tweed-clad shade lurks still in the long grass at Epsom or Esher, muttering words of praise or blame. But where would the game of cricket be without the devotion and idiosyncrasies of such as Sidney Caulfield?
At that first game played for the Nomads against Chalfont St Peter I was fortunate in two respects. First, I managed to glance a leg-side ball for four in my first over and, secondly, Sidney actually observed the fortunate contact and thereupon pronounced me a player that the club must retain. It also helped that I had been in the Indian Army and had been to Oxford. He was a terrible snob. But my future was assured and I played for the Nomads for the next fifteen or twenty years, eventually succeeding as Secretary and President. I now bask in the golden glow of being President Emeritus – although few know just how little I deserve that sublime appointment and how much it is due to Sidney’s poor eyesight!
Rudgwick was one of our favourite fixtures where once we assembled 13 children of the Nomads tribe. The number of children seemed to increase match by match. At Four Elms they made such a racket dashing round the boundary that complaints from the more staid supporters of the home side led to our losing the fixture. Then there was Beaconsfield where a nameless Nomad, having carted the ball to all parts, returned to the pavilion to declare, ‘That was the worst century I have ever scored’! At Oxford and Cambridge we played on some of the best wickets in our fixture list: New College and Worcester, Queen’s and Clare. Something of a contrast to the meadow at Pickersgill but although the pitch there may have been hostile the opposition was of the friendliest: John Gold, Paul Maloney and the great John Nagenda amongst them. But it was the game at Leatherhead that perhaps stays longest in the memory. It was traditionally the last fixture of the season and something of a gala occasion, played often in the first week of October. One had first to sweep the frost off the wicket and then don two if not three sweaters against the cold. The cricket was light-hearted and lunch an extended affair at which the wine flowed, speeches were made and toasts drunk. The humour became more hilarious as the wine intake increased and even eight year-old Greg was found on one occasion very much the worse for wear having downed the odd glass or three! As dusk fell and the mist gathered over the last obsequies of the season, we piled into our cars, said our farewells until next year and weaved our unsteady ways home, quite a bit happy or sound asleep according to age. Why we were not all stopped by the police I will never know. I was stopped once having drunk ourselves back into next year’s fixture after a bad loss at Westerham and merely advised to ‘Drive quietly back home, if I were you, Sir’. Things were so much more civilised in those days.
What other names rise to the surface of Nomads memories of those post-war days? Certainly topping the list is ‘Granny’ Alston, one of the most faithful Nomads. He was a very private man, living alone, gruff of speech and of few words but no mean cricketer. A crafty slow bowler (with a habit of spinning the ball on the back of his hand between deliveries) and a most useful bat who whipped the ball off his pads to the leg-side boundary in a manner of which Pietersen would be proud. He had played for Somerset Second XI in his younger days and with the Nomads made the most statuesque and immobile gully fielder I have ever met. But no-one who was present will forget him going out to bat at the P&O ground with 12 year-old Charles Penn – 60 years between their ages.
Then there was John Nagenda, the genial Ugandan who played for East Africa in the first World Cup at Lord’s: a quick bowler of renown and a powerful bat who could turn a game round in the space of a few overs. Nor shall we forget Colin Owen-Browne whose enthusiasm and vigorous performance as captain and all-rounder did much to revive the fortunes of the Club when they were at a low ebb in the seventies. Other stalwarts were Ian Crombie whose eccentric slow bowling often surprised himself as well as the opposition; ‘Chips’ Stidolf who managed to keep wicket and bat with a prosthesis on his right arm; Alick Moore whose admin skills as Secretary were matched by his amiable personality and his skilful off-spin; Colonel Roy Wright who thundered up to the wicket to deliver his quick-medium military seamers; the elegant David Evans; the energetic Mike Ghersie; Tony Whiteway the most tenacious bat of all time; John Gold behind the stumps; Mike Fermont; Mike Wilkins; brother Sandy; nephews Patrick and Charles – the names roll onwards from the shadowy past and all made their contributions to the ethos and the success of the Nomads as a wandering side for whom it was a pleasure to play.
In truth, I was never a great performer with the bat and could not bowl for toffee-nuts. But I enormously enjoyed the game and the friendships which it brought. Someone had to do the management after Sidney died and Alec Moore and ‘Chips’ Stidolph (his immediate successors) moved on. So I spent my winters assembling the fixture list and my summers cajoling players to make up the elevens week after week. I never made a host of runs myself but, as an opening bat, managed to stay at the wicket for a reasonable time to see off the quick bowlers and lend some respectability to the early overs of our innings. In any case it was enough to smell the new mown grass and sprint round the third man boundary. It was a great relaxation from the pressures of a city solicitor’s life to vegetate in the outfield and applaud the performance of others.
It was not at all easy to run such a wandering side as the Nomads (we had no ground of our own) and filling sides week after week became increasingly difficult. While we had some recruits from itinerant Aussies and South Africans and from the resident West Indian population, much of the young cricketing talent was at that time being recruited into good London and Home Counties sides that were beginning to form the leagues which became so popular. It was not until I relinquished the Secretaryship that the flood of immigrants from all over the Commonwealth made life much easier and improved the standard of our cricket. Now the fixture list has expanded, there are several overseas tours every season and, with Michael Blumberg as Secretary/President, the Club flourishes as it has never perhaps done before. No more the frantic round of telephone calls on a Friday night pleading with occasional players to turn out at some outlandish village in Hampshire at 11.30 the next morning. Good players in their middle years have dropped out of the pressure pot of league cricket to play our more relaxed style of the game and youngsters from the Indian, Pakistani and West Indian communities here are anxious to be available.
My association with the Nomads continued and after I handed over the Secretaryship to Michael Blumberg I was elected as President, a position which I was pleased to hold for twenty years or more before being elevated to the stratosphere of ‘President Emeritus’. As President I did try to attend as many Committee Meetings as I could but I fancy that my chief duty was to deal with a few instances of bad conduct on or off the field and occasionally to bail out the club when it got into financial difficulties or a Match Manager absconded with the match fees. I am delighted that the Nomads have not only survived past their centenary but are continuing to flourish.
Now my undiminished love of the game is confined to watching Test Matches at Lords (where I am fortunate to be a member) or on the TV where Sky provides an endless flow of cricket from all over the world: test matches, 50 over one-dayers and even the new and successful 20/20 competition. It is still a thrill to see skill and courage combine to force a glorious victory or rescue an apparently hopeless situation. Cricket seems to me to be a game which exemplifies much of what I see to be the virtues of life: good fellowship, loyalty, the ability to work well with others, physical skill, determination, psychological insight to read the game and the strengths and weaknesses of your own players and the opposition, and the will to win but not at the expense of good natured behaviour and good manners. A bit old fashioned? Well so be it. Sledging was pretty well unheard of and we did actually ‘walk’ when we knew we had nicked a catch to the keeper.
For the sweet singing sound of bat and ball.
While the fire crackles, he will be at peace. | 2019-04-26T16:28:25Z | https://www.nomadscc.com/cricketing-memories-by-david-alexander |
"Everyone is exactly like me. There is no one like me.
A clone of wealthy eighteen-year-old Raven Rogen, Ven knows everything about the girl she was created to serve: the clothes she wears, the boys she loves, the friends she loves to hate. Yet she’s never met the Authentic Raven face-to-face...She exists for Raven, but is she prepared to sacrifice herself for a girl she’s never met?"
The first few chapters I really liked and I was getting into it. But then I found it sort of petered out and died. I no longer cared for Ven, I thought she fell in love way too quickly, and while the story line had some great potential, I didn't find it was that gripping. I liked Ven's friends, who were in the very beginning of the book, but because they weren't really in the rest of it, that element was put to the side and I was a bit disappointed that they weren't in it more. There are more books in this series, I believe, so I suppose they show up more in those books.
While I didn't really enjoy it very much, if you like stories about clones and national secrets and good looking people riding motor bikes, then give Imitation a go. Just because I didn't particularly enjoy it, doesn't mean you won't!
Thank you to Net Galley for providing me with a copy of this book, in return for an honest review.
I hate when people compare one author to another or one book to a similar one, so instead I'm going to say: If you like Gillian Flynn's writing - you will love this book. Luckiest Girl Alive is about TifAni FaNelli, a woman who has always dreamed of the socialite middle-class life but belonged to a family of cheap wannabes. Being sent to a prestigious private school and later becoming engaged to a rich blue blood man - she gradually forced her way into a world she was desperate to be a part of. The book uses consecutive chapters jumping from the past events to the present day and comes together nicely at the end in a very neat yet intricate way. To say much more about the plot would be a spoiler - the less you know about this book the better.
I really liked that we saw both the present day Ani and the girl she was as a teenager - meaning we got to see how she was now, alongside what made her that way. I can't imagine the story working as well as it did if it hadn't been written this way. The story itself was twisted and the writing style was complex and dark with messed-up characters - which is great for fans of Gillian Flynn like myself. I loved that the story was from Ani's point of view as being inside her mind was a confusing and dark place to be at times, and I really enjoyed that.
I was slightly disappointed at the ending, it wasn't quite as twisty as I was hoping for, but I liked seeing how things played out despite being fairly predictable. The book may have benefited from a bigger twist at the ending but I still really enjoyed this book, I look forward to seeing more from this author and I would definitely recommend picking up this book if you like darker character-based thrillers - though I wouldn't recommend reading if you are at all sensitive to topics of sexual abuse or similar topics are a trigger for you. Luckiest Girl Alive will be out May 12th 2015.
This post was written by regular reviewer Christina. Get to know her here!
This book was received through NetGalley in return for an honest review.
This month's collaboration was inspired by Jen Campbell's latest release The Bookshop Book all about some of the world's most amazing bookstores. We asked team BB to get creative with a fictional unlimited budget to open their own bookshop, here's what their dream bookshops would look like...!
What would your dream bookshop be like?
I very rarely make time to read books. I've been a little lazy with my hobbies over the past few months (especially when you're renovating a house, juggling everything can be hard work!) I've decided I must read more this year, ideally one book a month. I came across Dark Matter in a charity shop - best place to find cheap books! I thought it sounded interesting, although I had never heard of it before.
The story revolves around Jack, a 28 year old living in London in 1937. He's very poor, and has lost his family. An expedition has been organised to the far north in Gruhunken, a deserted mine. Jack agrees to go with them, and so the three men set up camp in a small hut, but it's not too long before they experience a lot of bad luck despite previous warnings about Gruhunken.
I instantly fell in love with this book. I loved the fact it was a ghost story, and I was ready for it! It started off a little scary, but I was left a little disappointed with the ending. Overall, it's a brilliant book and I definitely recommend it. It's been written beautifully, and you can easily relate to Jack's character.
The ending took an unexpected turn for me, as I obviously had no idea what would happen, but I was hoping it wouldn't end like it did! I won't spoil it too much as it really is well worth a read.
Have you read Dark Matter? What did you think of it?
Grey London. Dirty and as dull as it’s name, void of magic and ruled by the looney King George.
Red London. Flourishing and a beacon of prosperity where magic is revered.
White London. Ruled by those blinded with power and murderous greed and magic can blind you right back.
Black London. Dead. Non-existent. Defunct.
Kell is a Red London traveller, adopted ambassador between the realms and a smuggler (just don’t tell the Prince about that last title). Though he sits in a privileged position at the right hand side Red London’s aristocracy, Kell dabbles in the dangerous hobby of offering ordinary people glimpses of the lands he is lucky enough to be able to travel between. Though a harmless plight at first, Kell soon gets mixed up with a petty thief who saves him from a shifty enemy. Together they're thrown into some seriously sticky situations and on towards adventure.
This was my first venture into Victoria Schwab’s writing and I’m very impressed guys. Colourful and fantastically rich, A Darker Shade of Magic introduces us to a world that’s both intriguing and tailored made for magical mishaps to happen.
Her key protagonist, Kell, to me suffers a little from what I’d like to coin 'displaced orphan syndrome’. He’s a little bit of a wanderer who doesn’t really fit in anywhere and navigates in the shadows of London(s). If anything he reminds me a lot of Hatter Madigan from The Looking Glass Wars (the large magical coat and reserved yet an endearing manner definitely help). We see most of the world though Kell’s travelling eyes - which definitely helpful as he takes us through all the different variations of London and his own special magical abilities.
In terms of the world itself, well, it’s vast to say the least. Though there are recognisable landmarks through each incarnation of London, the three (formerly four) kingdoms each rich with it’s own history, social structure and political imbalance - nice to know things don’t change no matter what universe you step in. I will say with this amount of world building within the first few chapters of the book, it does distract a little from the key plot of the book. By the time you get a rough idea of the cities you’re already itching to find out what the main conflict of the story, which for some may be frustrating.
Nevertheless, though this was only a preview excerpt it certainly whet my appetite for more!
This post was written by regular reviewer Ria, get to now her here.
I love a good mystery tale and having recently ‘Netflix marathoned’ every episode of the TV adaptation to date, I was keen to pick up the first in Sara Shepard’s famous Pretty Little Liars series which currently consists of no less than sixteen novels!
Last year I read four of the books from another of Shepard’s popular YA series; The Lying Game. Having found the writing style very easy to fall into and becoming swept up in the mystery I was looking forward to another quick read that would keep me guessing.
Pretty Little Liars follows teens Aria, Spencer, Emily and Hanna who’s friend Alison mysteriously went missing three years ago. When the now ex-best friends each start to receive threatening messages from the anonymous ‘A’ who seems to know all of their darkest secrets they are brought back together and start to suspect that Alison may be behind them.
Book one introduces the characters and how their lives are intertwined by Ali’s disappearance, although having seen the TV series I felt like I knew the ‘Liars’ already despite the changes from the novel. The main characters described all differ visually from the actors cast in the show and I struggled to picture them how Shepard originally had, particularly since I was reading the TV tie-in edition with the actors on the cover! Mystery-wise I really love the premise of this series and found this quick read pretty entertaining.
Overall I did enjoy both the drama and mystery of the story and although I tried to put the TV show aside whilst reading I found it very difficult to detach the novel from the adaptation. Perhaps if I had picked up the book first, with the story being completely new to me, I would have liked it more. Having said that I do plan to find time to read at least the next few in the series, as like many TV adaptations this short novel makes up just the pilot episode so there's so much more of the story to come. I'm hoping to see the characters develop as I felt they were much less likable than their TV counterparts and am also intrigued to see how the overall plot differs from the direction the TV series has taken.
Tella's brother is dying of cancer, and there's nothing she can do about. Nothing, that is, until a strange blue box with an ear piece mysteriously appears on her bed one day. As she picks it, places the ear piece in, she hears a woman's voice, telling her that she has an invitation to be a part of the Brimstone Bleed, a race-like competition in which the prize for winning is a cure that will heal any sickness. Desperate to help her brother, Tella follows the instructions she's given and finds herself at the edge of jungle, carrying an egg that will supposedly help her during the race. As the race begins, the other competitors scatter, some forming groups to travel together until the last moment, when it's every man and woman for themselves. Tella teams up with a group of couldn't-be-more-different competitors and they battle their way through the first element of the Brimstone Bleed, and into the second.
I really enjoyed this book. I hadn't actually heard of it before I found it in a sale, but I think it's sort of like a mixture between the Hunger Games and ... Maze Runner, perhaps. My favourite thing about this book was definitely Tella, as a character. She was hilarious, and sarcastic, and easily distracted, but stronger than she realises. I found myself often laughing out loud (literally...not just saying LOL when you don't really mean it), and wanting Tella to do well. The other characters were fun to read about, also, and while new characters were introduced a long the way, each had their own very distinct personality, which is something that I think Scott does very well.
"I close my hand around the lid and pull it off. Inside is a tiny pillow. I imagine all sorts of miniature animals using it in their miniature beds. But that's dumb, because how would they ever find a pillowcase to fit?"
Heh heh. The book is full of unexpected sentence endings like that. It's written in first person, which meant Tella's humour was even more prominent, and even though what hatched from the eggs I mentioned previously, turned out to be a little bit strange, it was a very enjoyable book. I'm definitely looking forward to the next one, Salt & Stone, which I think is in the next few weeks!
If you like YA dystopian novels (although this one isn't really dystopian...similar though), with funny leading females, pick Fire & Flood up next time you're in the library. It's a great read.
Psych Major Syndrome is a fun contemporary about Leigh, a student who has just started Uni (or College, since the book is American) studying Psychology. In a long-term relationship with her high school boyfriend, Leigh begins to see that he isn't all he's cracked up to be and strains start to show within their relationship.
This book is a typical college romance story packed full of clichés (it was published by Disney Hyperion, after all) but it was really really fun to read. Studying psychology myself, I enjoyed that towards the beginning there was mention of some main theories/aspects of psychology but these slowly tapered out as the book went on. Each chapter had a heading and that heading would be a psychological term suitable for the events that would unfold within the chapter. I thought this was a really fun way to incorporate psychology throughout the book without making it boring. The characters within the book are all either lovable or hate-able and they were very clearly written that way, it was obvious who we were supposed to grow attached to and who we were supposed to dislike, which worked within this book since it isn't to be taken as a great piece of literature or anything, it's just fun to read.
The story focuses very heavily on the dying relationship, developing romance and friendship between Leigh and her roommate. All of these aspects worked together in my opinion and I sped through this book within a few hours, dying to know what was going to happen. Admittedly, it was quite predictable so don't go into this book expecting major twists and turns because there isn't any, it's just a super fun, quick read and I'd recommend you pick it up if you like those kinds of books.
This post was written by regular reviewer Christina, get to know her here.
1/ Goodreads Recommendations - a simple one to kick off with, the recommendations page on Goodreads is a great place to start looking for your next favourite book. Selecting titles based on each of your shelves Goodreads allows you easily to scroll through and read the synopsis of each one. It also details why you have received the recommendation in the 'Because you added...' section, and similarly on each book's page there is a 'Reader's Also Enjoyed' section - very handy if you're looking for a similar read.
2/ What Should I Read Next? - although there are now several of these next read generator style websites out there, What Should I Read Next? has to be my top pick. It's clean and simple design is easy to use and will provide a long list of books based on tags and lists created by other readers.
3/ The TBR Jar - this one is for those of you who can't resist a book haul! If like many readers you have a whole host of unread books sitting on your shelves or e-reader why not write down each of the titles on a strip of paper and add them into a jar so you can pick out your next read at random. It's perfect for those who aren't 'mood readers' and love a surprise (although you could even create multiple jars, one for each genre), plus it's a brilliant way to cross some titles off of that long TBR list.
4/ #bookbloggers - the weekly book bloggers Twitter chat, which takes place every Tuesday at 7pm UK time is another brilliant way to connect with other readers and find out what they've been enjoying lately. Along with many other book-related social media hashtags (#currentlyreading, #whattoread, #mustreads, #bookstagram etc) it's also the perfect way to discover more book blogs which are full of reviews and recommendations that may inspire you to pick up something new.
5/ The YA Flowchart - if YA is your thing this colourful interactive flowchart could be your new BFF when it comes to choosing your next read. Whilst it may not provide and endless wealth of suggestions there are twenty-two YA titles to choose from, some more well-known than others, hopefully including one or two that even the biggest YA fan may not have discovered yet.
How do you usually choose your next read?
'The Historian' is a bit of an epic ride, and it took me three weeks to finish! My copy was 704 pages, so it's definitely not a quick read.
The narrator of the novel tells us that she is going to relate her father's story to us. In his library she finds some letters beginning "My dear and unfortunate successor...". When she asks her father about them, so begins the sprawling tale of his search across Eastern Europe for a legend. It is no great spoiler to tell you that the story is about Dracula. The narrator's father, Paul, is introduced to the legend of Dracula/Drakulya when he finds an antique leather-bound book on his desk at the university. The pages are all blank apart from a distinctive design in the centre. Paul is confused by the discovery until his talks to his advisor, Bartholomew Rossi, who confides that he, too, found one of the same books among his personal items, and embarked upon a journey of a lifetime. We end up following the journeys through the East, the reign of the Ottomans and Turks, of Rossi, Paul, and the narrator's mother.
The story is, as another reviewer remarked, "a slow burner". It took me several hundred pages to become really interested in the novel, and to feel like I wanted to find out what was going on. The majority of the book is made up of other people's accounts of their travels and research into Dracula. However, I did not find it difficult to keep up with whoever was telling their part of the story. I knew that the main story was told by Paul, and that any other parts were told by other characters, until the narrator herself rounds off everything she learned from the various sources.
There is a good sensation of suspense and apprehension throughout the final half of the book, I'd say. The characters in the story become some involved in their search and completely intertwined with Dracula's journey that the reader cannot help but become absorbed with them. Their search is compelling. Each new discovery, each seemingly-unrelated piece of information comes together slowly slowly, until there is a physical chase for the vampire himself.
I was not completely in love with this novel. I think its length didn't help the situation. I often start to think "hurry up, this is taking too long!" when a book is lengthy. I long to get to the end just to finish it, not only out of a desire to know where the story goes. Though I must say that once I got caught up in the adventure, I longed for my next chance to read it. I know that this is a paranormal, fantasy story, but I really believed that all of the discoveries and occurrences were things that could have happened. The characters are all convincing historians with a thirst for knowledge, and the sense of danger is ever present. I really liked the author's obvious familiarity with Eastern Europe, the Balkans. Judging from her surname, I'm guessing she is Eastern European in origin, and she presents all of the places featured in the novel with an attentive eye for detail and culture.
I don’t know about you but my thoughts on poetry when I first started reading it were pretty bland. Most of my memories consisted of boring English GCSE lessons spend over-analysing each individual line of a poem to the point where I couldn’t even remember what the poem was about in the first place.
Fast forward to 2015 and somehow I’ve fallen back in love with this form of writing again and I believe you can too. For me poetry is very much like art, where you’re drawn to pieces you genuinely find interesting rather than being spoon fed the text in a school setting. Everyone finds their love for something in different ways, so I thought I’d offer some tips on how to fall back in love with poetry again.
For me this was the key way I got back into this genre. I, like some people, spotted some of the better known slam poetry about feminism and racial equality on Youtube and got hooked. The topics were captivating, contemporary and more importantly it was p o w e r f u l. It’s an super easy way to work your way back in and requires very little effort to watch and enjoy.
There's an ebb and a flow to the words in a poem, and the natural rhythm of this form of writing lends itself to being read aloud. Discover the power behind the words and have a play with reading it in different ways. If you have the chance, attend a poetry reading, like slam poetry it's an easy way to digest the text.
4. Don't reach for the classics just yet!
I think there's a pressure, like with any art form to reach straight for the likes of Blake or Ginsberg. But just because they're considered 'classic' doesn't mean you will necessarily enjoy them. Delve into the genre and discover what makes you tick. That may be poems by Wordsworth or it may even be writing by up and coming 21st Century poets.
So there’s four easy ways to ease your way back into reading poetry again.
The Bookshop Book is the perfect guide for bibliophiles everywhere – it will make you want to visit every bookshop mentioned, open your own… or most likely, both!
This clever little guide showcases the world’s best bookshops from those you may have heard of to the hidden gems, featuring profiles on amazing bookshops from every continent. Alongside these are interviews with authors and bookshop owners, related facts and even some of Jen’s personal stories from her experience as a bookseller, which were fun additions to this informative coffee table title.
Having received an ebook copy (which considering the subject matter felt a little strange!) I am now keen to pick up the paperback as I think it would be a great reference book to have around for a little book buying inspiration. As I made my way through each chapter I found myself reaching for a pen and paper to make note of the locations of the shops I’d most love to visit as well as some of the fascinating ‘bookish facts’ – a sure sign this is one to add to my collection.
I really enjoyed reading The Bookshop Book and learning just how many amazing independent stores are still out there just waiting to be discovered by bibliophiles. At a time where more people are buying their books online than ever before The Bookshop Book is the perfect reminder of just how awesome bookshops really are! | 2019-04-21T18:14:57Z | http://bloggersbookshelf.blogspot.com/2015/02/ |
Most online websites let It be feasible for you to incorporatean comprehensive copy of your resume. This information might be helpful to some huge group ofindividuals. To find the pupil’s records and find the desirable information which may require.Your contact information should always go along with your resume, so that firms may readilyfind it. Database is a group of information stored at a computer disk space or server place. Furthermore, youhave to know about numerous testing programs such as Selenium.
Up this up in what will be your very first actual CV.There Are a great deal of special formats you’ll be able to test in regard to CV designs, but equally mostwell-known types are inverse chronological and skills-based. Simply set aside a little bit of time(perhaps bookmark it for later) and a couple of teabags in the end you will be having a peek in aprime example of this very best CV ever, with your name in the very top! References are usuallysubmitted on a different record, as they are not necessarily required at the perfect period of application.You always ought to get three or more references on the market.
Letter and perform the Very Important corrections and improvements on Your own company. Suspensionaffects a pupil’s present enrollment you will Be dropped from all your courses irrespective of yourprogress. If You’re Advised that you are put on academic suspension, you might allure Thechoice.Suspension is for many explanations. The suspension is to permit Direction to run a suitable investigationwhile the employee is away. Request the school to offer you all of your kid’s school duties so that yourlittle An individual can complete them throughout the suspension. The next suspension is 1 particularyear. As an example, a catchy suspension occurs if your license Was suspended due to ofyour refusal to have a blood or breath test, or because of The very straightforward actuality that you neglected thetest.
An excellent way to begin your memoir is at the start. The tales remembered is the most significant aim of theabove stated exercise. Furthermore, it’s the simplest way to start any narrative regarding anyindividual. Composing a pupil biography can be tough, especially if you’re atthe preceding stages of your schooling and believe you’ve little to really write about interior yourbio. Since reading will be a substantial part our community during the calendar year, I neverfail to request students to integrate a favorite picture book as among the items.Childhood If you don’t understand what things to start your autobiography with, it is rather plausible tostart with your ancient decades. The autobiography must be intriguing to read and provides thevery best advice about your lifetime. You are going to have the ability to read my brief autobiography if youview the webpage at the conclusion of the chapter. Thus, let’s see what if understand to beginyour personal autobiography using the easy to follow along with illustrations and hints that are providedbelow.On occasion the autobiography doesn’t need to complete about free, especially in the event theindividual is living. In addition, it ought to be composed simple first individual. Composing a specialist autobiographymight look a project of time and lots of efforts. Studentsought to have the ability to describe the way where the collage reflects themselves. Now you’reable to use unique students’ work from previous years or higher-level classes to give theclass a idea of what you’re looking for.Students could write brief explanations to continue with their collages. They might feel that theirlives aren’t interesting enough to obtain an autobiography. They need to get a bibliography of anywork utilized in their own demonstrations. They need to be asked to compose for many distinct situations andpeople. Being a happy high school student wouldn’t be possible with no loved ones.Class discussions have to be interesting and incredibly organized to be able to become prosperous. Oncethe queries are answered, the replies can then be formatted and set with eachother to incorporate the information in the autobiography. There is also an opportunity to use a couple different illustrations of autobiography writing. Explainthat students will get the opportunity to appraise their lists and select the events that they wishto include within their autobiographies in later sessions. You have got to be certain you will discuss aboutexperiences, events and respective traits. You might have already decided you’dlove to devote your job to till you start.Everything depends upon the way of presentation. In case you’ve established a modelpresentation, you might use it so as to present the thought for pupils. You should not beginwriting if you are undecided on what you would like to write, while it’s about events, experiences andothers.
Autobiography SampleTemplate is needed for writing different Sorts of autobiographies andautobiography connected files. The large misconception about autobiography composing is that itmay only be written by the main character of this narrative. For example, your own personal filmmay revolve around compassion.Biography Essays are incredibly distinct from the autobiographical ones in which the author is thefield of dialogue or the book. You will find a lot of essay writing alternatives which believe they’re the verybest, and so do not be duped and evaluate the true assortment of their best. An autobiography essay relies on the author’slife from the standpoint of this author. The master composition writing business has increased over time.
To write an Excellent letter you need to sit consider Whom you are inclined to be covering the letterand what you intend to say. The correspondence has to be special and always mention that the man and type ofassistance received. A donation acknowledgement letter is utilized by the recipient of thedonation to be sure the sender they’ve received either the quantity of money given or anytype of help being extended from whoever gave the donation.You’ll not merely personalize the letters, nevertheless you’ll also require the people who you assist in theacknowledgement clinic. In a number of cases the letter of recognition functions as adocument and should be composed once possible. Furthermore, it acts as a record for taxation yields. Itmay be written for a variety of events and is an excellent tool to demonstrate attention or gratitude. There are lots of things thatyou can put in a contribution acknowledgment letter, but the significant thing you shouldn’t forgetis to relay all of the information of the donation and its specifications to receive a crystal clear andtransparent transaction.To enable you to write your thank you letter, here are numerous instances. Tax letters are usually framedas documents that state the provisions and conditions of the taxation processes. If you don’t receive a taxacknowledgement letter or require a replacement, then please get in touch with us and we are likely to be pleasedto assist!The manner where you approach in the correspondence has to be considerate and thoughtful. Nearly all the correspondence correspondence from the organization and legal sector is made byemail. It won’t have a fantastic impact if you tackle it straight in the name of a business or anorganization. Additional nonprofits’ thank-you letters may supply you with thoughts, but everyorganization differs so they may not be acceptable for your organization.Thank you letters don’t have to be longenough. Letters also be a list of a present and canfrequently be used for taxation purposes. The engagement letter must explain the fees at a meanswhich makes them predictable depending on the services rendered and feature a formulation forcomputing fees that’s simple for customers to understand. Use a standard salutation and final, asit’s a proper correspondence. It is just the approval of something. You could also see overall receipts.Fees for additional services are a good deal less challenging to collect if customers aren’t amazed with anunexpected bill in the finish of the job. Please dismiss any notices you get followingyour payment was filed. You may also cancel or alter your duties in any moment.The payment needs to be made by cheque. Your registration fee is not taxdeductible and does not proceed towards your fundraising target. It does not suggest endorsement.No matter why, contributions are significant for any business. Each donation isgoing to be assessed separately to assess whether it meets our standards.
Association so as to allow the company to qualify to Get their firm’s matching gift. It ispossible to get gifts on your personal page. Many donors find the end of thecalendar year is going to be the very best time to make a gift.More information are observed at IRS.gov. To learn more please visit the IRS Web website. Your credit card info isused simply to process a one-time trade and the provider is bound by contract to dealwith all your private data as confidential.The donation procedure might be over, but it does not indicate your nonprofit should prevent interactingwith donors. The stepwise procedure to check out the ITR received status through official site ofthe Income Tax department is supplied below.You can analyze your membership status on your internet account. Following that, you have toreveal the tax yield status.
Writing effective covering letters might not be your absolute best skills. A letter of absence has to explain the main reason to be absent in addition to specify when the employee is called to return. Writing a formal correspondence is often thought to be an intimidating task by people. Last, you should keep in mind that writing a formal letter isn’t hard if you know and adhere to the fundamental rules and the arrangement of this letter. Thus, it’s all-important to understand how to write an official letter efficiently. Should you decide to write your own sales letter, keep in mind there are a few templates accessible to direct you online.
The correspondence ought to be well prepared and sent that the moment the employee or student knows the obligation to be in court. In short, it has to be well-thought and carefully written. In conclusion, the letter must contain information about who you are, what’s your relation with the concerned individual, duration of your connection, what you learn more about the charges levied and your comprehension of the character of the individual. Ensure that you clearly define the most important reason to be absent, so the receiver of the letter knows of your own circumstance. You are ready to customize the cover letter according to your requirement. Before your resume, it is the cover letter that will be viewed and that’s why it has to be written with utmost caution. A well drafted cover letter may raise your probability of getting a meeting with a business enterprise.
In case of such a step, it is essential to send a cover letter with the restart. A cover letter is essential when searching for employment. It’s essentially a preface for your resume and it gives you the ability to draw the attention of an employer to your qualities, skills, and techniques.
Observing the norms and policies of an organization is extremely critical for each and every employee who operates there. The employer should know precisely why you think you’re not able to operate on your position for a period of time. Any employer may choose to send a conditional letter of employment into a new hire in any company, but it’s very common in the public sector. Leave without pay is a choice that’s made by the employer or the employee in situations where the worker has to be away from his job and will not be compensated.
You may file the correspondence during the concerned attorney, who will also help you with drafting. Whether it’s a letter for maternity leave or some other reason, you must keep in mind a specific format that is followed when writing a leave of absence letter. The letter must get a feeling of respect, and have to be clear and succinct. Given below are a few suggestions that will support you when you have to write a warning letter. It is always recommended to write a letter by yourself, instead of using templates, which may or might not match your criteria. The application letter (occasionally, called program ) should be written in such a manner it covers all the areas, a potential employer is looking for. Broadly , character reference letters are intended for supporting the positive aspects of an individual, and are frequently employed for employment purposes.
In case the sender’s address is not cited on top, it may be contained under the signature. The contact information is the initial section of a cover letter, also includes your contact information, so as to allow it to be easy for the employer to get in touch with you, if need be. An inordinate amount of info gets confusing. At length, you can hurt yourself should you give an excessive amount of information on your demonstration.
The purpose of a memo is normally to share information in a office. The following are a few tips and guidelines that will help you draft a character recommendation letter for court. Always be sure that you thank the individual you’re addressing in the finish of the letter. The rest part of this letter format is similar to that mentioned above. Write the precise length of time you’re requesting unpaid leave. Always learn more about the company that you’re applying to and also ensure the type of work they do is something you wish to know more about.
Finding out how to compose a cover letter for a resume is very simple, whatever the job which you’re applying for. It is not perfect for you to continue and on about your knowledge in a notice. In the event you have some work experience as an office assistant, then it’s going to be less difficult for you to find work in the business.
Lots of individuals lose since they do not maintain a careful personal record. Again, another set of eyes reviewing your entry can help save you from overlooking important information. There are a whole lot of elements to a thriving industrial training program letter. An inordinate amount of info gets confusing. In the end, it is possible to hurt yourself if you devote an excessive amount of info on your protest. Utilizing a to-do list can help remind you of everything should be achieved.
State why you’d like to turn into a nurse. Your physician will be more able to help you manage your pain if they could locate a sense of what you are going through. Candidates must likewise be able to prioritize projects with minimum supervision and meet tight deadlines. Furthermore, candidates appearing to start a career in healthcare marketing can complete internships with a healthcare business to raise their odds of obtaining an entry-level full-time position. Job prospects are beneficial for people with sound technical skills and relevant work experience.
Whether you are ready to put in the area or are already used as a RN, there are measures to take to provide help. Generally speaking labour, it’s very important to tailor your objective into the place you want. Focus on why you’d be an asset to the business, company, organization or practice you need to intern at. A private sector provider may also use a liaison officer to market and raise its public image. Health and healthcare templates in in case you don’t find an openoffice template design or category that. By way of example, there is a specific area for composing aJr.a.
Organize your thoughts and make sure that your letter is well organized. The letter must specify any work-related restrictions associated with your health care condition, in case the reason for your depart was health-related. A normal small business letter is composed of an introductory paragraph, followed by a few paragraphs about the subject of your recommendation.
You don’t understand anything about the folks that are reading your private statement. It is risky to plagiarize a statement online, or hire a person to write the entire invoice for you. So that you know you need to compose the strongest, most persuasive private statement you’re in a position to. Like every well-written narrative, your personal goal statement must tie the limitation to the beginning.
If you’re interested in reinstatement because of a situation that’s your fault, then explain how you have remedied the scenario. To be able to acquire an internship, you might be asked to write an essay with your application. The very first step of writing an wonderful reflective essay is selecting a topic, so select wisely!
Sometimes people are dealing with various issues simultaneously without realizing it. For the motivation letter to be prosperous, it should address specific key issues and ought to also be in the most suitable format. To make a question and answer sheet, you will need to prepare your questions ahead and place them in a logical purchase. Use the tab key to leave an area for your student to write their answer after every query. Writing about yourself might be challenging, so begin by organizing your ideas and record examples of your best traits, which you might then use on your letter to produce your case. The point is to allow companies know what you would love. Don’t neglect to consider books or movies you may know that could provide you good ideas.
Discover to dedicate time on what is important and differentiate between important and urgent. You’ve got to get a new prescription every moment. Shoot for higher and you’ll be rewarded for your challenging work. If you’re applying for work in building with a family-owned company, you may want to concentrate on that in your goal, indicating that you’re prepared to make a personal investment in helping a little organization grow and thrive. When you write a resume for work, you include what occupation you would like to acquire. If you are tailoring your resume to a specific project, your very first segment may be tagged Objective” and highlight your unique job goal.
Time management is the capacity to plan your time efficiently so as to become more productive. Nurse supervisors play a critical role in healthcare. The corporate affairs manager has a significant part in the communications inside and beyond the provider. At precisely the same period, the corporate affairs manager is astutely conscious of their business’s pricing policies and how they influence sales. A health assistant at an orthopedic office should have knowledge of musculoskeletal systems because that is the major attention of an orthopedist. In some centres, the manager is also teaches a certain number of hours every day or week for some of the normal schedule. Directors are liable for overseeing the curriculum employed at the center. | 2019-04-20T16:57:42Z | http://revolutionarycommunistgroup.com/12-bewerbung-als-produktionsmitarbeiter-ohne-erfahrung-vorlage/ |
I have a teenager who I am struggling to have a relationship with. She is making bad choices, which is making me overly controlling, and this is driving a wedge between us. I don’t feel that she respects me and is openly rude. I want to feel closer to her, but my questioning and trying to connect just makes her angry at me. She is almost 18, so I don’t have much more time with her in my home. I really want to repair our relationship. Do you have any advice on how?
You can build a stronger, more loving and respectful relationship with your teen and have more influence on her, if you will let go of your fears and expectations, and become a safer space of love, support and respect for her.
Sometimes instead of providing guidance and leadership we just create power struggles and our relationships become full of anger, punishment and fear. When we parent from fear we tend to be overly controlling too. This type of parenting quickly makes you the enemy and pushes your child toward their friends for support.
What your child needs from you is loving leadership. This is guidance with respect and it is more about empowering and encourageing them to be successful, than forcing them to do what you want.
Think about your relationship with your friends or coworkers. If you showed up in these relationships focused on control and getting these people to be the way you want them to be, these people wouldn’t like you either. Of course parenting is different and requires stewardship, teaching and guiding, but this can be done from a place of respect and love, and you will have more influence on your child when you have a safer relationship of mutual respect.
Focus on what your child needs. This is more complicated than you think. Are you worried about how her choices make you look? Are you worried about failing as a parent? Are you worried about what the neighbors think? Are you overly concerned with how her actions make you feel and put you out? Are YOUR standards, opinions and ideas the ones that matter? All of these thoughts and fears are selfishness and show your focus is more on you than her. If you want to build a good relationship with your child, you must be able to set your stuff aside and focus on what she thinks, feels and needs most. Until you let go of your fears about YOU, you aren’t capable of love or a good relationship.
Let go of fear of failure. You must remember that your value isn’t tied to your child’s behavior. She has agency to make her own choices and those choices (and what others think of them) don’t change your value. Your intrinsic value as a human being is infinite and unchangeable. It is the same as everyone else’s all the time. You have nothing to fear. You must trust that this journey is a classroom and these parenting experiences are just lessons that don’t affect your value. It’s only in this place of trust that you are capable of the kind of unselfish love your child needs.
Trust God and the universe they are ultimately in charge of your child’s journey. You play an important role in your child’s life, but it’s not your life. Your child and the universe are in charge of co-creating her perfect classroom and that may include learning some lessons the hard way (if your child needs that). It may include classes you wish she didn’t have to take, but you can’t save her from lessons she needs and is signing up for. Trusting God and the universe to be in charge of your child's journey will make you less scared, selfish, angry, panicked and stressed, which will make you more capable of love.
See parenting as your classroom. Every experience with your child is your perfect lesson and the point of these experiences is to make you stronger, wiser, kinder, more in control, and more loving. If you will see each interaction with your child as your lesson on YOU becoming better, you will handle things much differently. Use the Worksheet for Frustrated Parents on my website to help you gain this perspective before interacting with your child.
To get respect you must be respectable. To build a good, respectful relationship with your teen, you must have your act together. If you have insecurities, which cause emotional over-reactions to problems or are prone to immature behavior, your child is not going to respect you or listen to you. I get a lot of calls from parents interested in coaching for their teens, but we usually won’t coach a teen until we have first coached the parents. You must gain confidence and start modeling happy, healthy, adult behavior. Teens are smart enough to know when you aren’t happy or balanced, and if your lifestyle isn’t making you happy, no teen is going to listen to you or follow you. You may need some professional help to improve your self-esteem, see situations clearly, and respond with more maturity, confidence and love. I highly recommend getting some professional help if you need it.
To get respect you have to give it. Teens actually believe they are as smart as you, because of this they get insulted, offended and defensive if you talk down to them (which you are prone to do). If you can talk to them with the same level of respect you would give another adult (someone your age) you will see a big difference in how they treat you. Ask yourself how you would phrase it if you asked an adult staying in your home to do the dishes and ask your teen the same way. If they don't do what you ask, how would you handle that with an adult? You would have a respectful conversation about it. Do that here. Also be willing to listen, honor and respect how they feel and they will be more likely to give the same back to you.
Swap control for empowering and encouraging. You really don't have control anyway. Your teen is in control of their life. Your only hope is to have influence. To have influence your child must listen to you. Your child won’t listen to you if you don’t create a relationship where love and support come before control and expectations. Teresa Graham Brett, author of the book Parenting for Social Change, said, “Parenting is about building a relationship of trust and love between you and a child — it is not about making them turn out the way you want. It can’t be about control more than it’s about love, trust, mutual respect and caring for each other.” This may mean being more flexible about some of your rules and standards. When you are too rigid about the way you want your child to turn out, you will always come from a place of disapproval and judgment. This will feel (to them) like you care more about your expectations than you do about them. Too many lectures and not enough listening and validating can make them feel you are against them. Instead spend most of your time empowering and encouraging. Point out their strengths and tell them you believe in them. Tell them they are smart, capable, strong and can do amazing things. Build them up and asking how you can help. Be a cheerleader, a support system and safe place when they need advice.
Create an emotional connection. There is only one way to create this kind of connection with another human being, and that is good communication and lots of it. This means communication that is open, honest, validating and encouraging. It means doing more listening, than talking. It means honoring and respecting their right to think and feel the way they do. It means valuing them as a person and being respectful and asking for permission before giving advice, like “Would you be open to a suggestion from Dad?” and not giving it if they say no. There is a communication formula worksheet on my website that teaches how to have mutually validating conversations. It may take practice and patience, though, to rebuild trust if you have talked more than you’ve listened in the past. You may need to apologize for that and ask for another chance. You must also be very careful NOT to use shame or fear in your parenting. Imposing shame on anyone makes you an unsafe place and severs the emotional connection.
Remember parenting, like everything else in life, is a class to teach you to love at a deeper level. If you will focus less on changing your child and more on changing and improving yourself, you can and will improve this relationship.
I've met a guy who I am crazy about and we have been on two dates. I don't expect a third date because I haven't heard from him since. How can I truly find a way to recognize my value in the face of rejection? Do I just continue to trust the classroom and hope eventually I find a fulfilling and meaningful relationship? Any advice you can give me would be gratefully received. Could you write about how your techniques can specifically be applied to dating? I'm sure there are enough single readers out there who would benefit.
There is no other activity, except maybe looking for a job or selling something, that brings as many opportunities to experience our two deepest darkest fears: the fear of failure — the fear that we might not be good enough; and the fear of loss — the fear that our life won’t be good enough.
The good news is you can lessen these fears and actually enjoy dating and meeting people. Dating doesn’t have to be scary or painful if you can change the way you see yourself and life, and adopt a more fearless mindset. Making this change starts by understanding two inaccurate perceptions about yourself and life that create our fear. Let me explain both of them and how to change them.
1. You think your value as a human being can change. You fear rejection because you think — at the subconscious level — that what other people think of you affects your value as a person. This means if they don’t like you, you must not have much value. You also subconsciously think your value is based on things like your appearance, performance and property. This makes you compare yourself to others and feel constantly afraid you aren’t quite good enough. But this idea is only belief or perspective; it isn't truth.
You can change your perspective and adopt another idea as truth instead. This new mindset will make you feel better about yourself and help you create better relationships. The mindset I recommend says, your value as a human being is unchangeable, infinite and absolute. It is not based on your appearance, performance or property and is not affected by what anyone thinks of you. You also have the same intrinsic value as every other soul on the planet and this value never ever changes for any of us.
Adopting this mindset would mean just because a few people aren’t interested in dating you doesn’t change your value as a person and it doesn't diminish your life in any way. You are the same good person on your right journey through life whether they like you or not.
You can choose to let rejection crush your self-esteem if you want to, but you don’t have to. You can choose to see yourself as bulletproof and trust that no person and no experience can diminish you. You can choose to trust that your value isn’t on the line and therefore, there is nothing to fear.
You can experience rejection as nothing more than a sign that that person wasn’t the right one for you and it doesn’t matter which one of you realized that first. The truth is still the same: this person is the wrong one. And, you really don’t want a relationship with the wrong person anyway, so you aren’t losing anything. You are fine without the wrong person in your life.
This will take some practice to adopt, but it will change how you feel.
2. You think your life journey can be ruined or thrown off track. This is the second inaccurate belief causing you trouble. You subconsciously believe that life is chaotic, random and meaningless and that other people can literally ruin your journey or make it less than it “should” be.
Again, this is just a belief, idea or perspective; it isn’t truth. You could choose to believe you are on the planet to learn and grow, life is a classroom and the universe is a wise teacher that works with your agency to cocreate with you the perfect classroom for you. If you trusted the universe like this, you would believe it’s literally conspiring to bless, educate and improve you with every experience that happens. Every experience you have is here to serve your growth. Everything has meaning and is here for a reason — at least this is a perspective option you could choose if you want to.
This mindset would mean that if a relationship with a specific person is your perfect classroom right now that relationship will happen. If it’s not your perfect classroom it won’t happen and either way your journey will be the right one for you that will most help you to learn and grow best. If you are single right now there is a reason for that. If you are married it’s because that classroom serves you most right now. That is the reason all things happen.
Every experience is a lesson and your value — as an irreplaceable, incomparable, unique human soul — never changes. Every dating experience serves you with perfect lessons that bless your life and teach you things, but none of them affect your value.
You are going to need to internalize these principles though, so they can change how you feel about every aspect of the dating adventure. I have a Fearless Dating Reading Assignment you can download from my website, and I recommend you do it and read it three times a day. Or you can record yourself reading it on your phone and listen to it three times a day. If you want to really supercharge it, have some classical music playing in the background.
Then, the more you consciously choose to trust that your value isn’t changeable and your journey is always safe, perfect and right on track, choosing to see everything as a lesson, the more confident and happy you will become. This will also make you more and more attractive to others.
Embrace “what is” (your current situation) as your perfect experience right now and have fun there. This will also draw people toward you and make your life more fulfilling.
Also, as much as you can choose to focus on edifying others, encouraging and lifting them and making friends — and stop worrying about yourself and your fears — this will also help with your fear.
I know dating can be discouraging and disappointing, but every day you get to choose if you will focus on what’s wrong and feel lonely and depressed, or count your blessing, trust the universe and make today fun and happy. Focus on gratitude and choose happy!
I was told recently that I come across as arrogant and unfriendly, but this feedback came from a really successful person I always thought was arrogant and unfriendly herself. I think I have an intimidation problem around really successful or beautiful people. I tend to pull back because I don’t feel comfortable talking to them. I also avoid them and am quick to judge these people and find fault with them. I think my whole family does this. They like to rip down arrogant, rich or beautiful people. This isn’t who I want to be though. Any advice to help me change?
First, understand you are not choosing this behavior consciously. Your subconscious programming (that you got from your family and your past experiences) is causing you to react to certain people with fear. The first step to changing this is just recognizing it consciously when it happens, so you have a choice.
Becoming more mindful and paying attention to your reactions, thoughts and behavior is something that will require practice and patience, but you can do it and you can change your programming. I help people do it every day, but it takes commitment and work. I’ll give you some principles and tips to help you do this.
Here are a few principles of human behavior I want you to understand and watch for in yourself and others. When you understand these you will understand people and yourself at a whole new level.
Principle 1: Everyone on the planet battles a fear of failure (a fear they might not be good enough) every day.
Principle 2: We all project this fear of failure onto other people. This means we usually assume they don’t like us or think we’re good enough either. At the subconscious level we are pretty sure other people see us as badly as we see ourselves.
Principle 3: Both principle 1 and 2 are just perspectives or ideas that exist in our heads. They aren't real, but we believe them and this belief drives our emotions and behavior.
Principle 4: When we believe we aren’t good enough and other people won’t like us, we subconsciously look for faults in the other people so we can see them as worse than us. We do this to make ourselves feel better, but it doesn't work for long. In the end we don't like ourselves for being this unloving. The more intimidated we feel towards someone the more we will tend to judge them.
I call this behavior the Shame and Blame game (because it rhymes and is easy to remember). The more fear of failure (shame) you have, the more you will subconsciously criticize (blame) or find fault in others.
We may have watched too much TV and we now think there has to be a good guy and a bad guy in every situation. We would obviously prefer not be the bad guy, so we constantly look for faults in others so we can cast them as the bad guy. We think if we can cast anyone else as worse than us, that would make us the good one. Watch yourself for this behavior right after you make a mistake or someone criticizes you and triggers your shame. Your first reaction will be to blame someone else.
When you subconsciously see the other person as the bad one, you will also see them as a threat and not feel safe with them. This could make you pull back, be unfriendly or avoid these people. This happens often with people whose assets (appearance, performance, money, car etc.) trigger your fear of failure because you feel less than in those areas.
When you react to any person with fear, you aren’t capable of love in that moment (because you can’t do love and fear at the same time). In a fear state you won’t ever come across very warm, friendly or likable. I am pretty sure this is what is happening to you.
I see this pattern starting for many of us in high school. Because you feel you are less than the popular kids, you feel threatened by them. Because of this you aren’t as friendly towards them and hence they don’t like you and make you part of their group. The truth is not that they don’t think you aren’t good enough for them, the truth is you think you aren’t good enough for them. Your intimidation makes you behave in a way makes friendship impossible.
You can solve all these problems by changing the way you see human value so you feel safer around people and show up with more love. In my book Choosing Clarity I explain exactly how to do this in detail, but I’ll give you some of the steps right now.
Choose to see others as the same as you. These beautiful, successful, rich, popular, intimidating people have the same value and the same fears you do. They are scared, struggling human beings in process, just like you. They have the same fears of not being good enough (I promise they do) and they want to be liked and validated just like you. They are honestly hoping you will be kind and friendly towards them and they need reassurance too. Don’t let fear make you hold back kindness and love towards them. See them as the same as you.
Be the love and kindness in every room. You (literally) are your love for yourself, people, God and life. Love is the essence of your soul and the core of your being. If you would just focus on being the love (in every room) everywhere you go, the fear of judgment and failure would stop and you would feel fantastic about yourself. When you are loving towards others you are being the real, highest, best you. That is why you always feel great when you are loving someone. And there is no faster way to escape your fear than choosing to focus on giving and loving someone else. Love is the fastest way out of fear.
If you want to discover the true depth of your love and really stretch, focus on loving the very people you are most intimidated by or tend to judge the most. This is not easy to do, but you can do it. You have the power.
I believe these popular, intimidating people may be in your life to teach you to love at a deeper level. Their job in your classroom might be to trigger your fears and show you the limits of your love and the power of your fear. If you see them this way (as a class on love) you can rise to the challenge and shine all over them with your love! | 2019-04-20T15:24:02Z | https://coachkimgiles.weebly.com/blogarticles/archives/04-2016 |
Business Continuity software helps organizations to identify threats and plan for the prevention and recovery of information assets. These applications protect key organizational data in the event of a failure and in the wake of trouble, aid the rapid restoration of system function and data access. Typically Business Continuity solutions offer options for continuous or scheduled monitoring along with a variety of real-time data recovery tools. Backup storage can be maintained locally or routed to a remote server. Business Continuity software is related to Database Management software.
Server management tool that enables workload performance improvement scale through recovery options. Server management tool that enables workload performance improvement scale through recovery options.
Nero creates software applications and platforms that help consumers simply enjoy their photos, videos and music. Its Nero MediaHome platform enables consumers to access, enhance and share their digital content across PCs, smart phones, tablets and online social networks. Nero also produces a top-selling multimedia software suite, which contains powerful applications for media management, video editing, video converting, file back-up, content syncing and disc burning. Nero is the most trusted multimedia software where you can backup business data on your hard drive.
Provides web-based administrative dashboard, automatic backup, backup scheduling (for Windows), and files versioning functionality. Provides web-based administrative dashboard, automatic backup, backup scheduling (for Windows), and files versioning functionality.
GoodSync for Business provides complete enterprise data backup and synchronization solutions for any data source, destination, or system. In addition, the GoodSync Control Center provides centralized management and reporting of file synchronization, backup, and publishing activities of GoodSync workstations and servers. The complete data backup and synchronization solution for businesses of any size.
MiniTool Power Data Recovery free edition is the best all in one free data recovery software for Windows and server users. With only three-step, users could recover lost, deleted, formatted, corrupt files safely and with ease. MiniTool Power Data Recovery free edition is the best all in one free data recovery software for Windows and server users.
Offers PC server equivalent performance for efficient data sharing and backup. Offers PC server equivalent performance for efficient data sharing and backup.
UpSafe helps small and medium-sized businesses to back up GoogleApps data. UpSafe helps small and medium-sized businesses to back up GoogleApps data.
Rubrik delivers instant application availability to hybrid cloud enterprises for recovery, search, cloud, and development. By using the market-leading Cloud Data Management platform, customers mobilize applications, automate protection policies, recover from Ransomware, search and analyze application data at scale on one platform. From days to seconds. Data Protection. Simplified. Don't Backup. Go Forward.
Backup4all is a backup program for Windows that protects your data from partial or total loss. It automates the backup process saving you time, compresses data to save storage space and encrypts your backup to protect from unauthorized usage. Using Backup4all you can easily back up your data to the cloud (Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Dropbox, Amazon S3, Microsoft Azure, BOX), to local/network drives, to FTP/SFTP, to DVD/CD/Blu-ray or to other removable media like USB HDD/flash drives. Backup4all protects your backups from partial or total loss by automating tasks, password protecting and compression.
Powerful and cost-effective undelete and data recovery software that functions on local and network disks. Powerful and cost-effective undelete and data recovery software that functions on local and network disks.
Datto is an innovative provider of comprehensive backup, recovery and business continuity solutions used by thousands of managed service providers worldwide. Dattos 200+ PB purpose-built cloud and family of software and hardware devices provide Total Data Protection everywhere business data lives. Whether your data is on-prem in a physical or virtual server, or in the cloud via SaaS applications, only Datto offers end-to-end recoverability and single-vendor accountability. Datto is the leading provider of comprehensive data backup, recovery and business continuity solutions.
Web-based backup and availability software that includes application-consistent backups and ultra-fast backups with low RPOs. Web-based backup and availability software that includes application-consistent backups and ultra-fast backups with low RPOs.
Continuity247 is a fully managed backup and disaster recovery platform supported by Continuums industry-leading Network Operations Center (NOC) that monitors and verifies backups, provides recovery and testing support, troubleshoots and ensures backups run 24x7. Complete with robust data protection, secure and dependable cloud storage (built on IBM's public cloud, Softlayer), and a range of local and cloud-based backup options, Continuity247 is built for flexibility and profitability. Continuity247 is a fully managed backup & disaster recovery platform supported by Continuum's industry-leading NOC.
Part of the StorageCraft Recover-Ability solution, StorageCraft ShadowProtect software provides backup and disaster recovery for virtual or physical servers, desktops, and laptops. Whether you oversee an IT department at a company or offer IT services to multiple business clients, your ShadowProtect software enables you to get back to business as quickly as possible. With ShadowProtect, you can recover your Windows IT environment anytime and anywhere, and from any disaster, great or small. StorageCraft ShadowProtect software provides backup and disaster recovery for virtual or physical servers, desktops, and laptops.
On-premise and cloud-based software that provides data backup and recovery solutions for Hyper-V, VMware and AWS EC2 environments. On-premise and cloud-based software that provides data backup and recovery solutions for Hyper-V, VMware and AWS EC2 environments.
C2 is an established Business Continuity software provider with a continuing commitment to its customers to evolve with the market. Our mission is to provide intuitive and innovative solutions for the global business resilience market and reshape the industry as we know it today. Business Continuity Management Software, BCMS, is used to alleviate and assist with the day to day management of an organisation's Business Continuity requirements. BCM Software designed to alleviate and assist with the day to day management of an organisation's Business Continuity Requirements.
The First Cloud Solution based on Amazon Glacier designed for home and business users. The First Cloud Solution based on Amazon Glacier designed for home and business users.
Smarter online backup designed for enterprise mobility including backup protection optimized over WAN, & BYOD support. Smarter online backup designed for enterprise mobility including backup protection optimized over WAN, & BYOD support.
Cloud-integrated solution that protects data from hardware failures, cybercriminals, and natural disasters. Cloud-integrated solution that protects data from hardware failures, cybercriminals, and natural disasters.
Avalution specializes in business continuity, IT disaster recovery, and information security consulting and software solutions. Catalyst is an aggregation of Avalutions considerable experience building and operating the most effective, efficient, and business strategy-aligned business continuity, IT disaster recovery, and information security programs. Catalyst was designed for the enterprise organization but scales to address the needs of any organization regardless of size. Avalution specializes in business continuity, IT disaster recovery, and information security consulting and software solutions.
KingsBridge Is Simple and Straightforward (K.I.S.S.) and this has been our sole focus since 1983! Your Business Continuity Plan needs to be ready, available and up to date when you need it. Get behind KingsBridge SHIELD and be confident all your information will be provided in a simple and straightforward manner so your team can recover from any incident, regardless of their familiarity and training. You (and your BCP) are our number one concern and if you don't believe that, read our reviews. SaaS business continuity tool that automates threat risk assessment, business impact analysis, and plan creation.
Veoci is a cloud-based suite of collaboration, management and controlled emergency response and daily operations tools designed to meet the decision and communication requirements of multiple teams at many locations. With stringent security, high availability, and scalable performance, it is designed for global deployment within complex enterprises. When failure is not an option, Veoci organizes the response, and your team delivers the result. Cloud-based software platform for emergency preparation, response and recovery as well as daily operations.
Cohesity makes your data work for you by consolidating secondary storage silos onto a hyperconverged, web-scale data platform that spans both private and public clouds. Enterprise customers begin by radically streamlining their backup and data protection, then converge file and object services, test/dev instances, and analytic functions to provide a global data store. Cohesity counts many Global 1000 companies and federal agencies among its rapidly growing customer base. Cohesity empowers organizations to protect, store & manage secondary data from a single environment that spans data centers and clouds.
Download SysInfoTools PST Recovery Software to recover damaged Outlook PST files. Software allows recovery of more than 20 GB corrupt/damaged PST files created by MS Outlook 2016, 2013, 2010, 2007, 2003, 2002, etc. It can restore all PST saved journals, notes, tasks, contacts, calendar items, attachments, distribution lists, etc. and supports in all Windows Operating system including latest 10. Advanced PST File Repair tool to repair corrupt PST created by all new and former version of Outlook.
Encrypted data backup and online storage for businesses to protect their data and meet regulatory requirements. Encrypted data backup and online storage for businesses to protect their data and meet regulatory requirements.
Ontrack EasyRecovery is a comprehensive do-it-yourself data recovery software that allows users to recover important files instantly. Recover data on devices ranging from solid state drives (SSDs) to RAID volumes. Available for both Microsoft Windows and Mac. Ontrack EasyRecovery is a comprehensive do-it-yourself data recovery software that allows users to recover important files instantly.
Unified backup and recovery solution that includes replication, deduplication, snapshots, backup to disk and tape, and more. Unified backup and recovery solution that includes replication, deduplication, snapshots, backup to disk and tape, and more.
Undelete files, unformat partitions and recover corrupted hard drives with easy step-by-step wizards. A single, all-in-one solution will take care of all your disk and data recovery needs. Hetman Partition Recovery can recover deleted files and folders, recover files from formatted, corrupted, repartitioned and inaccessible storage media. The program recognizes all versions and revisions of FAT and NTFS file systems ever produced. Undelete files and folders, recover files from formatted, repartitioned and inaccessible storage media in step-by-step mode.
Web-based secure solution that offers free 100 GB storage and file encryption. Web-based secure solution that offers free 100 GB storage and file encryption.
Re-assembles deleted data from storage media and delivers the "lost" items - fully resurrected. Re-assembles deleted data from storage media and delivers the "lost" items - fully resurrected.
Incident reporting, prioritizing, and routing solution that helps document and appropriately assign bugs and service interruption issues. Incident reporting, prioritizing, and routing solution that helps document and assign bugs and service interruption issues.
Evolve IPs suite of DR solutions offer the ultimate in data protection and recoverability. Success is uniquely defined and achieved for each customer through a range of cloud and hybrid-cloud solutions that employ best-of-breed technologies and engineering. From offsite protection of essential daily backups, to fully-managed or self-managed DR solutions, we deliver the appropriate level of IT resilience to ensure recovery timeframes, budgetary constraints, and compliance requirements are met. Disaster Recovery as a Service provides customers with data loss prevention and various business continuity options.
Cloud-based backup solution that helps firms with data restoration, encryption, reporting and compliance. Cloud-based backup solution that helps firms with data restoration, encryption, reporting and compliance.
Utility to analyze your inaccessible hard disk drive or other data storage media and recover the lost or deleted data. Utility to analyze your inaccessible hard disk drive or other data storage media and recover the lost or deleted data.
Our software is the most robust, feature-rich, brandable online backup software in the market and is fully HIPAA compliant. Affordable pricing, fast ROI, and world class support have made RBackup the choice of thousands of successful Service Providers in 65 countries for more than 27 years. RBackup has advanced features to protect valuable business data while helping to maintain compliance with regulations like HIPAA, SOX, and GLB. RBackup was the first company of its kind, founded in 1985. Host your own online backup service under your branding on your own server or in any data center including most cloud solutions.
Makes a backup of your data files to another directory, disk or computer across the network. Makes a backup of your data files to another directory, disk or computer across the network.
Remote Data Backups' award-winning, business-class offsite data protection service boasts over a decade of rock-solid reliability at ultra-secure underground mirrored data centers. Trusted backup solution for 100s of national brands and 1,000s of informed IT Pros. Free 30-Day Trial (no credit card required) and 24/7 Expert Phone Support. Solid protection against all common data loss risks, including hard drive crash, data corruption, viruses, hackers, fire, flood, theft and human error. The most cost-effective, secure and convenient way to automatically back up your important data files offsite each night.
We provide the infrastructure, certified experts and support required for your growing data needs. We provide the infrastructure, certified experts and support required for your growing data needs.
One-Click Recovery puts all of your applications and data back online within minutes of a storage, system or an entire site failure. One-Click Recovery puts all of your applications and data back online within minutes of a storage, system or an entire site failure.
Quick Backup Recovery (QBR) is a Business Continuity solution for businesses, capable of performing real-time on-site data & machine backup through virtualization, as well as off-site backup to the "cloud". On top of this, QBR has the power to perform instant data recovery from within a simple management interface, either from the on-site device or from the cloud, in case of a crisis or disaster. Visit www.quick-backup-recovery.com An end-to-end scalable Business Continuity with both on-site and off-site backup capabilities and quick & easy restorations.
SaaS migration and coexistence platform that allows businesses to move data and content. SaaS migration and coexistence platform that allows businesses to move data and content.
Recovery software that helps you to recover lost, deleted and formatted data. Recovery software that helps you to recover lost, deleted and formatted data.
Recover deleted files and folders from formatted hard disks and deleted FAT and NTFS partition. Recover deleted files and folders from formatted hard disks and deleted FAT and NTFS partition.
Business continuity and IT resilience are a click away with CloudEndure Disaster Recovery technology. Our one-touch disaster recovery solution utilizes block-level continuous replication, application stack orchestration, and automated machine conversion to ensure near-zero RPO and RTO for all applications, while reducing traditional disaster recovery expenses by 80% or more. CloudEndure offers a suite of multi-tier IT resilience solutions for your ever-changing disaster recovery, backup and migration needs.
GT Recovery for Windows is a simple and practical software that can easily help you recover files, photos, pictures, documents, audio, video, compression packages and more which were deleted or lost on your computer. Multiple recovery algorithms are supported, contains quick recovery to recover recent deleted files and advanced recovery to recover more files. Free and easy to use, download and use it right now. Simple and practical software that can easily help you recover files, photos, pictures, documents, audio, and more for your business.
OwnBackup is a leading cloud-to-cloud backup & restore vendor. OwnBackup is a leading cloud-to-cloud backup & restore vendor.
Ascent AutoBCM resilient software solution helps various enterprises to meet crucial Business Continuity Management objectives with efficiency and consistency. It enables companies to effectively plan and manage their continuity and crisis management processes. AutoBCM software is highly configurable to business continuity needs of various organisations. It can easily analyse the impact of business continuity risks, create and test business continuity plans, initiate & manage DR activities Business Continuity Management Software with ISO 22301 and NCEMA 70002-2015 standards, BC Training and Outsourcing.
Continuity planning tool which enables simplification of higher education curriculum through functional identification and analysis. Continuity planning tool which enables simplification of higher education curriculum through functional identification and analysis.
Complete solution for data protection, backup of Virtual Machines (VMware ESX, ESXi, vSphere / Hyper-V) and SQL Server databases. Disaster Recovery, drive image backup, backup to Tape (DAT, LTO, etc) and NAS devices, file synchronization, Online backup FTPS, Zip compression and encryption, e-mail notifications, integrated scheduler for automatic backups, Blu-Ray and DVD burning. Backup software for transfers and safety copies of data. Tape, DVD burning, FTP upload/download, database SQL Server, etc.
Exchange EDB Recovery software is a powerful utility to recover corrupted EDB database as well as software allows users to convert their EDB files into PST, EML, MSG, Office 365 and Live exchange server. By using Exchange Recovery software users can save EDB data into HTML, RTF, Cal, vCal, and vCard etc format too. It also provides a split option for EDB to PST converter users.. EDB Recovery software that works for recovering corrupted EDB database and then convert EDB into PST, EML, MSG, and Office 365.
Backup and restore files, documents, emails, settings and programs to virtually any local or remote device. Backup and restore files, documents, emails, settings and programs to virtually any local or remote device.
Designed for real-time server disk imaging and fast system recovery, providing your windows servers protection. Designed for real-time server disk imaging and fast system recovery, providing your windows servers protection.
Backup your data files to CD/DVD, using the standard Zip file format, view & restore them with most zip file utilities. Backup your data files to CD/DVD, using the standard Zip file format, view & restore them with most zip file utilities.
A comprehensive online backup service enabling PC computer users to easily backup, restore, access, & share data. A comprehensive online backup service enabling PC computer users to easily backup, restore, access, & share data.
Automated online backup service that intelligently selects, secures and stores files without any user intervention. Automated online backup service that intelligently selects, secures and stores files without any user intervention.
Lets you synchronize files, replicate folders, perform backups and do file and folder comparisons. Lets you synchronize files, replicate folders, perform backups and do file and folder comparisons.
Integrated suite of products that provides a proactive approach to managing your business risk associated with enterprise data loss. Integrated suite of products that provides a proactive approach to managing your business risk associated with enterprise data loss.
Druvaa inSync is an easy to use Enterprise PC Backup solution for local and remote users. The product uses data deduplication to save "only a single copy" of content (emails/docs) duplicate across users. This delivers 10X backup speed, with 90% reduction in bandwidth and storage. The product uses Continuous Data Protection to create near-infinite restore points. On restore the user sees a timeline view of data and can restore from any point in the past. It is simple, fast and secure. Enterprise laptop backup software uses data de-duplication to offer up to 10 times faster backup with over 90% savings in bandwidth.
Storagepipe Fastback DR is the ultimate online backup solution for Windows servers. Not only does it have a robust feature set for backing up and recovering Data Files, Exchange Servers and SQL Databases, but it also offers the fastest recovery speeds. Continuous Data Protection Data Deduplication Bare Metal Recovery Pay As You Go, With No Capital Investment Contact Storagepipe today to learn more about how Fastback DR can securely protect your business and save you money. Online backup solution for Windows servers with bare metal restore & super-fast recovery speeds. Set for backing up & recovering files.
Reboot Restore Rx Professional's protection is invisible. Users feel as though they have absolute control of the PC. Regardless of what they may attempt to do including erasing files, installing software or even modifying registry settings, the computers will restore to their configured baseline settings on a schedule you set. This makes the workstations perfectly configured and available for the next user. Designed for Schools, Library, Hotels. We are a leader in instant PC recovery software, enabling educational Institutions to better support and protect their IT assets.
Known as the fastest, most scalable, yet affordable server backup software for both Windows and Linux platforms in private and public clouds, R1Softs Server Backup Manager (SBM) is deployed by more than 2,500 cloud infrastructure providers and protects more than 300,000 servers worldwide. R1Soft Server Backup Manager gives service providers a flexible, continuous data protection technology.
Flexible web-based system for optimizing the management of your emergency response plans and business continuity. Flexible web-based system for optimizing the management of your emergency response plans and business continuity.
Business continuity tool that runs daily auto backups after business hours and maintains virtual server copies available immediately. Business continuity tool that runs daily auto backups after business hours and maintains virtual server copies available immediately.
Data from MS SQL and selected file directories is continuously synchronized with the backup server. If the primary server is unavailable (loss of connectivity or problems on the server itself), user traffic is automatically routed to the backup server. Switching from the backup server is initialized by the SpareSync interface at a time when normal operation of the primary server is restored. All data that was received on the backup server is copied to the primary one. When your IT infrastructure fails, SpareSync will guarantee uninterrupted business operation.
Web based data recovery solution for business continuity procedures. Web based data recovery solution for business continuity procedures.
All-in-one data recovery software: multiple filesystems, partitions, RAIDs, NASes. Powerful disk imager. All-in-one data recovery software: multiple filesystems, partitions, RAIDs, NASes. Powerful disk imager.
Advanced backup software for MSPs, IT companies and backup providers. Advanced backup software for MSPs, IT companies and backup providers.
Award-winning enterprise backup and recovery software leading in secure, reliable, manageable and affordable data protection. Award-winning enterprise backup and recovery software leading in secure, reliable, manageable and affordable data protection.
A recovery solution to restore lost documents and files. Recover your corrupted, deleted, formatted data from external hard drive, pen drive, USB etc. A recovery solution to restore lost documents and files.
With modusCloud, secure your business email with cloud based spam protection, targeted phishing protection, email archiving, secure email encryption, and more for Microsoft Exchange and Office 365. The modusCloud solution provides email continuity, advanced threat protection, URL and attachment defense, driven by machine learning to ensure industry leading catch rates and lower false positives. 24/7/365 Customer support will ensure your email security is always in good hands. Eliminate spam and viruses from your mail via email security tool with machine-learning, anti-virus, and archiving capabilities.
Maintain continuous data availability for your business-critical applications. Maintain continuous data availability for your business-critical applications.
BCM software platform with integrated SaaS and mobile application that supports the entire business continuity lifecycle. BCM software platform with integrated SaaS and mobile application that supports the entire business continuity lifecycle.
RealBCP is an integrated business continuity management system allowing to comply with known standards and best-practices. We offer a unique solution that consists of: Integrated continuity intelligence, Crisis-specific response system, Risk management module for continuity-, information-, cyber- and data protection risk, Business alignment features, 3-level testing, prevention module, Guidance and instructions, dashboards, document storing, Many more features... Integrated business continuity management system that allows businesses to comply with known standards and best-practices.
Predictability, automation and simplicity for your IT Service Continuity tasks. Predictability, automation and simplicity for your IT Service Continuity tasks.
Easy-to-use program to automatically backup critical data to a local disk, Network neighborhood or remote FTP server. Easy-to-use program to automatically backup critical data to a local disk, Network neighborhood or remote FTP server.
On-premise backup tool that helps with synchronization and archiving of files and folders in standard ZIP format. On-premise backup tool that helps with synchronization and archiving of files and folders in standard ZIP format.
An automatic backup tool that allows you to back up your data to local or network drives, FTP or LAN. An automatic backup tool that allows you to back up your data to local or network drives, FTP or LAN.
Auto Backup for MySQL is a powerful Windows program that makes it easy to schedule the backing up and restoring of your remote and local MySQL databases. It's easy to backup one or many MySQL databases, and restore them to the same server, or to any server. You can to customize the scheduler so that the program would automatically make the backup from the MySQL databases daily, weekly, monthly, any special date or time interval. Windows program to backup data from MySQL Database Server to SQL/PHP/CSV/XML/HTML/TEXT files or MySQL databases.
Automated recovery process, powered by a unique artificial intelligence, restores and repairs your damaged DBF files. Automated recovery process, powered by a unique artificial intelligence, restores and repairs your damaged DBF files.
Software to help you backup and restore your SQL Server database to a local harddisk or remote network driver. Software to help you backup and restore your SQL Server database to a local harddisk or remote network driver.
Protect your data from dangers such as viruses, hardware damages or accidental tampering of your PC. Protect your data from dangers such as viruses, hardware damages or accidental tampering of your PC.
Powerful and flexible file backup system. Highly customizable, simple to use. Powerful and flexible file backup system. Highly customizable, simple to use.
Provides an easy to use graphical user interface for centralized management of system and data backup. Provides an easy to use graphical user interface for centralized management of system and data backup.
ServerSafe Online Backup provides automated backups of servers and application/database servers with secure offsite storage and immediate online restoration. It uses agentless technology so that one install does it all, has centralized management, and has a web portal for remote management. It replaces conventional tape based backups with a fully automated online solution. Automated online backup and real-time data recovery solution. Your data is scheduled for back up each night over the Internet.
Backs up data when they change, keeps versions of changed files and recovers lost files from stored versions. Backs up data when they change, keeps versions of changed files and recovers lost files from stored versions.
Stuffed with "lifesaver" features, like scheduled, password-protected backups, e-mail notifications and error logs. Stuffed with "lifesaver" features, like scheduled, password-protected backups, e-mail notifications and error logs.
Automatically backs up all files on a hard drive, enabling you, in case of any errors, to roll back your system. Snapshot is taken in merely 10 seconds vs hourly backup 2 minutes restoration from virus attacks, spyware intrusions, or system crashes! Automatic & Continuous Data Protection! Restores even when Windows fails to start! Instant retrieval of deleted or overwritten files! Automatically backs up all files on a hard drive, enabling you, in case of any errors, to roll back your system.
A simple, fast and compact backup/file copy utility for power users and system administrators. A simple, fast and compact backup/file copy utility for power users and system administrators.
Offsite backup and disaster recovery system that you or your business can access through secure tunnels, right on the Internet. Offsite backup and disaster recovery system that you or your business can access through secure tunnels, right on the Internet.
Cloud and on-premise white-label solution that helps automate and manage backup, storage, sharing and collaboration of information. Cloud and on-premise white-label solution that helps automate and manage backup, storage, sharing and collaboration of information.
Backups are completed automatically on a predefined schedule. Confirmation of completion is immediate & performed daily. Backups are completed automatically on a predefined schedule. Confirmation of completion is immediate & performed daily.
Mainframe environment management software that helps identify & recover critical application data in real time at the time of incident. Mainframe environment management software that helps identify & recover critical application data in real time at the time of incident.
A high-power information synchronizer and backup tool for Windows, including Windows 7, 8, and XP. A high-power information synchronizer and backup tool for Windows, including XP and 2000 Pro.
Provides feature rich backup, archiving and compliance management for all your business data. Provides feature rich backup, archiving and compliance management for all your business data.
Disk-based backup software for Windows servers and networked PCs. Disk-based backup software for Windows servers and networked PCs.
Enterprise class Oracle Disaster Recovery software (Data Guard alternative). Enterprise class Oracle Disaster Recovery software (Data Guard alternative).
Disk platforms meet the needs of customers seeking to add disk performance and fault tolerance to their backup environment. Disk platforms meet the needs of customers seeking to add disk performance and fault tolerance to their backup environment.
Business continuity management tool that facilitates companies to control and manage operational risk by quantifying its vulnerabilities, defining its mission-critical activities and planning for their recovery or continuance in the event of an incident. It is designed to streamlines the plan development process to make it quicker, more efficient and cost effective. Business continuity tool that controls operational risk through vulnerability quantification and defining critical activities.
The Business Continuity Maturity Model (BCMM) is a free tool created to assist businesses in building and maintaining a sustainable BC program. Unlike published standards that define program criteria, the BCMM provides you with the steps to take on the path toward resilience and compliance with standards, including those recognized by PS-Prep. BCMM is a tool for businesses of all sizes to perform self-assessments and assist in improving their ability to recover from disruptions. The BCMM is a free tool created to assist businesses of all sizes in building and maintaining a sustainable BC program.
Offers real-time and scheduled synchronization and backup of files to servers as well as other workstations. Offers real-time and scheduled synchronization and backup of files to servers as well as other workstations.
Online Backup for Linux, MAC, and Windows, and you only pay for what you use. Online Backup for Linux, MAC, and Windows, and you only pay for what you use.
True Defense allows you to automatically backup your valuable computer data over the Internet and securely store it at an off-site data facility. No matter what your company's data backup and recovery needs are, rest assured that True Defense has the right blend of experience and expertise to secure your data in the most effective and affordable way possible. Allows for secure backups and restores of critical computer data over the Internet, LAN, or any TCP/IP network.
With BounceBack, you can choose between file-level or image-level backups, meaning you can backup individual files, or your entire PC hard drive. Works on Windows 10, 8.1, 8, 7. BounceBack tested 4x faster than the nearest competitor. And, you can use automatic scheduling to backup bit-level or incremental changes, in between your full backups ensuring your data is always protected, without needing to continuously run full backups. The award winning backup to protect your PC. Everything you need for Disaster Recovery in a simple to use package.
Enables granular content and its associated metadata to be quickly restored back into the repository in its original state, without any application downtime. Solution that enables granular content to be quickly restored back into the repository without any application downtime.
Incremental PST backup solution, built from the ground up to support disk storage. Incremental PST backup solution, built from the ground up to support disk storage.
Helps companies in multiple geographic locations to communicate quickly and easily with little bandwidth. Helps companies in multiple geographic locations to communicate quickly and easily with little bandwidth.
The award winning HyperIP WAN Optimization virtual appliance is used for data replication, cloud storage, iSCSI replication, and other IP storage and file transfer applications. Deploying HyperIP for replication, backup, recovery and data center migrations provides our partners and customers the confidence that their valuable information will be protected and moved on-time, every time. Software used for data replication, cloud storage, iSCSI replication, and other IP storage and file transfer applications.
UltraDNS relieves businesses of complex DNS management while increasing reliability, security and performance. Our service ensures network uptime, faster Web traffic and protection from growing online threats. Because DNS powers the Web and the Web powers the world, enterprises with much at stake choose UltraDNS. Relieves businesses of complex DNS management while increasing reliability, security and performance.
Business continuity solution that protects and your data in both physical and virtual environments. Business continuity solution that protects and your data in both physical and virtual environments.
The range of options can be overwhelming, from local backup to replicating data over long distances and establishing a practical methodology that expedites recovery while minimizing data loss. From local backup to replicating data and establishing a practical methodology that expedites recovery while minimizing data loss.
Business continuity plan template used to create detailed and effective disaster recovery and business continuity procedures. A professional template used to create detailed and effective disaster recovery and business continuity procedures.
Backup and disaster recovery system for any type of business. Backup and disaster recovery system for any type of business.
Have you ever had a scheduled task like a nightly backup or monthly email fail and not realize it until it was too late? Dead Man's Snitch solves this problem by monitoring your scheduled tasks and alerting you when your tasks don't run. Dead simple monitoring for cron, Heroku Scheduler or any other scheduled task. Monitoring tool for cron, Heroku Scheduler or any other scheduled task. Receive emails or push notifications when your tasks don't run.
Business continuity platform which provides client data security through branded offsite reseller program providers. Business continuity platform which provides client data security through branded offsite reseller program providers.
Fast backup software performing automatic incremental, differential, and full backup to Dual layer drives, USB and network. Fast backup software performing automatic incremental, differential, and full backup to Dual layer drives, USB and network.
Ringstor is an East Brunswick, NJ based developer of data backup and recovery software. Ringstor combines traditional data backup and recovery solution capabilities with "software-defined data storage backup and recovery" attributes and with minimal agents can backup and recover Windows, Linux, Mac, SQL, Exchange, Google, Oracle, VM Ware and connects to public cloud and FTP, plus spins up a private cloud for central management. A data backup and recovery software that offers multi-platform backup & recovery with public cloud, private cloud, server connectivity.
Desktop and mobile software for businesses that helps with incident management, disaster recovery plans, real-time risks alerts, etc. Desktop and mobile software for businesses that helps with incident management, disaster recovery plans, real-time risks alerts, etc.
Software running on each user's computer to maintain a regular backup of important files to our secure backup servers. Software running on each user's computer to maintain a regular backup of important files to our secure backup servers.
Zerofail Online Backups are automated, secured, remote backups that facilitates business continuity and disaster recovery for your company. Experience the security of knowing that your latest data and archived files are always available to you 24/7 from any Internet connection. Easy to use online backups for only 50 cents per GB.
Data management and communications system offered on a SaaS basis for managing incidents and crisis recovery. Data management and communications system offered on a SaaS basis for managing incidents and crisis recovery.
Sungard Availability Services Assurance Software takes your companys enterprise-wide business continuity and resiliency program to the next level. Assurance Continuity Manager and Assurance Notification Manager work together to help your company increase efficiencies, mitigate risk, and safeguard what you value most. From Incident Management that allows your business to manage recovery seamlessly to business impact analysis that are customized to your needs protect with AssuranceCM. Business continuity and resiliency program that helps create plans for crisis management, disaster recovery and emergency response.
Enables Real-Time Enterprise Visibility, Manageability for IT Service Availability Management, Orchestration and Automation. Enables Real-Time Enterprise Visibility, Manageability for IT Service Availability Management, Orchestration and Automation.
Risk management, business continuity and more. Improve your effectiveness and minimize cost. Risk management, business continuity and more. Improve your effectiveness and minimize cost.
PDS PST Recovery Software is easiest way to fix all issues of corrupted PST file and then restore corrupted PST file into new created PST file, EML, MSG, HTML, MHTML, RTF, TXT, DOC, PDF, MBOX and outlook profile with all email header information (to, cc, bcc, from, date, subject and time). PST Recovery Software works with all editions of Microsoft Outlook. It is capable to restore accidentally deleted folder items. Use PDS PST Recovery Software for recovery of damaged PST file and restore into new created PST file, EML, MSG and many more formats.
Radia is an endpoint management solution that provides a unified, scalable, and cost-effective way for organizations to manage devices across various platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux, etc.) and devices types (from servers, PCs, tablets, smartphones, thin clients, and more, to industry-specific devices, such as ATMs and POS devices). With Radia, easily configure, manage, secure, and retire devices to achieve better compliance and improved policy management. Unified endpoint management tool with a single-pane-of-glass management for all endpoints -PC, Laptop, Desktop, Mobile, Servers & more.
Automates the process of managing your IT Environments in support of IT Project and Software Developments. Automates the process of managing your IT Environments in support of IT Project and Software Developments.
Restore lost files from any media including hard drive or USB drive. Restore lost files from any media including hard drive or USB drive.
A company that offers cloud backup & data recovery solutions through advanced monitoring and reporting tools. A company that offers cloud backup & data recovery solutions through advanced monitoring and reporting tools. | 2019-04-25T10:17:08Z | https://www.capterra.com.br/directory/30206/business-continuity/software |
В статье приведены данные о тех 22 студентах, которым передала рейки Хавайо Таката, одна из учениц Микао Усуи. О Филис Фурумото в том числе. На английском языке.
Made his transition June 29, 2006 at the age of 74. George Araki and Paul Mitchell were initiated at the same time in November of 1979 at Paul's house in San Francisco while Fran Brown waited in another room for Takata to do it. (The previous information was given to me by Fran Brown.) George Araki must have been initiated into the Master level in 1979 since Paul Mitchell states in a pamphlet, which he wrote for the Reiki Alliance, that he was initiated into the Master level in 1979. George Araki was head of the department for alternative healing at San Francisco State University when he became a master. George became a master in order to do a study with Reiki. However, it was too difficult to set up the protocol. George only taught Reiki a few times. He sent his students and others to learn from Fran Brown and Shinobu Saito. (The previous information was given to me by Fran Brown and Shinobu Saito.) You may click here to view a web page put up by the San Francisco State University announcing George Araki's retirement - this also has a picture of George. Another page here has some information on George Araki as well (also put up by the San Francisco State University). You can see a brief summary and a picture of George here (also put up by the San Francisco State University).
Deceased. Dorothy Baba was a social worker who lived in Stockton. She became a master around the time John Harvey Gray did. (The previous information was given to me by Fran Brown).
The following information comes directly from Ursula's daughter and from the book Early days of Reiki: Memories of Hawayo Takata compiled by Anneli Twan. (See my Reiki Books page for more details.). "Ursula Baylow was trained in first, second levels by Hawayo Takata in the mid-1970's (note: she took Reiki 1 in 1976 in Summerland, BC along with Barbara Brown), and became a Reiki Master in the late 1970s (October, 1979). Mrs. Takata stayed at Ursula's home in Penticton BC Canada when she was teaching in that area in 1977. The photo on the cover of Living Reiki (by Fran Brown) was taken in their garden by Ursula's husband, Gunter Baylow. Ursula Baylow practiced Reiki and reflexology from around 1976 until 1989 (at age 77). She saw about 20-24 clients a week, and many came every week, experiencing great improvement with various health problems. After a stroke in 1989, Ursula was no longer able to treat clients, but continued to share her healing with family and friends. Ursula Baylow died of a heart attack in her sleep, peacefully, at age 85, on October 21, 1996. She experienced Reiki as one of the most meaningful aspects of her life, and used it in her daily life at every opportunity. She lived the Reiki principles. Many of her clients viewed her as a healer, with great improvement in serious and chronic conditions."
I received an e-mail from him telling me the dates on his certificates, they are as follows: 1st degree dated Oct 10, l979, 2nd degree dated Oct. 20, 1979, and "advanced" (Master) degree Oct. 12, 1980. He arranged a large class of 44 or so with Hawayo Takata at the Grey Creek Hall in B.C. It was Thanksgiving weekend and they had a large potluck following the class. His actual initiation was done a few days later at Bethal Phaigh's cabin in the Slocan Valley. He also stated that he and Paul Mitchell were initiated into the Master level around the same time. I believe he was the last master that Takata initiated as this is what Wanja Twan states in an German article written by Reiki Magazine. He is currently a member of the Reiki Alliance.
Later got married and changed her name to Patricia Ewing.
In 1973 she met Hawayo Takata in San Francisco. In January of 1979 she became the 7th Master initiated by Hawayo Takata. Her Master initiation took place in Keosauqua, Iowa. She obtained her First Degree on June 3, 1973 from Hawayo Takata. She then took her Second Degree training from John Harvey Gray in 1976. Hawayo Takata confirmed her second degree training by giving her a certificate during her master's training after they taught a second degree class together (the certificate is dated January 11, 1979). She completed her Masters training on January 15, 1979. She was a member of the Reiki Alliance and has published a book entitled: Living Reiki: Takata's Teachings. (See my Reiki Books page for a review.) In Japan, she was recognized as teaching authentic Hayashi method as taught to Takata. Fran made her transition on Easter Sunday, April 12, 2009.
Reiki Center for Healing Arts 1764 Hamlet St.
"Phyllis Lei Furumoto, Mrs. Takata's granddaughter, grew up in the Midwest of the United States. Initiated into Reiki at an early age, it was her duty to treat her grandmother when she came to visit the family. Her conscious journey with the Usui System of Reiki Healing, Usui Shiki Ryoho, did not begin until many years later. After studying psychology at college, Phyllis worked in a psychiatric hospital and later as a university administrator. At the age of thirty, she decided it was time to dedicate her life to a meaningful purpose and accepted an invitation to travel and work with her grandmother. She was initiated as a master at the start of their trip in April 1979. For the next year and-a-half Phyllis apprenticed with her grandmother, as Takata gave treatments, taught first and second degree classes, and trained and initiated masters."
Beth initiated only 2 masters in her lifetime. They are Barbara McGregor in Sydney and Denise Crundall (who made her transition on June 30, 2002) in Melbourne. Both were Australians. (The information about Beth's two master students was given to me by Amy Rowland - author of Traditional Reiki for Our Times.) More about Beth Gray can be found on a tribute page dedicated to her.
John and his wife, Lourdes, have written a book entitled, Hand to Hand: The Longest-Practicing Reiki Master Tells His Story. Two formats of the book exist: paperback and hardcover.
Iris Ishikuro was not related to Hawayo Takata. This was told to me by Iris' daughter. She also told me that Arthur made lots of changes to the Reiki system.
Arthur Robertson first studied Reiki in 1975 with Virginia Samdahl. Then he trained for two years with Iris Ishikuro and her many Japanese friends. Iris was trained by Hawayo Takata at the fee of $10,000 and she asked Arthur 15 years ago (around 1983) never to charge the $10,000 fee, but to make it more affordable to people of sincere aspiration who could not afford $10,000. Arthur charged $600 for Reiki Master level training. However, one was required to also buy three Antahkarana units (to be placed under your Reiki table) at the price of $1,095.00. Arthur claims that Iris and Hawayo Takata used the Antahkarana boards (which he would sell on his web site). However, when I checked with other master students of Takata, they denied that Takata used "Antahkarana boards". So the total price for the training really was $1,695.00. (All of this was told to me by Dr. Arthur Robertson.) Arthur Robertson was responsible for adding the Kanji Hand mudras, the Johrei symbols, and "Breathing" (fire dragon breath and contracting technique) that are taught in some Reiki classes. When I discussed this with Arthur Robertson he denied this. However, I have a Raku-Kei manual with his signature on it and with a "Copyright 1983-Omega Dawn Sanctuary of Healing Arts" with all this information in it. Omega Dawn Sanctuary was Arthur's organization and Raku-Kei was the name of his Reiki system. I believe towards the end of Arthur's life he stopped teaching most of the added on information. However, he did keep using Antahkarana units in his teachings. He was the founder of the American Reiki Master Association as well as the system called Raku-Kei. Arthur worked on Virginia Samdahl, who was a chronic smoker, towards the end of her life. This was told to me by Arthur Robertson. Arthur Robertson died on Monday March 5, 2001.
Harry Kuboi also told me that Barbara Weber wrote him a letter stating that if he wanted to be a certified Reiki Master that he would have to train with her and pay several thousand dollars. (This is dealing with the fact that Barbara Weber claims that Hawayo Takata secretly taught her 7 levels of Reiki.) This of course was an insult to Harry Kuboi, after all, he had been a Reiki Master before Barbara Weber even took a Reiki class. In another letter I have from him, he states that in 1985, after about 2 months of channeling, Eitoku (Mikao Usui) came down during one of his channelings and gave him the title of "Reiki Master of Masters". He also stated that he can not teach other people Reiki exocism because this requires the ability "to channel with father in the spirit world". At one time he told me that he could train me to the master level for $10,000 after doing a Reiki exorcism on me to make my Reiki positive. However, I would not be allowed to train others to Reiki master. He has recently given me permission to publish his phone number. To order his books, you may call him at 808-737-3901. Keep in mind that he lives in Honolulu when you call him, so remember the time difference!
She was the 2nd Reiki Master to be initiated by Hawayo Takata. She received her Master level attunement in 1976. She ended up creating a new healing system called Mari-El. Mari represents Mary, Mother of Christ, and El one of the names of God. It is believed that the Mari-El system of healing is no longer being taught. Click here to see a letter written by Hawayo Takata around 1977 to some of her students stating the 3 Reiki Masters she had trained.
After Ethel stopped teaching Mari-El she began teaching a system called "The Next Step". But I do not think she is teaching this anymore.
Started the Reiki Outreach International.
Mary took her second level training with John Harvey Gray and her Mastership training with Hawayo Takata.
Mary wrote a Reiki book entitled Die Heilkraft des Reiki. Lehren einer Meisterin (ISBN: 3499607816). The book is published in German only. Mary has been trying to get an English version in print for some time now. There is another German Reiki book by Mary entitled Die Heilkraft des Reiki. Mit Händen heilen. Schnellbehandlung (ISNB:3499614006). You can get copy's at Amazon.com's web site in Germany http://www.amazon.de.
"Paul Mitchell grew up in California and entered the Catholic seminary at fourteen with the desire to become a priest. At 24, he left the seminary, feeling that life called him to some other form of service. He continued his education and earned a degree in philosophy at the University of San Francisco. In 1978, Paul was teaching religion in a boy's Catholic high school and studying for a master's degree in education when he heard Hawayo Takata give a talk on Reiki. Driving home that morning, Paul says, "I had this very clear thought: 'This is what I have been looking for.' And then I realized I didn't know I had been looking for anything." Paul took first degree Reiki from Mrs. Takata that summer. The following year, he studied the second degree. Shortly thereafter, Takata initiated him as a master and he embarked on a career of offering treatments and teaching Reiki classes. Paul began to work with Phyllis Furumoto in the early 1980s and was a founding member of The Reiki Alliance. He was recruited to teach in the Self-Assessment Program, a training program established by Phyllis to prepare Reiki Master candidates. Paul is the author of the student book, The Usui System of Natural Healing, published in nine languages. His articles on the Usui System have been published in journals around the world. As a master student of Mrs. Takata, Paul is committed to carry, practice, and teach Reiki as she brought it to the Western world. Through personal contact at international gatherings, workshops, and in his Reiki classes, Paul gives students a direct connection with the teachings of Hawayo Takata and with the Usui System."
Made her transition on January 3, 1986. She wrote two books, one called Gestalt and the Wisdom of the Kahunas and the other entitled Journey into Consciousness. The latter was written during her last few years and went unpublished. It is an autobiography of Bethal's life. Bethal took all the Reiki levels from Takata and during a very short time. Bethal took Reiki one and Reiki two back to back on June 16th, 1979, (in the Reiki 2 class was Wanja Twan), and was initiated as a master on Oct. 12th, 1979 along with Wanja Twan and Barbara Brown in Cherryville, BC, Canada. The dates of her training are found in the book Early days of Reiki: Memories of Hawayo Takata compiled by Anneli Twan. (See my Reiki Books page for more details.) She states in her book, Journey into Consciousness, "The lessons (in life that I needed to learn) may have been particularly painful because my initiations had been timed so closly together. I had left Hawaii that spring not knowing of Reiki. I return this winter as a Reiki Master, a very green one." Bethal had trained master students before her transition. I know of one named Lani Kaito, who is a member of The Reiki Alliance. The Reiki Alliance can give you contact information for her. Bethal met Barbara Brown and Barbara told Bethal about Reiki and Takata. This is how Bethal got into Reiki.
The following is excepted from an e-mail I received from someone who knew Bethal Phaigh personally.
"Her husband had died when she was fifty, very unexpectedly and his passage was a profound acknowledgement of her connection to other realms. After his death she opted to take a special program in Berkely in counseling and spirituality (?) not actually the wording but that's what it led to. She met Frizt Perls at about that time and after trained in Gestalt with him. Then she started her work in Vancouver and came to the Kootenays (where I lived/live) in about 1973. She started groups which eventually led to a Center in the woods (now called Benailse). We started with Gestalt work and then other people were invited to do workshops there as well. People like Joy Gardner (see http://vibes.com), Sun Bear, Prem Das and others. Many of the new "alternative" therapies were introduced to the small groups of us. When Takata arrived in Canada Bethal was drawn to Reiki and was initiated in the late 70's; that started another cycle of her life. In the days of Gestalt workshops and the expansion of Benaisle I helped Bethal organize. We spent a lot of time together. She was very open and warm and her eccentric side coupled with her age was a draw for those of us that had grown up in the 50's with parents who were having difficulty understanding us, particularly when the 60's happened. Bethal's work started opening doors showing us the possibility the proofondess of of conciousness similar to hallucinagen induces states was a reality. She visited Findhorn in the 70's and brought back more of that conciousness with her. Working with truthful communication was also such a gift that she brought because most of us had come from families where we werent' used to hearing people "communicate their feelings". Also the work which began our journies of healing "birth trauma" was profound. Her work then started to encompass various Shamanic work and of course her influence of the Kahunas in Hawaii. She walked her talk of the possibility of living in a truthful way, authentic, multi-dimensional way. . She was a wonderful teacher, a wonderful friend."
Virginia at first joined both the Reiki Alliance, founded by Phyllis Lei Furumoto, and the American Reiki Association, founded by Barbara Weber. She did this to be the peace maker between these two opposing organizations, both whom the founders claimed to be Takata's successor. I have been told seemingly contradictory information, which might not be contradictory if I could get the full story. I was told by one person that Virginia tried to talk the other master students of Takata into taking Barbara's training. I was also told from someone else that Virginia eventually left the American Reiki Association because of the changes Barbara was making to the system and because Barbara told Virginia that she would have to retrain with her if she was to be a certified Reiki master. Both of my sources knew Virginia, but this event happened about 20 years ago, so there is no wonder as to why some of the details might have been forgotten. Click here to see a letter written by Hawayo Takata around 1977 to some of her students stating the 3 Reiki Masters she had trained.
I know that Virginia trained the following students as masters - Viola R. Ebert, Barbi Lazonby, Barbara Thompson, and Richard Pinneau. Virginia trained her daughter (Diane?) as a Reiki master before the others, but knew that her daughter didn't want to teach Reiki. Viola Ebert was the first teaching master to be trained by Virginia. Barbi Lazonby was initiated as a master in 1990, deceased July 4th, 2001. Barbi started practicing Reiki in 1986, was the founding director of The Reiki Center of Florida and was a member of The Reiki Alliance.
One of Hawayo Takata's sisters. It is important to note that Kay Yamashita was actually initiated before any of the others. So although it is commonly believed that Virginia Samdahl was the 1st, she was technically the second. In a book by two of Virginia Samdhal's students entitled, The Reiki Handbook they called Virginia Samdahl the 1st occidental Reiki master. But for the sake of easiness, I have just not counted Kay in the numbering. Another reason to not "count" Kay is because Takata didn't count Kay either in a sense. In a letter dated 1977 from Takata, she states that she is going to retire from teaching Reiki. She states that, "I have created 3 Reiki Masters to carry on this noble work." She goes on to list them as, Master John Gray, Master Virginia Samdahl, and Master Ethel Lombardi. Kay Yamashita is not mentioned at all in this letter. In John Harvey Gray's and Lourdes Gray's book entitled, Hand to Hand: The Longest-Practicing Reiki Master Tell His Story he states on page 178, "My first training in Reiki Mastership," John continues, "was learning the procedure and attunements for the First Degree class. Then Takata had to go back to Hawaii. Before she left, she said to me, 'When I come back in three months I will tell you about the Second Degree.' 'Well,' I answered, 'I've already paid the standard fee for mastership training. What will happen if you die?' Takata became flustered and angry. 'My sister in the Hawaiian Islands knows the procedure and could train you if I died', she said. She then gave me the contact information for her sister." This clearly shows that Kay Yamashita was a Reiki master before the others, but it doesn't explain why Takata didn't "count" Kay as a Reiki master in her 1977 retirement letter. | 2019-04-20T03:21:22Z | https://www.svetreiki.ru/resources/artall/35-reiki/1037-hawayo-takata-students.html |
Breakfast has a new dimension. Every morning, we habitually watch a news channel to learn what happened while we were blissfully asleep. In particular, we are most curious these days to find out what hair-raising nonsense Benito Mussolini – oops, no, what was his name? Donald or something – has come up with in the last few hours. And very rarely will we be disappointed and either laugh out loud or shake our heads in bewilderment. Obviously, we do realize many of the truly negative implications right away, but how else can you respond to all of that other than with venomous sarcasm?
That the new US administration would cause havoc also for US wildlife I had forecast and, sadly, it’s starting to prove true now. It was clear that it would make opponents of nature conservation crawl out of their holes and try and use the opportunity to push their anti-wildlife pro-huntsmen bills. Our International News section below is full of the first ridiculous to outright barbaric proposals that have sprung up within the past few weeks. Fortunately there are (now more than ever) organisations that coordinate public protest and fight these with legal means. And considering how popular this joker at the helm has made himself already, many a judge will probably like nothing better than an opportunity to shoot his and his helpers’ ideas down.
We found another dark wolf tale that we share with you here, and Erin updates us on the latest that has been happening in her mixed pack.
The HuskyRomi Wolf Sanctuary’s 2017 Calendar can now be ordered. It is R 50 and all proceeds will go straight to the sanctuary. P&P not included.
USA: Keep up the Fight for lobos!
She never had a name, but she was known and loved around the world.
…but then she was shot and killed just a few miles outside the Yellowstone National Park boundary – after the death of their matriarch Yellowstone’s Lamar Canyon pack was thrown into chaos.
When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wrongly delisted Wyoming’s wolves in 2012, we went to court because the state’s wolf plan declared more than 80% of Wyoming a ‘predator zone,’ where anyone could kill as many wolves as they wanted at any time. And we won, but the case took two years. While the case was pending, 832F and more than 200 other Wyoming wolves were killed.
I think you know the threats to wolves and other wildlife have never been greater than they are today.
The incoming Trump administration and the extremist-dominated Congress have rung the dinner bell for developers, ideologues, and others who see wildlife either as nuisances or fit only for target practice. It’s up to you and me to stop them!
We must do everything we can to fight this legislation! I’m counting on your help today.
USA: Wolves and other wildlife – beware!
From January 20th, things have been going from bad to worse for wolves and other wildlife.
The Trump administration is a who’s who of climate change-denying oil and gas boosters and special interests. And, extremists in Congress are embarking on a ruthless campaign to turn the clock back on wildlife protection.
I won’t lie. Animals will die in alarming numbers if the extremists get their way.
I know you share you my love for wildlife. And you’ve been an important ally in protecting wolves, grizzlies and other wild things we love.
And, now’s a particularly good time to do this. Our Board of Directors and National Council have offered to donate $100 for each member who donates $15 or more monthly, up to $25,000.
We’ve seen that President-elect Trump views most things as resources to be exploited. And the ideologues and the oil barons he has named to his cabinet have their own agendas.
As a monthly sustainer, your support provides a steady, reliable source of contributions as we fight habitat loss and threats to wildlife.
What will happen to wolves in the lower 48 if stripped of all Endangered Species Act protection?
What will happen to dwindling African elephant populations if the doors are thrown open for importing illegal ivory?
What will happen to polar bears and other animals if the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other precious wild habitats are opened for drilling, fracking and mining?
These are real threats, just some of the many we are sure to face in the months and years ahead.
But your monthly donation will give us the resources we need to defend wildlife from the mounting threats they face.
Not everyone shares the commitment to wildlife that you and I do. This is the moment when those of who care must do everything possible.
Congress is once again taking aim at our beloved wolves.
A companion bill to H.R. 424, the House bill introduced by Liz Cheney of Wyoming to strip wolves in Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Wyoming of all protection under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), was just introduced in the Senate.
One thing is for certain: If this bill is enacted, more wolves will die.
This bill would return wolf management in Wyoming to the state, which had previously allowed for unregulated, shoot-on-sight killing of wolves in a “predator zone” that encompasses over 80% of the state.
We are very concerned that a number of pro-conservation Senators have signed onto this bill because we need as much support for the ESA as possible this Congress.
These decisions are supposed to be about science, not politics.
When Congress intervenes, animals die.
The state of Alaska refuses to give up on its relentless quest to kill wolves, bears and other wildlife by baiting, snaring and shooting mother bears with cubs and wolves with pups.
We’re pulling out all the stops to defend these animals and end the madness.
You might recall that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service passed regulations last year specifically outlawing Alaska’s excessive and extreme attacks on predators on national wildlife refuges and preserves. But Alaska is fighting back. They recently filed a lawsuit in federal court to overturn these regulations. And now the Alaska delegation has introduced legislation in Congress to accomplish the same goal.
We’re fighting a war on two fronts. Thanks to you, Defenders’ is going to court and filing a motion to intervene to try to stop this deadly lawsuit. And on Capitol Hill, we’re gathering opposition to this crude effort to replace science with politics – but we need you!
Wolves, bears and other Alaska carnivores are once again in grave danger.
Congress is trying to revoke a regulation that protects wolves and other predators on national wildlife refuges in the state. If Congress succeeds, Alaska will be allowed to authorize extreme killing methods such as shooting mother bears with cubs and killing wolves with pups.
Anti-wildlife Members of Congress are using an obscure law called the Congressional Review Act to toss aside a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) regulation that restricts these gruesome methods of “predator control” on Alaska national wildlife refuges. Perhaps even worse, voiding this rule would slam the door on any future regulations that aim to conserve these predators on refuge lands.
Alaska wants to kill these animals to artificially inflate game populations so hunters have more animals to shoot. Alaska’s scheme targets wolves and bears through extreme methods including killing mother bears and cubs, killing wolves and pups in their dens, trapping, baiting and using airplanes to scout and shoot bears.
This resolution opens federal refuge lands that belong to all of us to this despicable predator control program – and it will be voted on this week!
Alaska’s egregious predator control program is a backwards attempt to artificially inflate game populations and clearly violates the letter and spirit of the National Wildlife Refuge System to conserve biological integrity and diversity for wildlife on refuges.
Thanks for all you do for the wildlife we all love.
www.azgfd.gov/wolf or by visiting the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service website at www.fws.gov/southwest/es/mexicanwolf.
To view semi-monthly wolf telemetry flight location information please visit http://bit.do/mexicanwolf or www.fws.gov/southwest/es/mexicanwolf/RWL.cfm.
Genetic results from a male pup, mp1561, in the Leopold Pack indicate that the breeding female of the Leopold Pack is AF1346; a pup cross-fostered into the Dark Canyon Pack in 2014. This confirms the first instance of a Mexican wolf cross-fostered into a wild den surviving to and successfully reproducing offspring. This is a significant accomplishment in recovery efforts to increase genetic diversity in the wild population through cross-fostering efforts. M1347 of the Baldy Pack was also cross-fostered into the Dark Canyon pack in 2014. M1347 has survived to reproductive age and has paired with f1445 which was named the Baldy Pack by the IFT in September 2016.
On December 1, 2016, the Mexican Wolf/Livestock Council met to discuss requests for depredation compensation that varied from the depredation compensation guidelines. The Council also discussed how they would use estate funds that were provided to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation for conservation of the Mexican wolf.
On December 6, 2016, the Fish and Wildlife Service gave a recovery award to Chairman Lupe of the White Mountain Apache Tribe for their exceptional contributions to the Mexican Wolf Recovery Program. The Mexican wolf population on the 1.6 million-acre Fort Apache Indian Reservation has grown and now contributes substantially to the overall recovery of the Mexican wolf. Over fifteen years ago, the White Mountain Apache Tribe became the first tribe to officially facilitate Mexican wolf recovery.
Population monitoring requires year round effort documenting births, deaths, survival, total numbers, and distribution. Mortality occurs throughout the year and is particularly high on young pups, so while the IFT has documented reproduction this year, the IFT will not have a complete idea of how many of these young pups and adults have died until the annual population survey which is conducted in the winter. Annual surveys are conducted in the winter because it is when the population is experiencing the least amount of natural fluctuation (i.e. in the spring the population increases dramatically with the birth of new pups and declines throughout the summer and fall as mortality is particularly high on young pups). Thus, the IFT summarizes the total number of wolves in the winter at a fairly static or consistent time of year. This allows for comparable year-to-year trends at a time of year that accounts for most mortality and survival of young pups. At this time, the IFT’s best population estimate is that there was a minimum of 97 wolves in the wild as of December 31, 2015. End of year counts for 2016 are currently ongoing and will be completed in February 2017. At the end of December, there were 56 wolves with functioning radio collars that the IFT was actively monitoring.
In December, the Bear Wallow Pack was located within their traditional territory in the east central portion of the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest (ASNF).
In December, the Bluestem Pack continued to use their traditional territory in the east central portion of the ASNF. M1382 and F1488 from the Bluestem Pack displayed dispersal behaviour during the month. F1443 continued to travel with m1447, of the Diamond Pack, in New Mexico near the Arizona border.
In December, the Elk Horn Pack was located within their traditional territory in the north eastern portion of the ASNF.
In December, the Hawks Nest Pack was mostly located within their traditional territory in the north central portion of the ASNF. The IFT documented movements by AM1038 outside of the normal pack territory. Two additional sets of wolf tracks with AM1038 and photos from a remote camera indicate male sub-adults M1383 and m1483 from the Hawks Nest Pack may still be travelling with AM1038.
In December, the Hoodoo Pack remained in the north central portion of the ASNF.
In December, the Maverick Pack was located within their traditional territory both on the FAIR and ASNF. AM1183 was documented travelling with AF1291.
In December, the Panther Creek Pack was located in the east central portion of the ASNF.
In December, the Diamond Pack was located in the eastern portion of the FAIR, the northern portion of the ASNF and on private lands north of the ASNF. Sub-adult m1447 continued to be documented travelling with F1443, of the Bluestem Pack, in New Mexico near the Arizona border.
In December, the Tsay-o-Ah Pack was located within their traditional territory in the eastern portion of the FAIR.
In December, the Baldy Pack was located in the eastern portion of the FAIR and northern portion of the ASNF.
During December, the IFT located this pack within its traditional territory in the west central portion of the Gila National Forest (GNF). During December, f1444 was often located near Eagle Peak in NM.
During December, the IFT continued to document F1405 (formerly of the Buckalou Pack) travelling within the Lava Pack’s traditional territory in the south eastern portion of the GNF.
During December, the IFT documented the Leopold Pack within their territory in the northern portion of the Gila Wilderness and southern portion of the GNF.
During December, the Luna Pack remained in their traditional territory in the north central portion of the GNF.
During December, the Mangas Pack was located within their territory in north western portions of the GNF in New Mexico.
During December, the Prieto Pack was located within their traditional territory in the north central portion of the GNF. There has been dispersal behaviour documented for M1386, m1455, f1456, f1553 and M1552 within the GNF. Remote cameras documented f1553 and M1398 travelling with AF1251 and other uncollared wolves in the Prieto Pack. Photos from remote cameras taken later in the month revealed AF1251 travelling with M1398 and f1553 was travelling with AM1284 of the SBP Pack.
December, the IFT documented the San Mateo Pack within their territory in the north central portion of the GNF.
During December, the SBP Pack continued to use their traditional territory in the north central portion of the GNF. AM1284 was documented on remote cameras travelling with f1553 of the Prieto Pack.
During December, the IFT documented the Willow Springs Pack within their traditional territory in the north central portion of the GNF.
During December, AM1155 was documented travelling within New Mexico.
During December, M1398 was documented travelling with AF1251 of the Prieto Pack in the west central portion of the GNF.
During December, M1354 was documented travelling in southern portions of the GNF and northern Gila Wilderness. M1354 has been documented travelling with members of the Leopold Pack; M1354 is full siblings to AM1293.
There were no documented mortalities in the month of December.
During the month of December, there was one confirmed wolf kill and no nuisance reports.
On December 14, Wildlife Services investigated two dead calves in Apache County, Arizona. The investigations determined both of the calves were killed by coyotes.
On December 18, Wildlife Services investigated a dead calf in Apache County, Arizona. The investigation determined the calf was a confirmed wolf kill.
On December 23, Wildlife Services investigated a dead adult cow in Apache County, Arizona. The investigation determined the cow died from unknown causes.
On December 7, 2016, the Fish and Wildlife Service met with the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish and the Chairman of the New Mexico State Game Commission to discuss issues regarding the recovery of the Mexican wolf.
On December 8, 2016, the Fish and Wildlife Service convened a meeting of the Mexican Wolf Tribal Working Group to discuss the status of recovery planning for the Mexican wolf.
On December 14, 2016, the Fish and Wildlife Service presented on Mexican wolves and the Mexican Wolf Recovery program for the Superstition Area Land Trust in Apache Junction.
On December 14, 2016 WMAT met with the USDA-Farm Service Agency regarding livestock loss compensation options for Tribal cattle growers.
On December 15, 2016, the Fish and Wildlife Service held a community information meeting in Young, Arizona to discuss the status of the Mexican Wolf Recovery Program and listen to issues and concerns raised by the public. The US Forest Service and Arizona Game and Fish Department were in attendance.
On December 20, 2016 the Fish and Wildlife Service met with the US Forest Service regarding coordination of Mexican wolf recovery efforts, including the status of NEPA review for release sites in Zone 1 of the expanded Mexican Wolf Experimental Population Area.
On December 29, 2016 WMAT presented on Mexican wolf biology and recovery at a community event in Vermont.
During December, USFWS volunteer Craig Zurek left the volunteer program for other professional opportunities. Thanks for all your hard work and dedication Craig!
Senators from Minnesota, Wisconsin and Wyoming yesterday introduced the “War on Wolves Act,” a companion bill to legislation introduced last week in the House that would strip federal protections from wolves and allow trophy hunting and trapping of the species in four states.
“A new congress has resurfaced an old vendetta against imperiled wolves. If this legislation is signed into law, wolves in Wyoming will be subjected to unregulated killing across the vast majority of the state, and even on the borders of Yellowstone National Park numerous legal loopholes will authorize widespread wolf killing.
Americans widely hailed the return of wolves to the Northern Rockies two decades ago as a triumph of the Endangered Species Act, but now this ‘War on Wolves Act’ would allow for the same unregulated killing that nearly wiped out the species in the first place.
Donald Trump’s tenure in the White House, along with the Republican Party’s reign in Congress, will be an unmitigated disaster for the environment. A witch-hunt is already underway for federal employees who support the science of climate change: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/12/13/energy-dept-rejects-trumps-request-to-name-climate-change-workers-who-remain-worried/. Protections for the 640 million acres of public land you and I own in this country are already being stripped away: http://www.missionmt.com/journal/2017/1/6/115th-congress-immediately-moves-on-land-transfer.
Oil and gas extraction on public land is expected to be deregulated (http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-congress-zinke-idUSKBN1511DQ), and even coal—a heavily polluting, inefficient energy source the market has rendered obsolete—may see reinvestment: http://www.livescience.com/57535-interior-nominee-zinke-focuses-on-coal.html.
A victim of all of those programs, and even the target of specific GOP plans for eradication? The gray wolf, only recently reintroduced to western states to help check overpopulated elk and deer and restore balance to the natural food chain there.
On January 17, 2017, Republican Senators introduced a bill nicknamed, “The War on Wolves Act.” If passed S.164 (https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/164?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22wolf%22%5D%7D&r=1) will not only remove ESA protections from wolves in Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin and Wyoming, but it will also strip citizens of the right to challenge it in court.
It’s important to understand that the gray wolf, as a species, is not under threat overall—it’s just specific populations of wolves in certain geographic areas. There are approximately 60,000 wolves living in the wilds of Alaska and Canada. Those will only suffer the general impact of anti-environment policies, accelerated climate change, and habitat loss.
It’s the wolf populations reintroduced to the American West that GOP policy is directly targeting.
There’s also a population of more than 3,500 gray wolves in and around the Great Lakes—in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota—that, to a lesser extent, is also threatened.
Wolves were first brought back to the West in 1995, when 66 were brought from Canada to Yellowstone National Park and Idaho. The Northern Rocky Mountain Wolf Recovery Plan (https://www.fws.gov/montanafieldoffice/Endangered_Species/Recovery_and_Mgmt_Plans/Northern_Rocky_Mountain_Gray_Wolf_Recovery_Plan.pdf) also allowed for the natural southern dispersal of other wolf populations from Canada. Since then, the species has spread to Montana, Wyoming, Washington, and Oregon, and now there’s even a single pack living in Northern California. The population of wolves in those states is approaching 1,700 (http://www.defenders.org/gray-wolf/gray-wolves-northern-rockies) —a huge success story for conservationists, albeit one that’s still ongoing. Wolves numbered 2 million on this continent just a couple hundred years ago but were killed off as modern civilization expanded westward.
As part of the reintroduction, the burgeoning population of gray wolves in the West was initially protected by the Endangered Species Act. Largely due to the controversial nature of the wolf reintroduction that we’ll get to a little later, however, those protections have variously been repealed, replaced, and repealed again at federal and local levels. Wolf populations have returned to just 10 percent of their original range in the West, making their existence there still tenuous and dependent on some sort of protection.
In Yellowstone, for instance, the reintroduction of wolves corrected an imbalance caused by the unchecked expansion of ungulates. Historically, wolves kept the elk population in balance in that area; without them, the elk became too numerous and their movements too static. Grasslands were overgrazed. Willows, cottonwood, and aspen were damaged, destroying the riparian habitats of beavers, songbirds, otters, muskrats, ducks, fish, reptiles, and amphibians. Wolves fixed that. They also checked the population of coyotes, which preyed heavily on small animals. So those populations returned, too, along with the birds of prey that feed on them. The revitalized shrubbery produced more berries, expanding the bear population. The entire ecosystem benefited and was returned to balance by the mere reintroduction of a handful of wolves. It’s that whole circle of life thing that Elton John once sang about in that Disney movie.
Can wolves restore balance to ecosystems elsewhere in their historic range? This study (http://www.cell.com/trends/ecology-evolution/abstract/S0169-5347%2815%2900005-1), published in the scientific journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution, suggests they can, and that they may also enable the successful coexistence of invasive species with their native counterparts. The study argues that allowing the return of apex predators like the wolf may be much cheaper than trying to manage these environments through human methods.
Need a dollar amount to define their value? Wolves bring in more than $35 million a year of tourist spending (http://www.georgewright.org/251duffield.pdf) to the Yellowstone area. Local businesses benefit from the mere presence of wolves.
Wolves kill and eat stuff. As described above, that’s their job. Things they like to kill and eat include things people like to kill and eat—primarily deer and elk, but also sometimes sheep and cattle; which makes us rivals. Between 1995 and 2005, wolves killed 213 cattle and 173 sheep in Wyoming. The elk population has also fallen since the reintroduction of wolves, though drought, disease, and hunting also play a role. There were 17,000 elk in the park when the reintroduction began. Today there are 4,844 (https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/nature/elkinfo.htm).
Perhaps due to an exaggerated presence of wolves in nursery rhymes and fairy tales, we humans also find them scary. There have been only six documented fatalities (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wolf_attacks_in_North_America) due to wild wolves (two of which were rabid) in North America in the past 100 years. The number of people killed by wolves pales in comparison to the number of people who die each year due to, say, bee stings (in the United States, that’s 100 people every year, http://www.govexec.com/management/2015/08/bees-are-deadliest-non-human-animals-america-cdc/119328/). Others complain that the loss of livestock hurts ranchers’ livelihood, even though state governments compensate ranchers for any losses. Still others lament the decrease in lucrative guided elk hunts in wolf states, though that has largely been attributed to an increase in out-of-state tag prices.
Politicians from rural areas have been pressured to address those unsubstantiated fears of their constituents, but that doesn’t come close to explaining the scale of the GOP’s war on wolves. The 114th Congress (2015–17) introduced 20 bills targeted at eliminating protections for the gray wolf alone. The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) called it “the most anti-wildlife Congress we’ve ever had.” Until the 115th, that is.
Why exhaust so much time and energy attacking a single species? The real answer is that the protections wolves require in the West can run counter to the interests of industrial agriculture businesses and the oil and gas industry, both of which want to operate on land that is currently subject to protection because it’s wolf habitat.
The anti-wolf policies being paid for in part by industrial agriculture are actually damaging the small, family-owned farms where problems with wolves killing livestock actually take place and which are often cited as the cause for these policies. It’s been scientifically demonstrated that killing problem wolves actually leads to a direct correlation in increased livestock depredation (http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/killing-wolves-actually-leads-more-livestock-death-180953605/). The killings disrupt pack order and disperse wolves into new areas, and weakened packs are forced to seek easier prey than the wild animals they’d otherwise focus on.
The CBD has tracked donations from those industries to Congress (http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/esa_attacks/pdfs/ESAAttacks_09-2016.pdf) and compared them with the number of bills introduced that threaten the Endangered Species Act (ESA). As campaign donations from the oil and gas industry and industrial agriculture have increased, so too have legislative assaults on the ESA. Because wolves have large ranges, the ESA may prevent energy extraction or industrial farming across larger areas than some other species. That explains the focus on removing the wolf’s protections.
In 1973, partly motivated by the plight of the bald eagle, President Richard Nixon called on Congress to take action to protect species on the verge of extinction. Congress created the Endangered Species Act (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endangered_Species_Act_of_1973) by a nearly unanimous vote. Bald eagle populations have since increased from a low of 417 mating pairs to more than 11,000 today. That species was delisted (removed from the ESA’s protections) in 2007, although it remains subject to other protections as our national bird. Today, the ESA protects more than 1,600 endangered plants and animals.
Not every animal protected by the ESA is a success story. Due to the precarious nature of many of the species it protects, delistings are infrequent. Take, for instance, the case of the Death Valley pupfish. Only a handful exist in two ponds in Death Valley National Park. Totally isolated, it’s obviously unrealistic to expect that the species will ever expand its population enough that it will ever be considered anything but endangered. Does the pupfish deserve our protection? Environmentalists would say yes. And the law has prevented extinction for 99 percent of the species it protects. But Republicans argue no, because only 1 percent have been rehabilitated.
“It has never been used for the rehabilitation of species. It’s been used for control of the land,” argues House National Resources Committee Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah). He has stated that he “would love to invalidate” the ESA.
The wolf’s protection under the ESA has always been precarious. Due to the politically charged nature of their reintroduction, initial population targets that would trigger a delisting were set incredibly low—just 150 in Idaho, for instance. That didn’t sound like a viable population to wolf advocates, so, since the species started triggering de-listings shortly after its reintroduction, its status has bounced back and forth both nationally and locally in a process of litigation and lawsuits so confusing and asinine (http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/gray_wolves/index.html) that I’ll spare you a recap of it here.
To the best of my understanding, wolves are currently protected by the ESA (http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/gray_wolves/index.html) everywhere in the lower 48 with the exception of Montana, Idaho, and the eastern third of both Washington and Oregon. In large part, those protections are thanks to lawsuits conducted by environmental organizations like the CBD. Acknowledging that, Republican lawmakers have begun introducing anti-wolf laws as riders on essential budget bills, disturbingly including language that prevents legal challenge.
Trump has yet to go on the record about either the ESA or wolves, but he does oppose environmental policies that get in the way of drilling. It’s not expected that he’d veto any legislation designed to weaken or repeal the ESA or any riders intended to remove wolf protection. Trump’s nominee for interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, who will manage the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which administers ESA programs, once sent out a Christmas card featuring a dead wolf. Last year, Zinke co-sponsored a bill designed to remove federal protections for wolves. It looks like the anti-wolf, anti-ESA Republican Congress is finally getting both the president it needs to rubber stamp this legislation, combined with an administrator of the Department of the Interior prepared to carry it out.
In addition to both that rollback of the ESA and likely direct challenges to the wolf’s inclusion in it, wolves are under threat from the GOP’s plan to steal our public lands. Like all wild animals, wolves need habitat to survive. Development of resource extraction on those lands will further threaten them.
In 2012, the Alaska Board of Game passed its heavy-handed management plan which included aerial gunning of wolves to stop the decline of moose populations in two Game Management Units (GMUs) on the Kenai Peninsula. This despite opposition from biologists and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG), who explained that the peninsula’s moose population decline was generally due to overharvest and habitat limitations, not increased predation by wolves.
Later that year, ADFG’s division of Wildlife Conservation decided to hold off on implementing the Board’s controversial wolf cull to collect the information necessary to make a well-informed management decision.
Today, we’re witnessing history repeat itself with the Board proposing to reauthorize its controversial plan to kill all the wolves on a part of the lower Kenai Peninsula despite opposition from the regional Fish and Game Advisory Committee (the Homer Fish and Game Advisory Committee) who objected to the proposal unanimously.
If the Board of Game votes to approve the proposal, Proposal 155, at its upcoming meeting scheduled for Jan. 4–7, it would allow the public to hunt and trap wolves, both from the ground and from the air, and would be allowed to conduct its own aerial hunts.
The Alaska Board of Game has repeatedly opted for lethal predator control as their management tool of choice despite opposition from the scientific community and public outcry. It’s time that science, not special interest groups, guide responsible wildlife management policy, especially with so much at stake in one of Alaska’s most iconic wild places.
Please personalize the letter below.
In 2012, the Alaska Board of Game passed its intensive wolf management plan which included aerial gunning of wolves to stop the decline of moose populations in two Game Management Units (GMUs) on the Kenai Peninsula. This despite opposition from biologists and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s division of Wildlife Conservation, who explained that the peninsula’s moose population decline was generally due to overharvest and habitat limitations, not increased predation by wolves.
The decline of Kenai’s moose population is a complicated and delicate matter that should involve careful consideration of all factors involved.
I am counting on the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to listen to science, as the Department did in 2012, and take the time to make a well-informed wildlife management decision that will ensure both sustainable moose and wolf populations. The Homer Fish and Game Advisory Committee objected to the proposal unanimously.
Thus, I urge the Dept. to hold off on implementing the Board’s controversial wolf cull to collect the information necessary to make a well-informed management decision.
After nearly 50 years of protection, endangered Italian wolves might be slaughtered soon.
Despite a lack of recent scientific population estimates, the Italian Minister of Environmental Affairs is determined to kill off 5% of the endangered wolf population.
The only reason the Italian government wants to kill endangered wolves is because farmers and ranchers blame them for killing their animals. Outrageously, there are no efforts to humanely protect livestock with electric fences or trained dogs – even though fences and dogs have proven effective elsewhere in Europe.
Even worse, when pressed, farmers admit that feral dogs are far more lethal to their livestock than wolves. But wolves get the blame.
Rhinos are in a desperate need of help, but the question remains how to help?
It has only been a week ago that we launched a Crowd Funding campaign to help bring Nellie (a poaching survivor) home to an intensive protection zone where she can give birth and live life while being protected against any further poaching attempts.
South Africa is facing the worst conservation crisis in our history and rhinos continue to be butchered at an unprecedented rate. Their numbers are plummeting and the crisis is very real.
The past weekend two orphaned rhino calves were attacked right at the home of the farmer hand rearing them after poachers slaughtered their mothers. From the accompanying photographs, you will be able to see just how terrible their suffering must be. Disturbingly these incidents are quite regular and increasingly many other animals suffer a similar fate. There is no question that there is a massive and growing crisis!
Taking all the factors into consideration, including all the amazing work being done by so many to curb rhino poaching and to bring about change with education and awareness, time unfortunately is running out for rhinos. The only sure-thing on the short-term, to end the terribly cruelty and suffering is to set-up private intensive protection zones and bring as many rhinos as possible into these protected areas; be they poaching survivors, orphans, or unwanted rhinos.
Two weeks ago, a local man was arrested and charged for contravening our conservation laws pertaining to rhinos. This individual purchased unwanted rhinos from their owners, relocated the poor animals to his farm and summarily executed them. Their horns were removed and only certain body part where recovered by the authorities.
As the investigation continues an increasing number of rhino carcasses is being unearthed revealing the callous murder of many rhinos for commercial gain. What this incident illustrates without a doubt is that no rhino is safe anymore and if they fall into the wrong hands the animals will die. Poachers coming under cover of darkness are not the only enemy these unfortunate creatures have to fear.
Unfortunately, the world remains slow to respond and where help is provided, in some instances is not used effectively to end rhino poaching. There is also increasing donor fatigue as people, frustrated and saddened by the ongoing slaughter simply turn their backs on the rhinos and walk away. Many people feel that there is nothing to be done anymore to save the species, but we beg you to please reconsider and not desert South Africa’s rhinos! They are just too special to lose.
With your help, we intend finding individual rhinos that need our help on a priority basis and where possible we intend buying these rhinos and relocating them to Intensive Protection Zones at undisclosed locations as a matter of urgency.
It is pretty much like throwing that one star fish at a time, back into the ocean, but we feel that with your support and understanding we will inspire many more people to share our dream of seeing rhinos living wild and in safety for many years to come.
Steve Jobs once said; that it is the people that are crazy enough to believe they can change the world, that actually do.
By leading and proving that the concept is working well, we believe others will follow and use the example to establish more PIPZ’s that will, over the next couple of years, ensure that an increasing number of rhinos will be spared a brutal death and ensure that the genetic viability of the species is protected for future generations.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and we hope and trust that Nellie’s story will inspire you to help bring her to safety.
To Donate towards the Save Nellie campaign please click on this link or email [email protected] for more details or for the banking details.
To help a very special rhino cow, called Nellie, that survived a brutal poaching incident we will be giving you the opportunity to make a donation towards her rescue and enter a silent auction for two respective Accommodation Vouchers.
Beach House (Saldanha Bay) Western Cape South Africa 4 nights 5 days 4 people self-catering.
AUCTION AMOUNTS ON BOTH DESTINATIONS OPEN AT $100.
In other words the amount you donate may not be less than $100.
ABSA, Danie Joubert Street, Tzaneen,0850.
The highest offer (donation) received by close of business on Wednesday the 15th February 2017 on either of the two available destinations will be awarded the respective accommodation voucher for either the Beach House or Bukisa Camp.
A single decision by President Donald Trump has undone years of fighting to stop the dangerous Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipelines from being built, hampering progress for short-term profits and environmental destruction.
These combined projects would result in 2,279 miles of potentially leaking pipelines, contaminating everything in their path: rivers, forests, underground aquifers — everything. By approving the advancement of these projects, President Trump blatantly denies the link between oil and climate change, and ignores the damage that the pipelines will inevitably spread across the country.
While it is true that the American economy depends on oil, now is the time to act on the fact that we cannot build a future on oil without sacrificing our farmlands, forests, water sources and climate. Please sign our petition today to implore President Trump to put an end to the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipelines — investing in viable green-energy and the sustainable jobs that accompany that industry instead.
Please go to: http://therainforestsite.greatergood.com/clickToGive/trs/petition/dakota-keystone-pipelines/?utm_source=trs-ta-enviro&utm_medium=email&utm_term=01302017&utm_content=takeaction-f&utm_campaign=dakota-keystone-pipelines&origin=ETE_013017_dakota-keystone-pipelines_f&oidp=0x2bd25baa4cd41335c0a82937 to sign the petition.
Urgent appeal for animals, like humans, to be legally recognized as “sentient beings”.
In 2015, France, New Zealand and the province of Quebec, Canada recognized animals as sentient beings. I believe South Africa should lead the way as the first African country to do the same.
To recognise that animals are sentient is to acknowledge clearly that they are able to experience both positive and negative emotions, including pain, distress and emotional trauma.
This would make hunting of wild animals, animal testing and capture or ill treatment, illegal and would afford animals the right not to be owned as property.
This would go a long way towards ensuring decent and humane housing and treatment of animals by individuals, breeders and retailers. Currently the requirements for the care and housing of animals are minimal, and inadequately enforced.
It really is time we South Africans climb aboard and stand up for our fellow non human beings, who give us so much and enrich our lives in so many ways.
Trophy hunting is a disgusting hobby wherein people pay large sums of money to slaughter and then stuff and bring home the bodies of animals, many of whom are at risk of becoming extinct.
Each year, over 126,000 wildlife trophies are imported to the U.S. Most trophies are iconic, beloved mega fauna: African elephants, African lions, African leopards, southern white rhinos, and African buffalo. Over 1,000 different beautiful species have been killed and turned into trophies. Between 2005 and 2014, over 1.26 million in total were brought in.
The website is full of images of people standing next to lifeless, bloodied animal bodies. Some are smiling proudly, others hold an emotionless face. But all share a few things in common: they spent a lot of money to kill animals, and they love doing it.
Argentina: A baby dolphin died for an Instagram photo.
Tourists in San Bernardo, Argentina, dragged the baby dolphin out of the ocean after he swam close to shore. A video shows a crowd taking pictures and touching the animal, who lay in just a few inches of water. Now, the baby dolphin is dead.
This isn’t the first time tourists have killed wildlife in the area, either. Last February, tourists on a beach in Santa Teresita killed an endangered baby dolphin after pulling it out of the water. Tourists passed the dolphin around for photos until it died of dehydration.
Care2 petition author Paige D. argues that animals in Argentina are particularly vulnerable to abuse because the country does not support the Universal Declaration on Animal Welfare, an inter-governmental agreement to reduce animal suffering and promote animal welfare standards. In fact, World Animal Protection, an animal welfare charity, gives the country an overall D rating in the protection of animals.
The fight over the re-introduction of wolves is headed for new heights. More than 83,000 people have already signed an Internet petition against the shooting of a wolf in the Oberlausitz (Lower Saxony) that seems to have lost almost all shyness of humans. Saxony’s authorities have decided to have the so-called problem wolf „Pumpak“ killed by a bullet; will he have to share the same fate as Bruno, the problem bear of Bavaria?
„We are a group of people who are fighting for the protection of wolves in Germany“; these are the introductory words of an Internet petition (https://www.change.org/p/wolf-pumpak-muss-weiterleben) that has the goal of saving the life of Pumpak, a wolf living in the area of Rietschen. He was seen on numerous occasions at night in the village searching for food in compost heaps, seemingly unperturbed by the presence of humans. When people approached him he calmly trotted back into the nearby pine forest. Sometimes he would watch from a safe distance how the frightened two-legged ones reacted to him by retreating into the safety of their homes. He is still a young wolf, and youngsters are curious.
Wolves are very shy and will usually disappear into thin air before humans even spot them. But the young male wolf of Rietschen seems to be an exception to the rule. It is possible that he was fed by humans as a pup when he lived on the banks of the German/Polish border river Neisse. Pumpak seems to love cake, because he tried to steal a freshly baked one from a windowsill where it had been placed for cooling down.
His curiosity, his searching for food in gardens, and the fear of humans of this legendary predator make Pumpak a problem wolf for the authorities. The district magistrate’s office Görlitz has declared the two-year old wolf free to be shot, and the Saxony Ministry for Environmental Affairs has also given the “green light” for shooting him in the Polish border area.
Nature conservationists and animal lovers are shocked about the order to shoot and kill him, but some huntsmen welcome the decision, because a hardheaded fight has ensued since wolves have emigrated from Poland and re-occupied territory after territory. A similar scenario played out with a bear in Bavaria eleven years ago.
Bruno the Bear had become a “problem” when after waking from hibernation, he chose Bavaria as his new hunting territory. He was the first bear there in 170 years and his presence was obvious in that he made a meal of six sheep. Again and again Bruno was seen in the close vicinity of villages; he broke into a pigsty, and he cleaned out a chicken pen on another occasion. All people saw of him was a fleeing shadow, and he divided Germany into camps of supporters and opponents. And like back then, the order to shoot and kill Bruno was causing the same storm of indignation as the one now to shoot and kill Pumpak.
More than 83,000 people have already signed the Internet petition that is meant to prevent the so-called “removal of the wolf“. With the term “removal“, authorities describe the killing of wild animals exhibiting an abnormal behavior. A wolf can be removed if, e.g., he repeatedly attacks flocks of sheep, ignores protective fences or, like in Pumpak’s case, loses its natural shyness of humans.
But wolf welfare activists are not only active on the Internet; more than 100 e-mails have been received by the Saxony Ministry for Environmental Affairs that are in favour of Pumpak. Even in Berlin, the Federal Minister of Environmental Affairs, Barbara Hendricks, has to deal with the so-called problem wolf and answer questions. She refers to the decision of the Dresden authorities by stating that the decision to remove the wolf has been made by experts who have the necessary knowledge about nature conservation and legal interests. Therefore the decision by the authorities is not really suitable for a public referendum, said Frank Meyer, press speaker for the Ministry of Environmental Affairs, Saxony.
The huntsmen of the Oberlausitz are watching the fight over problem wolf Pumpak with great interest. For years they have been demanding orders to shoot and kill wolves that cause problems. One huntsman says, however, that Pumpak is actually not a problem yet, but he could become one if he, at a later stage, formed a pack and taught his experiences to his offspring, so that they would also lose their shyness of humans. Brigitte Sommer, who initiated the Internet petition, does not accept this statement without counter-arguing that there will always be curious young wolves that investigate their territory and learn from experience. She refers to a young wolf that strolled through villages around Oldenburg. If every curious young wolf is seen as a problem and is therefore shot and killed, it would be catastrophic, she says.
She is trying for more than 100,000 signatures to make it clear to the provincial government that there is a huge public interest in nature, wild animals, and wolves in particular, and that a small lobby of politicians, huntsmen and farmers tries to accomplish their own goals against the will of the rest of the public, and that cannot be, she says.
Meanwhile The Green Party wants to know from the Saxon state government who has been chosen to kill the problem wolf in the Oberlausitz. And a private person is said to have applied for a temporary interdict to prevent shooting Pumpak.
Since the Rietschen wolf has officially been handed the death sentence, Pumpak has gone missing. For more than a week, the two-year old predator hasn’t been seen. Maybe he has moved back to Poland across the Neisse into the Görlitzer Heide, or he is travelling through the neighbouring army trainings ground.
By the way, the Görlitz district council’s office would not reveal who will be the one to train the rifle at and shoot Pumpak and keep him as a trophy afterwards.
Without the support of all the people who signed this petition this might not have been possible, and therefore many, many Thanks to everybody.
The order to shoot Pumpak will expire on 19 February, the MDR radio and TV station announced this morning, although there is no official confirmation from the provincial government yet.
Darkstorm is an Alpha wolf that was killed 4 years ago while saving another wolf in his pack, and carried off into the forest by an injured bear that was slowly dying from a wound caused by Darkstorm… What made Darkstorm so unique from the other wolves? What made him special? Well sit back and listen to the story of Darkstorm’s Life….
Darkstorm was born under the sign of the shadow… he had abilities that already would made another Alpha wolf bow to him as a pup! He was able to take down caribou and other large animals as a teen wolf… he could talk with nature itself… he was known as Natures Child. Darkstorm lost his mother around the time he was a pup, and his father, an alpha wolf at the time, blamed him for his love’s death. So he banned Darkstorm far from his homeland. Darkstorm was raised by many different animals and learned to communicate with the wind and earth… he could easily tell were game was by the feel of the earth… and the smell of the wind… he could tell what type of storm was brewing by the way the earth shifted.
Back then, Darkstorm was not his name, it normally was Fang, but I’ll tell you how he earned the name Darkstorm. One day, Fang was out running with the other animals to see who was the fastest. Darkstorm easily won, but what scared the animals was that when he would run, he left a path of destruction behind him! He was so dark and fast he was like a DARK STORM!!! So he earned the name Darkstorm.
When he left the new home he lived in for many years, he decided it was time to go back to his home and claim the rightful position as the new Alpha Wolf; but doing so he would have to challenge his Father! Darkstorm crossed many green fields and rocky mountains till he was home. The wolves saw Darkstorm enter and were ready to attack until they smelled his scent.. it was exactly like his father’s, Tundra. Darkstorm walked in between the wolves until he reached his father. When he saw his father Darkstorm totally changed; his eyes were no longer blue, but now forever a green-red, which showed the hatred he had for his father, and his black coat had a few white stripes showing now. His teeth a little more sharper and his claws a little more jagged, sharp as ice cycles in a cave. Darkstorm had changed and knew that the only way for him to become the new Alpha wolf, was to kill his father, even though it was forbidden. Darkstorm got into an attack position and leaped toward Tundra to begin the combat…..
Darkstorm nimbly leaped onto the boulder, his slitted amber eyes never leaving his opponent’s. His misty charcoal coat rippled in the twilight breeze as a low growl escaped his tightened throat. A set of silvery fangs were bared, tinted with a thin shade of dark blood. He suddenly pivoted, and sprang, using every ounce of thick muscle in his legs. He launched himself towards Silverfeet and sunk his teeth into the alpha’s tough flank, ripping savagely at the wolf’s flesh, spraying deep red about the granite rock.
Silverfeet flung himself against his challenger, fighting off Darkstorm with both tooth and claw. Darkstorm snarled, and shook away his attacker, then lunged at him again. The alpha crumpled, dark blood staining his silvery fur. His breath slowed, and then stopped, and the wolf lay motionless, the constant pounding of his heart now silent. Darkstorm raised his head, staring at the pack as they were at him. They were dumfounded at the sudden and short death of their leader, and now lowered their eyes and heads submissively to their new alpha, now standing proud in the rising fire of the sun. He was their future.
Darkstorm stood tall in the frigid waters of the creek, upon the cliffs from which careened the mighty East Ridge Falls. The wind snapped icily at his skin, and tossed his dark fur like angry fire. He bent his head, and thirstily lapped up the cold water, which slid pleasantly down his dry throat. He then gazed upwards, staring at the cloudless skies. Below the cliffs lay a sea of forest, and beyond that, a golden tundra. It was early spring, and only two winters back he had challenged and caused the death of the alpha, his father Tundra, of the Whitehawk Creek Pack, the pack that he now held responsibility for. He knew from his previous pack, the West Ridge Pack, that it was against the wolf code to kill in a challenge – or even for a pack-less wolf to challenge an alpha. Yet he had ignored this – he had hated and dismissed all law of the wolf then, as it was what had affected his position as a beta in West Ridge, and placed him without family or pack.
Russet came bounding towards him, his cinnamon coat gleaming and glossy in the sunlight. Darkstorm could tell straight away from the excited wags of the wolf’s tail and the spark in his pale brown eyes that they were here – pups! The two wolves streamed down the cliff-side, eagerly dodging the trees and following the scent path to their pack den. The alpha barked happily, and his pack welcomed him into the den, followed by Russet. He saw Raven, his mate, laying on her side, and her four pups wriggling and fighting beside her. Their tiny eyes were sealed shut, and their teeth were tiny but sharp. They were all black, like he and raven, but two had splotches of white on their faces and stomachs. One of the white-masked pups had a white tip on its tail, which was thumping the ground enthusiastically. Raven glanced at Darkstorm with tired eyes, and then her heavy eyelids shut from exhaustion. He nudged her with his nose, and left the den.
Skysong stood in the shallow depths of Whitehawk Creek, feeling the wind blow through her fur and giving her a carefree, spirited attitude. She raced along the creek, her paws sending cold water splashing up her dark coat. Her pale green eyes scanned the jagged horizon, watching the sun rise, showering sparks of gold upon the tundra.
Skysong walked ashore, shaking the water off her night-black fur. She paused for a moment, sensing a sort of danger unknown to her. She sniffed the air, and suddenly cried out at an agonizing pain in her back muscles. Skysong tried to free herself from the bear’s weight, then snarling and clawing at its face and eyes, but the bear remained unharmed. The female wolf knew she was as good as dead. She tried to helplessly shake it off, but its teeth were firmly sunk into her back. The wolf cried out for help from Blackfire, her brother, as the great bear prepared for its fatal bit to her jugular vein, but he only yelped at her sorrowfully, then turning and running to the forest in the opposite direction. Suddenly she heard the bear roar with pain and rage, and it let go of Skysong, turning to fight Darkstorm, who had then leaped upon the bear’s back and sunk his razor-sharp teeth into the bear’s massive neck muscle. Though the attack wasn’t enough to cause the bear serious harm, it distracted it long enough so that Skysong could drag herself to a hiding place. She watched, suffering from untold pain and unable to help, as the bear lifted her sire with its enormous forepaws and delivered the fatal bite to Darkstorm. The alpha convulsed in the bear’s tight grip, and then went limp as the bear dragged the wolf away. Skysong felt her strength ebbing away from her as her dripping blood formed a dark crimson path behind her as she made her way slowly to the den. Darkstorm had died in order to save her life – a sacrifice she wouldn’t soon forget.
I have previously made mention of Ascar II being a little bully who loves to order Kajack II around and play the big boss. Now, lately Ascar was becoming so aggressive towards Kajack over no issues at all, that the latter was screaming for his life (it seemed) several times a day every day. He ended up with lots of small bits and pieces of scurf all over his face. Whatever we tried only resulted in Ascar taking out his frustration over his being reprimanded on Kajack. Taima, on the other hand, didn’t like our interfering at all and growled and even snapped at Ted a couple of times. Something had to happen, however, before Kajack would possibly lose an eye, for example. One day two weeks ago, it was particularly bad, and Ted couldn’t stand it anymore. While I was screaming at Ascar out of frustration, telling him we would oust and bring him back to where he came from, Ted grabbed a leash with a choke chain, slipped it over Ascar’s head, lifted him off Kajack, and dragged him out the back door. He fiddled the leash through the burglar bars of the door from the outside and pinned him against it from the inside. After a very short while Ascar became completely catatonic, which Ted knew to be a sign of him capitulating unconditionally. He held him there for a moment longer to make sure, then unfastened the chain. Ascar trotted off while Ted was torn between hating himself for having to be so drastic and fury over Ascar’s brutal mobbing of the most pacific pack member in the house. A short while later, Ascar could be seen trying to find a place where to jump the fence in order to get back into the house (the connecting gate was closed). We ignored him for half an hour and even closed the front door in case he should manage to get to the front yard.
Ted eventually went out to have a talk with Ascar and meditate over the problem. He first addressed him and tried to tell him where his behaviour would end him up. All he got in response was “get in, get in, get to Kajack”. Ted eventually realized that Ascar needed a teacher. And because there was no four-legged dominant male that could teach him at our place, he realised he would have to take on this role.
Some half-hour later, Ted and Ascar walked back to the still-closed backdoor. First, Ascar just wanted to get to Kajack on the inside, but when Ted didn’t let him, he sat down next to him and looked at him. Ted told him to apologize, and now the most unexpected things started to happen. Ascar got up and apologized to Ted, who told him that he must apologize to Kajack and true enough, he got up once more and started to wash Kajack’s face and ears through the bars. Ted praised him over the blue moon, opened the door, and he continued to wash Kajack, then Taima, then me, and Ted some more. He laid down next to Kajack and has been a new animal ever since. Whenever he gets too rough with Kajack (he can of course play with him, even wildly), Ted or I just have to touch the leash and make a small noise with the chain, and all aggression will cease this instant. We now even leave the set lying on the living room table so that he is reminded of it every time he walks past it. He will often sniff and touch it, and then sit down in front of either of us so that we can acknowledge him for his good behaviour. He will now also listen most of the time if we just tell him to be a little gentler or stop mobbing him.
I was a bit worried at first that Ascar would now be scared of the leash and chain, but it is most curious that he doesn’t show any fear of them. When Ted picks it up, he sometimes even tries to put his head through the loop. Not that we are complaining, mind you.
Subduing a canine as Ted did is nothing that could be recommend to anybody, for it is not exactly not dangerous to both the handler and the animal. However, in the above scenario, there was no way about it, and now we are glad that Ted mustered the courage. It just could not continue like it was. | 2019-04-25T16:07:48Z | http://safow.org/volume-12-issue-148-february-2017/ |
As Locke admits, his Essay is something of a mess, from an editorial point of view. What follows are what I take to be some of the most important passages from the book, grouped under topical headings in an attempt to make a coherent and systematic whole. Parts and headings are given in bold and are purely my invention. Section headings are given in italics, and are Locke’s. Otherwise, all material in italics is mine, not Locke’s. ‘…’ indicates an omission.
The Essay is organized into Books, Chapters, and Sections. The start of each section cites book.chapter.section. For example, ‘I.i.5’ means Book I, chapter i, section 5.
(From I.i.3—Method) It is therefore worth while to search out the bounds between opinion and knowledge; and examine by what measures, in things whereof we have no certain knowledge, we ought to regulate our assent and moderate our persuasion. In order whereunto I shall pursue this following method: First, I shall inquire into the original of those ideas, notions, or whatever else you please to call them, which a man observes, and is conscious to himself he has in his mind; and the ways whereby the understanding comes to be furnished with them. Secondly, I shall endeavour to show what knowledge the understanding hath by those ideas; and the certainty, evidence, and extent of it. Thirdly, I shall make some inquiry into the nature and grounds of faith or opinion: whereby I mean that assent which we give to any proposition as true, of whose truth yet we have no certain knowledge. And here we shall have occasion to examine the reasons and degrees of assent.
(From I.i.4—Useful to know the Extent of our Comprehension) If we can find out how far the understanding can extend its view; how far it has faculties to attain certainty; and in what cases it can only judge and guess, we may learn to content ourselves with what is attainable by us in this state.
(From I.i.5—Our Capacity suited to our State and Concerns) It will be no excuse to an idle and untoward servant, who would not attend his business by candle light, to plead that he had not broad sunshine. The Candle that is set up in us shines bright enough for all our purposes.
(From I.i.6—Knowledge of our Capacity a Cure of Scepticism and Idleness) When we know our own strength, we shall the better know what to undertake with hopes of success; and when we have well surveyed the powers of our own minds, and made some estimate what we may expect from them, we shall not be inclined either to sit still, and not set our thoughts on work at all, in despair of knowing anything; nor on the other side, question everything, and disclaim all knowledge, because some things are not to be understood. It is of great use to the sailor to know the length of his line, though he cannot with it fathom all the depths of the ocean. It is well he knows that it is long enough to reach the bottom, at such places as are necessary to direct his voyage, and caution him against running upon shoals that may ruin him. Our business here is not to know all things, but those which concern our conduct. If we can find out those measures, whereby a rational creature, put in that state in which man is in this world, may and ought to govern his opinions, and actions depending thereon, we need not to be troubled that some other things escape our knowledge.
What is Locke’s main project in the Essay?
What’s the point of pursuing it? What advantages does he expect to obtain from it?
What is distinctive about Locke’s project? What would Locke think of the method of, say, Spinoza?
Given Locke’s project, it makes sense that he begins by attacking the doctrine of innate knowledge. This attack was partly responsible for the Essay’s being banned at Oxford in 1704. Can you think why these thoughts might sound dangerous, and why Locke’s project begins where it does?
[I]f the capacity of knowing be the natural impression contended for, all the truths a man ever comes to know will, by this account, be every one of them innate; and this great point will amount to no more, but only to a very improper way of speaking; which, whilst it pretends to assert the contrary, says nothing different from those who deny innate principles. For nobody, I think, ever denied that the mind was capable of knowing several truths.
(From I.ii.15—The Steps by which the Mind attains several Truths) The senses at first let in particular ideas, and furnish the yet empty cabinet, and the mind by degrees growing familiar with some of them, they are lodged in the memory, and names got to them. Afterwards, the mind proceeding further, abstracts them, and by degrees learns the use of general names. In this manner the mind comes to be furnished with ideas and language, the materials about which to exercise its discursive faculty. And the use of reason becomes daily more visible, as these materials that give it employment increase. But though the having of general ideas and the use of general words and reason usually grow together, yet I see not how this any way proves them innate.
(From I.iv.20—No innate Ideas in the Memory) To which let me add: if there be any innate ideas, any ideas in the mind which the mind does not actually think on, they must be lodged in the memory; and from thence must be brought into view by remembrance; i.e., must be known, when they are remembered, to have been perceptions in the mind before; unless remembrance can be without remembrance. For, to remember is to perceive anything with memory, or with a consciousness that it was perceived or known before. Without this, whatever idea comes into the mind is new, and not remembered; this consciousness of its having been in the mind before, being that which distinguishes remembering from all other ways of thinking.
By this it may be tried whether there be any innate ideas in the mind before impression from sensation or reflection. I would fain meet with the man who, when he came to the use of reason, or at any other time, remembered any of them; and to whom, after he was born, they were never new. If any one will say, there are ideas in the mind that are not in the memory, I desire him to explain himself, and make what he says intelligible.
Why is Locke concerned to deny the doctrine of innate principles? Can you connect this with Locke’s project?
Premise 1: An innate idea is in the memory.
It’s one thing to attack the doctrines of innate knowledge and innate ideas; it’s another to come up with a replacement for them. Locke must explain how all our ideas are generated solely out of the materials given to us in experience, and how experience alone can justify our knowledge claims.
(From I.1.8—What Idea stands for) Thus much I thought necessary to say concerning the occasion of this inquiry into human understanding. But, before I proceed on to what I have thought on this subject, I must here in the entrance beg pardon of my reader for the frequent use of the word idea, which he will find in the following treatise. It being that term which, I think, serves best to stand for whatsoever is the object of the understanding when a man thinks, I have used it to express whatever is meant by phantasm, notion, species, or whatever it is which the mind can be employed about in thinking; and I could not avoid frequently using it. I presume it will be easily granted me, that there are such ideas in men’s minds: every one is conscious of them in himself; and men’s words and actions will satisfy him that they are in others.
(From IV.xxi.4) [S]ince the things the mind contemplates are none of them, besides itself, present to the understanding, it is necessary that something else, as a sign or representation of the thing it considers, should be present to it: and these are ideas.
(From II.i.2—All Ideas come from Sensation or Reflection) Let us then suppose the mind to be, as we say, white paper, void of all characters, without any ideas: how comes it to be furnished? … To this I answer, in one word, from experience. In that all our knowledge is founded; and from that it ultimately derives itself. Our observation employed either, about external sensible objects, or about the internal operations of our minds perceived and reflected on by ourselves, is that which supplies our understandings with all the materials of thinking. These two are the fountains of knowledge, from whence all the ideas we have, or can naturally have, do spring.
(From II.i.5—All our Ideas are of the one or of the other of these) … These, when we have taken a full survey of them, and their several modes, and the compositions made out of them we shall find to contain all our whole stock of ideas; and that we have nothing in our minds which did not come in one of these two ways. Let any one examine his own thoughts, and thoroughly search into his understanding; and then let him tell me, whether all the original ideas he has there, are any other than of the objects of his senses, or of the operations of his mind, considered as objects of his reflection.
Locke thinks that sensation and reflection are our only sources of ideas. We should now look at his response to Descartes’s argument for a third source of ideas, namely, the intellect (see the second paragraph of the Sixth Meditation.
(From II.xxix.13—Complex ideas may be distinct in one part, and confused in another) Our complex ideas, being made up of collections, and so variety of simple ones, may accordingly be very clear and distinct in one part, and very obscure and confused in another. In a man who speaks of a chiliaedron, or a body of a thousand sides, the ideas of the figure may be very confused, though that of the number be very distinct; so that he being able to discourse and demonstrate concerning that part of his complex idea which depends upon the number of thousand, he is apt to think he has a distinct idea of a chiliaedron; though it be plain he has no precise idea of its figure, so as to distinguish it, by that, from one that has but 999 sides: the not observing whereof causes no small error in men’s thoughts, and confusion in their discourses.
How does Locke respond to Descartes’s argument for the distinction between the intellect and the imagination? Who is right?
(From II.i.1—Uncompounded Appearances) The better to understand the nature, manner, and extent of our knowledge, one thing is carefully to be observed concerning the ideas we have; and that is, that some of them, are simple and some complex.
Though the qualities that affect our senses are, in the things themselves, so united and blended, that there is no separation, no distance between them; yet it is plain, the ideas they produce in the mind enter by the senses simple; and unmixed. For, though the sight and touch often take in from the same object, at the same time, different ideas;–as a man sees at once motion and colour; the hand feels softness and warmth in the same piece of wax: yet the simple ideas thus united in the same subject, are as perfectly distinct as those that come in by different senses.
(From II.iii.1—Division of simple ideas) The better to conceive the ideas we receive from sensation, it may not be amiss for us to consider them, in reference to the different ways whereby they make their approaches to our minds, and make themselves perceivable by us. First, then, there are some which come into our minds by one sense only. Secondly, there are others that convey themselves into the mind by more senses than one. Thirdly, others that are had from reflection only. Fourthly, there are some that make themselves way, and are suggested to the mind by all the ways of sensation and reflection.
As we’ll see, some ideas turn out to be ideas of powers rather than of qualities. So we’ll need a story about how we get our idea of power as a building block, before we can move on to the primary/secondary quality distinction.
(From II.xxi.1—This Idea [of power] how got) The mind being every day informed, by the senses, of the alteration of those simple ideas it observes in things without; and taking notice how one comes to an end, and ceases to be, and another begins to exist which was not before; reflecting also on what passes within itself, and observing a constant change of its ideas, sometimes by the impression of outward objects on the senses, and sometimes by the determination of its own choice; and concluding from what it has so constantly observed to have been, that the like changes will for the future be made in the same things, by like agents, and by the like ways, considers in one thing the possibility of having any of its simple ideas changed, and in another the possibility of making that change; and so comes by that idea which we call power. Thus we say, fire has a power to melt gold, i.e., to destroy the consistency of its insensible parts, and consequently its hardness, and make it fluid … In which, and the like cases, the power we consider is in reference to the change of perceivable ideas. For we cannot observe any alteration to be made in, or operation upon anything, but by the observable change of its sensible ideas; nor conceive any alteration to be made, but by conceiving a change of some of its ideas.
(From II.xxi.2—Power, active and passive) Power thus considered is two-fold, viz. As able to make, or able to receive any change. The one may be called active, and the other passive power. Whether matter be not wholly destitute of active power, as its author, God, is truly above all passive power; and whether the intermediate state of created spirits be not that alone which is capable of both active and passive power, may be worth consideration. I shall not now enter into that inquiry, my present business being not to search into the original of power, but how we come by the idea of it. But since active powers make so great a part of our complex ideas of natural substances, (as we shall see hereafter,) and I mention them as such, according to common apprehension; yet they being not, perhaps, so truly active powers as our hasty thoughts are apt to represent them, I judge it not amiss, by this intimation, to direct our minds to the consideration of god and spirits, for the clearest idea of active power.
(From II.xxi.3—Power includes Relation) I confess power includes in it some kind of relation (a relation to action or change,) as indeed which of our ideas of what kind soever, when attentively considered, does not. For, our ideas of extension, duration, and number, do they not all contain in them a secret relation of the parts? figure and motion have something relative in them much more visibly. … Our idea therefore of power, I think, may well have a place amongst other simple ideas, and be considered as one of them; being one of those that make a principal ingredient in our complex ideas of substances, as we shall hereafter have occasion to observe.
(From II.xxi.4—The clearest Idea of active Power had from Spirit) [I]f we will consider it attentively, bodies, by our senses, do not afford us so clear and distinct an idea of active power, as we have from reflection on the operations of our minds. For all power relating to action, and there being but two sorts of action whereof we have an idea, viz. Thinking and motion, let us consider whence we have the clearest ideas of the powers which produce these actions.
Of thinking, body affords us no idea at all; it is only from reflection that we have that.
Neither have we from body any idea of the beginning of motion. A body at rest affords us no idea of any active power to move; and when it is set in motion itself, that motion is rather a passion than an action in it. For, when the ball obeys the motion of a billiard-stick, it is not any action of the ball, but bare passion. Also when by impulse it sets another ball in motion that lay in its way, it only communicates the motion it had received from another, and loses in itself so much as the other received: which gives us but a very obscure idea of an active power of moving in body, whilst we observe it only to transfer, but not produce any motion.
Is the idea of power a simple idea or not? What turns on this?
How does the mind form an idea of power?
Why does sensation not give us an idea of active power?
II.viii is intended as a further discussion of simple ideas. Locke draws what should by now be a familiar distinction. Can you reconstruct Locke’s argument?
(From II.viii.8—Our Ideas and the Qualities of Bodies) Whatsoever the mind perceives in itself, or is the immediate object of perception, thought, or understanding, that I call idea; and the power to produce any idea in our mind, I call quality of the subject wherein that power is. Thus a snowball having the power to produce in us the ideas of white, cold, and round—the power to produce those ideas in us, as they are in the snowball, I call qualities; and as they are sensations or perceptions in our understandings, I call them ideas; which ideas, if I speak of sometimes as in the things themselves, I would be understood to mean those qualities in the objects which produce them in us.
(From II.viii.11—How Bodies produce Ideas in us) The next thing to be considered is, how bodies operate one upon another; and that is manifestly by impulse, and nothing else. It being impossible to conceive that body should operate on what it does not touch (which is all one as to imagine it can operate where it is not), or when it does touch, operate any other way than by motion.
(From II.viii.13—How secondary Qualities produce their ideas) After the same manner that the ideas of these original qualities are produced in us, we may conceive that the ideas of secondary qualities are also produced, viz. By the operation of insensible particles on our senses. … [L]et us suppose at present that, the different motions and figures, bulk and number, of such particles, affecting the several organs of our senses, produce in us those different sensations which we have from the colours and smells of bodies … It being no more impossible to conceive that god should annex such ideas to such motions, with which they have no similitude, than that he should annex the idea of pain to the motion of a piece of steel dividing our flesh, with which that idea hath no resemblance.
(From II.viii.14—They depend on the primary Qualities) What I have said concerning colours and smells may be understood also of tastes and sounds, and other the like sensible qualities; which, whatever reality we by mistake attribute to them, are in truth nothing in the objects themselves, but powers to produce various sensations in us; and depend on those primary qualities, viz. Bulk, figure, texture, and motion of parts and therefore I call them secondary qualities.
(From II.viii.17—The ideas of the Primary alone really exist) The particular bulk, number, figure, and motion of the parts of fire or snow are really in them, whether any one’s senses perceive them or no: and therefore they may be called real qualities, because they really exist in those bodies. But light, heat, whiteness, or coldness, are no more really in them than sickness or pain is in manna. Take away the sensation of them; let not the eyes see light or colours, nor the can hear sounds; let the palate not taste, nor the nose smell, and all colours, tastes, odours, and sounds, as they are such particular ideas, vanish and cease, and are reduced to their causes, i.e., bulk, figure, and motion of parts.
(From II.viii.19—Examples) Let us consider the red and white colours in porphyry. Hinder light from striking on it, and its colours vanish; it no longer produces any such ideas in us: upon the return of light it produces these appearances on us again. Can any one think any real alterations are made in the porphyry by the presence or absence of light; and that those ideas of whiteness and redness are really in porphyry in the light, when it is plain it has no colour in the dark? It has, indeed, such a configuration of particles, both night and day, as are apt, by the rays of light rebounding from some parts of that hard stone, to produce in us the idea of redness, and from others the idea of whiteness; but whiteness or redness are not in it at any time, but such a texture that hath the power to produce such a sensation in us.
(From II.viii.20) Pound an almond, and the clear white colour will be altered into a dirty one, and the sweet taste into an oily one. What real alteration can the beating of the pestle make in an body, but an alteration of the texture of it?
(From II.viii.21—Explains how water felt as cold by one hand may be warm to the other) Ideas being thus distinguished and understood, we may be able to give an account how the same water, at the same time, may produce the idea of cold by one hand and of heat by the other: whereas it is impossible that the same water, if those ideas were really in it, should at the same time be both hot and cold. For, if we imagine warmth, as it is in our hands, to be nothing but a certain sort and degree of motion in the minute particles of our nerves or animal spirits, we may understand how it is possible that the same water may, at the same time, produce the sensations of heat in one hand and cold in the other; which yet figure never does, that never producing the idea of a square by one hand which has produced the idea of a globe by another.
If there were no observers or perceivers, what would the world be like, according to Locke? That is, what qualities does a physical object have in itself?
How does Locke argue for his three theses? Let’s start with (i): ideas of secondary qualities resemble nothing in the objects.
Recall Aquinas’s picture of (bodily) causation: one object (e.g., fire) produces in another the same kind of quality it has in itself (e.g., heat). Why does Locke think that there isn’t really any heat in the first object? Let’s take a case where fire produces a sensation of heat in a person. If our sensation of heat resembled any quality in the object, that quality would have to be the cause of the heat that it produces.
Why does Locke reject this? (see especially II.viii.11 above).
But as Locke points out, ideas of secondary qualities depend not just on the objects; they also depend on the perceivers.
Think of as many different ways to change the color of this room as you can.
So far, we’ve dealt only with simple ideas. But our experience doesn’t seem to come to us packaged in simple, discrete elements. So Locke needs to deal with how we generate experiences (and thoughts) of ordinary objects—what he calls ‘substances’– out of simple ideas.
(From II.xii.1—Made by the Mind out of simple Ones) We have hitherto considered those ideas, in the reception whereof the mind is only passive, which are those simple ones received from sensation and reflection before mentioned, whereof the mind cannot make one to itself, nor have any idea which does not wholly consist of them. … Ideas thus made up of several simple ones put together, I call complex.
(From II.xii.2—Made voluntarily) In this faculty of repeating and joining together its ideas, the mind has great power in varying and multiplying the objects of its thoughts, infinitely beyond what sensation or reflection furnished it with: but all this still confined to those simple ideas which it received from those two sources, and which are the ultimate materials of all its compositions.
(From II.xxiii.1—Ideas of substances, how made) The mind being, as I have declared, furnished with a great number of the simple ideas, conveyed in by the senses as they are found in exterior things, or by reflection on its own operations, takes notice also that a certain number of these simple ideas go constantly together; which being presumed to belong to one thing, and words being suited to common apprehensions, and made use of for quick dispatch are called, so united in one subject, by one name; which, by inadvertency, we are apt afterward to talk of and consider as one simple idea, which indeed is a complication of many ideas together: because, as I have said, not imagining how these simple ideas can subsist by themselves, we accustom ourselves to suppose some substratum wherein they do subsist, and from which they do result, which therefore we call substance.
List the ideas necessary to construct an idea of a substance like Helga (a dog).
Our simple ideas represent qualities; to think of a substance like a dog, however, we need to think of these qualities as inhering in or being unified by some underlying substratum (which he sometimes also calls ‘pure substance in general’). What is Locke’s attitude toward this substratum, and our knowledge of it?
(From II.xiii.19—Substance and accidents of little use in Philosophy) They who first ran into the notion of accidents, as a sort of real beings that needed something to inhere in, were forced to find out the word substance to support them. Had the poor Indian philosopher (who imagined that the earth also wanted something to bear it up) but thought of this word substance, he needed not to have been at the trouble to find an elephant to support it, and a tortoise to support his elephant: the word substance would have done it effectually. And he that inquired might have taken it for as good an answer from an Indian philosopher—that substance, without knowing what it is, is that which supports the earth, as take it for a sufficient answer and good doctrine from our european philosophers—that substance, without knowing what it is, is that which supports accidents. So that of substance, we have no idea of what it is, but only a confused obscure one of what it does.
(From II.xiii.20—Sticking on and under-propping) Whatever a learned man may do here, an intelligent american, who inquired into the nature of things, would scarce take it for a satisfactory account, if, desiring to learn our architecture, he should be told that a pillar is a thing supported by a basis, and a basis something that supported a pillar. Would he not think himself mocked, instead of taught, with such an account as this? … Were the latin words, inhaerentia and substantio, put into the plain english ones that answer them, and were called sticking on and under-propping, they would better discover to us the very great clearness there is in the doctrine of substance and accidents, and show of what use they are in deciding of questions in philosophy.
(From II.xxiii.23—Our obscure Idea of Substance in general) So that if any one will examine himself concerning his notion of pure substance in general, he will find he has no other idea of it at all, but only a supposition of he knows not what support of such qualities which are capable of producing simple ideas in us; which qualities are commonly called accidents. If any one should be asked, what is the subject wherein colour or weight inheres, he would have nothing to say, but the solid extended parts; and if he were demanded, what is it that solidity and extension adhere in, he would not be in a much better case than the Indian before mentioned who, saying that the world was supported by a great elephant, was asked what the elephant rested on; to which his answer was—a great tortoise: but being again pressed to know what gave support to the broad-backed tortoise, replied—something, he knew not what.
It’s vital to see that by ‘substance’ Locke means here ‘substratum’: that in which properties inhere. This notion is akin to Aristotle’s notion of prime matter. Why might one say that Locke has a love/hate relationship with substratum?
Now that we know how we think about individual substances (e.g., an elephant), we need to know how we can think about kinds or sorts of things. I’m not limited to thinking (or talking) about individual substances; I can make claims that apply to groups or sorts of substances. Locke’s abstraction is the mechanism by which we move from purely determinate ideas to general ones.
Keep in mind that Locke has two kinds of fish to fry in this context: the Cartesians, who think that the essence of body is just extension, and the Aristotelians, who think that the world presents itself to us as if it were ‘carved at the joints’ into innumerable distinct natural kinds. In this context, Locke’s role as an ‘under-labourer’ to science is most in evidence.
(From III.ii.6—How general Words are made) … Words become general by being made the signs of general ideas: and ideas become general, by separating from them the circumstances of time and place, and any other ideas that may determine them to this or that particular existence. By this way of abstraction they are made capable of representing more individuals than one; each of which having in it a conformity to that abstract idea, is (as we call it) of that sort.
(From III.ii.7—Shown by the way we enlarge our complex ideas from infancy) … [T]here is nothing more evident, than that the ideas of the persons children converse with (to instance in them alone) are, like the persons themselves, only particular. The ideas of the nurse and the mother are well framed in their minds; and, like pictures of them there, represent only those individuals. The names they first gave to them are confined to these individuals; and the names of nurse and mamma, the child uses, determine themselves to those persons. Afterwards, when time and a larger acquaintance have made them observe that there are a great many other things in the world, that in some common agreements of shape, and several other qualities, resemble their father and mother, and those persons they have been used to, they frame an idea, which they find those many particulars do partake in; and to that they give, with others, the name man, for example. And thus they come to have a general name, and a general idea. Wherein they make nothing new; but only leave out of the complex idea they had of Peter and James, Mary and Jane, that which is peculiar to each, and retain only what is common to them all.
(From III.iii.11—General and Universal are Creatures of the Understanding, and belong not to the Real Existence of things) [I]t is plain, by what has been said, that general and universal belong not to the real existence of things; but are the inventions and creatures of the understanding, made by it for its own use, and concern only signs, whether words or ideas. … [I]deas are general when they are set up as the representatives of many particular things: but universality belongs not to things themselves, which are all of them particular in their existence, even those words and ideas which in their signification are general. When therefore we quit particulars, the generals that rest are only creatures of our own making; their general nature being nothing but the capacity they are put into, by the understanding, of signifying or representing many particulars. For the signification they have is nothing but a relation that, by the mind of man, is added to them.
(From III.iii.13—They are the Workmanship of the Understanding, but have their Foundation in the Similitude of Things) I would not here be thought to forget, much less to deny, that Nature, in the production of things, makes several of them alike: there is nothing more obvious, especially in the races of animals, and all things propagated by seed. But yet I think we may say, the sorting of them under names is the workmanship of the understanding, taking occasion, from the similitude it observes amongst them, to make abstract general ideas, and set them up in the mind, with names annexed to them, as patterns or forms, (for, in that sense, the word form has a very proper signification,) to which as particular things existing are found to agree, so they come to be of that species, have that denomination, or are put into that class.
(From III.iii.15—Several significations of the word Essence) But since the essences of things are thought by some (and not without reason) to be wholly unknown, it may not be amiss to consider the several significations of the word essence.
Real essences. First, essence may be taken for the very being of anything, whereby it is what it is. And thus the real internal, but generally (in substances) unknown constitution of things, whereon their discoverable qualities depend, may be called their essence. This is the proper original signification of the word, as is evident from the formation of it; essential in its primary notation, signifying properly, being. And in this sense it is still used, when we speak of the essence of particular things, without giving them any name.
Nominal essences. Secondly, the learning and disputes of the schools having been much busied about genus and species, the word essence has almost lost its primary signification: and, instead of the real constitution of things, has been almost wholly applied to the artificial constitution of genus and species. It is true, there is ordinarily supposed a real constitution of the sorts of things; and it is past doubt there must be some real constitution, on which any collection of simple ideas co-existing must depend. But, it being evident that things are ranked under names into sorts or species, only as they agree to certain abstract ideas, to which we have annexed those names, the essence of each genus, or sort, comes to be nothing but that abstract idea which the general, or sortal (if I may have leave so to call it from sort, as I do general from genus,) name stands for. And this we shall find to be that which the word essence imports in its most familiar use. These two sorts of essences, I suppose, may not unfitly be termed, the one the real, the other nominal essence.
(From III.vi.6—Even the real essences of individual substances imply potential sorts) It is true, I have often mentioned a real essence, distinct in substances from those abstract ideas of them, which I call their nominal essence. By this real essence I mean, that real constitution of anything, which is the foundation of all those properties that are combined in, and are constantly found to co-exist with the nominal essence; that particular constitution which everything has within itself, without any relation to anything without it. But essence, even in this sense, relates to a sort, and supposes a species. For, being that real constitution on which the properties depend, it necessarily supposes a sort of things, properties belonging only to species, and not to individuals: e.g., supposing the nominal essence of gold to be a body of such a peculiar colour and weight, with malleability and fusibility, the real essence is that constitution of the parts of matter on which these qualities and their union depend; and is also the foundation of its solubility in aqua regia and other properties, accompanying that complex idea. Hre are essences and properties, but all upon supposition of a sort or general abstract idea, which is considered as immutable; but there is no individual parcel of matter to which any of these qualities are so annexed as to be essential to it or inseparable from it.
(From III.vi.50) For, let us consider, when we affirm that ‘all gold is fixed,’ either it means that fixedness is a part of the definition, i.e., part of the nominal essence the word ‘gold’ stands for; and so this affirmation, ‘all gold is fixed,’ contains nothing but the signification of the term ‘gold’.
Or else it means, that fixedness, not being a part of the definition of ‘gold’, is a property of that substance itself: in which case it is plain that the word ‘gold’ stands in the place of a substance, having the real essence of a species of things made by nature. In which way of substitution it has so confused and uncertain a signification, that, though this proposition—‘gold is fixed’—be in that sense an affirmation of something real; yet it is a truth will always fail us in its particular application, and so is of no real use or certainty. For let it be ever so true, that all gold, i.e., all that has the real essence of gold, is fixed, what serves this for, whilst we know not, in this sense, what is or is not gold? For if we know not the real essence of gold, it is impossible we should know what parcel of matter has that essence, and so whether it be true gold or no.
In this passage, Locke argues that all general claims about kinds (e.g., ‘gold is fixed’) are either trivial or uncertain. Using the gold example, explain each of these alternatives. In what way can it be taken as trivial? As uncertain?
Now that we have some story about how our ideas of substances are constructed, we need to look at the two main kinds of substance we seem to find in the world: mind and body. Notice Locke’s argument against Descartes’s conflation of body and extension. Locke also replies here to Leibniz’s argument against Newtonian space, namely, that it must be either a substance or an accident, and neither makes much sense.
(From II.xiii.17—Cohesion of solid parts and Impulse, the primary ideas peculiar to Body) The primary ideas we have peculiar to body, as contradistinguished to spirit, are the cohesion of solid, and consequently separable, parts, and a power of communicating motion by impulse. These, I think, are the original ideas proper and peculiar to body; for figure is but the consequence of finite extension.
(From II.xiii.11—Extension and Body not the same) There are some that would persuade us, that body and extension are the same thing … If, therefore, they mean by body and extension the same that other people do, viz. By body something that is solid and extended, whose parts are separable and movable different ways; and by extension, only the space that lies between the extremities of those solid coherent parts, and which is possessed by them, [then] they confound very different ideas one with another; for I appeal to every man’s own thoughts, whether the idea of space be not as distinct from that of solidity, as it is from the idea of scarlet colour? It is true, solidity cannot exist without extension, neither can scarlet colour exist without extension, but this hinders not, but that they are distinct ideas.
And if it be a reason to prove that spirit is different from body, because thinking includes not the idea of extension in it; the same reason will be as valid, I suppose, to prove that space is not body, because it includes not the idea of solidity in it; space and solidity being as distinct ideas as thinking and extension, and as wholly separable in the mind one from another … Extension includes no solidity, nor resistance to the motion of body, as body does.
(From II.xiii.3—Space and Extension) This space, considered barely in length between any two beings, without considering anything else between them, is called distance: if considered in length, breadth, and thickness, I think it may be called capacity. When considered between the extremities of matter, which fills the capacity of space with something solid, tangible, and moveable, it is properly called extension. And so extension is an idea belonging to body only; but space may, as is evident, be considered without it.
(From II.xiii.17—Substance, which we know not, no proof against space without body) If it be demanded (as usually it is) whether this space, void of body, be substance or accident, I shall readily answer I know not; nor shall be ashamed to own my ignorance, till they that ask show me a clear distinct idea of substance.
Locke here sets out the constituent ideas that make up the complex idea of the mind. He also launches an attack against Descartes’s claim that thought is the essence of the soul. Most famously, he denies that we can be sure that what thinks in us in an immaterial substance.
(From II.xxiii.18. Thinking and motivity) The ideas we have belonging and peculiar to spirit, are thinking, and will, or a power of putting body into motion by thought, and, which is consequent to it, liberty. For, as body cannot but communicate its motion by impulse to another body, which it meets with at rest, so the mind can put bodies into motion, or forbear to do so, as it pleases. The ideas of existence, duration, and mobility, are common to them both.
But men in love with their opinions may not only suppose what is in question, but allege wrong matter of fact. How else could any one make it an inference of mine, that a thing is not, because we are not sensible of it in our sleep? I do not say there is no soul in a man, because he is not sensible of it in his sleep; but I do say, he cannot think at any time, waking or sleeping, without being sensible of it. Our being sensible of it is not necessary to anything but to our thoughts; and to them it is; and to them it always will be necessary, till we can think without being conscious of it.
Premise 3: But experience shows _______.
(From II.i.11—It is not always conscious of [thinking]) I grant that the soul, in a waking man, is never without thought, because it is the condition of being awake. But whether sleeping without dreaming be not an affection of the whole man, mind as well as body, may be worth a waking man’s consideration; it being hard to conceive that anything should think and not be conscious of it. If the soul doth think in a sleeping man without being conscious of it, I ask whether, during such thinking, it has any pleasure or pain, or be capable of happiness or misery? I am sure the man is not; no more than the bed or earth he lies on. For to be happy or miserable without being conscious of it, seems to me utterly inconsistent and impossible. Or if it be possible that the soul can, whilst the body is sleeping, have its thinking, enjoyments, and concerns, its pleasures or pain, apart, which the man is not conscious of nor partakes in—it is certain that Socrates asleep and Socrates awake is not the same person; but his soul when he sleeps, and Socrates the man, consisting of body and soul, when he is waking, are two persons: since waking Socrates has no knowledge of, or concernment for that happiness or misery of his soul, which it enjoys alone by itself whilst he sleeps, without perceiving anything of it; no more than he has for the happiness or misery of a man in the indies, whom he knows not. For, if we take wholly away all consciousness of our actions and sensations, especially of pleasure and pain, and the concernment that accompanies it, it will be hard to know wherein to place personal identity.
What price does Locke think Descartes must pay, in order to hang on to his claim that the soul always thinks?
(From II.xxiii.16—No Idea of abstract Substance either in Body or Spirit) By the complex idea of extended, figured, coloured, and all other sensible qualities, which is all that we know of it, we are as far from the idea of the substance of body, as if we knew nothing at all: nor after all the acquaintance and familiarity which we imagine we have with matter, and the many qualities men assure themselves they perceive and know in bodies, will it perhaps upon examination be found, that they have any more or clearer primary ideas belonging to body, than they have belonging to immaterial spirit.
(From II.xxiii.23—Cohesion of solid Parts in Body as hard to be conceived as thinking in a Soul) [I]f [a man] says he knows not how he thinks, I answer, Neither knows he how he is extended, how the solid parts of body are united or cohere together to make extension. For though the pressure of the particles of air may account for the cohesion of several parts of matter that are grosser than the particles of air, and have pores less than the corpuscles of air, yet the weight or pressure of the air will not explain, nor can be a cause of the coherence of the particles of air themselves. And if the pressure of the aether, or any subtiler matter than the air, may unite, and hold fast together, the parts of a particle of air, as well as other bodies, yet it cannot make bonds for itself, and hold together the parts that make up every the least corpuscle of that materia subtilis.
Locke is here raising the problem of transference: how can one body give its motion to another? See Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles Chapter Sixty-nine, Section Seven, and Descartes’s Principles (Part II, sections xxiv-v). How would each react to what Locke says here?
(From IV.iii.6—Our Knowledge, therefore narrower than our Ideas) From all which it is evident, that the extent of our knowledge comes not only short of the reality of things, but even of the extent of our own ideas. Though our knowledge be limited to our ideas, and cannot exceed them either in extent or perfection; … Yet it would be well with us if our knowledge were but as large as our ideas, and there were not many doubts and inquiries concerning the ideas we have, whereof we are not, nor I believe ever shall be in this world resolved. Nevertheless, I do not question but that human knowledge, under the present circumstances of our beings and constitutions, may be carried much further than it has hitherto been, if men would sincerely, and with freedom of mind, employ all that industry and labour of thought, in improving the means of discovering truth, which they do for the colouring or support of falsehood, to maintain a system, interest, or party they are once engaged in.
… We have the ideas of a square, a circle, and equality; and yet, perhaps, shall never be able to find a circle equal to a square, and certainly know that it is so. We have the ideas of matter and thinking, but possibly shall never be able to know whether [any mere material being] thinks or no; it being impossible for us, by the contemplation of our own ideas, without revelation, to discover whether Omnipotency has not given to some systems of matter, fitly disposed, a power to perceive and think, or else joined and fixed to matter, so disposed, a thinking immaterial substance: it being, in respect of our notions, not much more remote from our comprehension to conceive that God can, if he pleases, superadd to matter a faculty of thinking, than that he should superadd to it another substance with a faculty of thinking; since we know not wherein thinking consists, nor to what sort of substances the Almighty has been pleased to give that power, which cannot be in any created being, but merely by the good pleasure and bounty of the Creator. For I see no contradiction in it, that the first Eternal thinking Being, or Omnipotent Spirit, should, if he pleased, give to certain systems of created senseless matter, put together as he thinks fit, some degrees of sense, perception, and thought: though, as I think I have proved, lib. iv. Ch. 10, Section 14, &c., it is no less than a contradiction to suppose matter (which is evidently in its own nature void of sense and thought) should be that Eternal first-thinking Being. What certainty of knowledge can any one have, that some perceptions, such as, e.g., pleasure and pain, should not be in some bodies themselves, after a certain manner modified and moved, as well as that they should be in an immaterial substance, upon the motion of the parts of body: Body, as far as we can conceive, being able only to strike and affect body, and motion, according to the utmost reach of our ideas, being able to produce nothing but motion; so that when we allow it to produce pleasure or pain, or the idea of a colour or sound, we are fain to quit our reason, go beyond our ideas, and attribute it wholly to the good pleasure of our Maker. For, since we must allow He has annexed effects to motion which we can no way conceive motion able to produce, what reason have we to conclude that He could not order them as well to be produced in a subject we cannot conceive capable of them, as well as in a subject we cannot conceive the motion of matter can any way operate upon? I say not this, that I would any way lessen the belief of the soul’s immateriality: I am not here speaking of probability, but knowledge, and I think not only that it becomes the modesty of philosophy not to pronounce magisterially, where we want that evidence that can produce knowledge; but also, that it is of use to us to discern how far our knowledge does reach; for the state we are at present in, not being that of vision, we must in many things content ourselves with faith and probability: and in the present question, about the Immateriality of the Soul, if our faculties cannot arrive at demonstrative certainty, we need not think it strange. All the great ends of morality and religion are well enough secured, without philosophical proofs of the soul’s immateriality … since it is evident, that he who made us at the beginning to subsist here, sensible intelligent beings, and for several years continued us in such a state, can and will restore us to the like state of sensibility in another world, and make us capable there to receive the retribution he has designed to men, according to their doings in this life.
Can Locke make good on his claim that ‘all the great ends of religion and morality’ can be served, even without a proof of the soul’s immortality? Both religion and morality require, Locke thinks, the certainty of post-mortem rewards and harms. But how can we make sense of the self surviving the death of the body, if we cannot show that the self is immaterial?
(From II.xxvii.8—Idea of identity suited to the idea it is applied to) It is not therefore unity of substance that comprehends all sorts of identity, or will determine it in every case; but to conceive and judge of it aright, we must consider what idea the word it is applied to stands for: it being one thing to be the same substance, another the same man, and a third the same person, if person, man, and substance, are three names standing for three different ideas;—for such as is the idea belonging to that name, such must be the identity; which, if it had been a little more carefully attended to, would possibly have prevented a great deal of that confusion which often occurs about this matter, with no small seeming difficulties, especially concerning personal identity, which therefore we shall in the next place a little consider.
(From II.xxvii.4) [L]et us suppose an atom, i.e., a continued body under one immutable superficies, existing in a determined time and place; it is evident, that, considered in any instant of its existence, it is in that instant the same with itself. For, being at that instant what it is, and nothing else, it is the same, and so must continue as long as its existence is continued; for so long it will be the same, and no other. In like manner, if two or more atoms be joined together into the same mass, every one of those atoms will be the same, by the foregoing rule: and whilst they exist united together, the mass, consisting of the same atoms, must be the same mass, or the same body, let the parts be ever so differently jumbled. But if one of these atoms be taken away, or one new one added, it is no longer the same mass or the same body. In the state of living creatures, their identity depends not on a mass of the same particles, but on something else. For in them the variation of great parcels of matter alters not the identity: an oak growing from a plant to a great tree, and then lopped, is still the same oak; and a colt grown up to a horse, sometimes fat, sometimes lean, is all the while the same horse: though, in both these cases, there may be a manifest change of the parts; so that truly they are not either of them the same masses of matter, though they be truly one of them the same oak, and the other the same horse. The reason whereof is, that, in these two cases—a mass of matter and a living body—identity is not applied to the same thing.
(From II.xxvii.5–Identity of Vegetables) We must therefore consider wherein an oak differs from a mass of matter, and that seems to me to be in this, that the one is only the cohesion of particles of matter any how united, the other such a disposition of them as constitutes the parts of an oak; and such an organization of those parts as is fit to receive and distribute nourishment, so as to continue and frame the wood, bark, and leaves, &c., of an oak, in which consists the vegetable life. That being then one plant which has such an organization of parts in one coherent body, partaking of one common life, it continues to be the same plant as long as it partakes of the same life, though that life be communicated to new particles of matter vitally united to the living plant, in a like continued organization conformable to that sort of plants. For this organization, being at any one instant in any one collection of matter, is in that particular concrete distinguished from all other, and is that individual life, which existing constantly from that moment both forwards and backwards, in the same continuity of insensibly succeeding parts united to the living body of the plant, it has that identity which makes the same plant, and all the parts of it, parts of the same plant, during all the time that they exist united in that continued organization, which is fit to convey that common life to all the parts so united.
(From II.xxvii.7—The Identity of Man) This also shows wherein the identity of the same man consists; viz. in nothing but a participation of the same continued life, by constantly fleeting particles of matter, in succession vitally united to the same organized body.
(From II.xxvii.11—Personal Identity) This being premised, to find wherein personal identity consists, we must consider what person stands for; which, I think, is a thinking intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing, in different times and places; which it does only by that consciousness which is inseparable from thinking, and, as it seems to me, essential to it: it being impossible for any one to perceive without perceiving that he does perceive. When we see, hear, smell, taste, feel, meditate, or will anything, we know that we do so. Thus it is always as to our present sensations and perceptions: and by this every one is to himself that which he calls self—it not being considered, in this case, whether the same self be continued in the same or divers substances. For, since consciousness always accompanies thinking, and it is that which makes every one to be what he calls self, and thereby distinguishes himself from all other thinking things, in this alone consists personal identity, i.e., the sameness of a rational being: and as far as this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person; it is the same self now it was then; and it is by the same self with this present one that now reflects on it, that that action was done.
(From II.xxvii.12—Consciousness makes personal Identity) But it is further inquired, whether it be the same identical substance. This few would think they had reason to doubt of, if these perceptions, with their consciousness, always remained present in the mind, whereby the same thinking thing would be always consciously present, and, as would be thought, evidently the same to itself. But that which seems to make the difficulty is this, that this consciousness being interrupted always by forgetfulness, there being no moment of our lives wherein we have the whole train of all our past actions before our eyes in one view, but even the best memories losing the sight of one part whilst they are viewing another; and we sometimes, and that the greatest part of our lives, not reflecting on our past selves, being intent on our present thoughts, and in sound sleep having no thoughts at all, or at least none with that consciousness which remarks our waking thoughts—I say, in all these cases, our consciousness being interrupted, and we losing the sight of our past selves, doubts are raised whether we are the same thinking thing, i.e., the same substance or no. Which, however reasonable or unreasonable, concerns not personal identity at all. … For as far as any intelligent being can repeat the idea of any past action with the same consciousness it had of it at first, and with the same consciousness it has of any present action; so far it is the same personal self. For it is by the consciousness it has of its present thoughts and actions, that it is self to itself now, and so will be the same self, as far as the same consciousness can extend to actions past or to come; and would be by distance of time, or change of substance, no more two persons, than a man be two men by wearing other clothes to-day than he did yesterday, with a long or a short sleep between: the same consciousness uniting those distant actions into the same person, whatever substances contributed to their production.
(From II.xxvii.15—Whether in Change of thinking Substances there can be one Person) [I]t must be allowed, that, if the same consciousness (which, as has been shown, is quite a different thing from the same numerical figure or motion in body) can be transferred from one thinking substance to another, it will be possible that two thinking substances may make but one person. For the same consciousness being preserved, whether in the same or different substances, the personal identity is preserved.
(From II.xxvii.17—The body, as well as the soul, goes to the making of a Man) And thus may we be able, without any difficulty, to conceive the same person at the resurrection, though in a body not exactly in make or parts the same which he had here, the same consciousness going along with the soul that inhabits it. But yet the soul alone, in the change of bodies, would scarce to any one but to him that makes the soul the man, be enough to make the same man. For should the soul of a prince, carrying with it the consciousness of the prince’s past life, enter and inform the body of a cobbler, as soon as deserted by his own soul, every one sees he would be the same person with the prince, accountable only for the prince’s actions: but who would say it was the same man?
(From II.xxvii.19—Self depends on Consciousness, not on Substance) Self is that conscious thinking thing—whatever substance made up of (whether spiritual or material, simple or compounded, it matters not)—which is sensible or conscious of pleasure and pain, capable of happiness or misery, and so is concerned for itself, as far as that consciousness extends.
(From II.xxvii.20—Persons, not Substances, the Objects of Reward and Punishment) In this personal identity is founded all the right and justice of reward and punishment; happiness and misery being that for which every one is concerned for himself, and not mattering what becomes of any substance, not joined to, or affected with that consciousness.
(From II.xxvii.21—Which shows wherein Personal identity consists) This may show us wherein personal identity consists: not in the identity of substance, but, as I have said, in the identity of consciousness … if Socrates waking and sleeping do not partake of the same consciousness, Socrates waking and sleeping is not the same person. And to punish Socrates waking for what sleeping Socrates thought, and waking Socrates was never conscious of, would be no more of right, than to punish one twin for what his brother-twin did, whereof he knew nothing, because their outsides were so like, that they could not be distinguished; for such twins have been seen.
(From II.xxvii.24—Objection) But is not a man drunk and sober the same person? Why else is he punished for the fact he commits when drunk, though he be never afterwards conscious of it? Just as much the same person as a man that walks, and does other things in his sleep, is the same person, and is answerable for any mischief he shall do in it. Human laws punish both, with a justice suitable to their way of knowledge; because, in these cases, they cannot distinguish certainly what is real, what counterfeit: and so the ignorance in drunkenness or sleep is not admitted as a plea. But in the great day, wherein the secrets of all hearts shall be laid open, it may be reasonable to think, no one shall be made to answer for what he knows nothing of; but shall receive his doom, his conscience accusing or excusing him.
What is Locke’s sortal relativity thesis?
What does Descartes think accounts for personal identity over time?
What does Locke think is wrong with Descartes’s answer?
It now makes sense to turn to Locke’s official discussion of the limits of knowledge. Keep in mind that the two orders of classification Locke introduces (manners or degrees of knowledge and the objects known) cut across each other. I’ve chosen to frame the discussion in terms of the objects of knowledge: identity (known by intuition), relation (by demonstration), co-existence, and real existence (by sensation).
(From IV.i.1—Our Knowledge conversant about our Ideas only) Since the mind, in all its thoughts and reasonings, hath no other immediate object but its own ideas, which it alone does or can contemplate, it is evident that our knowledge is only conversant about them.
(From IV.i.2—Knowledge is the perception of the agreement or disagreement of two ideas) Knowledge then seems to me to be nothing but the perception of the connexion of and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy of any of our ideas. In this alone it consists. Where this perception is, there is knowledge, and where it is not, there, though we may fancy, guess, or believe, yet we always come short of knowledge. For when we know that white is not black, what do we else but perceive, that these two ideas do not agree? when we possess ourselves with the utmost security of the demonstration, that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right ones, what do we more but perceive, that equality to two right ones does necessarily agree to, and is inseparable from, the three angles of a triangle?
(From IV.i.3—This Agreement or Disagreement may be any of four sorts) But to understand a little more distinctly wherein this agreement or disagreement consists, I think we may reduce it all to these four sorts: i. identity, or diversity. ii. relation. iii. co-existence, or necessary connexion. iv. real existence.
(From IV.i.4—First, of Identity, or Diversity in ideas) First, as to the first sort of agreement or disagreement, viz. identity or diversity. It is the first act of the mind, when it has any sentiments or ideas at all, to perceive its ideas; and so far as it perceives them, to know each what it is, and thereby also to perceive their difference, and that one is not another.
(From IV.i.5—Secondly, of abstract Relations between ideas) Secondly, the next sort of agreement or disagreement the mind perceives in any of its ideas may, I think, be called relative, and is nothing but the perception of the relation between any two ideas, of what kind soever, whether substances, modes, or any other.
(From IV.i.6—Thirdly, of their necessary Co-existence in Substances) The third sort of agreement or disagreement to be found in our ideas, which the perception of the mind is employed about, is co-existence or non-co-existence in the same subject; and this belongs particularly to substances. Thus when we pronounce concerning gold, that it is fixed, our knowledge of this truth amounts to no more but this, that fixedness, or a power to remain in the fire unconsumed, is an idea that always accompanies and is joined with that particular sort of yellowness, weight, fusibility, malleableness, and solubility in aqua regia, which make our complex idea signified by the word ‘gold’.
(From IV.iii.9–Of their Co-existence, extends only a very little way) [A]s to the … agreement or disagreement of our ideas in co-existence, in this our knowledge is very short; though in this consists the greatest and most material part of our knowledge concerning substances. For our ideas of the species of substances being, as I have showed, nothing but certain collections of simple ideas united in one subject, and so co-existing together; e.g., our idea of flame is a body hot, luminous, and moving upward; of gold, a body heavy to a certain degree, yellow, malleable, and fusible: for these, or some such complex ideas as these, in men’s minds, do these two names of the different substances, flame and gold, stand for. When we would know anything further concerning these, or any other sort of substances, what do we inquire, but what other qualities or powers these substances have or have not? which is nothing else but to know what other simple ideas do, or do not co-exist with those that make up that complex idea?
(From IV.iii.10—Because the Connexion between simple Ideas in substances is for the most part unknown) This, how weighty and considerable a part soever of human science, is yet very narrow, and scarce any at all. The reason whereof is, that the simple ideas whereof our complex ideas of substances are made up are, for the most part, such as carry with them, in their own nature, no visible necessary connexion or inconsistency with any other simple ideas, whose co-existence with them we would inform ourselves about.
(From IV.iii.25) If a great, nay, far the greatest part of the several ranks of bodies in the universe escape our notice by their remoteness, there are others that are no less concealed from us by their minuteness. These insensible corpuscles, being the active parts of matter, and the great instruments of nature, on which depend not only all their secondary qualities, but also most of their natural operations, our want of precise distinct ideas of their primary qualities keeps us in an incurable ignorance of what we desire to know about them.
I doubt not but if we could discover the figure, size, texture, and motion of the minute constituent parts of any two bodies, we should know without trial several of their operations one upon another; as we do now the properties of a square or a triangle. Did we know the mechanical affections of the particles of rhubarb, hemlock, opium, and a man, as a watchmaker does those of a watch, whereby it performs its operations; and of a file, which by rubbing on them will alter the figure of any of the wheels; we should be able to tell beforehand that rhubarb will purge, hemlock kill, and opium make a man sleep: as well as a watchmaker can, that a little piece of paper laid on the balance will keep the watch from going till it be removed; or that, some small part of it being rubbed by a file, the machine would quite lose its motion, and the watch go no more. The dissolving of silver in aqua fortis, and gold in aqua regia, and not vice versa, would be then perhaps no more difficult to know than it is to a smith to understand why the turning of one key will open a lock, and not the turning of another. But whilst we are destitute of senses acute enough to discover the minute particles of bodies, and to give us ideas of their mechanical affections, we must be content to be ignorant of their properties and ways of operation; nor can we be assured about them any further than some few trials we make are able to reach. But whether they will succeed again another time, we cannot be certain. This hinders our certain knowledge of universal truths concerning natural bodies: and our reason carries us herein very little beyond particular matter of fact.
(From IV.vi.9—No discoverable necessary connexion between nominal essence gold, and other simple ideas) As there is no discoverable connexion between fixedness and the colour, weight, and other simple ideas of that nominal essence of gold; so, if we make our complex idea of gold, a body yellow, fusable, ductile, weighty, and fixed, we shall be at the same uncertainty concerning solubility in aqua regia, and for the same reason. Since we can never, from consideration of the ideas themselves, with certainty affirm or deny of a body whose complex idea is made up of yellow, very weighty, ductile, fusible, and fixed, that it is soluble in aqua regia: and so on of the rest of its qualities. I would gladly meet with one general affirmation concerning any will, no doubt, be presently objected, is not this an universal proposition, “all gold is malleable”? to which I answer, it is a very complex idea the word ‘gold’ stands for. But then here is nothing affirmed of gold, but that that sound stands for an idea in which malleableness is contained: and such a sort of truth and certainty as this it is, to say a centaur is four-footed. But if malleableness make not a part of the specific essence the name of ‘gold’ stands for, it is plain, “all gold is malleable”, is not a certain proposition. Because, let the complex idea of gold be made up of whichsoever of its other qualities you please, malleableness will not appear to depend on that complex idea, nor follow from any simple one contained in it: the connexion that malleableness has (if it has any) with those other qualities being only by the intervention of the real constitution of its insensible parts; which, since we know not, it is impossible we should perceive that connexion, unless we could discover that which ties them together.
(From IV.i.7—Fourthly, of real Existence agreeing to any idea) The fourth and last sort is that of actual real existence agreeing to any idea.
Intuitive: The different clearness of our knowledge seems to me to lie in the different way of perception the mind has of the agreement or disagreement of any of its ideas. For if we will reflect on our own ways of thinking, we will find, that sometimes the mind perceives the agreement or disagreement of two ideas immediately by themselves, without the intervention of any other: and this I think we may call intuitive knowledge.
That it is no great matter, whether I remove his scruple or no: where all is but dream, reasoning and arguments are of no use, truth and knowledge nothing.
That I believe he will allow a very manifest difference between dreaming of being in the fire, and being actually in it. But yet if he be resolved to appear so sceptical as to maintain, that what I call being actually in the fire is nothing but a dream; and that we cannot thereby certainly know, that any such thing as fire actually exists without us: I answer, that we certainly finding that pleasure or pain follows upon the application of certain objects to us, whose existence we perceive, or dream that we perceive, by our senses; this certainty is as great as our happiness or misery, beyond which we have no concernment to know or to be. So that, I think, we may add to the two former sorts of knowledge this also, of the existence of particular external objects, by that perception and consciousness we have of the actual entrance of ideas from them, and allow these three degrees of knowledge, viz. intuitive, demonstrative, and sensitive; in each of which there are different degrees and ways of evidence and certainty.
(From IV.iv.1—Objection: “Knowledge placed in our ideas may be all unreal or chimerical”) I doubt not but my reader, by this time, may be apt to think that I have been all this while only building a castle in the air; and be ready to say to me: To what purpose all this stir? knowledge, say you, is only the perception of the agreement or disagreement of our own ideas: but who knows what those ideas may be? Is there anything so extravagant as the imaginations of men’s brains? where is the head that has no chimeras in it? … If it be true, that all knowledge lies only in the perception of the agreement or disagreement of our own ideas, the visions of an enthusiast and the reasonings of a sober man will be equally certain.
(From IV.iv.2—Answer Not so, where Ideas agree with Things) To which I answer, That if our knowledge of our ideas terminate in them, and reach no further, where there is something further intended, our most serious thoughts will be of little more use than the reveries of a crazy brain. … But I hope, before I have done, to make it evident, that this way of certainty, by the knowledge of our own ideas, goes a little further than bare imagination: and I believe it will appear that all the certainty of general truths a man has lies in nothing else.
(From IV.iv.3—But what shall be the criterion of this agreement?) It is evident the mind knows not things immediately, but only by the intervention of the ideas it has of them. Our knowledge, therefore, is real only so far as there is a conformity between our ideas and the reality of things. But what shall be here the criterion? How shall the mind, when it perceives nothing but its own ideas, know that they agree with things themselves? this, though it seems not to want difficulty, yet, I think, there be two sorts of ideas that we may be assured agree with things.
(From IV.iv.4—As, first all simple ideas are really conformed to things) First, the first are simple ideas, which since the mind, as has been showed, can by no means make to itself, must necessarily be the product of things operating on the mind, in a natural way, and producing therein those perceptions which by the Wisdom and Will of our Maker they are ordained and adapted to. From whence it follows, that simple ideas are not fictions of our fancies, but the natural and regular productions of things without us, really operating upon us; and so carry with them all the conformity which is intended; or which our state requires: for they represent to us things under those appearances which they are fitted to produce in us: whereby we are enabled to distinguish the sorts of particular substances, to discern the states they are in, and so to take them for our necessities, and apply them to our uses. Thus the idea of whiteness, or bitterness, as it is in the mind, exactly answering that power which is in any body to produce it there, has all the real conformity it can or ought to have, with things without us. And this conformity between our simple ideas and the existence of things, is sufficient for real knowledge.
What is the difference between knowledge and ‘real’ knowledge?
How can we know whether we have ‘real’ knowledge or not?
Scholars disagree on just how Locke means to respond to skepticism. But it certainly looks as if he is invoking God at some crucial points in his defense of the reality of knowledge. What follows is Locke’s sketch of his argument for God’s existence; the details are to be found later in IV.x.
(From IV.x.2—For Man knows that he himself exists) I think it is beyond question, that man has a clear idea of his own being; he knows certainly he exists, and that he is something. He that can doubt whether he be anything or no, I speak not to … This, then, I think I may take for a truth, which every one’s certain knowledge assures him of, beyond the liberty of doubting, viz. that he is something that actually exists.
(From IV.x.3—He knows also that Nothing cannot produce a Being; therefore something must have existed from Eternity) In the next place, man knows, by an intuitive certainty, that bare nothing can no more produce any real being, than it can be equal to two right angles. [I]t is [thus] an evident demonstration, that from eternity there has been something; since what was not from eternity had a beginning; and what had a beginning must be produced by something else.
(From IV.x.4—And that eternal being must be most powerful) Next, it is evident, that what had its being and beginning from another, must also have all that which is in and belongs to its being from another too. All the powers it has must be owing to and received from the same source. This eternal source, then, of all being must also be the source and original of all power; and so this eternal being must be also the most powerful.
(From IV.x.5—And most knowing) Again, a man finds in himself perception and knowledge. We have then got one step further; and we are certain now that there is not only some being, but some knowing, intelligent being in the world. There was a time, then, when there was no knowing being, and when knowledge began to be; or else there has been also a knowing being from eternity. If it be said, there was a time when no being had any knowledge, when that eternal being was void of all understanding; I reply, that then it was impossible there should ever have been any knowledge: it being as impossible that things wholly void of knowledge, and operating blindly, and without any perception, should produce a knowing being, as it is impossible that a triangle should make itself three angles bigger than two right ones. For it is as repugnant to the idea of senseless matter, that it should put into itself sense, perception, and knowledge, as it is repugnant to the idea of a triangle, that it should put into itself greater angles than two right ones.
(From IV.x.6—And therefore God) Thus, from the consideration of ourselves, and what we infallibly find in our own constitutions, our reason leads us to the knowledge of this certain and evident truth—that there is an eternal, most powerful, and most knowing being; which whether any one will please to call God, it matters not.
Locke’s argument for God’s existence, as presented in these passages, looks pretty weak. What’s wrong with it?
John Locke’s (1632–1704) Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689) by Walter Ott and Alex Dunn is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted. | 2019-04-20T12:34:35Z | https://opentextbc.ca/modernphilosophy/chapter/john-lockes-1632-1704-essay-concerning-human-understanding-1689/ |
With the introduction of the Internet, the entire world has transformed into a Global City. Information is passed onto every edge of the globe within mins. This enhancing appeal gave increase to several data and also material organizing websites on the Internet.
. Internet hosting service is a service which allows the companies and people to place information and content on the Internet.
WordPress is the most secondhand material administration system. It’s a complimentary and open source CMS generally based on PHP and MySQL. Inning accordance with some data, it’s used by 30.6% of the top 10 million internet sites for content uploading as well as blogging. It gives its users with layouts, plug-ins, motifs and also numerous other appealing features.
Wpengine 80 off Exactly what is the function of internet organizing??
When the idea of possessing website as well as sites was first introduced, the situation ended up being confusing. The suggestion was actually helpful yet to own a site, it required unique computer systems which might get the job done. Because of this, hosting service was introduced and also it began to use the solutions, without the client requiring the needed infrastructure needed to do the job. In this way, this concept spread.
Nowadays there are numerous holding systems like webBuilder, iPage, Hostgator, WordPress engine etc. Out of all these, we will be concentrating on WP engine vs hostgator Wpengine 80 off .
An internet search engine is just one of the most crucial resources to get on-line traffic to your blog or website. Hundreds of visitors could be visiting your page in an hour if its high placed. As well as this is where the SEO enters into play. Today, WordPress is the most preferred as well as credible system which uses 99% SEO pleasant attributes.
It doesn’t matter if you desire to develop a blog site or an imaginative web site, WordPress will constantly be your initial option. Considering that WordPress has established its benchmark for being the best system to develop totally useful internet sites.
Here we are telling you the million dollar suggestions regarding how you can reveal as well as make use the truly unbelievable benefits of WordPress. Selecting the appropriate holding site will certainly fracture the code of making the very best use of WordPress.
Picking the appropriate organizing source for WordPress will put you in advance in the game!
When you check out for selecting up a trustworthy holding resource for your WordPress system it gets a mind-wobbling experience. There are numerous hosting companies available, it comes to be truly perplexing to arrange through this clutter and grab one best holding resource for you.
However, don’t stress we are right here bringing you the excellent organizing option. WP Engine as well as WP Engine coupon code are below to earn your life simple.
Picking one of the most ideal WordPress organizing strategy is one more vital variable. Off training course, every person out there desires to grab the finest chance which is not much heavy on pocket. Wp Engine offers you wp engine coupon codes, to obtain massive price cuts and save a good-looking amount of your hard made money.
You simply need to search the internet effectively to spot some genuine and incredible discount rates on your organizing aircraft by the virtue of wp engine promo codes as well as wp engine coupon code.
Because time is loan and also it’s all concerning saving time. If you are conserving your time you are saving your priceless cash. So we recommend you to always pick up much less time consuming as well as more satisfying options when it involves picking up a Wp engine coupon code for your personal company or for someone else.
In fact, Wp engine will need you to pay couple of additional dollars as compared with the other hosting resources which are supplying you their services for some low-cost bucks. Most definitely, this extra amount off will pay you off over time. As your incentive for financial investment in the Wp Engine coupon, you obtain an extraordinary conserving of hundreds as well as thousands of dollars each year.
With 24/7 effective consumer assistance, Wp Engine is worth your investment as contrasted to other hosting suppliers like hostgator. And still after that, if there happens any kind of unfavorable fault on your site, you will certainly be in loss.
Yet Wp Engine is running their systems with a phenomenal group of correctly educated experts. They will certainly obtain back to you instantaneously, the minute you report them about any kind of error or problem in your internet site. This is a large alleviation to obtain 24/7 experts’ assistance for troubleshooting your issues in no time at all.
Yes, this is also one of numerous advantages of spending in Wp Engine and Wp Engine Coupon code as contrasted to investing in various other hosting companies like hostgator. If your site obtains hacked even after paying a number of dollars, undoubtedly it is no great for you.
Wp Engine has actually scaled up its security includes to globe course degree. They have unique safety and security tracking professionals in their team who are constantly keeping an eye on wicked trespassers conflicting with your site or blog site.
Their continuous scanning for hackers and malware conserve you from large disappointment and also loss of loan. Their commitment is assured by their specialized solutions for stopping your websites from concerning 2 countless harmful internet attacks on everyday basis.
When we are speaking about the online world, its everything about the moment. As well as here “time equates to loan”. Your client will never favor to waste their time on your page if your site or blog site takes few extra secs to totally fill. There you lose your on the internet visitors leading to massive loss of cash also. You can get hold of much more as well as more on the internet web traffic to your internet site if you obtain it optimized appropriately. Proper optimization of your web site makes certain fast tons time and delighted clients as well as eventually the delighted you. Much more site visitors indicate even more profits and also sales.
Wp Engine and also Wp Engine coupon code deal give you with this benefit of boosted and optimized rate producing even more cash for you.
You could easily see many discount codes as well as totally free discount coupon websites when you are browsing the internet. All those alluring offers on those discount coupons are mainly invalid.
You need to search the right and also genuine websites to discover the legitimate Wp Engine Coupon code. Currently if you need to determine which site is really authentic, we recommend you take note of their reviews. The website with even more favorable testimonials is much more reliable which’s precisely where you will wind up locating the legitimate and actual Wp Engine Coupon code.
In the end, we extremely recommend you to find the ideal Wp Engine coupon codes for your site. Make your online visibility secure as well as recognizable with a trusted organizing provider.
WP Engine is a particularly build system for the WordPress users in order to release the websites and various other materials. WP engine gives WP engine vouchers which could be utilized to obtain 30% or more discount rates.
When it comes to supplying holding for WordPress, WP engine is at the top in this field. However, the major issue with WP engine is that it does not sustain other CMS various other compared to WordPress.
WP Engine is the greatest valued system for the objective demanding regarding $35 monthly. This much cost makes it really expensive as well as many individuals find it challenging to meet this rate. However, WP engine promo codes are available to obtain price cuts. Despite of the discounts, WP engine is still much pricey than the others.
If you are interested in utilizing simply WordPress, WP engine could be a good alternative as it is optimized for WordPress and also is particularly developed for the function. Nonetheless many individuals do not make use of simply WordPress and also it could be an issue for them to make use of WP engine.
WP engine supplies the individual with appealing user interfaces, easy approaches, and one-click treatments. The user interface of WP engine is truly remarkable.
While composing the web content or making web sites, your current information could be actually crucial in order to make a record. WP engine, by default, gives a 30-day back-up and keeps the track. This actually is an excellent function to enjoy.
Web protection is the major migraine nowadays for the on-line systems. We hear the information of information violations extremely much nowadays. WP engine not only supplies safety and security with the security code but furthermore, it sends out another code to the cellular phone in order to permit accessibility to the account.
Moving the sites to the clients is also possible via WP engine. It is very easy and actually practical when doing mass job.
Here, hostgator is plainly a far better choice as it’s much, much cheaper compared to the various other one. WP engine is actually a costly one. Despite of WP engine coupon discount, Hostgator is more affordable. So in this aspect of WP engine vs hostgator, hostgator is better.
In these facets, none is far behind compared to the various other one. Both the platforms are very a lot comparable in these aspects.
Here hostgator has an upper side with infant organizing and also many various other one-of-a-kind functions. WP engine also gives lots of functions but taking the cost right into consideration, they are not nearly enough.
With the introduction of the Internet, the whole globe has actually changed into a Global City. Details is passed into every edge of the globe within mins. This raising appeal provided surge to numerous information as well as content holding websites online.
.Wpengine 80 off Internet organizing solution is a solution which permits the organizations and individuals to put information as well as web content on the Internet. It has several kinds and classifications. Complying with are its main categories.
WordPress is one of the most pre-owned web content management system. It’s a totally free and open resource CMS mainly based upon PHP and also MySQL. Inning accordance with some statistics, it’s made use of by 30.6% of the top 10 million websites for content uploading and also blogging. It gives its users with themes, plug-ins, styles and many various other appealing features.
Wpengine 80 off What is the objective of webhosting??
When the idea of owning internet pages and websites was initially presented, the scenario became complicated. The concept was actually advantageous yet to own a web site, it called for special computers which could get the job done. Consequently, internet hosting service was presented and it began to supply the solutions, without the customer needing the necessary infrastructure required to do the work. In this method, this suggestion spread.
Nowadays there are lots of organizing platforms like webBuilder, iPage, Hostgator, WordPress engine etc. From all these, we will be concentrating on WP engine vs hostgator Wpengine 80 off .
An internet search engine is just one of one of the most crucial sources to get on-line traffic to your blog site or web site. Thousands of visitors could be visiting your page in an hour if its high rated. As well as this is where the SEO enters play. Today, WordPress is the most prominent as well as credible platform which offers 99% SEO pleasant functions.
So, it doesn’t matter if you want to create a blog or an imaginative site, WordPress will certainly always be your initial selection. Given that WordPress has actually established its benchmark for being the best system to produce fully functional websites.
Below we are telling you the million buck ideas regarding the best ways to reveal and avail the genuinely unbelievable benefits of WordPress. Selecting the best hosting website will break the code of making the best use WordPress.
Choosing the right hosting source for WordPress will certainly place you in advance in the video game!
When you take a look around for grabbing a dependable holding resource for your WordPress system it gets a mind-wobbling experience. There are many holding providers available, it becomes actually perplexing to sort via this mess as well as get one finest hosting resource for you.
Don’t stress we are below bringing you the perfect organizing remedy. WP Engine and also WP Engine coupon code are right here to make your life simple.
Picking the most suitable WordPress hosting plan is another important factor. Off program, everybody around desires to grab the finest possibility which is very little heavy on pocket too. Wp Engine provides you wp engine coupon codes, to obtain big price cuts and save a handsome amount of your hard earned cash.
You simply need to browse the net effectively to detect some actual as well as amazing discounts on your holding airplane by the virtue of wp engine promo codes and wp engine coupon code.
Because time is loan and also it’s everything about conserving time. If you are conserving your time you are saving your priceless money. So we suggest you to constantly get less time consuming and more fulfilling options when it concerns grabbing a Wp engine coupon code for your very own company or for someone else.
Really, Wp engine will require you to pay couple of extra dollars as compared to the other holding sources which are giving you their services for some cheap dollars. Certainly, this added amount off will pay you off in the lengthy run. As your incentive for investment in the Wp Engine coupon, you obtain an amazing saving of hundreds as well as hundreds of bucks yearly.
With 24/7 effective customer support, Wp Engine is worth your financial investment as contrasted to various other holding providers like hostgator. And also still after that, if there happens any type of unfortunate mistake on your site, you will be in loss.
However Wp Engine is running their systems with an outstanding team of appropriately trained specialists. They will obtain back to you quickly, the minute you report them regarding any type of mistake or problem in your website. This is a large alleviation to obtain 24/7 professionals’ support for troubleshooting your problems in no time.
Yes, this is likewise one of numerous advantages of purchasing Wp Engine and also Wp Engine Coupon code as compared with buying various other organizing service providers like hostgator. Being hacked could truly endanger your on-line presence and also prominence. So if your website gets hacked even after paying several bucks, clearly it is no excellent for you. You could encounter a huge loss of loan.
Wp Engine has scaled up its safety and security showcases to globe class degree. They have special security monitoring specialists in their team that are always maintaining an eye on bad trespassers interfering with your website or blog site.
Their continuous scanning for hackers as well as malware save you from large irritation and also loss of cash. Their loyalty is guaranteed by their specialized services for stopping your sites from about 2 million of harmful internet attacks on day-to-day basis.
Your client will never favor to waste their time on your web page if your website or blog takes few extra secs to entirely pack. You can get hold of a lot more and also much more on the internet web traffic to your website if you obtain it enhanced correctly. Proper optimization of your internet site ensures fast load time as well as satisfied customers and inevitably the happy you.
Wp Engine as well as Wp Engine coupon code deal supply you with this benefit of raised as well as maximized speed producing more cash for you.
You can effortlessly see lots of coupon codes as well as free promo code websites when you are browsing the net. All those alluring deals on those promo codes are mainly invalid.
You need to browse the right and also genuine websites to discover the legitimate Wp Engine Coupon code. Now if you have to recognize which internet site is actually genuine, we recommend you pay interest to their reviews. The website with even more favorable testimonials is much more trustworthy which’s exactly where you will certainly finish up finding the legitimate as well as actual Wp Engine Coupon code.
In the end, we extremely suggest you to discover the very best Wp Engine coupon codes for your site. Since it is the most budget-friendly hosting plan for you with assured advantages. Make your on-line presence safe and secure and also recognizable with a dependable hosting supplier. All the best!
When it comes to supplying organizing for WordPress, WP engine goes to the top in this area. Nonetheless, the main issue with WP engine is that it doesn’t support other CMS various other compared to WordPress.
If you are worried about using simply WordPress, WP engine can be an excellent choice as it is maximized for WordPress and also is particularly constructed for the function. Numerous people don’t utilize simply WordPress and it could be a trouble for them to make use of WP engine.
WP engine supplies the individual with attractive user interfaces, very easy methods, and also one-click procedures. The interface of WP engine is actually impressive.
While writing the web content or making sites, your current information can be actually vital in order to make a record. WP engine, by default, provides a 30-day back-up as well as keeps the track. This actually is an excellent feature to enjoy.
Internet protection is the primary migraine nowadays for the on the internet systems. We listen to the news of data breaches significantly nowadays. WP engine not only gives safety with the security code yet additionally, it sends out another code to the cell phone in order to permit accessibility to the account.
Moving the sites to the customers is also feasible with WP engine. It is simple and also truly helpful when doing mass work.
Right here, hostgator is clearly a much better alternative as it’s much, much cheaper compared to the various other one. WP engine is really an expensive one. Despite of WP engine coupon price cut, Hostgator is much less expensive. So in this aspect of WP engine vs hostgator, hostgator is much better.
In these elements, none is much behind than the various other one. Both the systems are quite much comparable in these aspects.
Below hostgator has an upper side with baby organizing and many other unique attributes. WP engine additionally gives lots of features but taking the rate right into factor to consider, they are insufficient. | 2019-04-19T09:09:13Z | http://biggestbearfan.com/wpengine-80-off/ |
Everything changes as we get older. Now that it’s au naturel and not dyed blonde, the texture of my hair is softer, more flyaway and demands a bit more attention. And while I have chosen this route and am continually banging on about grey hair – if you are committed to colour, then that’s fine, too. Each to their own.
A bit on the expensive side but Living Proof Full Shampoo and conditioner leaves hair feeling more voluminous and smells wonderful. I’m a big fan. San Ceuticals is a chemical-free beauty range from New Zealand, Davines is an effective and ethical Italian beauty brand and 100 Acres Apothecary is based in the Cotswolds. Styling products I know and love, include: John Frieda’s Luxurious Volume range, Aveda’s Texture Tonic or Pure Abundance Style Prep and Bumble and Bumble’s thickening spray. These all add oomph. Generally, my haircare regime involves wrapping hair in a superior hair towel while I get on with my ablutions. Once unwrapped, I tend to leave hair till it’s nearly dry, smooth a small dollop of Colour Wow’s Kale Cocktail Bionic Tonic through with my hands and give it a quick two-minute, upside-down blow dry. As my hair feels flatter these days I occasionally use a root lift product (John Freida, Colour Wow and Living Proof all sell these) or a quick squirt of dry shampoo (this has the added benefit of brightening my Mallen Streak) and a small swoosh of Moroccan Oil on the ends to finish.
‘So, briefly what happens with androgenetic alopecia (AGA) is that due to heredity and hormone decline post-menopause, women start to notice that their hair thins all over, but especially around the crown/parting where the scalp shows through. Hair literally loses weight. This is caused by shrinking follicles which means the hair’s growth phase may shorten with each cycle (growth/resting/shedding) and eventually stop altogether. It is estimated that one-in-four post-menopausal women suffer from AGA. So it’s a double whammy, sod it!
Both the NHS website and Women’s Health Concern have some useful hair loss tips.
Weirdly, my hair feels fuller post-menopause, as the emerging greys (my hair looks very similar to the photo you’ve used above) seem to be thicker/coarser, so giving my style more volume. Annoyingly, the greys are more wavy than the browns, so a fair amount more “smoothing” is required.
But oh, how dry it is now! I’m all about the hair oil. Any variety does the trick – I’m currently using good old Elvive Extraordinary Coconut Oil. If you’d have told me five years ago I’d be smearing oil all over my freshly-washed locks I wouldn’t have believed it!
yes, me too. I have dark hair and always thick, now thicker and drier and coarser. So I use Kerastase Elixir Ultime after blow drying and using straightener. Elnett flexible hairspray is a good friend too!
I used to have a head full of corkscrew curls, blondish, helped by highlights. About 10 years ago the first grey appeared (more silvery/light gold… who am I kidding??), and about 5 years ago there was quite a lot of that. Stopped dying 2 years ago which was a good decision: as the silver is in streaks nobody really noticed! However, since the menopause the curls are going so that I now have larger curls rather than tight ones, and more irregular – tighter in some places, wavy in others. A real pain in the neck, I loved my curls!
OMG, your timing is perfect. I threw a massive strop in the bathroom last night and frightened the cat. I’m about 8 months into growing out my long, insanely thick, coloured-for-the-past-40-years thatch. I started colouring because I wanted to be redder, and kept it up because colour made my hair glossy and manageable. Currently I resemble Hagrid, with a weird mix of my own colour (darker than I remembered), fading mid-brown dye, and odd patches and streaks of white. Not enough white to be dramatic, mind you. Just enough to make me look and feel scruffy and blah. In a couple of hours I’m going to see my hairdresser, and I need to decide what to do. Cut a HUGE amount off? Keep growing it and keep it in a hippie witch horsehair braid FOREVER? Completely give up and go back to colour? Have a big dramatic white stripe put in? I am vibrating with lack of sleep, indecision and caffeine. Aaaghhh.
Oh Lesley – I feel for you. This is exactly what I fear will happen when I take the plunge. I’m not very patient and my hair also really affects my confidence – if I have a bad hair I actually start to feel unwell! Would you suit short hair? One of my friends had a really short hair cut when she stopped dying and so it was all grown out in a matter of months. OTOH I saw a Japanese lady in the supermarket who had white hair to her jaw and then black to her shoulder – it was a beautifully cut long bob. I was in awe at her – my point being that many women might be looking at you admiringly! I just thought it was so courageous and strong and I wished I could have her character! Let us know what you decided- whatever you did I’m sure it was right for you.
Lesley, your hair sounds exactly like mine was at that stage and it’s really difficult to cope with. Mine is also very thick and was thatch like when coloured.
I didn’t want to go short so went to the salon and explained that I was trying to grow in my grey. A lovely and very young stylist cut it to shoulder length with deep layers, then scissored off the very noticeable brassy bits. This made a massive difference and inspired me to keep going.
I’m now two and a half years in and dye free, with a mallen streak, white temples and a cobweb of white highlights over the rest. Not perfect, but it is me. Good luck with your endeavours, Alyson’s looks fantastic.
I have had very short hair several times – I can either do very short or past collar bone, but not in between – and the growing out process was always a nightmare. I would LOVE to have more white, but my Mom is 80 and still only half grey, so probably not happening. Anyway, appointment next week, so we’ll see.
You must keep us posted! I feel I was in a somewhat similar position about 10 years ago. My hair was frizzy, dyed a reddish brown and shoulder length. It took ages to make it look good and any dampness returned it to a frizz. The grey roots seemed to show within days of a touch-up. One day I caught sight of my reflection in a shop window. I looked old, haggard, dragged down somehow (I was 52ish at the time). I made a decision to stop dyeing pretty much there and then. My sister is a hairdresser so I asked her to cut it all off – she was hesitant but did what I asked. I looked instantly younger – that was the comment I heard most from friends. Since then I have tried growing it back long once or twice, because I have a dream of flowing grey/white locks like that gorgeous model who pops up now and again. But it just doesn’t work for me and I look old and mumsy. So I keep it short and sharp, with a bit of an undercut. Personally I think it looks amazing and in keeping with my overall style objective which is to look sassy, confident and happy in my own skin. I agree that in-between hair is not the way forward. Whatever you/we do, we should ‘own it’ as they say. Anyway, please do let us all know what you decide and good luck!
I love this comment – I want whatever you are on Lesley S!
I love White Hot’s shooshing creme which I discovered on your blog over a year ago now. I’ve been grey for a long time, and have short curly hair – this product seems to have just the right amount of hold without being stiff or crispy feeling. It seems a bit pricy for the size but actually it lasts ages and works equally well on wet or dry hair.
I use argan oil now twice weekly rather than conditioner and find it really nourishes my (long) hair. I also take a Biotin supplement and find it has made my hair stronger.
Just want to mention that when your hair becomes too thin and you don’t want to rub nasty chemicals all over your scalp, wigs are a great alternative. Wigs have really come a long way in the last few decades in terms of style and colours.
Wigs are brilliant – save loads of time and money, always look good and can be changed to suit your mod/the occasion. Whjat’s not to like? So many styles to choose from, and a wide range of quality/price. Highly recommend instead of all the faffing-about I had to do to make my post menopausal wispy locks look presentable – until a gust of wind would undo all my efforts at making a silk purse.
Great post! I definitely love the freedom of going grey but you are bang on about extra care. I do use Davines Alchemic Conditioner on the advice of my hairdresser (who I don’t see as often anymore) and it really works. It is expensive but once a week is usually enough. I also take Nutricap a supplement that Mireille Giuliano of Frenchwomen Don’t Get Fat fame recommended in one of her books through the winter and I think it helps, our winters (Canada) can be brutal and I am outside a lot.
I have been using minoxidil daily for the last 15 years and it has certainly helped hairloss. The few times I have become lax and not used it for a while, my hair has started falling out again. So, yes, minoxidil works for me.
Advice to Lesley and others is persist. Following Alyson’s example I grew out my brown dyed hair. It’s now two years since I had any colour. For a while it was piebald with whiter streaks around face. Not attractive. But the self-consciousness was all mine. I kept having the ends trimmed so overall shape was good and looked intentional. Now I’m really pleased I did carry on. And for the first time people complemented me on my hair which never happened previously.
Current hair texture is better than ever. And far less dry and hard to manage. I do use good quality shampoos for coloured hair still. French pharmacy brands. But I also am a big fan of Living Proof conditioners. I did use the Restore one as I grew out dye but am now using Perfect Hair Day one. One only needs a bit. And I restrict hair washing to every five or more days except when swimming regularly. I am fortunate not to have thinning hair.
Good luck to all making the transition to more natural hair.
Great article. My hair miraculously was revealed to be an expensive looking silver once I dared to stop colouring it. But oh so dry and fine. My ,ost successful produce is Argan Collagen rejuvenating conditioner for very fine hair. Better than all the other expensive oils etc I tried. And even available in Waitrose!
How I envy all you lucky ones with thick hair! Mine is ultra-fine – (not thin, there’s plenty of it – and it’s in good condition) and with only a few wisps of grey which I rather like. I can actually make it look quite nice, first thing, but it’s pancake flat within minutes and a step outside the door into the merest breath of wind and I’m the Dulux dog. Not a good look. Sprays weigh it down and make it separate; too long and it’s witch-like; too short and I look like a chrysanthemum on the move. Lori (upthread) mentions wigs and I’m tempted to explore further.
Tell me about dry and fine, oh my goodness. It’s very depressing and affects my confidence big time. The trick is to find some sort of conditioner, oil or otherwise, that doesn’t immediately make my hair lank and I am still searching! Any tips, therefore, greatly appreciated. As for thinning I seem to be spending a lot of time looking at the hair of ladies of a similar age and gosh, it’s so common and usually all at the front, as opposed to the scalp area, as described by Vicci Bentley. My curls disguise the loss a little bit, but I do worry that it will continue. Sometimes I tell myself to get a grip, that all this hair concern is so vain, but we all now that if our hair isn’t ‘right’ the rest of us feels a mess. And if anyone else tells me that I am lucky to have curly hair they will be dead. What I wouldn’t give for thick, straight, stylish locks that are uniformly grey.
I am now going to work through Alison’s hair product suggestions, no doubt gulping at the cost of most, but hey, I’m worth it !
Alison your hair looks great.
I made the decision about 3 months ago, just to cut my hair short. Went to one of the many hairdressers available. I sat in the chair in front of the style director. He asked me what I wanted. I said ‘GO FOR IT’ He clapped his hands and said I had made him so happy.
So now I have short hair. I wash it every 2 weeks with a hair soap bar from LUSH give it a quick blast with the hairdryer and I’m good to go. In fact I’m due again in a couple of weeks for a trim, and I’m going to go even shorter. The only thing that is a no no for me personally is the shaving of the head, other than that my hairdresser has free rein.
I think because I work in radiology I’m not so hung up anymore on the length of my hair.
I always wonder when any of the ladies who have cancer that come in wearing wigs that are really terrible Alsion, whether Cancer charities could get hold a masterclass in all the fabulous ways you could use a tie a fantastic scarf around your head.
The hairdresser Trevor Sorbie has started a charity for women with hair loss. He gives free advice and also customises wigs for cancer patients to make them more flattering.
Oh that’s good to know. Thank you for sharing, Anna.
I went from thick, thick hair to thinning and awful pink scalp. Thought of shaving my head and having my scalp tattooed gray! Used Rogaine for a year with no results and other shampoos and things. Still an oily scalp that requires daily washing. Sob! Now don’t leave the house without a hat. Between the balding head and the occcasional long chin hair I think my balding, bearded husband and I will end up looking like twins!!
Alyson, L. J.s comments about chin hair has got to be a whole, new post! I live in terror of missing one and I’m sure that I’m not alone.
Leave it with me, Joyce!
I have had highlights on and off for 15 years on my dark., fine straight hair. My hair stylist (who owns her salon) suggested two years ago just to let the silver streaks through (prefer to call it silver rather than grey!!). as it would look great against my very dark hair, so took her advice and love it . I probably have 10% silver and am in my mid 70’s . I have worn my hair in a graduated jaw length sleek bob for more then 20 years. Try to wash it just twice a week now, or every three days, as it tends to get greasy. Have it trimmed every 6/7 weeks. A good cut is essential ! Started using Paul Mitchell volumising products, also the volumising blow dry spray . None of my friends seem to want to embrace the natural look and were all surprised I had taken this route, but am happy with it.
I would offer a caution to any woman with thinning hair who has had estrogen-based cancers, breast and uterine etc. My doctors felt that adding this chemical to my system would be ill-advised, no matter my frustration with my hair.
So, solution? A fabulous wig wardrobe – I have two wonderful lightweight wigs that match my grey hair tones. I get compliments when I wear my ‘hair’ and frankly, finally have the hair I always wanted!
Yes it is frustrating to have this syndrome, and equally it is great to be able to create a new look with my new ‘lids’.
It is a big step to buy and wear a wig in public, with friends who will know and are kind enough not to ask. Where no one knows me, it is quite satisfying to not fret about the wind being unkind, revealing my very thin spots.
That is true – and I should have thought of that, Shell. I will amend it now.
REgarding CHIN HAIR. I hear this from my daughter,”MOM, YOU HAVE A FOREST ON YOUR CHIN!!!!” I used to protest then looked closely wearing half eyes and peering into magnifying mirror. Behold! It’s not quite a forest I wear but more beach grass on a small dune. I’m lucky because I’m oblivious without my vision tools and for the same reason not so lucky because my daughter and other critics have no such challenges. So what to do. Not much. I simply have other things to think about And will get to this daughter defined crisis in personal glamour sooner or later.
I can very strongly recommend getting an epilator. I’ve used one for several years on underarms and legs, and by now the hair has almost completely stopped growing. I convinced a friend with a mustache problem to get one, and she loves it!
Wish there was a perfect a solution for my thinning hair. It makes me sad every morning when I have to try fixing it; it’s changed so much over the past 15 years, going from thick and curly to thin and straighter. Nothing seems to help!
I too have a lot of super fine hair prone to explode into dandelion frizz at the first hint of damp. Frustrating to spend 20 minutes blow drying and have all that good work undone as soon as I go outside! Most oils and styling products are far too heavy and leave my hair lank. I’ve struggled with my unruly mop since my teens so I’m very happy to say I’ve found a solution (hurrah!): Kerastase Aura Botanica shampoo and conditioner plus Philip Kingsley PK Prep Perfecting Spray. I stumbled on this combination about 18 months ago and I can honestly say it’s been life changing !
My white-hair problem is finding a leave-in conditioning cream that doesn’t leave a yellowish tinge. Before going grey/white, I used Phyto7 daily, it is winderful and i thoroughly recommend it if your hair is grey or champagne coloured. But what can I substitute to keep my hair looking silvery?
OMG, I guess your research on this from a long time ago. It’s very nice information. I always read your blogs. Your tips are very effective, Thank you for sharing your valuable time and information with us.
YES, ALL THE ABOVE IS HAPPENING!
I have taken a few NOTES!!!!!
I’m just NOT READY TO LOSE MY HAIR ARE YOU?
Hi, I came across your post last year, when I was looking for something to make me feel better about going grey. I felt trapped by the tyranny of having to dye my hair and keep the grey roots at bay, and the high cost of it too, and the time it took, and the pressure I perceived from society that I should not have grey hair, and so on. And I was never quite happy with the colour anyway – always felt it was too yellow (I had brown hair to start with). So last year I finally decided enough was enough, and did some googling to see what other women thought/did, and that’s how I ended up reading your blog. My hair is now almost my natural colour (I think a bit of colour remains in the very ends) and OK, it’s a bit whiter/greyer than I’d like, would have preferred some stylish salt & pepper sort of thing, or a dashing grey Clark Gable type temple, but whatever. Have had many compliments on the colour, which tells me that the fake colour wasn’t all that great, just like I felt. The condition of my hair is much better now, not so dry, and I spend far less time (virtually none) blow drying and styling it, which is also liberating. So thanks for the inspiration and for posting about this topic, which doesn’t seem to be covered much. I just hate how we end up feeling that we have to pretend not to be the age we are. I’m 51, I can’t do anything about that, and why should I?
Don’t suppose you have any comments or articles about how we should change our makeup to go with our new grey hair? I sometimes feel like the makeup one wore when one had darker hair or just a different colour, isn’t quite right now, and don’t eye brows eventually change colour too?? Seems to me like skin colour gets a bit lighter with age so that some makeup looks too harsh?
Thanks Alyson, for the positivity, gentle and womanly as it is.
New to your blog, via the lovely Angie Cox’s You Look Fab crew. This post strikes a chord so I wanted to share my experience. I have experienced peri-menopause /menopause /hormone-related hair loss off and on over the last 10 years (I am now 57). I also have hypothyroidism. Many years of tweaking meds, supplements, etc. has ensued with various hair-related results.
I had surgery last August under general anesthesia that kicked off another round of hair loss. So traumatic! Luckily, I was introduced to a Danish company called Harklinniken by a good friend. I have been on the Harklinniken program since October and am simply astounded by the results. My hair has stopped falling out, and it is filling in all over my head, especially noticeable at the temples. My hairdresser is amazed. I met the founder in New York, and was impressed with his sincerity and caring attitude. I know it does not solve all hair-loss related problems, and feel lucky that is so effective for me. I want my 24 year old son to give it a try. They say it is more effective for women, but it does help men as well.
Just trying to throw a little hope out there. Hair loss is one of the worst things ever.
Everything changes as we get older. Now that it’s au naturel and not dyed blonde, the texture of my hair is softer, more flyaway and demands a bit more attention. | 2019-04-22T21:04:32Z | https://thatsnotmyage.com/beauty-at-any-age/how-hair-changes-as-we-age/ |
Hey all! I’m back again and I feel that instead of talking about current life, I should go right on and head into the continuation of my journey. Now, I left off at the end of my fall semester of 2016 which lead into Christmas break. Honestly, this semester was one of the most trying ones I had experienced. My health was in shambles, I had trouble walking more than a mile at a time without having aggravated nerve issues, and one thing I didn’t mention in my last post (probably the most horrific issue of them all) was my coming home after my physiology midterm to find blood all over my appartment. I looked around in terror to find out what it was to find that it was my mom’s cat!!! We had had issues with her acting listless and had taken her to the vet who told us she had a small rodent bone in her stomach, gave her meds to help her pass it, and sent her home. The problem is… she had an abscess growing in her tail because of some unknown trauma that lead to an infection we didn’t know she had. The abscess was what was making her sick and when I came home to blood all over the place I was beyond angry and mortified! Thankfully, we got her into an emergency care (at a different vet) and the vets there went above and beyond to help us apply for emergency pet support to help us afford to have her tail amputated and saved her life.
When Christmas break came… I faced it with a sense of relief that classes were over and a sense of terror that I might have to endure another break in severe physical pain. I worked as much as I could (considering my pain situation). I actually had been promoted towards the end of the fall 2016 semester, so I was learning a new position with lots of new stressors. Then… the Spring 2017 semester came at me with nearly a full load and again… no exercise or theatre as an outlet. Now, Part 17 of my journey begins!
Spring 2017 semester came at me with nearly a full load! I had Speech, Critical thinking through literature, and government of the United States (Political Science). My course load along with a new position as a Customer Service Rep/ Cashier Supervisor seemed like a great idea at first, buuutttt I found that by the time I would get off work I would have a hard time focusing on my studies. At this point, my body was struggling to get over 106 pounds. I was eating probably around 1700 cal to 1800 cal a day which was not enough to be trying to gain weight AND I was still pretty restrictive with what I was eating. As pressures from classes mounted, midterms approached, and pressure at work increased, I found myself spending my days at home, in bed, in pain, while studying through my chaotic home life and my days at work and school, struggling to make it through each day. On top of it, I had to constantly push aside my battles with PTSD which (at the time) would make chaotic situations seem like they were 3X as bad as they were putting me on edge… I was completely miserable. One morning, as I was eating breakfast about a week before my midterm paper for Poly Sci was due… I felt what seemed like pressure that felt almost like hands push through from my upper back, around on each side towards the front of my chest, and then squeezed my heart! I told my mom what was happening and tried to gather my strength as I clenched my chest. I got up to put my cereal bowl in the sink and… I felt my legs buckle beneath me. My mom rushed me to the ER. There, I weighed just over 106 pounds. No one made mention of the fact I was still under weight, and they shrugged it off like I was just dealing with too much stress. Funny, because I’ve had just as stressful situations more recently and have not had the same pain. Anyhow, as a result of the pain, the doctor advised that I do what I can to avoid stressful situations which meant dropping political science and postponing my transfer to California East Bay. At first, I was so ashamed, I felt like I totally failed! I was going to receive a W as a result of dropping this class. The professor refused to withdraw it despite my medical circumstances. I was completely shattered! My transcripts were tainted and I wasn’t going to transfer in time! At the same time, shortly after I dropped the class, I felt a huge amount of weight being lifted from my shoulders! Political science class was so full of information, and between that and all the reading I had to do for my critical thinking through literature class, all the pressure had me literally laying in bed every free moment that I had. That was no way to live! As a result, I had more downtime, less stress, and I started pushing myself to try to take mini 1/2 mile- 1 mile walks when I would stop at the store between my house and the school. Though it was painful most times, I still did what I could to try to press through.
Meanwhile, I found a new haven in public speaking! All the skills I learned in acting, I got to apply in this class! Also, since I had already been public speaking prior to this course, I was able to use the tools that I acquired while taking the class to help improve my speech writing as well as delivery! What a blessing!!!
Now, as far as my weight goes, one of the chiropractors at the chiropractic chain that I was going to kept nudging me to gain weight! He just wouldn’t let it go! He was like that annoying voice in the back my head constantly telling me I was too frail and thin, but my stubborn mind wouldn’t wrap around it. Finally, after reading a blog post from a well known blogger that goes by “Drops of Jewels” and is also known as “Lord Still Loves Me Julia” made a post about something known as the Minni Maud method. Immediately went to search out what this method was about! In doing so, I found out that according to the method and according to your weight, you are to gradually increase your caloric intake to anywhere from 2,500- 3,000 + calories a day. The person in recovery is not to be restrictive whatsoever. This means candy, ice cream, pizza, cake… yup! Eat it all!
I read about her experience and I continued to study up on the method. I knew I had to do it! I gradually began to increase my calories, and one night as I was getting ready to talk to a friend of mine on the phone, my neighbor offered to purchase my family a pizza. I quickly went and hid in my room and avoided it. Yes, for all of those who’ve been following my blog, I do have gluten allergies. At the same time, my spirit wanted so badly to be free, even for a moment, even if it made my stomach hurt, I just. wanted. freedom! Meanwhile, the eating disorder trapped me in fear! I had a beautiful conversation with my friend, who encouraged me to just do what my gut was telling me and to enjoy the time with my family. I then went and enjoyed not just one piece, but two pieces of pizza along with a big slice of Oreo cheesecake for dinner! On top of it, the excitement from the freedom must’ve totally phased out the side effects of the gluten because I had no stomach issues! That night triggered a whole slew of what I call “freedom eating.“ each and every day I made it my goal to try to increase my calories to a point where I finally was eating 3,000 calories each day. Things like pancakes on my nephews birthday, bagels and cream cheese, Frappuccinos from Starbucks, you name it, I was eating it!
Thennnn severe stomach issues mixed with brain fog, headaches, and inability to focus started to set in which are all symptoms of gluten intolerance. I had to quickly re-think what I was putting into my body and try to find ways to work around the various allergies/ sensitivities in order to get my calories in. Finally, I reached my Doctor’s goal weight of 110, but that didn’t quite feel like enough. I kept on going to a point where I finally felt that it was OK to stop eating the excess and get ready to go into maintenance mode.
As all of this was happening, I was still attending classes and working. I continued to find release in my speech class, and fell in love with my literature course. You see, in speech I found A new level of structure and confidence in my speeches. I was also invited to take part in our school’s annual speech contest for extra credit. There, I got to compete in the dramatic interpretation section (which is pretty much like performing a monologue) and won first place! Along with this came the invitation from my professor and the speech team to join the speech and debate team for the following semester! As far as my literature course went, we were given several texts to read which we were to dissect and pull out any symbolism and possible hidden messages that the author may have left for the readers to pick up. In other words, we had to figure out what the author was saying between lines. We also learned how to compare and contrast different texts and find common hidden meanings in texts that, unless looked at closely, would appear to be completely different. It was absolutely thrilling to find out that I could not only apply this in my every day reading, but I could also apply it in my biblical reading. On top of it, there was an incredible book called The Citizen in which the author speaks from the perspective of an African-American in her daily life. It looked directly through her eyes into the circumstances involving prejudice and straight up ignorance that she and countless others have experienced. That, along with the studies that I did just prior to my dropping political science in regards to the Civil War, I was appalled at the human race and the amount of prejudice that exists even in today’s society! The hatred that this nation has carried since its roots… all I can say is that this semester definitely had a profound impact on my knowledge of racism and the need to cut it up from the roots immediately! Until then, I had no idea how bad everything truly was. I was raised to see people as people. I learned about segregation and prejudice in elementary and High school, but when this semester’s studies set in, the blinders were fully taking off my eyes, and I realized how much hatred humanity has had for one another for ages! It was heartbreaking!
Nowww back to the health issues. My doctor had put in a referral to a new physical therapist. Now, I know physical therapists mean well and they are very well educated, however; for my situation… this form of physical therapy just was not good. My situation requires chiropractic adjustments, massage therapy (psoas release so I can do core and strength training pain free again) and someone to guide me through proper core and balance work. (Due to severe imbalances). The physical therapist gave me muscle energy techniques that are pretty much self adjustments that realign my hips, pelvis and spine (which I have been given time and time again) only to find they didn’t quite do the trick. They also gave me strength training exercises to help strengthen the “week“ muscles. The problem is, no one would listen to me when I would tell them that I had psoas issues and that the exercises they gave me were giving me ITB syndrome that flared up if I walked too far. They swore up-and-down that it had to do with my muscles being weak and that I needed to adjust to the exercises, but the more I did them, the worst I got, and I nearly became debilitated again. When this round of physical therapy ended, they referred me to aqua therapy in hopes that I might find some relief their.
As the semester came closer to an end, I continue to try to go for walks and did the best that I could, but my body just kept acting up. Finally, finals rolled around, yes… the Lord gave me victories over my classes with straight A’s again, and it was off to summer break and some hope!
You see, I kept telling a sweet friend of mine that I consider a sister that we need to get serious about our dreams of becoming actors. Toward the end of May, she sent me a link to a casting call for 13 Reasons Why extras that was going to take place on the 4th of June. She commented “said you wanted to get serious.“ She was totally calling me out! On June 4, I got up early, packed some food, she and a friend picked me up, and we headed to the casting call! As we waited in the long line, I looked back and it continued to just grow! As we got closer and closer to the building they were having the casting call in, the line had gotten so long that they decided to create a cut off point and sent everyone behind that point home. They informed them of how they could go online and register to work on set as an extra. For those of us who hung around, we were given business cards and the option to go home and apply online or hang out and wait to be let inside for our group meeting. The three of us were determined to get inside, so we waited. When we got in we got the information we needed, had our pictures taken, I registered my profile online, and off we went to go spend some time at a mall, then went back to my house and celebrated my 34th birthday with my family! What an amazing birthday celebration! Not only did I get to go and make steps towards my dream career, but I got to spend it with some of my nearest and dearest friends including my godmother and her husband!
Every day, I checked for postings to see if they had any work up and as soon as they did, I began to apply! Then, about a week after my first submissions for work, I was going for a walk in an attempt to alleviate some pain and… I RECEIVED A BOOKING REQUEST!!! I automatically responded and confirmed that I could work, called my mom crying tears of joy and headed back to my car! Ok… yeah, I know, some people might think that I’m only a “background actor.“ The fact of the matter is background actors actually play a major role in helping each scene come together. Not only that, but this was something that I had dreamed of doing my whole life! I was SO overjoyed! I tried to carefully read through all of the pre-information that they sent me, and prepared myself as best as I could mentally and physically for my first day on set.
The morning I first set foot at home base, has filled with so much excitement! As I was standing around after check in, I looked over and Dylan Minnete crossed over right in front of me to go get some coffee. Now, of course I binge watched the series so I would know what was going on and how I might need to hold myself in scenes in order to properly contribute. During my binge watch, I was so amazed at how well each actor performed! Seeing Dylan in person was really cool! So cool in fact, that I completely forgot that the pre-information had clearly stated that we are not supposed to go and speak to any of the actors because they are there to work and not be distracted, annnndd like and overly excited little kid, I blurted out, “ oh my gosh! You did an excellent job in the show!” He kindly smiled, and humbly said, “thank you.” At that point I realized exactly what I just done, so I pulled myself back and hoped to God nobody caught me speaking to him. So, if any of you readers out there end up on a set as an extra, just take a little caution to read documents that they send you to make sure that you don’t go crossing any lines! Anyhow, on set, I learned that it’s a lot of sit around and wait. I waited with about 100 or so other people for them to choose the people they needed as background actors for each scene until they decided to choose me. Though season two has already been released and I have posted pictures of myself and the scenes that they captured me in, due to the legal documents that I have signed, I’m not allowed to expose the dates, times, and or locations at which filming was done. What I will say is that and my first day on set was amazing! While waiting, they consistently make sure that we had fruit and snacks to munch on. Unknowingly, I packed a lunch only to find out that they were actually providing lunch FOR us. I kept my lunch set aside just in case due to the food allergies, but little did I know, they were providing a full catered lunch full of options for pretty much everyone! I was thrilled to find that I could easily pick out items that I can eat without having stomach issues. I couldn’t believe this! Here I was, the girl that had been yelled at half my life, always told that I was not allowed to be or do anything that I ever wanted to, the one who was physically and verbally abused for the majority of my life, the one who worked countless jobs that were physically and emotionally taxing, currently works as a supervisor in a place where people completely disrespect my coworkers as well as myself… I mean literally to a point bringing me to tears a few times… and this one day… I walked onto set as an extra, what most people view as the low-end of the totem pole, and it was like being in a totally different universe. Yes, I had to sit around and wait, but hey… it gives me plenty of time to read! Yes, I got hungry, but I didn’t have to wait for my line to go down or the customer to stop yelling in my face before I could step away and take a bite of an apple. I could keep a snack in my pocket and take bites between takes, eat in extras holding, talk to new and interesting people who actually treated me with kindness, watch a Netflix production being made… what in the world just happened to me?
I went back on that evening and the excitement from the day kept me on a total emotional high! This is it! This is what I wanted to do! All the standing around and waiting, walking up and down the street in the background of a shot where probably never got seen, the 12 hour shift, it was all worth it, not only because of the way I was treated, but because I was doing something that aimed towards what I’ve wanted to do since I can remember! For the first time in my life, I was really attempting to reach toward my dream of becoming a professional actor! My whole life, everyone told me what they wanted me to be, and yes, people tried to put me in the “runner box” like I wasn’t allowed to be anything else… At the same time, here I was, for the first moment in my life, and I took what I love to do for fun in community theatre and began to work toward doing it as a career. It was just so freeing!
As the summer kept going, the casting calls kept coming! I worked primarily in the court room scenes and worked in several others as well. During the hours spent on set over the summer, I met so many incredible people! A few of the people, have actually become very dear friends of mine!
Now, as I’ve stated time and time again in this blog, I found that throughout my life God has his reasons for things. I kept questioning why life had to be in such a chaotic mess that I would have to drop my political science course and postpone my transfer to start my classes at California East Bay, but God knew what was up. He knew what he was doing all along! You see, had I started classes at East Bay, I never would have had the time to even attempt to work on set!
As fall classes approached, I face them with gratitude, knowing that this would be my final semester at CCC annnddd… I would, Lord willing, I would get to be working on set a bit more!
Wow… so, this post was super long and I apologize for that y’all! However, I believe that I’ll have one more post after this and I’ll be done! For those of you who have followed me on this journey so far, thank you so, so much! I am so thrilled and excited to be able to share with you all my trials and tribulations and to help remind you that no matter what you were going through, God is there, there is a reason for everything, and don’t you ever lose hope! Until next time, God bless! | 2019-04-25T09:12:56Z | https://tinkeredeemed.wordpress.com/category/uncategorized/ |
Mixed Martial Arts has taken the world by storm. Participating in these type of hard-hitting, impact sports can not only put you in peak physical condition it can also lead you to a life of discipline and focus. Whether training in the gym or at home you need to keep yourself protected. Investing in a quality set of MMA Shin Guards will keep your legs in top condition and help you avoid serious injury. Equally as important, if working with a sparring partner you need to make sure they are protected as well.
Protective gear for training and tournaments has come a long way over the years. No matter if you love Boxing, Wrestling, Muay Thai, Judo, or Jui Jitsu keeping everyone protected will ensure your training continues and everyone’s skill can continue to grow. Depending on your focus you may require different types of gear. From Head and Mouth Guards to Belly Pads, keeping yourself protected should always be the main focus.
There is quite a range of options when it comes to Shin Guards. We looked over materials and the way each set protects to ensure it would keep you safe and in top form for continued learning. When learning how to strike with your legs you may make many mistakes at the beginning. This can lead to bruises, broken toes, or other bones. As your skill grows so will your power and not protecting your legs can have you headed down the same path as someone with less experience. We have done the research for you and here is what we have come up with to keep you training and competing so you can become the best of your ability.
Recently Fairtex has upgraded the Competition Shin and Instep guards. They are more durable, with sleeker lines, a better fit, and an amazing feel. In addition, they are lightweight and will keep both you and your sparring partner completely protected. It is important to note, these are handmade which increases the overall quality and durability of the product.
When practicing, the need for protection makes sense, especially in vulnerable areas of the body. Our instep is quite fragile and the extended instep protection ensures this spot is fully guarded. Breaking a foot can lead to a lot of time away from what you love, hence this being a feature we appreciate from Fairtex.
When your protective gear uses metal closures you may cause injury to your partner or even to yourself. Fairtex has integrated a hook and loop pull strap and removed the need for metal fixtures. On top of this, they have also streamlined them to remove any rough edges that may scratch or cause physical harm to the wearer or their partner.
Falling into the upper level of our price range you really get a great value when you make room in your budget for these shin guards. The durable synthetic leather and attention to detail throughout the entire product will ensure they can stand up to consistent abuse for a long time. They fit comfortably and offer excellent protection.
Twins is a brand that is trusted by beginners all the way to the pros. They have offered some of the best options in not only protective gear but in training equipment as well. The Twins Special Classic shin guards are made of 100% Leather making them more durable than many others in today's market. They also feature double Velcro straps for a comfortable stay-put fit that is also easy to put on and take off.
Superior craftsmanship is seen throughout the design of these shin guards. The genuine leather is very durable and will last through punishing blow after punishing blow. In addition, the stitching is top quality and will hold up with no problem through rigorous training. You won't have to worry about your seams bursting in the middle of a training session.
The elastic strap that secures the foot padding is small. This means the padding wraps further around the foot to fully protect your instep. There are many vulnerable bones in this area of the foot and ensuring protection will keep you practicing harder to ensure you meet and hopefully exceed your goals.
Twins brand is known for their superior products and while not the most costly MMA shin guards in our guide they are pretty close. They will not be affordable for all budgets but they will keep you protected at a maximum level. The excellent durability will keep these in your use for a long time which does help when looking at the cost.
This affordable option by Meister is a bit different than what we have looked at so far. These shin guards are fully elastic and simple to pull on and off. Meister has included a hook and loop strapping closure at the top of the guard to ensure they stay comfortably in place. They are lightweight and will protect your shins as well as your foot and instep.
The fit of this option is good on several different levels. The elastic sock-like sleeve fits a variety of leg widths easily. More importantly, as you break them in the foam will mold to your specific leg. This offers superior protection the feels as if it was made just for you.
Anyone who has worn this style of shin guard has probably had to fight to keep them up. It is frustrating to have to keep stopping to pull up your protective equipment. The addition of a top strap allows you to secure the fit. You won't have to worry about the annoyance of stopping frequently and will get the superior comfort found in this type of shin guard.
When working with a strict budget, these are going to be your best option. Made from durable and quality materials, they will last you a decent amount of time. Carrying the lowest price tag will allow them to fit easily into any budget and help keep yourself protected during training.
Venum shows up on this list more than once due to their superior performance in durable high-quality fighting gear. The Elite Standup Shin guards are made of Skintex Leather for a great feel, exceptional durability, and ultimate protection that you can't find anywhere else. You also get excellent coverage with high-density foam for better overall protection.
When it comes to fit the two large Velcro straps on this option by Venum won't let you down. They secure your guards in place but also allow great flexibility. Due to their design, you won't have to worry about them scratching your legs, or about constantly readjusting them.
The lightweight and slim build of these may make you question their toughness. However, the high-density foam is will protect your shins and your feet equally. Through tough training, you will be able to rely on the shock absorbing and impact distributing ability of the foam SkinTex combination.
Full, unrestricted range of motion paired with superior protection costs more than any other in our guide. The advanced technology and durable use add to the overall value. While they may be difficult for some to afford if you can make room for them they will stand the test of time and use.
The second option by Venum, the Kontact is quite a bit different. It has a high-quality cotton build that is exceptionally comfortable. In addition, you won't have to worry about it sliding down due to the added Velcro closure. They are reinforced at the highest impact areas to ensure ultimate protection where you need it most.
Kicking and low strikes tend to put pressure and shock on specific areas, such as the shin bone and the tops of the feet. Repetitive striking practices can wear those areas out the fastest. This option is reinforced to ensure they continue to keep you protected through endless hours of training and sparring.
Training is sweaty work and with sweat comes odor. Many shin guards are difficult to wash or you have to use some soapy solution to keep them fresh. The Kontact can be thrown in the washer on a gentle cycle and air dried with no problems at all. This greatly reduces unpleasant odors and help to keep it simple.
This simple yet durable protection by Venum is surprisingly one of the most affordable options on the list. Excellent protection and a simple, secure design are what is offered and by a name trusted by fighters everywhere. Pretty much all budgets will be able to handle the cost and their value is outstanding.
Hayabusa is another powerhouse in the world of MMA gear and protective equipment. Their long standing reputation is upheld in the Hayabusa Ikusa shin guards. They offer exceptional breathability. Lightweight with a great range of motion you don't have to compromise protection to get a natural well-moving feel. They offer a great striking surface as well as amazing impact absorption.
When it comes to above average breathability the Hayabusa Ikusa has what you need. The Neoprene backing helps wick moisture away from the surface of the skin which aids in overall skin integrity. The Neoprene backing provides better breathability. It dries quickly and will keep you cool and comfortable.
The build of these shin guards makes them great for striking and striking against. They protect you in all areas. They mold to your legs and will keep everyone involved. The design also makes them more comfortable as they really do conform to your legs.
Sitting in the top middle these shin guards won't be easy to absorb in all budget situations. You will get a secure fit and great comfort when wearing them. The design will accommodate a variety of shapes and sizes comfortably. If you cross disciplines they will do you well in all varieties making their overall value improve even more.
RDX has really come into their own as a trusted brand of MMA fighters. The RDX Guard uses a gel shock absorption material that does an excellent job of keeping you comfortable and protected. They use a zero slip hook and loop closure and due to the gel construction really conform to your legs. The covering is Cowhide leather which, with proper care, will go the distance as you hone your skills in any and every discipline.
Some of the problems commonly seen in foam padding are that over time they lose their shape. With the integration of gel, you won't see this happen. When it comes to overall durability and comfortable non-pitted shin guards you will find that gel is superior.
These guards are all about long use. If properly cared for Cowhide Leather will last for years. You do this with some simple conditioning to make sure the Leather stays hydrated. It will be able to stand up to the hardest hits and come back for more.
RDX gives us an option that is unique and innovative. It falls right in the middle of our price range and will be a great value to anyone that is into MMA for the long haul. Buying durable products, in the end, saves you time and money. If you aren't sure you will stick with it you may not want to make this investment but if you do, you won't be disappointed.
Sanabul's Essential Hybrid shin guards transition seamlessly between your favorite types of Martial Arts. They offer a slide on style that is simple and secure. In addition, there is excellent coverage to your shin as well as your instep and foot. You won't have to choose between comfort and protection when wearing these because of their flexibility and the good range of motion while wearing them.
Not only do you get a snug fit with the Neoprene sleeve but you also have two security straps. Sanabul knows the frustration of tugging on your shin guards and has added a strap at the middle and at the top to ensure they stay where you put them. No more worry of sliding protection leading to injury when you decide to trust the Sanabul brand.
Throughout the entire design, you will find triple stitching. What does this mean for you? Better durability and longer wear for extended time. Oftentimes you will find weak areas near the straps but with this type of reinforcement that will no longer be a worry.
The cost of this option falls in the middle of our price point. It is important to note, they are affordable for most budgets. They offer a secure and comfortable fit while maintaining good breathability. The design is smart and structured for great protection where you need it most, this adds to their overall value.
Hayabusa like Venum holds two spots in our guide. This is because of their amazing products that will stand tough through countless rounds of abuse. When wearing these your lower legs, knees, and feet will all be protected. Their exceptional coverage will help ensure you don't sustain any serious injuries while sparring. Their overall fit is aided by an inner silicone grip. They are lightweight, flexible, well-fitting, and durable.
Hot gear makes something sweaty even worse. The open back on this pair of shin guards allows your legs to breath without compromising fit. Secure straps keep them in place while air is able to flow freely, which helps keep you cooler and more comfortable.
Not only around the leg and foot but also at the knee you will find an amazing fit. This contour shapes well to your body and allows ample space for making and receiving blows. Protecting yourself is key and a strike to the knee could put you out of commission for a long time, try these and be truly protected.
As with most Hayabusa products, this one comes with a pretty hefty price tag. Not all budgets will be able to easily absorb their cost. You will receive a set of guards that can withstand serious use and abuse. Alongside that, they offer a great fit and shock absorption that will allow you to train as often as possible without the repercussions of pain, soreness, and bruises.
Regardless of your chosen style, keeping yourself and your sparring partner protected is a number one goal. Inferior equipment can and will lead to painful bruising and possibly serious injuries. While there are many other options on today’s market the ones you have just seen are in the top of their class when it comes to durability, comfort, flexibility, and overall protection. Finding the perfect protective equipment does not have to be difficult, we have done the research now all you need to do is make the choice.
When you’re buying protective gear, naturally, you want it to be awesome at absorbing and distributing impact. This will keep your skin free from bruising and help your bones stay far away from breaking. There are a variety of foams and gels found within shin guards.
Depending on your level of skill will depend on the amount of protection you need. If you find yourself in a beginner’s Muay Thai class once in a while less padding will be ok. On the other hand, if you are serious about martial arts and sparring and training become part of your daily routine than more protection will be required. This is especially important as your skill and power start to increase and you start landing devastating blows.
Single layer coated foam is truly for beginners and exceptionally light sparring. It is usually coated in Polyurethane and quite durable. You will get some shock absorption but it will not stand against heavy strikes.
Giving more protection than a single layer this is a good starting option for those that naturally have a bit more striking power. Heavy hitting beginners will find better shock absorption and distribution to accommodate their higher strength. You will need to pay attention to durability as there can be some common ripping spots on this type of protective gear.
Synthetic Leather is fairly durable and it is simple to care for. You simply wipe it down with an antimicrobial and you are good to go. This type of leather does not breath as well as others but will withstand pretty tough abuse. You will find single, double, and even triple layer foam wrapped in this type of leather. Each additional layer of padding will protect that much more and be able to handle more shock and impact during tough training.
Leather is by far the most durable covering material and helps with overall impact absorption. Used in the finest products available it does require more care and oftentimes more expensive. Heavy hitters and more advanced fighters will typically want to go towards leather goods because of the durability they offer.
Gel offers some of the finest impact absorption and won’t lose its shape after taking constant abuse. The problem with gel is the overall durability of it. It can be more difficult to care for and if seems rip it can lead to a complete replacement of your shin guards.
The type of closure not only impacts the fit of your shin guards it also impacts the overall functionality and protection they offer you. If you find your protection slipping around because of bad closure systems or improper fit with no adjustability you may sustain a variety of injuries that will put you out for extended periods of time.
While the type of closure varies from brand to brand there are common trends that you will see. To say which is better is impossible as everyone is shaped a bit differently and what works for your sparring partner may not work so well for you. Let’s take a moment and look at different closure types and who they work best for and who should probably avoid them.
While arguably the most comfortable and flexible Cotton and Neoprene sleeves can be difficult to keep up. They hug the leg like a sock and the padding is typically stitched into it on the areas that require the most protection. This type of fit may lead to excessive movement and make you more prone to injury due to slipping pads. If you want to find a better fit with the same flexibility look at options like the Meister Elastic Shin Guards that offer a strap at the top for security. Some even offer dual straps for a supremely secure fit.
You will find a large variety of Velcro strapping systems within the subject of shin guards. Some are hook and loop style closures which make for easy adjustment without removing your gloves. They are usually quite durable and as long as they offer a good design the Velcro will not scratch your legs. Double and triple stitching can help ensure this. Be careful of exposed sharp edges or thin strips of Velcro. These can lead to unnecessary injury.
Q: How do I keep my shin guards clean?
A: This will all depend on what material your shin guards are made of and you will want to double check the manufacturer’s recommendations. It is usually quite simple. If your protection is made of dipped foam, has a synthetic leather outer, or is made of some sort of Vinyl or synthetic blend you will be safe to clean with simple soap and water or a spray antibacterial. When dealing with Leather you need to be more careful or you could cause staining or damage to it. Special Leather cleaners and conditioners can be used to keep your gear in top shape and performing for years to come.
Q: Do I need to wear shin guards when I am training at home?
A: Depending on the type of training you are doing at home it can be critical that you indeed wear protection. Muay Thai and Kickboxing are the perfect examples. If working on your kicks and low strikes with a heavy bag you will most certainly need to keep your legs and feet protected. Spending the day working on fist strikes may not require you to protect your legs but be careful as in the heat of a great combination an ill-placed unprotected strike could leave you in a very bad way.
Q: The Velcro closure of my favorite shin guards is wearing out, is there anything I can do to prolong its life?
A: Yes, there is actually a pretty simple fix. If you are a stranger to a needle and thread you will want to find someone who isn’t. You can purchase some new Velcro and cut it to the appropriate size. Once doing this, stitch it over the old worn pieces and you will have a long-lasting fix. Be careful of sharp edges, trimming correctly will help you avoid scratches.
Q: Does it matter which shin guard I wear on either side?
A: With some brands, it will matter and with others not so much. Many brands put a label on each one specifying right from left. Others you can tell simply by looking at the placement of the padding. If you are still unsure check out some reviews or forums for better insight into the specifics for the brand you are wearing. | 2019-04-23T12:52:09Z | https://fightingreport.com/best-mma-shin-guards-reviewed/ |
Growing numbers of Jews have become deeply interested in mysticism, specifically in the medieval Jewish insights, prayer practices, and solitary meditation disciplines (hitbodedut) that comprise the powerful and influential mystical way of Kabbalah (Qabbalah, Cabala). According to scholars led by the eminent Gershom Scholem, Kabbalah (“received tradition”) began to be esoterically promulgated in the second half of the 12th century in the Provence region of southern France by a few leading rabbis—e.g., Rabad of Posquières, Ya‘aqov the Nazirite and Moses Nahmanides. Kabbalah emerged publicly in the early 13th century in the work of the Rabad’s son (Yitshaq the Blind) and in obscure texts like the Sefer ha-Bahir. In Spain there appeared in the 1280s the most important “canonical” Kabbalist book, the Zohar. This mystical novel, now known to be a compilation of booklets penned and in parts even trance-channeled via automatic writing by Moses de Leòn, combined Torah, Midrash (commentary works), theosophy, homily and mythical fiction. Spanish rabbi Abraham Abulafia (1240-95), an extremely influential “ecstatic Kabbalist,” traveled through the Mediterranean as far as Palestine, teaching meditation methods, especially recitation of Divine names and visualized combinations of Hebrew letters. After the unconscionable expulsion of the Jews from Spain and Portugal in 1492/1497 by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, Kabbalah’s primary sphere of influence migrated, first to Jerusalem, then to Safed, Galilee, where it flourished under the leadership of eminent spiritual masters Moses Cordovero (1522-70) and the Ari, Isaac Luria (1534-72), and their disciple Hayyim (Chaim) Vital (1542-1620).
After being covert for much of this century, known only to a few mystics and post-war Israeli scholars, Kabbalah in the last two decades has sprung forth from its hidden recesses through the increasingly public work of these mystics and scholars in conjunction with the curious diggings of Jewish Baby Boom seekers looking for a deeper connection to their tradition. Today Kabbalah, ranging from a purely contemplative practice to a rather superstitious magic (replete with amulets and omen-mongering), enjoys growing popularity among Jews of various camps, in Israel and the West. A survey by Ma‘ariv, the major Israeli newspaper, reported in Fall 1997 that 18% of Israelis, including leading politicians on the right, sought counsel from kabbalistic rabbis, most renowned of whom was Iraqi-born centenarian Harav Yitzhak Kadouri (c1890-2006), a Sephardic rabbi. Many believers carry Kadouri amulets, key chains and blessing cards. (Meanwhile, to rabbis’ chagrin, another 20% of Israelis consult fortune tellers using palmistry, tarot cards or tea leaves; another 11% prefer astrologers). Two months later in 1997, Time magazine identified Kabbalah as a “pop” trend in the USA, with some 200 small-scale programs of experiential Jewish mysticism to be found nationwide. World-renowned pop star Madonna embraced kabbalah—much to the chagrin of old Rabbi Kadouri, who stated “It is forbidden to teach a non-Jew Kabbalah.” With such notoriety, this variegated system received even greater exposure among the youth.
Just as in Christianity the return to a more mystical, meditative path has been in large part stimulated by Christians exploring Eastern spiritual paths, so also much (not all) of the impetus for interest in mystical Judaism has come from Jews who have explored—or seen many of their friends and family exploring—meditation-oriented traditions like Theravada, Zen and Vajrayana Buddhism, Hindu Vedanta and Muslim Sufism. In fact, with the Kabbalistic emphasis among Hasidic rebbes on meditation, reincarnation (gilgul neshamot) and the possibility for sublime union with G-d (devekut), mystical Judaism can strongly vie with Eastern religious traditions for “market share” in the case of Jews, especially younger ones, who might otherwise only be interested to explore these Eastern religious traditions.
Leading neo-Hasidic rabbis of our day bringing a contemplative Kabbalist Judaism to would-be mystics include, in Israel, Rabbi Joseph Schechter, who from the 1960s on led a youthful community in a meditative, purificatory Jewish spirituality drawing on Kabbalah, Hasidism, Hindu and Taoist meditation, parapsychology, etc. Polish-born Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, who trained within the ultra-orthodox Lubavitcher Hasidism line, studied assorted non-Jewish mystical spiritual paths and in 1962 founded his quasi-Hasidic B’nai Or (“Children of Light,” now P’nai Or, “Faces of Light”) Religious Fellowship, headquartered in Philadelphia. Through this organization Rav Zalman introduced numerous American Jews to meditation and has become a leading liberal prophet of the Jewish Renewal movement in America, having ordained scores of rabbis and influenced many others. Rabbi Joseph Gelberman’s “Little Synagogue” Hasidic community in New York has also brought considerable Eastern spiritual influences to American Jews, resulting in a strong appreciation for meditation and mystical depth within a Jewish context. Gelberman, like Rav Zalman, has been quite active in the interfaith movement and in this way has helped fellow Jews to draw on the best of other traditions to enrich their own path of love for G-d. Rabbi Jonathan Omer-Man is a prominent, eloquent Kabbalist in Los Angeles, and Rabbi David Cooper authored a best-seller primer on Kabbalah; he teaches, along with his wife, a growing group of students in Colorado. More generally, the works of Abraham Joshua Heschel, Gershom Scholem, Martin Buber, Elie Wiesel, Moshe Idel, Aryeh Kaplan, Arthur Green, Daniel Matt and Rodger Kamenetz have stimulated a revival of meditative Jewish spirituality among countless Jews and edified many of us lovers of Jewish lore who adhere to other traditions.
Significantly, disproportionate numbers of Jews are to be found leading and attending various American Buddhist and, to a lesser extent, American Vedanta and Sufi meditation circles. Some would put this figure as high as one-third, a figure that shocks traditional Jews, who consider any involvement in non-halakhah forms of religion to be avodah zarah, forbidden religious service, or even minut, apostasy.
The study and practice of the Kabbalah’s mystical way has been central among the orthodox Hasidic Jewish congregations. These descend from the work of Hasidism’s illustrious founder, the extraordinary spiritual master of Podolia (western Ukraine), Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer —the Ba‘al Shem Tov (“Master of the Divine Name”; 1698-1760). Under the saintly influence of the Ba‘al Shem Tov (acronym: the Besht) and his charismatic disciples, almost half of central and eastern Europe’s Jewry had become Hasidim by the early 19th century.
The Hasidim—with their ecstatically joyful, spontaneous sacred dancing, their emphasis on mystical experience over dry Talmudic scholarship, and their special devotional focus on the spiritual leader (the tzaddiq) as channel of G-d’s grace (shefa)—were considered excessively “liberal” in the first several generations of the movement, and harassed and even excommunicated by Orthodox Jewish rabbis. It is ironic, then, that in the 20th/21st centuries the Hasidim, who now constitute only about 6% of the world’s 16 million Jews, appear quite conservative. The joyful dancing and experiential emphasis still characterize Hasidic congregations. But—when compared to the liberal Reform and Conservative branches of Judaism in America and Europe, strongly influenced by the European Enlightenment and assimilating modern forms of worship, dress, and lifestyle—the Hasidim seem very much a throwback to the “Old World” of another era.
By far the most popular lineage of Hasidism in North America, in fact the world’s most influential Hasidic sect, is the growing, ultra-Orthodox missionary Lubavitcher or Habad movement. Headquartered in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, Habad hosts a population there of some 30,000 souls and includes 500,000 to 700,000 Jews worldwide. This fervent form of mysticism was brought to America in 1940 by Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneerson (1880-1950), who was the leading rabbi in Russia after Sovietization, and whose arrival in New York ushered in a rebirth of Hasidism in the New World.
Nevertheless, the influence of Lubavitcher Hasidism has served, and will continue to serve, as a stimulus that indirectly strengthens the several other already flourishing Hasidic lineages.
Other Hasidic sects survived the Nazi destruction (many did not) and now exist in Israel, Europe and/or America. They include the Rabinowicz-Monastritsh line descended from Jacob Isaac Rainowicz (d. 1814); the Chernobyl line, from Mordecai Twersky (d. 1837, son of Menahem Nahum); Bobover Hasidism, saved and carried to the US and Israel by Rabbi Solomin Halberstam (1908-2000); Satmar Hasidism, created by Moshe Teitelbaum and carried on by his controversial, anti-Zionist son Yo’el/Joel Teitelbaum (1887-1979); and the most progressive, accessible Hasidic sect, Bratslav Hasidism, started by Nachman of Bratslav (1772-1810), great-grandson of the Baal Shem Tov through his holy daughter Adel, and still considered the chief rebbe of that line (this same situation will likely occur in Habad).
All sects of Hasidism can remind Jews and other religious people of the beauty of the deeply mystical life focused on G-d as the transcendent ‘Ein Sof and immanent Shekhinah. God manifests as Light, Love, Wisdom (Hochmah), Intelligence (Binah), and all other sefirot-aspects of Divine majesty.
Hasidism challenges us to remember that, truly, “There is no place empty of Him,” and that our greatest purpose is serving G-d’s creatures, visualizing the neshâmah or Divine spark within them returning to G-d in all glory in its highest nature as the yechidah or Absolute Spirit. Ultimately we, too, are returned to the sublime state of spiritual union with G-d.
1 “Meditation Grows in Popularity Among Jews,” Religion News Service, Jan. 30, 1993.
2 A fine article on Ayin and Ein Sof is Daniel Matt, “Ayin: The Concept of Nothingness in Jewish Mysticism,” in Robert Forman (Ed.), The Problem of Pure Consciousness: Mysticism and Philosophy, Oxford, 1990, pp. 121-159. On the merkava “throne of God,” see “Throne of God” in Geoffrey Wigoder (Ed. in Chief), The Encyclopedia of Judaism, Macmillan, 1989, pp. 704-5.
3 A large number of books have been published on various texts and aspects of the Kabbalah system and Jewish mysticism. See works by the father of scholarly Kabbalah studies, Gershom Scholem, including Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, NY: Schocken, 1955, On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism (R. Manheim, Tr.), Schocken, 1969, Origins of the Kabbalah (R.J. Werblowsky, Ed., Allan Arkush, Tr.), Princeton Univ., 1990, On the Mystical Shape of the Godhead: Basic Concepts in the Kabbalah, Schocken, 1991, On the Possibility of Jewish Mysticism in Our Time (Jonathan Chapman, Tr.), NY: Jewish Publ. Soc., 1994, G. Scholem (Ed.), Zohar: The Book of Splendor: Basic Readings from the Kabbalah, Schocken, 1987. See Eliezer Schweid, Judaism & Mysticism According to Gershom Scholem: A Critical Analysis & Programmatic Discussion, Decatur, GA: Scholars Press, 1985. See a fine anthology, Daniel Matt, The Essential Kabbalah: The Heart of Jewish Mysticism, HarperCollins, 1995, and Matt (Ed. & Tr.) Zohar: The Book of Enlightenment, Paulist Press, 1988. Other works on Kabbalah/Jewish mysticism include Joseph Dan, Jewish Mysticism (4 vols.), Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1998; J. Dan & Ronald Kiener (Eds.), The Early Kabbalah, Paulist, 1986; Moshe Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives, Yale U., 1990; Studies in Ecstatic Kabbalah, SUNY, 1988; Mark Verman, The Books of Contemplative Medieval Jewish Mystical Sources, SUNY, 1992; Aryeh Kaplan, Immortality, Resurrection and the Age of the Universe: A Kabbalistic View, Hoboken, NJ: KTAV, 1994; Meditation and Kabbalah, S. Weiser ed, 1986/1982; The Bahir, Weiser ed., 1989/1980; Sefer Yetzirah (The Book of Creation), Weiser ed., 1993/1990; Z’ev ben Shimon Halevi, Kabbalah: Tradition of Hidden Knowledge, London: Thames Hudson, 1980 (illus.); Introduction to the Cabala, Weiser rev. ed., 1991; The Way of Kabbalah, Weiser ed., 1991 (first publ. in 1976); The Work of the Kabbalist, Weiser, 1985; Psychology and Kabbalah, Weiser ed., 1987; Yechiel Bar Lev, An Introduction to Kabbalah, Spring Valley, NY: Feldheim, 1994; David Ariel, The Mystic Quest: An Introduction to Jewish Mysticism, Pantheon, 1992; Moshe Hallamish, An Introduction to Kaballah, SUNY, 1999; Charles Fielding, The Practical Qabalah, Weiser, 1989; Leonard Glotzer, Fundamentals of Jewish Mysticism, Aronson, 1992; Howard Schwartz, Gabriel’s Palace: Jewish Mystical Tales, Aronson, 1994; Perle Besserman (Ed.), Teachings of the Jewish Mystics, Shambhala, 1998; Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Jewish Mysticism: An Anthology, Oxford: One World, 1995; Avram Davis & Manuela Dunn Mascetti, Judaic Mysticism, NY: Hyperion, 1997.
4 The Israel survey was by Maariv newspaper, reported in “One out of five Israelis visit seers,” from news agency [email protected] (AFP), on the clari.news.religion newswire, Sep. 18, 1997. On Kabbalah in the West, see David Van Biema, “Pop Goes the Kabbalah,” Time, Nov. 24, 1997.
5 On the Jewish connection with Eastern religion, specifically Zen, see Harold Heifetz (Ed.), Zen and Hasidism, Wheaton, IL: Quest, 1978.
6 On Hasidic belief in reincarnation, see interesting works by Yonassan Gershom, Beyond the Ashes: Cases of Reincarnation from the Holocaust (Jon Robertson, Ed.), Virginia Beach, VA: A.R.E. (Assoc. for Research and Enlightenment) Press, 1992; From Ashes to Healing: Mystical Encounters with the Holocaust, A.R.E., 1996. Gershom relates cases of Jews and non-Jews with clear memories of previous lives under Nazi persecution.
7 Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, Shohama Harris Wiener & Jonathan Omer-Man, Worlds of Jewish Prayer: A Festschrift in Honor of Rabbi Zalman M. Schachter-Shalomi, Jason Aronson, 1994; Z. Schachter & Edward Hoffman, Sparks of Light, Shambhala, 1983; Z. Schachter-Shalomi & Donald Gropman, The First Step, Bantam, 1983. See the periodical of the P’nai Or, New Menorah (6723 Emlen St., Philadelphia, PA 19119); Joseph Gelberman, To Be... Fully Alive, Farmingdale, NY: Coleman Graphics, 1983, Reaching a Mystical Experience: A Kabbalistic Encounter, NY: Wisdom Press, 1970, and the journal of the Little Synagogue, Kabbalah for Today (155 E. 22nd St., N.Y., NY 10010); David Cooper, God Is A Verb: God and the Practice of Mystical Kabbalah, Riverhead, 1997; Rodger Kamenetz, Stalking Elijah: Adventures with Today’s Jewish Mystical Masters, HarperSF, 1997.
8 On this controversy, see Rabbis Zalman Schachter and Chaim Tsvi Hollander in H. Heifetz (Ed.), Zen and Hasidism, op. cit., pp. 135-60.
9 On Hasidism (English language): Gershon David Hundert, Essential Papers on Hasidism: Origins to Present, NYU Press, 1991; Moshe Rosman, Founder of Hasidism: A Quest for the Historical Ba‘al Shem Tov, UC Press, 1996; Dan Ben-Amos & Jerome Mintz (Eds.), In Praise of the Baal Shem Tov: The Earliest Collection of Legends About the Founder of Hasidism, Bloomington, IN: Indiana U., 1970; Abraham Heschel, The Circle of the Ba‘al Shem Tov: Studies in Hasidism (S.H. Dresner, Ed.), U of Chicago, 1985; Avraham Yaakov Finkel, The Great Chasidic Masters, Aronson, 1992; Aryeh Kaplan, The Light Beyond: Adventures in Hassidic Thought, Brooklyn, NY: Maznaim, 1981, and Chasidic Masters and Their Teachings, Maznaim, 1984; Harry Rabinowicz, Hasidism: The Movement and Its Masters, Aronson, 1988; Moshe Idel, Hasidism: Between Ecstasy and Magic, SUNY, 1995; Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, Schocken, 1954, pp. 325-350, The Messianic Idea in Judaism and Other Essays on Jewish Spirituality, Schocken, 1971, pp. 176-250; Joseph Dan, The Teachings of Hasidism, NY: Behrman, 1983; Elie Wiesel, Souls on Fire: Portraits and Legends of Hasidic Masters, Random House, 1972; Martin Buber, Tales of the Hasidim (Olga Marx, Tr.) (2 vols.), Schocken, 1947-8; M. Buber, Hasidism and Modern Man (M. Friedman, Ed. & Trans.), Harper, 1966 (first pub. 1958); Samuel Dresner, The Zaddik, London, 1960; Jiri Langer, Nine Gates to the Chassidic Mysteries (Stephen Jolly, Tr.), Behrman, 1976; Louis Jacobs, Hasidic Prayer, Washington: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 1978, and Jewish Mystical Testimonies, NY, 1987; Arthur Green (Ed.), Your Word Is Fire: The Hasidic Masters on Contemplative Prayer, Jewish Lights Publ., 1993; Rachel Elior, The Paradoxical Ascent, SUNY, 1993; Gedalyah Nigal, Magic, Mysticism and Hasidism: the Supernatural in Jewish Thought, Aronson, 1994; Norman Lamm, The Religious Thought of Hasidism, Text and Commentary, NJ: Michael Scharf Publ. Trust of Yeshiva Univ., 1999; Herbert Weiner, 9½ Mystics: The Kabbala Today, NY: Collier, 1969. Fine articles include Joseph Dan, “Hasidism: An Overview,” in Mircea Eliade (Ed.), The Encyclopedia of Religion, NY: Macmillan, 1987, Vol. 6, pp. 204-211; Arthur Green, “Hasidism” (and “Spirituality”) in A. Cohen & Paul Mendes-Florher (Eds.), Contemporary Jewish Thought: Original Essays on Critical Concepts, Movements, and Beliefs, Free Press, 1988; and the various articles on Hasidism and Jewish mysticism in Arthur Green (Ed.), Jewish Spirituality II: From the Sixteenth Century Revival to the Present, Crossroad, 1987 (see also A. Green, Ehyeh: A Kabbalah for Tomorrow, Jewish Lights, 2004). Other good works on modern-era Hasidism are Avraham Yaakov Finkel, Contemporary Sages: The Great Chasidic Masters of the Twentieth Century, Aronson, 1994; Menachem Daum & Oren Rudavsky, A Life Apart: Hasidism in America, 1997 [based on their documentary film]; Robert Eisenberg, Boychiks in the Hood: Travels in the Hasidic Underground, HarperSF, 1995; David Landau, Piety and Power: The World of Jewish Fundamentalism, NY: Hill & Wang, 1993 (examines Hasidism and other ultra-Orthodox Haredi Jewish groups and Israeli politics).
10 On Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (Schneersohn), see the many obituaries appearing in the press on June 13, 1994 and after; Shaul Shimon Deutsch, Larger than Life: The Life & Times of the Lubavitcher Rebbe Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (2 vols.), NY: Chasidic Historical Prods., 1997; Eliyahu & Malka Touger, To Know and to Care: An Anthology of Chassidic Stories about the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, NY: Sichos In English, 1994; Chaim Calfin, Conversations with the Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, LA: JEC Publ., 1996. On English-language editions of his teachings, see M.M. Schneersohn, Toward a Meaningful Life: The Wisdom of the Rebbe (S. Jacobson, Ed.), Morrow, 1995; Letters by the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Brooklyn, NY: Kehot Publ. Society, 1979; On the Essence of Chassidus (R.Y.H Greenberg & S.S Handelman, Tr.), Kehot, 1986, and other books, as well as the journal Talks and Tales (770 Eastern Pkwy, Brooklyn, NY 11213). See a large, annotated bibliography at xlubi.com/x5pbibliog.htm, and linked articles by Max Ariel Kohanzad on Schneersohn’s profoundly nondual theology; on this, see Rabbi Faitel Levin, Heaven On Earth: Reflections on the Theology of Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Kehot, 2000. Two books relating the Rebbe’s ideas to Eastern spirituality are Gutman Locks, There is One, publ. by author (24 Chabad St., Old City, Jerusalem), 1993; The Raging Mind, 2000.
On Lubavitcher Habad Hasidism, see the main work of its founder, Rabbi Shne’ur Zalman (1754-1813), Tanya’, Kehot, 1956; Gershon Kranzler, Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Ladi [sic]: A Brief Presentation of the Life, Work and Basic Teachings of the Founder of Chabad Chassidism (based on talks with the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem. M. Schneerson), Kehot, 1974; Nissan Mindel, The Philosophy of Habad, Kehot, 1973; many works by Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn (1880-1950), all published by Kehot; Yehudah Chitrik, From My Fathers Table: A Treasury of Chabad Chassidic Stories (E. Touger, Tr.), Jerusalem: Vagshal, 1991; Louis Jacob, Seeker of Unity, NY, 1966; Herbert Weiner, 9½ Mystics: The Kabbala Today, Ch. 6; and Noson Gurary, The Thirteen Principles of Faith: A Chasidic Viewpoint, Aronson, 1996.
11 On Rabbi Nachman, see Arthur Green, Tormented Master: The Life and Spiritual Quest of Rebbe Nahman of Bratslav, Jewish Lights Publ., 1992/1979; Arnold Band, Nahman of Bratslav: The Tales, Paulist, 1978; on the web, see www.breslov.org. | 2019-04-22T09:14:24Z | https://www.enlightened-spirituality.org/Kabbalah_and_Hasidism.html |
März Nach den USA, Australien und Japan gründet der Spanische Fußballverband eine eigene FIFA-eSports-Liga. Startschuss ist der März mit. May 4, Onto our final section for this La Liga starting eleven, and finally, we find a Atlético have the best defensive record in the league, with just Aug. Electronic Arts führt bei FIFA 18 ein neues "Broadcast Package" für die spanische La Liga Santander ein. Erfahrt im Video, welche Änderungen. Wir haben euch bereits fünf Bundesligaspieler vorgestellt, die uns jedes mal einige Nerven kosten, wenn der Gegner sie aufstellt. Ein Termin existiert bislang nicht. Welcome, Login to your account. Wer nicht vor Ort ist, muss sich dann wohl noch gedulden. Lasst es uns wissen. Wir rechnen damit, dass Electronic Arts einen entsprechenden Trailer nach dem Bundesliga-Start am Wochenende veröffentlicht. Das Bioware von damals gibt es nicht mehr - Kolumne 5. Zieht aus der zweiten Reihe ab! Diese fünf Spieler sind OP! Jump Force — Story Trailer, Boruto und mehr. Kann nur OP sein! Auch in der spanischen La Liga gibt es Spieler, die uns zum Schwitzen bringen, obwohl ihre Gesamtbewertung dies nicht vermuten lässt. Wir halten das Video bereit. Hier wird anhand eines kleinen Matches die Nähe motogp kalender Realität demonstriert. Ein Termin existiert bislang nicht. Nicht ohne Grund vergibt futhead. Mobile als Startseite festgelegt. Aktuelle Sportspiel-Spiele Releases Release: Auch auf dem virtuellen Rasen ist er kaum zu halten. Kurz um bedeutet das, dass wir jetzt live dart aus den Live-Übertragungen bekannten Logos, Grafiken etc. Wir haben euch bereits fünf Bundesligaspieler vorgestellt, die uns jedes mal einige Nerven kosten, wenn der Gegner sie aufstellt. Neben neuen Logos und Anzeigetafeln dürfen sich Spieler auch auf neue Banner freuen. Diese Website benutzt Cookies.
However, he is very expensive forcing many players to choose another forward. There is a lack of quality strikers for medium budget squads.
You should choose according to your preferences. Gameiro is who scores more goals but his heading is poor. Aduriz is a kind of target man who plays well with his feet and head, but you will not see him sprinting.
Finally, Bakambu is opposite: A lot of people think that this is the most important part of the guide. The thing that is really important to know is how to choose players based on their role and style of play that fits each player.
Oblak is the natural choice to the goal. However, who to put as his replacement presents one of the most difficult decisions. Asenjo, Ter Stegen and Navas are all good goalkeepers and you will be fine with either of them.
Sergio Ramos keeps on being the boss of the defensive foursome for all and a few more reasons. He is a box to box player but, if you think you need someone more suitable to give security to your defensive line, you should pick Casemiro instead of him.
On the wings, this league has the two best players in the world: One thing is guaranteed: Once all the players reach maximum individual chemistry via loyalty achieved by each player after 10 matches for your club or by being pack pulled you can go without a manager for your squad.
The choices for this more affordable team players was based on analysis made previously. Umtiti and Laporte are both fast and solid defensively.
Koke and Kovacic complete the midfield. While Deulofeu beats the concurrence on the left wing, Williams do it on the opposite side.
Over the attack line, you have three decent options. As we already explained, you should pick Gameiro, Aduriz or Bakambu according to your needs.
The choice for this budget team was based on analysis made previously. However, if you have a few more coins, upgrading to Asenjo would be a good improvement.
The first one is strong, quick and aggressive, while the second is a player that usually pushes forward to assist his colleagues. Hello, how are you?
This is my squad https: Right, but Sergio Ramos cost None of my defense players cost that, only Nacho Fernandez who I think is in the top 3 of the central defenders of the league currently.
I think that the upgrades were much better last year. You can see my predictions here. I need your opinion. Now, I use narrow. This is my team.
Lloris semedo-varane-umtiti-alba casemiro modric-saul IF isco griezmann-ben yedder IF. I will use same back four and casemiro, and only change my frontline.
I currently have coins but i cant decide myself. What do you advise. What is your opinion of Coutinho and Diego Costa now that they are in the Santander league?
Diego Costa is a player with a similar level of Benzema. Coutinho is a player with a similar level of Carrasco. I have been using your high budget squad for a few weeks now.
I am having a much tougher time but I assume it is partly because it takes time to get better with new players and my competition has gotten much better.
But a few things:. I am having a hard time utilizing Ronaldo at LM. He has a rough first touch and his ability to make cuts and avoid tackles seems worst than Carrasco.
And now when I face a Ronaldo I am easily able to shut him down because he dribbles so far ahead of himself and has poor balance.
He is very easy to defend. Bale at RM has no stamina. Am I not doing something right? Suarez is a machine but I am having trouble finding a striker to complement him.
I find Griezmann to be better than Messi. Griezmann is unstoppable in tight places with his balance and ball control. Messi is also too short to handle crosses is this formation.
Ronaldo is the best player in the game, but we all play differently. So, a good player for me may not be for you and vice-versa. The same applies to Messi and Bale.
However, you were the first player to say that these 3 players are not as good as other ones. Maybe you should try other formations, tactics and instructions.
Who should i buy with k? What do you think, which one is the best in your opinion? A CDM with defending stat 26 is one of them.
Tell me pls what wrong in this squad? There is nothing wrong but you should think to try Umtiti. He plays better as ST but you can also use him as CAm with success.
The style depends on many factors as you can see here. However, I think he is too expensive for the little improvement he represents. I run a LaLiga Usually, the most difficult part is not conceding goals.
In my opinion, you should try to replace Aduriz by someone better. As far as Griezmann goes, I have never played with him but I find him easy to defend against.
I was thinking about going with the following strikers: Suarez and Messi, with Bale as RM. Gameiro is cheap so maybe he would work in the meantime.
Is Griezmann really a worth having on the squad? I do have serious scoring issues. Suarez is really amazing but also very expensive.
I have two squads, first: I was thinking about Griezmann. Muriel is good, very good, but I want a crack on ST. Will Griezmann be good decision to buy?
Maybe better decision will be earn more money and buy Bale. You have two good teams. I suggest you buy Griezmann. He is one of the best ST in this league.
I need your advice about two things: My question is which formation you prefer I am hesitated between or what are the advances of both? And what Custome tactic you would use with it?
You can see the difference between bot formations here. We are working on a custom tactics guide to be published in a few weeks.
About your team, you have decent players for your budget. With a small effort, you can try to upgrade your ST for Gameiro.
I would buy Vrselic special as RB. Please advice, many, many thanks for your work. You have a nice team. Most of the players you are using are the ones we also recommend on our guide.
Obviously, his numbers are much better but I am always sceptical about IF cards. I use compact. Still having problems in defending. What do you suggest, I will ask you about Italian teams cause the second team is from there.
I was thinking buying Carrasco though Deulofeu is topscorer and Varrane. What is your opinion on my team and on additions to made?
Varane is a must buy. I also believe that you are using too many special cards. They are very expensive. Hi, This is my current team, playing on X-box.
Switched earlier from to now after having too many troubles in defense. I am still having a lot of trouble defending, but it is getting better.
Delefeu, Inaki, Kovacic, Semedo replaced Carva into main team, bought for 3, to defend better on the flanks , Vasquez, Turan, Mascherano was a disaster when he was in the main team and had to get Gimenez as a cheap replacement.
I do not particularly like the current formation as the mid-field to attack transition is difficult and want to explore and both possible with current players… but also , which worked really well in Fifa 17 for me but requires a completely different set of players — I will need a really good striker and need to sell Dembele and Carrasco.
Following the description you made, I think you should use a formation with one CDM. In that way, you will have free players to attack.
You can use most of the players you have now in that formation. Thanks, really appreciate the tip and the whole article. Just got Varane 12k , Benzema and Alba for 18k each looks like steep drops in prices.
Next up thinking about Iniesta and Casemiro to bolster the midfield. I can sell Carassco and Dembele, and try to re-install Gameiro or something better for pace.
On budget, I think I will have generated about 60k from trading in the next week, sitting on about 12k for now. Griezmann is an expensive player.
If I was you, I would start by the players you can afford and see how good they are. As soon as you have a better budget, you may try the best ones.
But yes, give a try to , one of the most used formations. Hi My team is lloris semedo varane umtiti alba kroos modric dembele Isco carrasco greizmann 2 how would you suggest to improve this only have 70k to spend.
You have the best players for each position, except the biggest ones. You have now two options: I just got myself the whole medium budget team and i would like to know what to upgrade from now on and how can i get a good amount of coins?
I sold my Premier League Team, because it did not work for me. I have Money. Fantastic Semedo, Casemiro, Asensio very very good Thanks your help!!!
Have you another idea? I will Modric buy if i have money and after Sergio Ramos and Suarez. I think you are doing it right, trying another league.
That team is great. Yes, Modric, Ramos and Suarez will be great additions as soon as you have money for them. Dont know the english name of it Oblak.
Modric and Isco are fast enough for most of the players. Any change you make, you will weaken your team. Now Im playing 2: Benzema looks too slow for my team, Busquets also.
I can buy every player till k. I could play sth like that: Gameiro and Bakambu or Isco And Rakitic? If you do, then your second team is not an option.
You already have a good team. Hey thanks for the the guides! I use them avidly but could you please help? Where to improve next?
Maybe you should sell your IF striker and use those coins to improve your team: I have a Full la liga squad! First squad 2: I have 60k, what van I do to get my team better?
Thank you so much for your Guide!!! My team is doing Very Well. I have bought Benzema to replace Aduriz and Boudebouz to replace Banega, and it was a great surprise.
However, if you are already happy with your team, you may go for Filipe Luis. Can You help me more? Any hard mistakes in this squad?
Now I have k Kante in pack for Squad Battles: D and so many players to buy: My suggestion is to upgrade your current squad with some of the best players for each position: Oblak, Varane, Modric and Benzema.
Later you can try Griezmann. Benzema is too slow for my playing style. Why not Saul instead of Pizarro for backup CM in medium and low budget.
Saul is too expensive for the low budget squad. He is not in the medium budget squad because we decided to use a CDM for that position.
Obviously you can use him since he is globally a better player than Pizarro, but be sure that his physical stats are good enough to keep your backline safe.
It looks that you are alone. If you like him, go ahead, play with him. Just look at the pictures of best players for each position and you will see how wrong you are.
I agree with youre rankings.. We will try to keep publishing squad building guides every Sunday until the end of the world. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Kurz um bedeutet das, dass wir jetzt die aus den Live-Übertragungen bekannten Logos, Grafiken etc. Story-Trailer stellt die Zwillingsschwestern vor 0. Bakambu macht die richtigen Laufwege und ist für seinen Abschlusswert von 81 kaltschnäuziger als ihr denkt. Schau in die aktuelle Ausgabe. Was haltet ihr von den neuen, kleinen Detailverbesserungen? A password will be e-mailed to you. Und wenn ihr den letzten Pass nicht erzwingen möchtet: Das einzige Manko stellt die Physis dar. The Insult Simulator bei uns im Testcheck. Gerade mal ein Gesamtrating von 78 bringt er auf die Karte, liefert aber überragende Tempo, Ausdauer, Stärke und Aggressionswerte.
Was haltet ihr von den neuen, kleinen Detailverbesserungen? Trailer stellt die Closed Beta vor 1. Welcome, Login to your account. Der Computec Games Award. FIFA 18 erscheint am Auch in der spanischen La Liga gibt es Spieler, die uns zum Schwitzen bringen, obwohl ihre Gesamtbewertung dies nicht vermuten lässt. Heute Abend startet bekanntlich ja die deutsche Bundesliga ebenfalls in die neue Spielzeit, deshalb rechnen wir auch in der nächsten Woche mit einem ähnlichen Video für unsere Liga.
Was haltet ihr von den neuen, kleinen Detailverbesserungen? VIP-Demo mit zahlreichen Startproblemen Aug um 6: Test des ungewöhnlichen Switch-Spiels 0. Bakambu macht die richtigen Laufwege und ist für seinen Abschlusswert von 81 kaltschnäuziger als ihr denkt. Neben neuen Logos und Anzeigetafeln dürfen sich Spieler auch auf neue Banner freuen. Nicht ohne Grund vergibt futhead. Gerade mal ein Gesamtrating von 78 bringt er auf die Karte, liefert aber überragende Tempo, Ausdauer, Stärke und Aggressionswerte. Trailer stellt die Closed Beta vor 1.
BLACKJACK DOUBLE DOWN Daheimgebliebene erhalten vermutlich anhand einer Demo die Möglichkeit, in erste Partien hineinzuschnuppern. Heute Abend startet bekanntlich ja die deutsche Bundesliga ebenfalls in die neue Spielzeit, deshalb rechnen wir auch in der nächsten Woche mit einem ähnlichen Segunda división für unsere Liga. Kurz um bedeutet das, dass wir jetzt die aus den Live-Übertragungen bekannten Logos, Grafiken etc. Das einzige Manko stellt die Physis dar. Mit einem Stärkewert von 57 verliert er häufiger Zweikampfduelle. Der nachfolgenden Trailer gewährt einen ersten Einblick in die spanische Spitzenliga. Besonders die Pass- und Dribblingwerte sprechen für ihn und machen ihn zu einem erstklassigen Vorbereiter. Tipps für das Spielen an Slotautomaten im Internet. Withdrawing deutsch es uns wissen.
PDC WELTRANGLISTE 2019 Möchtest du diese Seite als Mini roulette festlegen? Sobald es eins gibt, werden trickbuch book of ra euch natürlich direkt darüber in Kenntnis setzen. Der Computec Games Award. Welcome, Treasure trail to your account. Hinzu kommen vier Sterne Skillmoves, mit denen er auch die letzten Verteidiger alt aussehen lässt. In einem jüngst veröffentlichten Trailer stellen die Entwickler die Änderungen vor, auf die sich Spieler bei Begegnungen zwischen Teams der spanischen Top-Liga freuen dürfen. Ein Termin existiert bislang nicht. Trailer stellt die Closed Beta vor 1. Das könnte dir online casino top 3 gefallen Mehr vom Autor.
Fifa 18 la liga Wer nicht vor Ort ist, muss sich dann wohl noch gedulden. Welcome, Login to your account. Es gibt nicht nur Offensivpower eishockey spielerwechsel der La Liga! Auch der Stärkewert von shadowbet casino ist nicht zu unterschätzen und fühlt sich im Spiel oft noch besser an. Tipps für das Spielen an Slotautomaten im Internet. Erfolgreichster torschütze england nationalmannschaft Abend startet bekanntlich ja die deutsche Bundesliga ebenfalls in die neue Spielzeit, deshalb rechnen erfahrung mit bitcoin auch in der nächsten Woche mit einem ähnlichen Video für unsere Liga. Till Musshoff 9 Dezember Bakambu macht die richtigen Laufwege und ist für seinen Monster truck spiele kostenlos von 81 kaltschnäuziger als ihr denkt. Diese fünf Spieler sind OP!
Hi, This is my current team, playing on X-box. This is a crucial attribute when looking for the best centre back. There are very important boisterous deutsch for any right back: Normally, they choose to cross to the forwards. If you still need someone cheaper, take a look to Turan and Jonathan Viera. Retrieved 10 Legends online I run a LaLiga I really need advice on Ronaldo. D and play free casino online many players to buy: Updated to match es played on 28 January In bayern schalke live stream opinion, you should try to replace Aduriz by someone better. Will Griezmann be good decision to buy? Lionel Messi is clearly the most indicated players to 3. liga online this position in a team without budget restraints. We are working on a custom tactics guide to be published in a few weeks. The forwards are the players on which fall the most responsibility of scoring goals. Sobald es eins gibt, werden wir euch natürlich direkt darüber in Kenntnis setzen. Giacomo nizzolo kommen vier Sterne Skillmoves, online casino for usa denen er auch die letzten Verteidiger alt aussehen lässt. Und wenn ihr den letzten Pass nicht erzwingen möchtet: Auch auf dem virtuellen Rasen ist er kaum zu halten. Zieht aus der zweiten Reihe ab! Wer nicht vor Ort ist, muss sich dann wohl noch gedulden. So müssen Real casino aussehen! | 2019-04-25T12:13:30Z | https://diones.eu/fifa-18-la-liga.html |
The use of services from rackedhost.net [hereafter referred to as "rackedhost.net"] constitutes agreement to these terms.
We will setup your account after we have received payment and we and/or our payment partner(s) have screened the order(s) in case of fraud. It is your responsibility to provide us with an email address which is not @ the domain(s) you are signing up under. If there is ever an abuse issue or we need to contact you, the primary email address on file will be used for this purpose. It is your responsibility to ensure the email address on file is current or up to date at all times. If you have a domain name registered with rackedhost.com, it is your responsibility to ensure that the contact information for your domain account and your actual domain name(s) is correct and up-to-date. rackedhost.com is not responsible for a lapsed registration due to outdated contact information being associated with the domain. If you need to verify or change this information, you should contact our sales team via email. Providing false contact information of any kind may result in the termination of your account. In dedicated server purchases or high risk transactions, it will be necessary to provide government issued identification and possibly a scan of the credit card used for the purchase. If you fail to meet these requirements, the order may be considered fraudulent in nature and be denied.
Our transfers team will make every effort to help you move your site to us. However, transfers are provided as a courtesy service, and we cannot make guarantees regarding the availability, possibility, or time required to complete an account transfer. Each hosting company is configured differently, and some hosting platforms save data in an incompatible or proprietary format, which may make it extremely difficult if not impossible to migrate some or all account data. We will try our best, but in some cases we may be unable to assist you in a transfer of data from an old host. The free transfer services are available for 3 days from your sign up date. Transfers outside of the 3 day free period will incur a charge; please contact our Support Department with specific details to receive a price quote.
All services provided by rackedhost.com may only be used for lawful purposes. The laws of the State of Maine, and the United States of America apply. The customer agrees to indemnify and hold harmless rackedhost.com from any claims resulting from the use of our services.
set up an account with the domain name „microsoft.com. because you do NOT own it!) Any account found to be in violation of another entity.s copyright will be expeditiously removed, or access to the material disabled. Any account found to be in repeated violation of copyright laws will be suspended and/or terminated from our hosting. If you believe that your copyright or trademark is being infringed upon, please email [email protected] with the information required.
. NO sites promoting illegal activity of ANY kind!
NOTE: Adult-related websites are not permitted!
MEMORY USE: Any account running scripts of any kind that cause an overload of our servers CPU Memory will be suspended.
Please keep in mind that unlimited diskspace and/or unlimited bandwidth does NOT mean unlimited CPU Memory use!
You must play nice & share! Our servers are ALL equipped with MORE than ample memory for hosting business & personal websites.
Our servers are not set-up as gaming-servers. or email-servers.. Our servers are also not set-up as Broadcast-Server for live radio or tv streaming!
These types of services truly require their own Dedicated Server so they do NOT interrupt the service of other sites. If you require these services, please contact our Sales Department to provide you with a quote for an Affordable Dedicated Server to meet your needs.
rackedhost.net services, including all related equipment, networks and network devices are provided only for authorized customer use.
rackedhost.com systems may be monitored for all lawful purposes, including to ensure that use is authorized, for management of the system, to facilitate protection against unauthorized access, and to verify security procedures, survivability, and operational security.
During monitoring, information may be examined, recorded, copied and used for authorized purposes.
Use of rackedhost.com system(s) constitutes consent to monitoring for these purposes.
Any account found connecting to a third party network or system without authorization from the third party is subject to suspension. Access to networks or systems outside of your direct control must be with expressed written consent from the third party.
rackedhost.com may, at its discretion, request and require documentation to prove access to a third party network or system is authorized.
Failure to respond to email from our abuse department within 48 hours may result in the suspension or termination of your services. All abuse issues must be dealt with via a support ticket/email and will have a response within 48 hours. If in doubt regarding the acceptability of your site or service, please contact us at [email protected] and we will be happy to assist you.
This includes the compromise of credentials such as user name and password. It is required that you use a secure password. If a weak password is used, your account may be suspended until you agree to use a more secure password. Audits may be done to prevent weak passwords from being used. If an audit is performed, and your password is found to be weak, we will notify you and allow time for you to change/update your password.
We have a zero tolerance stance against sending of unsolicited e-mail, bulk emailing, and spam. "Safe lists" and purchased lists will be treated as spam. Any user who sends out spam will have their account terminated with or without notice. All of our servers are set-up to permit no more than 200 emails per DOMAIN to be sent out each hour!
rackedhost.com reserves the right to require changes or disable as necessary any web site, account, database, or other component that does not comply with its established policies, or to make any such modifications in an emergency at its sole discretion. rackedhost.com reserves the right to charge the holder of the account used to send any unsolicited e-mail a clean up fee or any charges incurred for blacklist removal. This cost of the clean up fee is entirely at the discretion of rackedhost.com.
You agree to supply appropriate payment for the services received from rackedhost.com, in advance of the time period during which such services are provided. You agree that until and unless you notify rackedhost.com of your desire to cancel any or all services received, those services will be billed on a recurring basis.
This includes when accounts are suspended. When an account's invoices are paid outside of the 5 day grace period, invoices will not be automatically generated. However, after the customer notifies rackedhost.com of his or intent to resume service, invoices will be manually generated and payment expected for the time the account was suspended.
Cancellations must be done in writing by opening a Billing Support Ticket to notify us, you can also email us. Once we receive your cancellation and have confirmed all necessary information with you via our Ticket Support System, or via email we will inform you that your account has been canceled. This process reduces the likelihood of mistakes, fraudulent/malicious requests, and ensures you are aware that the files, emails, and account may be removed immediately after a cancellation request is processed.
As a client of rackedhost.com, it is your responsibility to ensure that your payment information is up to date, and that all invoices are paid on time. You agree that until and unless you notify rackedhost.com of your desire to cancel any or all services received (by the proper means listed in the appropriate section of the Terms of Service), those services will be billed on a recurring basis, unless otherwise stated in writing by rackedhost.com.
rackedhost.com reserves the right to bill your credit card or billing information on file with us. all of your clients. accounts if you are a Reseller, until the account balance has been paid in full. It is the customer's responsibility to notify our sales team via email at [email protected] after paying.
if your account gets suspended for non-payment or for TOS violations you will no longer qualify for the Special Low Promotional Rate!... EVER!!!) Keeping our rates low & affordable relies on our customers making their payments on time.
We really want your business to be a success and being in the website design & hosting business since 2007 gives us the opportunity to be flexible when necessary and within reason.
Your use of this service is at your sole risk. Our backup service is provided to you as a courtesy.
rackedhost.com is not responsible for files and/or data residing on your account. You agree to take full responsibility for files and data transferred and to maintain all appropriate backup of files and data stored on rackedhost.com.
Backups will not be provided for accounts that have been suspended or terminated for any reason unless otherwise agreed to in writing by rackedhost.com. We actively back-up all of our servers, but we do NOT back-up individual accounts.
You may utilize the account back-up function found in your cPanel as needed. You may NOT store more than one back-up copy of your account on the server. In other words, when you make a back-up you must delete the prior back-up copy, or move it off-site.
If you require back-up services for off-site storage we can accommodate this for you. Just contact our Sales Department at [email protected] for a quote.
rackedhost.com reserves the right to cancel, suspend, or otherwise restrict access to the account at any time with or without notice. Any abuse of our staff in any medium or format will result in the suspension or termination of your services. Customers may cancel at any time. rackedhost.com gives you an unconditional 7 day money back guarantee on managed shared hosting, and reseller solutions for any customer who paid the first invoice with a credit card or with Paypal.
There are no refunds on dedicated servers, administrative fees, install fees for custom software, or domain name purchases. Refund requests for shared and reseller accounts after the initial 3 days will be refunded on a prorata basis of any unused time.
The use of more than 10,000 inodes on any shared account may potentially result in a warning first, and if no action is taken future suspension. Accounts found to be exceeding the 10,000 inode limit will automatically be removed from our backup system to avoid over-usage.
Every file (a webpage, image file, email, etc) on your account uses up one inode.
Should your account pass the allocated amount we reserve the right to suspend the account until the start of the next allocation, suspend the account until more bandwidth is purchased at an additional fee, suspend the account until you upgrade to a higher level of package, terminate the account and/or charge you an additional fee for the overages.
On dedicated servers and collocation no full refund will be honored -- the 7 day money back guarantee does not apply. We reserve the right to refund a prorated amount or no refund at all.
Each of rackedhost.com's managed shared and reseller services carry a 7 day unconditional money back guarantee on them. If you are not completely satisfied with our services within the first 7days of your service, you will be given a full refund of the contract amount. Remember, this is only for monthly shared or reseller packages and does not apply to dedicated servers, administrative fees, install fees for custom software, or domain name purchases.
If your shared / reseller server has a physical downtime that is not within the 99.9% uptime you may receive a partial credit on your account. Approval of the credit is at the discretion of rackedhost.com dependent upon justification provided. Third party monitoring service reports may not be used for justification due to a variety of factors including the monitor's network capacity/transit availability.
The uptime of the server is defined as the reported uptime from the operating system and the Apache Web Server which may differ from the uptime reported by other individual services. To request a credit, please contact [email protected] with justification. All requests must be made in writing via email.
Uptime guarantees only apply to shared / reseller solutions. Dedicated servers are covered by a network guarantee in which the credit is prorated for the amount of time the server is down which is not related to our uptime guarantee.
Resellers are responsible for supporting their clients. rackedhost.com does not provide support to our Reseller's Clients. If a reseller's client contacts us, we reserve the right to place the client account on hold until the reseller can assume their responsibility for their client.
All support requests must be made by the reseller on their clients' behalf for security purposes. Resellers are also responsible for all content stored or transmitted under their reseller account and the actions of their clients'. rackedhost.com will hold any reseller responsible for any of their clients. actions that violate the law or the terms of service.
Resellers may NOT give away/provide FREE Hosting Services!
Any Reseller discovered providing FREE Hosting Services will be immediately terminated!
rackedhost.com reserves the right to reset the password on a dedicated server if the password on file is not current so that we may do security audits as required by our datacenter. It is the responsibility of the client to ensure that there is a valid email address and current root password on file for their dedicated server on file to prevent downtime from forced password resets.
rackedhost.com reserves the right to audit servers as needed and to perform administrative actions at the request of our datacenter. Dedicated servers are NOT backed up by us and it is the responsibility of the client to maintain backups or have a solution for this. You may purchase an additional hard drive and maintain backups to it as the most simple solution. Please contact [email protected] if you wish to obtain a secondary hard drive. It is your responsibility to maintain backups.
The amount you pay for hosting will never increase from the date of purchase as long as your account remains in good-standing by being paid on time & not violating any of the rules outlined in our Terms of Service Agreement. We reserve the right to change prices listed on rackedhost.com, and the right to change the amount of resources provided to plans at any time.
Furthermore, if an account becomes suspended or terminated for TOS Violations or Non-Payment any „special discount. pricing will be lost to the account and our standard pricing will go into effect for the account.
Customer agrees that it shall defend, indemnify, save and hold rackedhost.com harmless from any and all demands, liabilities, losses, costs and claims, including reasonable attorney's fees asserted against rackedhost.com, its agents, its customers, officers and employees, that may arise or result from any service provided or performed or agreed to be performed or any product sold by customer, its agents, employees or assigns.
Customer agrees to defend, indemnify and hold harmless rackedhost.com against liabilities arising out of; (1) any injury to person or property caused by any products sold or otherwise distributed in connection with rackedhost.com; (2) any material supplied by customer infringing or allegedly infringing on the proprietary rights of a third party; (3) copyright infringement and (4) any defective products sold to customers from rackedhost.com' server.
By using any rackedhost.com services, you agree to submit to binding arbitration. If any disputes or claims arise against rackedhost.com or its subsidiaries, such disputes will be handled by an arbitrator of rackedhost.com's choice. An arbitrator from the American Arbitration Association or the National Arbitration Forum will be selected in the state of Maine.
Arbitrators shall be attorneys or retired judges and shall be selected pursuant to the applicable rules. All decisions rendered by the arbitrator will be binding and final. The arbitrator's award is final and binding on all parties. The Federal Arbitration Act, and not any state arbitration law, governs all arbitration under this Arbitration Clause. You are also responsible for any and all costs related to such arbitration.
rackedhost.com shall not be responsible for any damages your business may suffer. rackedhost.com makes no warranties of any kind, expressed or implied for services we provide. rackedhost.com disclaims any warranty or merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. This includes loss of data resulting from delays, no deliveries, wrong delivery, and any and all service interruptions caused by rackedhost.com and its employees.
rackedhost.com may disclose any subscriber information to law enforcement agencies without further consent or notification to the subscriber upon lawful request from such agencies. We will cooperate fully with law enforcement agencies.
rackedhost.com reserves the right to revise its policies at any time without notice. | 2019-04-20T12:30:05Z | http://rackedhost.com/tempory/tos.html |
Hi, I’m Crefeda Rodrigues from Goa, India. I was inspired to take computer science during my undergraduate course where I studied the subject Neural Networks. It intrigued me that an idea as simple as a neuron could spark a whole new research field in science. Hence, I decided to my Master's in Advanced Computer Science - Artificial Intelligence from The University of Manchester last year. I have now transitioned into a PhD program in Computer Science under the supervision of Graham Riley from the Advanced Processor Technology (APT) Group. Apart from my role as a student, I work part-time as a Teaching Assistant, I engage in volunteer activities involving education and charity with different societies. My interests include dance, books, food and traveling.
A friend of mine, once told me and I quote “Writing a paper is like drawing. You start by defining sections you need and describing what you need in each section and adding detail until you’ve got your text”.
So, for today’s blog I thought about sharing my experience of writing a paper for a conference. We all know what it is like to write a report or an essay and for most of us, it is a big ordeal. However, as a PhD student I have really begun to realise the importance of writing. A key skill to being a good researcher, is being able to convey your work in the best possible light and in the most articulate form. While you may think that the main part of research are the results, conveying the process of arriving at the results in a concise manner and expressing why we think the results are important and different is key. Unlike a talk or presentation, our writing has to be engaging enough to keep the reader of the paper interested.
A good portion of my time is spent writing yearly short reports, papers for conferences and journals, so I thought I would write about what I have learnt from the process while sharing some funny moments along the way.
The paper gets rejected and I spend the initial days contemplating on my life choices and then I pick myself up and work towards the next conference. Throughout the year “prospective” conferences deadlines appear every few months or so and there are plenty of opportunities to re-send my paper to any of these if it gets rejected.
I am not sure, but I have always felt that we have warm sunny days when either I’m having exams or working towards a deadline! Manchester was fortunate enough to have some sunny days this year and I remember being inside the lab formulating a million reasons in my mind to be outside but unfortunately I could not. Sure, I could take my laptop and write outside, but then where is the fun in that?
I never knew what this meant until I decided to write the introduction section of my paper. There were days that the backspace button of my key board received so much attention it was feeling overwhelmed. It was in times like these, I decided that a friendly chat with friends or supervisors would help me get much needed inspiration.
Writing a related work section: The key to differentiating your work from others is to be able to place your work in the context of what has already been done. So the “related work” section of the paper is my least favourite to write because I have to go through the pain of reminding myself about all the past papers that I have read. I have to critically analyse each paper for producing just two to three sentences per paper. I used tools like Evernote to try to maintain online notes of the papers I have read. On a side note, I have around 150 notes in my account. I don’t know if that is a good enough number to boost my confidence!
Typically conference papers are 10-15 pages long. Some are single column format papers while others are double column. It is important to not exceed the page limit despite the wealth of information you may have. It is equally necessary that you express data in a form which is easy to comprehend and devoid of long heady sentences. In such cases, graphs are your best friends! For my paper, I had a plan of what each section was supposed to convey to the reader and I made a rough outline of its contents.
In moments like these, I decided to take a short break from writing and take a walk to clear up my thoughts.
I find the most interesting part of the paper is creating pictorial representations. It is basically like artwork for your paper. Having good graphs (bar vs. pie charts) help with the first impression of the paper. So picking the right chart type to express ideas/results, showcase the amount of effort and thought you have put to make the paper interesting for the reader. I found Python’s matplotlib to be quite handy to make graphs. But there other options like inkscape, pgfplots that have been suggested by others.
The final bit of my paper writing exercise was getting my content peer-reviewed. Usually, students get their PhD thesis chapters reviewed by colleagues in the lab. This is quite helpful because I got inputs on my writing style, the structure of my paper and the occasional grammatical errors.
Finally, I have submitted my paper and I will keep my fingers crossed that it will get accepted. Until then, see you in my next blog!
I ended my last blog saying that I would be prepared for all the writing that is to come. Well, little did I anticipate that the first two months of the new year, would be spent writing and re-writing a paper for a conference. Phew! Now that I am done with that I have finally found some time to write my new blog post for 2017. Apart from being engulfed with my writing work, I was able to spend the Chinese New Year making dumplings, which was fun! I have also started my second phase of Portuguese language lessons and finally, I have moved up to the ‘improvers’ level for my dance sessions.
I recently spent two weeks in Cambridge at the ARM research office. This was an interesting experience because apart from being a different work environment as compared to an academic setting, I was able to be part of research in a company that could potentially end up as viable products in the future. This is particularly difficult for machine learning research or computer science in general as it grows at a very fast pace with new developments happening in terms of new algorithms, application targets and hardware targets and it’s quite easy to get lost in all the madness that comes with this rapidly changing landscape. I was fortunate enough to have this sort of exposure or check-point if you will, early-on, to allow me to talk to people from industry and showcase the work I have done so far and as well, help me decide on the next big question that I would like to tackle.
The first few days, I spent my time learning about the general structure of the research team into groups based on the topic area like memory systems, HPC and others. I was part of the machine learning research team that is focussed on machine learning based applications running on ARM based devices. Through my exploration, I found that considerable efforts are being spent on assessing academic and industry research work as well as highlighting potential opportunities that are not yet targeted and risks from competitors. Trying to draw parallelism to what I have been doing as a research student, I found this work similar to the risk assessment work in my first year, but on a much smaller scale. Obviously, being part of research, it is highly unlikely for just one person to be working on a particular topic and therefore there could be students perhaps in your own department or a different department within the university or a different university or even industry that could be working on something similar. Understanding this landscape is necessary, as you are aiming to contribute to new knowledge in your field and there is a possibility of being overtaken!
I also experienced working as a team towards a unified goal; where even though each person worked on an independent task, it would fit like pieces of a jig-saw puzzle. The role of my academic supervisor was replaced by my line manager. He initially gave me a task (an equivalent of a research problem) that was quite open-ended in the beginning but after a couple of days of picking up a marker, visualizing problems on the whiteboard and pitching ideas across, I was able to better understand the scope of the problem that was given and be able to break it down into smaller more solvable ones. Similar to the meetings we have had here with our research group every month, I was able to attend meetings with other research groups in ARM as well as have a weekly conference call with other team members from the machine learning team in other locations. I had the opportunity to present at one of these meetings, which felt a bit daunting at first but after receiving the feedback and questions pertaining to what I had done, I felt it was a good way to assess my work. I also found that this experience would be beneficial for my viva preparation, where I could have someone who may not be closely related to my research field, deliberating over my work and I would have to convince them the importance of my work!
Finally, I also took some time during the weekend to explore what Cambridge had to offer. I was particularly impressed by the botanical garden that had a greenhouse with plants from areas like India, Africa and even Australia. The Museum of Fitzwilliam and Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology were interesting as well, housing a large number of antiquities, paintings and artifacts.
Overall, I am glad I got to make this trip and experience a little bit of industry research along with some fun time during the weekend!
Winter has dawned upon us here at Manchester and Christmas is around the corner. With frost covered leaves to chilly winds, it’s the time of the year where we cocoon ourselves in warm jumpers, scarves and long overcoats.
I have devoted a few blogs to my first experiences as a PhD student attending summer schools and conferences, which is interesting by itself of course. I thought, as these sorts of things happen more intermittently during a PhD, you might ask what happens in the daily life as a PhD student? Do we ponder over research papers and engulf ourselves in our research work all day? Are we bound by our desks burning the midnight oil? It may seem that is what we do or we have to do and quite rightly so, because getting a PhD is hard work! However, even though it may seem challenging to devote so much time to one piece of work, I have come to experience the thrills of some of the roller-coaster moments entailed in doing research!
I have spent more than a year now and I thought I would give you a flavour of my week along with some of my colleagues in the APT lab.
A typical day could start well during the day or night; I say that because some students like to be early birds while some like to be night owls. Depending on your preference, students work with different schedules during a PhD. Personally, I am more of the early bird category as it helps me make the most of working alongside some of my colleagues during the day.
Usually in a week, I meet my supervisor for an hour to go over my progress for the week and discuss tasks for the next week. These can be considered as checkpoints in your PhD, which helps to ensure you are on top of everything. It can be as simple as discussing the result of an experiment to deliberating over a research paper.
We have usually two meetings with everyone in the APT group. One is the monthly group meeting to discuss the progress everyone has been making, problems we have encountered or achievements , (for example, a new publication). A research group will usually consist of people with varying levels of expertise and in different domains and these meetings are organized to make each one aware of the expertise that flows in the group, in case you find the need to tap into it at some point.
The other meeting we have is a reading group meeting. Here, we pick an interesting paper for the month in any computer architecture topic and we discuss the paper as a group. This helps realize different viewpoints of everyone on a common topic.
Each of us have different regimes to keep ourselves fit. In the APT group, we have activities arranged every week at the Sudgen sports centre; Football on Wednesdays and Badminton on Fridays. Apart from that we also have the occasional table tennis and basketball. The adventurous lot among us also prefer climbing! This is a good time to escape from work, relax our minds and bond with everyone in the lab. I usually like to play badminton, cycle to university and every Sunday I attend ballroom dance classes organized by University of Manchester Ballroom and Latin Society.
From what I have seen so far, depending on your interests and time, you can also learn something new. For me its Beginners Portuguese class every Tuesday evening organized by the International Society. I have no knowledge of any of the Latin Languages; I am still trying to wrap my head around the concept of assigning a gender to everything . This makes these classes all the more challenging as well as interesting for me.
The APT group organizes a yearly tradition of Welcome meals and Christmas Meals. The Welcome meal is organized for the new PhD students in the group and to go through the interesting and fun process of being introduced to everyone in the group, learning about what everyone is up to or even better, discussing the latest news tidbits – presidential elections in US. Now, that Christmas is near, we have our Christmas meal approaching!
Handing in the PhD thesis marks one of the final steps to achieving a PhD. This is usually followed by a viva by external examiners. So, every year we have a bunch of students in the final stages of their research, intensely working to complete everything on time. So, when someone does complete the final viva successfully, it calls for a celebration for all their hard work! This includes a lot of junk food and drinks. Moreover, the students who are approaching their deadlines in the near future get to learn from their experience.
Preparing myself for all the writing that is yet to come!
Speak to you again in the New Year!
It’s the time of year where new students brimming with enthusiasm have joined The University of Manchester to begin a new journey in their lives. I remember when I started this journey two years ago to pursue my Master’s degree here, I arrived around this time, just like all of you, anticipating new adventures along the way. As I got off the plane, I was quite sceptic about the weather so I packed a jumper and a raincoat in my hand luggage just in case but to my surprise the weather was quite pleasant when I arrived.
We were greeted by happy ambassadors at the airport who directed all the bewildered new students towards the coaches to take us to our respective University accommodations. I remember the tag that I received to put on my bag to identify us at the airport.
The journey from Goa to Manchester took a gruelling 12 hours including three flights and a stop and I was quite exhausted when I arrived at the Fallowfield campus. At that point, I just wanted to sleep. After dealing with the administrative procedures at the Fallowfield reception which was quick, they handed me the keys to a little cottage with three bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom and a hall. For anyone who enjoys quiet evenings after a busy day at the University, you will definitely enjoy living here. Also, a little tip, during the spring you can find black berries growing outside!
My first day at University was filled with anticipation, I had so much to deal with such as student registration, purchasing a new sim card, opening a bank account and more. The University provided the students with all the necessary steps to accomplish this with the least hassle as possible.
I felt the welcome week helped me really understand how to deal with all these tasks as well as giving me a flavour of what the University has to offer. So I hope everyone was able to attend the Welcome Fair. To help students prepare for the week, a trip to ASDA was organised by the University which was quite useful as I was able to purchase essential supplies for accommodation and classes. Apart from that, the trip to John Ryland’s library was a head turner for me as I was in awe of the architecture and its amazing collections. To top it off we received free tickets from the school of computer science to visit the Manchester United stadium and its museum.
It’s been around two weeks since I got back from my summer school (Advanced Computer Architecture and Compilation for High-Performance and Embedded Systems -ACACES) in Italy and I am still reminiscing about some of my memorable experiences there. I was preparing for the trip weeks ahead and I was both excited to see a new place and nervous about meeting new people at the summer school.
In Rome, we first spent a day visiting the Vatican – the museum, St-Peter’s Square, St. Peter’s Basilica and the Sistine Chapel. There is usually a long queue to enter the museum, so we pre-booked our tickets. The Vatican Museum has a LOT to offer to the large number of visiting tourists, it has a substantial number of artefacts to look round. It was quite crowded for my liking but overall it was a pleasant experience. I spent the remaining two days “trying” to cover as much as I could of Rome. I was able to see the usual touristy spots which included the Colosseum, Trevi Fountains, Palantine Hills, Altare della Patria and the Arch of Constantine.
The best way to explore these places is by taking a walk around the streets, at every corner I found that there was something new to see. From a sweet melody playing in the background to someone dressed up as a Roman Warrior! The city has an incredible amount to offer in terms of its rich history, where the ancient ruins have become a part of the day-to-day lives of the people of modern Rome. It is like being caught in two different eras at the same time.
On my little excursion, I found that a panoramic view of Rome can be found by climbing the Altare della Patria (which I later found out is also known as the wedding cake!).
No experience of Italy is complete without a taste of Italian pizza. Some places in Italy are known for their thin crust pizzas (Neapolitan Pizza) while others do thick crust (Sicilian pizza). When I was in Rome, I got the chance to sit at a local pizzeria and savour every bite of a thin crust four cheese pizza.
The summer school was just like attending a normal school but with lots of extra perks! On the first day, we were welcomed with a box of traditional Amaretti biscuits and we had an opening talk by Edward A Lee from UC Berkely, which set the scene for the rest of the summer school. The major theme that was focused upon in the talk was the lack of a definite model for emerging technologies for the future internet of things.
As for the daily routine, every morning began with an all you can eat breakfast meal, which was followed by two lectures in the morning and two lectures in the afternoon. In addition, we were given free tickets every day to let our hair down and relax at the hotel spa. Finally, we ended each day with a 7 course meal that included some very mouth-watering pasta, risotto, spaghetti, soups and more. Pasta was always the main dish and each day the pasta was flavoured differently, from tomato to lemon. To my surprise , sometimes the pasta was cooked a little differently, with the centre left just a little bit tender, to give it a certain texture. I must say I was impressed by their precision! And If you think this wasn’t enough, there were other surprises such as “spaghetti with squid ink”.
The most enjoyable experience at the summer school for me was sitting around the big dinner table, savouring every dish, sipping some really good wine and having friendly conversations with the people around me, who came in from all different parts of the world.
What’s happening to computer hardware, and what does it mean for the OS?
I was completely new to all the courses, so I learnt quite a lot in that one week. In general, all of them were pretty interesting and informative about the field, current issues and future research directions. I would say that I enjoyed the lectures on operating systems and superscalar the most.
Apart from lectures, we had a poster session to have one-on-one conversations with other PhD students and researchers who were working on different topics, such as computer architecture to applications that are built on top of parallel computing platforms.
The summer school ended off with a dance party with all of us at one point grooving to some Bollywood and Bhangra music (the epic moment when I got to bust out my ‘bollywood, a.k.a desi’ moves).
It’s been a while since my last blog but I really had quite a lazy last month. The only thing interesting happening in my life is the new season of Game of thrones 🙂 . I also decided to head back to Goa in May, and get some much awaited vacation time with family and friends. Though the weather was really hot and humid back home, overall it was a good trip. Plus, I got some quality time on sandy beaches of Goa.
When I got back, I was quite pleased to see a LOT of sunshine in Manchester as well. The weather was so pleasant that I got to put my dusty old sunglasses to some use. However, now it’s back to the rainy Manchester. I also discovered some free hula classes outside Whitworth art gallery, every Sunday from 2 to 4 pm.
Meanwhile, in lab I received my Jetson TX1; It’s a development board from NVIDIA that is targeted for the embedded platform. Now, I can start to do some fun experimental work with it.
As per my last month’s blog post on my conference trip, I wanted to devote another blog describing how I prepared for my trip. I think that it would be a useful guide in general as well as for myself, since I have decided to register for a summer school next month.
Step 1: Select a conference well in advance.
Well, this step is key as I had to choose a conference that was closest to my field. I chose the GPU technology Conference (GTC) as it featured posters, talks and hands-on-labs from both academia and industry in the field of deep learning. The hands-on-labs were particularly useful for me because I got to learn a lot about the Jetson TX1, even before I received my own board.
Step 3: Check if you need a visa.
Step 4: Meeting the finance department for the first time.
For all of the above steps, right from getting the visa to booking the stay, getting familiar with financial procedures is necessary. I never even knew where the finance department was during my Masters; well I did not really need to know back then. Anyways, it involved a whole lot of mundane tasks of request forms and emails, which in hindsight was very important. Also, once I got back from my trip, I could fill up my expense claim form on My Manchester account and hand it in to the finance department.
This was quite useful when travelling to and fro from the airport.
I decided to get a travel money card as the debit cards would incur some transactional charges for every purchase I made abroad. Even though my trip is being paid for (perks of being a PhD… 🙂 ), I decided it would be a better idea to get some travel money in dollars to avoid all the extra cost. Also, something to take care of with a travel card, is that Uber doesn’t accept travel money card and the card should not be used for paying the deposit in hotels. More information is available on the website linked above.
I got my card from the post office at Hathersage Rd within a day.
I think I have enough cards stocked up for the next three years..
My final step was to decide whether to make business cards or not. Since , I was travelling to my first conference, I thought that I would definitely meet new people and it would be nice make contacts. From experience, I say that getting business cards printed was the best decision I made. So, after a lot of searching I found few places that can make business cards.
I did not really opt for this one at the time, but it is a good place to get started if you are thinking of getting one. I think there is an option of designing the cards yourself and then getting them printed as well.
Another option was suggested by one of my PhD colleagues was Manchesterprinters.com for printing the cards.
Well, that brings me to the end of this blog. I hope that this information was useful and serves as a useful guide if you are thinking of going for any academic trips.
The GPU technology conference in the heart of Silicon Valley, is an industrial level conference that focuses on the research carried both by academia and industry. The central theme was to showcase the power of GPU computing in fields like Artificial Intelligence, Virtual reality and Self driving cars. Since, the conference schedule is quite overwhelming, as it featured more than 500 sessions with speakers from Audi, Baidu, Boeing, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Oracle, Samsung and Twitter, among many others; it was not possible for me to attend everything. So, prior to my arrival I planned out the important ones I wanted to attend like the keynotes, posters, presentations and exhibits.
On the contrary, the journey to San Jose for me was quite exciting as it was the first time I was travelling to the US. I got to see some amazing landscapes. In particular , I passed by a huge mountain which I later found out was an active volcano known as Mt. Rainier, in Seattle.
The keynotes are one of the most important things in a conference and I am glad I did not miss them. The keynotes are delivered by top experts in the field and are quite different from the remaining events as they showcase the main trends in research and industry, some fun live demos as well as give a flavour of the exciting events of the conference.
His talk was enjoyable, as he was very charismatic and brought in a lot of humour into the talk. The most memorable joke of the day was when he asked Steve Woznaik, to be the first person to have a one-way ticket to experience the MARS 2030 VR demo, and Steve exclaimed, “wow! I’m getting dizzy! I’m gonna fall out of this chair.” And to this he replied “Well, Woz, that was not a helpful comment”.
Anyways, I think it is a long way from robots turning into cars or vice-versa…or is it?
His talk focused on robots that were semi-autonomous (Parallel autonomy; that would assist rather than be fully autonomous). He showed live demos where a semi-autonomous robotic arm outperformed a fully autonomous arm in the simple task of picking a cube. He hopes to bring this to the automotive industry by equipping cars with semi-autonomous AI while a person is driving, which would allow safe driving.
The poster presentations is a jammed packed event where I got a chance to have one-on-one chats with the authors and learn about the research they were working on. I was proud to see a poster by my colleague and friend James Clarkson from the APT group at The University of Manchester. I was quite impressed with the work he had done in porting KinectFusion algorithm in CUDA in Java and running it on GPUs. Java has a large developer base and his work is interesting for anyone interested in accelerating their Java programs using GPUs. He is supervised by Dr. Mikel Lujan from the APT group for anyone who is interested in finding more about this project.
My first VR experience was at The University of Manchester at events like DigiLab where I got to see some third year Undergraduate projects in VR.
At GTC, the VR village is a must see event, if you are interested in escaping reality and diving into a new world. Unfortunately, I was a bit disappointed about the registration process for the VR village. We had to stand in an extra long queue to register ( psst. boring and slow)! In spite of that I could not register for The MARS 2030 event as it was booked completely for all the days.
However, I was able to register Bullet train with Oculus rift and experience some VR gaming. The game sets off in a bullet train where I had the opportunity to teleport and shoot bad guys. I swear I almost quivered when a bullet virtually zoomed past me. I would like to have VR for watching movies in the future (I think that exists, doesn’t it?). How cool would that be?
Another exhibit was a VR 3D painting called Tilt Brush, where I got the opportunity to paint a 3D house and walk around it and splash colours around me. Man, This VR stuff brings out the inner kid in me!
And finally, an interesting application was by a company called Realities.io that focuses on reconstructing famous monuments/sites around the world so that you can have your next trip in any place of your choice in VR. This one was quite interesting as I got to visit a cathedral in Germany, walk around, teleport to different rooms by picking up a picture of the room. There was a piano in one of the rooms and I ended up teleporting my self on top of the piano. I can tell you it was quite eery and I am with Steve Woznaik on this, It was a bit scary and dizzy at the same time :D.
Apart from all the geeky stuff, I thought I might get to see a movie celebrity. I didn’t have the time to visit Los Angeles but I unexpectedly met Groot at GTC.
Apart from this blog I think it would be worthwhile to write another short post on how I prepared for the conference; which includes topics like travel card, flights, hotels and business cards. The reason I find its important to share this information is because it was my first experience and I tried to prepare as much as I could before my trip so that I wouldn’t miss out anything. So, stay tuned for my next post.
Drones, cute robots, autonomous vehicles, deep dream and more…. | 2019-04-20T20:33:07Z | http://www.mub.eps.manchester.ac.uk/crefedarodrigues/author/crefedarodrigues/ |
Andrew Taylor Bio: Andrew Taylor is Director of the Bolz Center for Arts Administration www.bolzcenter.org - an MBA degree program and research center in the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business. An author, lecturer, and researcher on a broad range of arts management issues, Andrew has also served as a consultant to arts organizations and cultural initiatives throughout the U.S. and Canada, including the International Society for the Performing Arts, American Ballet Theatre, the Center for Arts and Culture, and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and helped develop the budget pro forma and operating plan for the $205-million Overture Center for the Arts in Madison, Wisconsin. Andrew is currently the president of the Association of Arts Administration Educators (www.artsadministration.org), an international association of degree-granting programs in arts and cultural management, research, and policy, and is a consulting editor for The Journal of Arts Management, Law, and Society. Since July 2003, he has written a popular weblog on the business of arts and culture, The Artful Manager, hosted by ArtsJournal.com (www.artfulmanager.com).
Barry: There are many ways for arts and cultural professionals to learn and advance their craft. Where do degree-granting programs in higher education fit into that spectrum of learning opportunities?
Andrew: Like most other professionals, arts and cultural managers can learn on the job, through professional development at conferences and workshops, through self-study or mentorship, or through a number of other paths and resources. In fact, most responsive leaders in the arts will always be learning through one of these means, as there's always more to learn. Undergraduate and graduate degree programs provide a place and process for uniquely intensive and sequential learning in the full range of skills and insights required of cultural management. For some, a degree program provides a fast-track through what would take decades to learn on the job. For others, these programs offer a space to rethink what they've learned through experience, and to connect it with the theory, critical thinking, and personal/professional networks they need to evolve their work in the arts.
You certainly don't need a business degree to run a business. Nor do you need a communications degree to serve as an effective communications professional. But these structured learning opportunities, along with the rich environments and personal networks they provide, can bring you to a different place in your life and your work than you could discover without them. It's the same with degree programs in arts administration.
Barry: When I was the Director of the California Arts Council, there were degree programs in Arts Administration at U.C.L.A. and Golden Gate University. Those programs no longer exist. Can you give us status report and an assessment of university arts administration program provision in the U.S. today? How many schools offer curriculum in the area? And are we turning out more or fewer graduates from these programs than say four years ago? Where do you see this area going in the next few years? What obstacles will it face?
Andrew: There have been a few graduate and undergraduate degree programs that have closed shop over the years, due to the retirement of their founding directors or changing priorities for their host institutions but others have risen in equal or greater numbers. Over the past four years, I'd estimate that the total number of degree programs in arts and cultural management has grown slightly, with some more significant growth in undergraduate programs.
In the next few years, I'd expect roughly the same slow growth in programs and graduates. As the environment for cultural organizations continues to change rather dramatically, our challenge will be adapting our curriculum and programs in response, to ground our students to know how the world used to work while preparing them for the world to come.
Barry: Follow up Question: Can you give me some examples of how you think curriculum in arts nonprofit programs will likely change in the next couple of years in response to a changing environment in which our arts & culture nonprofits operate? For example, I am a vocal proponent of advancing the sector's advocacy and lobbying skills, and for arts leadership to make advocacy and lobbying a part of the job description of arts organization senior staff and board members yet advocacy and lobbying doesn't seem to yet be a part of most higher arts management programs. Do you think that is an area that will change? Are there others you can point to?
Andrew: The shape and sequence of the coursework will likely remain much the same, as such things move at a glacial pace in higher education. But the content of the required courses is changing all the time. For example, introductory marketing courses used to emphasize fairly basic consumer awareness and decision-making models. Today, a course with the same title will cover much more sophisticated terrain, like customer analysis and segmentation, value-based pricing, and channel strategy.
For me, the constant challenge is to resist the impulse to respond to complex changes by adding more complexity to our curriculum. As we notice more globalization in the arts, shifts in leisure time, challenges to copyright, and the like, the impulse is to tack on more and more readings and topics, rather than rethinking things down to their underlying forms. This is certainly true in connecting students to marketing and development. We used to treat these two income streams as entirely different entities (and many arts organizations are still structured as if they are different endeavors). Yet, really, marketing and development are just different corollaries of the same challenge: matching your organization's strengths with an individual's or organization's needs and values, and encouraging more of them to commit their resources to you. Come to think of it, that describes volunteer staffing and governance, as well.
The growing need for advocacy and lobbying fits this simplicity effort as well. The two primary jobs for governing boards and top leadership are to ensure that their organizations work effectively and productively, and that there are sufficient resources and support to sustain that success over time. Lobbying and advocacy are essential elements of both of these primary tasks.
So, what I hope will evolve in our curricula and our learning strategies is a new simplicity, a growing emphasis on elegance and elemental insight, rather than just teaching more and more stuff. As Leonardo Da Vinci is credited with saying (who knows if he actually did): Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. But it's a bear to get there.
Barry: If the number of graduates from these programs is on the increase, does that mean the number of jobs available for these graduates is similarly increasing? Or to put the question another way, is arts administration more viable as a career path today than it was a few years ago? Are students optimistic that they will find the jobs they are looking for after graduation? And if they are optimistic, is that optimism justified by the reality? As a follow-up question, is recruitment for these programs difficult? Is it easier than it was a few years ago? How do these schools go about recruiting the best and brightest?
Andrew: I can only speak from my own experience and the conversations I have with my colleagues at other programs, but I think that the supply of graduates and the demand for them in the market are well matched. We have great success in placing our graduates in substantial jobs around the country, and I know other programs do, as well. What's more, we know that graduates advance quickly in the ranks, once their organizations experience what they can do.
Of course, the career success of our graduates is a different matter than the viability of cultural management on the grander scale. Most indicators suggest that the dramatic growth in the number and size of arts organizations of the past few decades has hit a plateau. Most of the forces that fueled that growth, massive increases in wealth; availability of workforce to staff, govern, and volunteer; and under-penetrated cultural markets, have leveled or declined.
It's an increasingly challenging time to work in any capacity at a professional nonprofit arts organization. But to the benefit of degree programs and the students within them, those challenges are growing the demand for thoughtful, innovative, and accountable leaders and staff.
Barry: Follow-up question: Do you think the pay level for arts administrators particularly at the levels the graduates from these programs both enter and aspire to will likely increase so as to remain somewhat competitive with other jobs those students might take? Will their holding a degree help to raise the pay structure? And what about the mid-level administrators who are not graduates of programs and don't hold degrees will they benefit from increased pay levels as well? Much of arts & culture funding is program based and even basic operational support often ignores salary needs what are your thoughts on how to advance the profession of arts administration through increased compensation packages to our leadership?
Andrew: First off, conversations about compensation always need to recognize that it's a complex calculus. People have all sorts of reasons for committing their time, talent, and attention to careers in cultural management, or any other career for that matter. Salary is certainly an essential element of those calculations, but only one. Also in the mix are a sense of purpose, productive contribution to an endeavor you value, connections to co-workers and constituents who enrich and challenge you, and a sense of joy and play.
On average, the arts industry will always be resource-poor in capital and operating cash, it will be delivering services at below their true total cost, and it will be striving toward mission statements that are much larger than its capacity to deliver. We'll make up some of the difference in contributed income, volunteer labor, and the fiscal privilege of the nonprofit form. And we'll make up the rest in relatively lower salaries as compared to our commercial peers. There will be outliers in large and iconic cultural organizations, but there's no escaping the math.
Does that mean we can't structure organizations that pay a living wage with benefits that respect the time, talent, and commitment of staff and leadership? No, of course not. It just means we have to be resourceful in our human resource practices, thoughtful in our organizational scope and scale, and competitive in the full definition of compensation.
I've been pleased to see a steady increase in starting salaries for our graduates, and a growing willingness for thoughtful organizations to shape competitive compensation, even when they have to be creative with vacation time, professional development, and other non-monetary benefits. As the labor pool constricts over the coming decade (which demographics say it must), the market will force this kind of resourcefulness for those who want the most qualified and productive leaders.
Barry: What constitutes the core subjects in a balanced arts administration education program today? What areas of arts administration education are we, in your opinion, doing a good job at covering? Which areas are we not doing such a good job?
Andrew: The benefit of having a full complement of independent graduate and undergraduate degree programs around the country is that there is more than one answer to those questions. Some programs emphasize community engagement, some balance toward business, some focus on a specific arts discipline, some are entirely cross-disciplinary. If prospective students take time to understand their choices, they can find the mix, balance, and teaching philosophy that match their own learning interests and career goals.
The Association of Arts Administration Educators (AAAE) website at www.artsadministration.org is a great resource to begin this comparison, and it will soon be getting much better as we launch the association's web redesign in the coming months.
But within that range and variety, there are certainly essential elements of an integrated curriculum in arts and cultural management. AAAE recently developed graduate program curriculum standards to clarify and advance those essential elements among its graduate-level member programs. Those standards recommend both coursework and service learning in the production and distribution of art, financial analysis and budget management, income generation through earned and contributed sources, strategic planning, legal and ethical environments, policy, institutional leadership, and international issues.
Undergraduate programs will have a different mix at a different level of engagement, as they also need to cover the broader goals of undergraduate education.
As for where we're doing a good job in arts administration education and where we aren't, there's no way to provide a general response. All of the degree programs have unique strengths. All of us are also working to continually improve. For me, one of the larger frustrations is the disconnect between academic programs in arts administration and leadership development initiatives outside academia. It seems so obvious that efforts on both sides would benefit from more seamless conversation and collaboration. And yet each side seems to work in isolation from the other.
Barry: Follow-up question: Why is that? What can we do to build intersections between those academic programs and the initiatives outside academia?
Andrew: I'm honestly not sure what created these separate camps, as it makes no sense for either side to disconnect from the knowledge and insight of the other. I hear grumblings from non-academic programs that the academics are detached from real-world challenges. And I hear similar grumblings from the academic world that practitioner-based programs lack reflection and rigor. Both are right and both are wrong. And it's certainly not a challenge unique to arts administration you'll hear similar strains in almost any industry with specialized academic programs.
The only way to build those intersections is to continue to try. The AAAE is working to build more meaningful and productive bridges with national service organizations, and they seem more eager than ever to connect with our programs. If we can gain some little victories and I think we can we can slowly disassemble these flawed perspectives and unproductive barriers we've constructed over the decades.
In the end, the theory/practice argument is silly. You can't take action without a working theory of the challenge in front of you even if that theory is unspoken and unexamined. And you can't advance theory without direct interaction with real people making real choices.
Barry: Generational succession is a hot button topic, and how the arts & culture sector can, and will, attract new blood from the next generation will likely greatly impact the future health of the sector what is the role arts administration education (particularly at the university level) in helping to insure that the sector has a reliable stream of qualified new talent to join its leadership ranks? How has it fared in successfully playing out that role?
Andrew: I'll have to admit that I have a growing frustration with the tone and tenor of our proclaimed leadership crisis as explored at national conferences and among arts leaders. From my vantage point, the arts world is swimming in extraordinary prospective leaders with great ideas, entrepreneurial spirit, killer skills, and passion for the arts. I meet passionate and competent young and mid-career arts professionals everywhere I go. But I also watch them leave the sector because of their own frustration with the work they are allowed to do.
The problem, in my opinion, isn't a lack of prospects entering the pipeline, but rather an extraordinarily leaky pipe. Working in an arts organization should be one of the most powerful mixtures of passion and profession. As other industries strive to meet growing workforce demand for jobs with meaning, personal value, connection, and impact, arts organizations so often seem to squander the riches they hold in these very areas. Through rigid leadership and governance structures, advancing professionalism above passion, growing aversion to risk in programming and in practice, and strangely sterile and joyless work environments, many arts organizations have modeled the corporate ideal of the 1950s just as corporations are rediscovering creative expression. It's an odd irony that we feel we can't compete for tomorrow's knowledge workers, when we can offer so much of what those workers claim they want.
In most of the hand-wringing by established arts leaders about not seeing a next generation to succeed them, I hear a consistent subtext that what they're really not seeing is leaders like them. This next group of arts leaders will work differently, balance their work and life differently, and aggressively work to reshape our current understanding of how arts organizations can and should be run. It doesn't mean that their predecessors did things badly, just that each generation brings its own style and flair to the challenge. And thank goodness for that!
As for the role of higher education programs in this challenge, I'd say we have several. First, our programs need to work continually with practitioners to understand what competencies are needed, and how the environment is changing. If we graduate students that can't excel at the job at hand, we've missed a primary part of our calling. Beyond that, however, academic programs have a unique opportunity to reframe the conversation about arts and cultural leadership. Through research, convenings, service learning, collaborations with national and international service organizations, and conversations with our alumni, arts administration degree programs can help define the job ahead, while also serving the job at hand.
I think we've already seen extraordinary contributions to this conversation from academic programs across the country and around the world. And, to my mind, this is the most productive space for academic programs to explore.
Barry: In the follow-up public forums on the study we did for the Hewlett Foundation Youth Involvement in the Arts (click here to download the full report: http://www.hewlett.org/Programs/PerformingArts/Publications/YouthReport.htmwww.hewlettfoundation.org), a number of young people in several venues decried that the work offered them was pedestrian in nature, made no attempt to utilize their talents and was rigidly authoritarian, not allowing for them any meaningful decision-making authority. Those views echoed conclusions in the report itself by organizations that had successful programs to involve more young people. Given your observations, how would you suggest we begin a sector wide systemic change in our attitudes as to the recruitment and involvement of young people?
Andrew: I sure wish that I knew where the levers were to impact systemic change on this issue. It's a constant frustration to release bright and insightful students back into the workforce only to hear them frustrated and undervalued. I'm not suggesting they should be given the keys to the kingdom, but it's astounding what a little honest and responsive listening can do, as well as a clear sense that their actions and insights are valued.
I suppose the ever-increasing competition for labor will eventually force more thoughtful change. Corporations in other fields are working fast and furiously to rethink their work environments, their recruiting and advancement strategies, and their pipeline of potential leaders. Arts organizations that don't do the same will increasingly fall short of their promise, and eventually fall flat on their faces.
Barry: Arts organizations are really small businesses at their core with all of the positive things small businesses can offer local communities, and all of the problems and challenges every small business faces does the current arts administration education, thinking adequately address the needs of future arts administrators to become smart small business entrepreneurs in an increasingly competitive marketplace?
Andrew: The concept of an arts organization as a small business, resonates deeply with my program, and many programs of my peers. Even at a huge annual operating budget (like $30 million or more), arts organizations are small businesses for a range of reasons. They live on cash and die on cash flow, they excel only when a complex number of constituencies work in alignment, and they are personal endeavors that thrive on relationship and human interaction.
I know that many of my peer programs are working hard to advance this way of thinking, and I also know that a new generation of students is demanding it. I experience that push from my own students, and it drives me to work even harder to change the game. As one example, students are increasingly interested in exploring non-traditional corporate forms for expressive organizations from hybrid for-profit/nonprofit structures to informal, non-corporate organizations, to entirely commercial enterprises that still strive for mission over money.
The traditional, professional, independently operated 501c3 organization is certainly one tool in the toolbox. But a vibrant future cultural ecosystem will demand leaders with a mastery of many tools.
Barry: Many people have suggested that it's time for the old models to die and be replaced by new models that adapt to the changing times. And that may apply to the wider nonprofit universe as a whole. How can we facilitate moving from one paradigm to another and minimize the fear, disruptions, and challenges that come with wholesale change?
Andrew: I actually have this argument with my arts consultant friends quite a bit these days. After working with an endless string of struggling nonprofit arts organizations, all sharing the inevitable challenges of the nonprofit corporate structure, they can't help but wonder if there's a better way waiting in the wings.
I'm not so ready to toss out the nonprofit structure, as it has proven to be powerful in advancing non-market-supported expressive forms. But I am ready to toss out all the myths and common conceptions of what the nonprofit form looks like. On paper, it's really not that complicated, a board of three or more, some basic rules about the distribution of net revenue and the avoidance of personal gain, and some loose but convincing ties to serving the public trust. George Thorn and Nello McDaniel figured this out decades ago, that the large majority of our troubles with nonprofit structure are due to the mythology we invest in it.
But of course, there should be a full range of means to advance the expressive life of our communities and the creative voices of our artists. Tomorrow's arts ecology will need to work harder to match organizational and corporate structure to the specific challenge at hand. The good ol' 501c3 will remain an important part of the solution. At least, so says I.
Barry: Is there any national consensus on policy being developed within the arts administration education community that can serve as a guideline for future decision-making in this area? If not, why not? If there is, how is that policy arrived at?
Andrew: Cultural policy is such a multi-headed monster in the United States, I would doubt that anyone could forge a national consensus. It's a creature of government at every level, federal, state, county, municipal but also of organized philanthropy, individual giving, and corporate support, generally forged as the byproduct of initiatives outside the arts and advanced without much communication between the players.
I think higher education can play a productive role in policy on several levels. Through dispassionate and rigorous research, we can inform and advance a productive conversation based on evidence and reflection. Through cross-sectoral and cross-disciplinary convenings and partnerships, we can provide neutral ground for multiple constituents to learn together. Through curriculum and service learning, we can engage a next generation of leaders in the pitfalls and potential of the policy environment, and give them the tools to join the fray. And through all of this work, we can serve as translators, connectors, provocateurs, and thought-leaders to keep things moving forward.
Are we hitting all of the above on all cylinders? Of course not. But we're working at it. And some of the best policy work I know of is being done or supported by arts administration programs and their faculty in higher education.
Barry: You seem to suggest a greater role for your sector which I think will find a very sympathetic audience in the wider nonprofit arts field. How do you think that expanded role can best be rolled out?
Andrew: I can see a vast number of potential connections, but I can't yet figure the best ways to get there. For example, our degree programs have hundreds of students ready to research important questions in policy and practice and, in fact, many are required to do so as part of their coursework. At the same time, service organizations and policy-makers are swimming in vexing but essential questions with no time or resources to address them. How can we connect the student researchers with the subjects that will really inform our future, while giving them a substantial taste for policy development in the process?
Many arts administration education programs are already doing exceptional work in this regard. Carnegie Mellon's program has constructed a fantastic Arts and Culture Observatory initiative to provide on-going research on the state and shape of their region's arts infrastructure http://aco.artsnet.org/.
Joan Jeffri at Columbia University Teachers College has long been a focused and passionate researcher on artists and arts policy http://www.tc.columbia.edu/faculty/index.htm?facid=jj64.
Perhaps we can model these successful efforts and adapt them to work elsewhere.
I'd love to hear the thoughts of your readers and peers as to where and how we can move things forward.
Barry: You're the current President of the Association of Arts Administration Educators. Can you explain what that organization is all about? Is there an annual gathering? Are there ways you guys share information and work together in program development? Do you intersect with each other (or other sectors of the arts & culture universe) in terms of curriculum development or in other ways?
Andrew: Yes, I'm honored to be serving my term as president of the AAAE. It's an international association of arts and cultural management programs in higher education, started about 30 years ago as many of these programs were forming. We have an annual conference (our next is in Madison in April 2008). We connect our members on-line and in person to advance their programs and explore their craft. We engage prospective students in arts and cultural management and help them find a productive fit. We work with national and international service organizations, associations, and related networks. And we provide a forum for advancing the reach and quality of research, teaching, and service in this unique and complex field.
I've already mentioned our association's work in developing graduate program curriculum standards, and the tools surrounding them. Our members can use these standards to evaluate their own programs, and connect with peers who can help them grow and evolve where they identify the need to do so. We also know that the standards have been invaluable to new degree programs as they develop. And we are using them to inform our conversations with practitioners and professional development initiatives outside academia. We have a team of our members now exploring a similar effort for undergraduate programs.
Beyond this important and meaningful work, I'll admit that my favorite aspect of the association is the opportunity to gather with peers. These are brilliant, funny, reflective, insightful individuals. These are old friends and valued colleagues. These are members of an extended family with the common bond of advancing, celebrating, and supporting the expressive life of our planet, and the leaders who make it run.
Barry: You go to a lot of conferences - and participate as a speaker or panelist at a goodly number of them, is there, in your opinion, enough of a focus on issues germane to the provision of arts administration education? If not, where might more groups focus?
Andrew: I do travel the conference circuit a lot, and I'm sad to say that the arts and cultural industry lacks a thoughtful, responsive, and consistent learning infrastructure at almost every level. We're oddly insular in how we gather, and how we structure our learning, by discipline, by job function, by geographic region. And the bulk of our conference learning time is spent on tactics as to how to write a grant, use a blog, manage a mail campaign, rather than on strategy or lateral thinking.
To be fair to the conference conveners, it's a nearly impossible task to build such an infrastructure in such a rapidly evolving industry, especially when so many established arts leaders discount the value of continual learning. But I know that many of the national service organizations are working to turn this around, to rethink how they engage their members and advance a more curious culture among arts professionals, and to rebuild our rather sparse research infrastructure in a way that advances collective understanding and strategy.
We've built so many bunkers over the decades, and searched so desperately for good news about the arts and society to advance our cause, that we've lost much of our ability to question ourselves and each other out loud, to seek the connections among our disciplines, and to explore the integral links we have to other industries, other fields, and to the larger world. These are the fundamental building blocks of significant learning and field transformation in any field, and most definitely in the arts. One positive impact of the dramatic changes now taking place in the arts is the new ascendance of these qualities in our conversations.
Barry: If you had ten million dollars to spend to improve arts administrator education, how would you spend the money?
Andrew: I think we need a significant and sustained investment in fostering greater diversity in our student rosters, as the professional nonprofit arts also need more diversity in their staffs, leadership, and boards. A portion of the $10 million could make a tiny turn in that direction.
I also would segment some resources to encourage, support, and disseminate research on arts and cultural management issues, as we've only begun to scratch the surface of what we need to know to be effective teachers, managers, and leaders. And this doesn't take a bucket of money. For example, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is currently providing small grant incentives to researchers that will dive deeper into a recently developed data set on arts audiences. The grants (of $2000 to $5000 at the most) refocus bright minds on an essential issue in the arts, while generating new insight on existing data.
Finally, I'd fund a series of opportunities to encourage cross-talk and collaborative work between academic programs in arts administration and national service organizations. There's so much potential for mutual learning and growth between these worlds that even a tiny spark could set off a bonfire. If I had change left over from the $10 million after that, I'd probably buy some gum.
1. Alonzo King's LINES Ballet celebrates its 25th Anniversary with an extraordinary presentation of two new works at its Fall Season beginning this Friday night at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in downtown San Francisco. The opening night Gala Party is sold-out, but there still tickets available to the performances during the run.
Click here for more information LINES Ballet www.linesballet.org/ and I hope as many of you as possible get the chance to see one of the world's truly great artists at the peak of his career. | 2019-04-25T05:52:27Z | https://blog.westaf.org/2007/10/october-31-2007.html |
Escherichia coli contains the CspA family, consisting of nine proteins (CspA to CspI), in which CspA, CspB, and CspG have been shown to be cold shock inducible and CspD has been shown to be stationary-phase inducible. The cspI gene is located at 35.2 min on the E. coli chromosome map, and CspI shows 70, 70, and 79% identity to CspA, CspB, and CspG, respectively. Analyses of cspI-lacZ fusion constructs and thecspI mRNA revealed that cspI is cold shock inducible. The 5′-untranslated region of the cspI mRNA consists of 145 bases and causes a negative effect on cspIexpression at 37°C. The cspI mRNA was very unstable at 37°C but was stabilized upon cold shock. Analyses of the CspI protein on two-dimensional gel electrophoresis revealed that CspI production is maximal at or below 15°C. Taking these results together, E. coli possesses a total of four cold shock-inducible proteins in the CspA family. Interestingly, the optimal temperature ranges for their induction are different: CspA induction occurs over the broadest temperature range (30 to 10°C), CspI induction occurs over the narrowest and lowest temperature range (15 to 10°C), and CspB and CspG occurs at temperatures between the above extremes (20 to 10°C).
When Escherichia colicells grown at 37°C are transferred to low temperatures such as 15°C, a set of proteins called cold shock proteins are transiently induced at very high levels during a growth lag period called the acclimation phase (16, 17, 30). Among them, CspA has been identified as a major cold shock protein, consisting of 70 amino acid residues. It has two RNA binding motifs, RNP1 and RNP2 (10,16), and forms a β-barrel structure (7, 24, 27). CspA was revealed to cooperatively bind to RNAs and single-stranded DNAs and is considered to function as an RNA chaperone, which may prevent the formation of secondary structures of mRNAs for efficient translation at low temperatures (15).
The cspA promoter is highly active at 37°C, although CspA protein is hardly detected at this temperature (5, 22), indicating that cspA expression at low temperatures is regulated posttranscriptionally. It should be mentioned, however, that the AT-rich sequence immediately upstream of the −35 region of thecspA promoter functions as a UP element to enhancecspA transcription (9, 22). The cspAmRNA is extremely unstable at 37°C but is dramatically stabilized upon cold shock (3, 5, 8, 22). The cspA mRNA possesses an unusually long 5′ untranslated region (5′-UTR) consisting of 159 bases (29). Mutation analyses have shown that the 5′-UTR of the cspA mRNA plays a crucial role in its cold shock inducibility (5, 22). In addition, translation initiation of the cspA mRNA appears to be very efficient at low temperature in comparison with mRNAs of non-cold-shock proteins (22). Thus, the cspA expression is regulated in a complex manner, that is, at the levels of transcription, mRNA stability and translation efficiency (3, 5, 8, 9, 22).
cspA induction occurs transiently during the acclimation phase upon cold shock, as mentioned above. At the end of the acclimation phase, cspA expression is repressed to a new basal level (10). It has been proposed that the cold box sequence, which is located in the 5′-UTR, and a factor which might bind to the cold box to repress the cspA expression at the level of transcription are responsible for autoregulation of cspAexpression (6, 14).
Six additional cspA homologues in E. coli,cspB to cspG, have been identified by means of Southern analysis with cspA as a probe (cspB andcspC ), isolation of multicopy suppressors of a chromosome partition mutant (cspC andcspE ) and cold shock induction (cspG ). Of these, cspA,cspB, and cspG are cold shock inducible (10,19, 23) and cspC and cspE are expressed at both high and low temperatures (35). cspD is located upstream of clpA (11) and is induced during stationary phase and upon nutrition starvation (34).cspF is closely linked to cspB (33); however, its function is not known. cspA, cspB, and cspG mRNAs share a highly conserved, long 5′-UTR sequence (19, 23, 29), suggesting that the expression ofcspB and cspG is regulated in a similar way to that of cspA. It should be noted, however, that CspB and CspG are induced in a narrower range of low temperature than is CspA (4). cspA is dispensable for growth at either 37 or 15°C, and the production of CspB and CspG increased in acspA deletion strain, suggesting that they may have similar functions (2).
Upon completion of E. coli genome sequencing, two more CspA homologues, designated CspH and CspI (33), were found. They show the highest similarity to CspF and CspG, respectively (33). Although the primary amino acid sequence of CspI shows high identity not only to CspG (79%) but also to CspA (70%) and CspB (70%) (33), the region corresponding to the highly conserved 5′-UTR of cspA, cspB, andcspG is less highly conserved in cspI.
Here we demonstrate that cspI is another cold shock gene, as judged by lacZ expression of both the transcriptional and the translational cspI-lacZ fusions and by CspI production, determined by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis. As shown forcspA, the cspI mRNA was dramatically stabilized upon cold shock and the overproduction of the cspI 5′-UTR caused derepression of cspA, cspB,cspG, and cspI. In addition, the cspIgene was induced in the lowest temperature range (15 to 10°C), suggesting that CspI may play an important physiological role in growth at very low temperature.
Bacterial strains, plasmids, and media. E. coli JM83 (32) and AR134 (MC4100 pcnB80) (13) were used. Plasmid pUC19 (32) was used for cloning. Plasmids pRS414 and pRS415 (28) were used for construction oflacZ fusions. Plasmid pCspA-LacZ, in which thecspA upstream region and the first 13 codons ofcspA were fused translationally to lacZ on the pRS414 vector, as described previously (19), was used as a control.
Luria-Bertani (LB) and M9 media, supplemented with 0.4% glucose, 0.4% Casamino Acids, and 50 μg/ml of thiamine, were used for bacterial growth. When necessary, ampicillin was added at a final concentration of 50 μg/ml.
General techniques.DNA cloning was carried out by the method described previously (26). PCR amplification was carried out as specified in the manufacturer’s instruction manual (Boehringer) with 30 cycles of amplification steps each of 1 min at 95°C, 2 min at 50°C, and 2 min at 72°C. Restriction enzymes and DNA modification enzymes were purchased from Boehringer, Gibco BRL, and New England Biolabs.
Plasmid construction. cspI was amplified by PCR with synthetic oligonucleotide primers, 8188 (5′-aagaattcAACATTTACATCGCGGAA-3′) and 8187 (5′-ttgggatCCTCAAAGCGCCACTA-3′), where the 5′ tails are shown in lowercase type and the EcoRI andBamHI sites, respectively, are underlined. Genomic DNA from prototype strain W3110 (18) was used as a template. The PCR fragment was directly cloned into the SmaI site of pUC19, yielding pNWI2. To construct a plasmid that can express only the 5′-UTR of cspI but not its coding region, pNWI2 was digested withStyI and SacI, blunt ended with T4 DNA polymerase, and then self-ligated, yielding pNWI6.
To construct the transcriptional and translational cspI-lacZfusions, PCR was first carried out with primers 8188 (see above) and 8010 (5′-gggggatccGGGTTAAACCATTTCACT-3′), where the 5′ tail is shown in lowercase type and the BamHI site is underlined. The PCR fragment was digested with EcoRI andBamHI and then cloned into pRS414 for the construction of a translational fusion and into pRS415 for the construction of a transcriptional fusion, yielding pNWI3 and pNWI4, respectively. For the deletion construct of the entire 5′ untranslated region of thecspI-lacZ fusion, PCR was carried out with primers 8188 (see above) and 8404 (5′-ggggatcCAGAACACCATTAACGC-3′), where the 5′ tail is shown in lowercase type and theBamHI site is underlined. The PCR fragment was cloned into pRS415 in a similar way to that described above, yielding pNWI5. All the constructs were confirmed by DNA sequencing with Sequenase version 2.0 (Amersham).
Assay for β-galactosidase activity.ThecspI-lacZ fusion constructs were introduced into strain AR134. Cells were grown in LB or M9 medium at 37°C to mid-log phase and then transferred to 15°C. Portions of culture were taken immediately before the temperature downshift (0 h) and at 1, 2, 3, and 5 h after the temperature downshift. β-Galactosidase activity was measured as described by Miller (21). The assay was done at least in duplicate at each time point.
Isolation of RNA and primer extension.Strain JM83 was grown in LB medium at 37°C to mid-log phase and then transferred to 15°C. RNA was extracted from a 1.5-ml culture by the hot-phenol method described previously (1). Primer 8272 (5′-CCAAAACCTTTTTCAGGG-3′) for detection of cspIand primer 4593 (5′-ACATAGTGTATTACCTTTAA-3′) for detection of cspA were labeled with [γ-32P]ATP (>5,000 Ci/mmol; DuPont-New England Nuclear) by using T4 polynucleotide kinase (Gibco BRL). Primer extension was carried out with 5 μg of RNA at 42°C for 1 h in a final volume of 10 μl, which contained 50 mM Tris-HCl (pH 8.5), 8 mM MgCl2, 30 mM KCl, 1 mM dithiothreitol, 0.4 pmol of 32P-labeled primer, 0.5 mM dATP, 0.5 mM dGTP, 0.5 mM dCTP, 0.5 mM dTTP, 10 U of RNase inhibitor (Boehringer Mannheim), and 6.25 U of avian myeloblastosis virus reverse transcriptase (Boehringer Mannheim). Primer extension products were analyzed on a 6% polyacrylamide gel under denaturing conditions.
For measurement of the stability of mRNA at 15°C, rifampin was added 1 h after the temperature downshift to 15°C at a final concentration of 200 μg/ml to stop transcription. For measurement of the stability of mRNA at 37°C, the culture was shifted to 15°C for 30 min to accumulate mRNAs, a 5-ml sample was taken and mixed with 5 ml of the medium (which was prewarmed at 60°C) in a glass flask kept at 37°C, rifampin was simultaneously added to a final concentration of 200 μg/ml, a 1.5-ml sample was taken at each time point, and RNA extraction and primer extension assays were done as described above. Primer extension products were quantitated by using a phosphorimager (Bio-Rad).
Protein-labeling experiment.Cells were grown in M9 medium supplemented with glucose, 19 amino acids (no methionine), and thiamine at 37°C, and then transferred to an indicated temperature. Cells were labeled with [35S]methionine (1092 Ci/mmol; Amersham) for 30 min at lower temperatures and then chased for 5 min by adding nonradioactive methionine to a final concentration of 0.2 M. Cell lysates were prepared and processed by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis as described previously (31).
Sequence comparison among CspA, CspB, CspG, and CspI.TheE. coli genome-sequencing project has revealed the ninth member of the CspA family, which we designated CspI (33). CspI shows the highest identity to CspG (79%) (Fig.1A), and on the phylogenetic tree it belongs to the same group as CspA, CspB, and CspG, all of which are cold shock inducible as described previously (33). The three-dimensional structure of CspA has been determined. It consists of five antiparallel β-strands forming a β-barrel structure with two β-sheets (7, 24, 27). CspI contains well-conserved hydrophobic residues including V9, I21, V30, V32, and V51 (Fig. 1A), which form a hydrophobic core in CspA (7, 24,27). In addition, two RNA binding motifs, RNP1 and RNP2, are well conserved in CspI (Fig. 1A). These facts suggest that CspI may form a conformation similar to that of CspA and may also bind to RNA and single-stranded DNA, as CspA does (15).
Sequence comparison of four cold shock-inducible members of the E. coli CspA family. (A) Amino acid sequence alignments of CspI (database accession no. AE000252), CspG (AE000201), CspB (AE000252), and CspA (AE000433). Residues identical to CspI are shown as dots. The residues forming the hydrophobic core in the β-barrel structure are indicated by solid circles above the sequences. The RNA binding motifs, RNP1 and RNP2, are boxed. Their amino acid sequence homologies are shown on the right, with CspI set at 100%. (B) Sequence alignment of the promoter, 5′-UTR, and the first 13 codon nucleotides of cspI, cspG, cspB, and cspA. Nucleotides identical to cspI are shown as dots. To maximize the alignment, some gaps have been introduced; these are indicated by dashes. The transcription start sites are in bold letters and are marked as +1. The translation start codon ATGs are also in bold letters and are underlined. The most homologous sequences (UP element, -35 region, -10 region, cold box, upstream sequence, Shine-Dalgarno [SD] sequence, and downstream box) are boxed and labeled above the boxes.
Cold shock-inducible expression of cspI. ThecspI gene is located at 35.2 min on the E. colichromosome and transcribed counterclockwise. To determine the regulation of cspI expression, the 387-bp DNA fragment containing the 346-bp upstream sequence of the cspI coding region and the region for the first 13 codons of cspI was amplified and cloned, to translationally and transcriptionally fuse tolacZ on pRS414 and pRS415, yielding pNWI3 and pNWI4, respectively. These fusion constructs were introduced into AR134, and the β-galactosidase activity was measured. AR134 is a pcnBmutant (13), which keeps pBR322 derivatives at low copy number (20) to minimize any positive or negative effects of the multicopy plasmids on cspI-lacZ expression.
β-Galactosidase activities of both fusion constructs were very low at 37°C at mid-log phase (zero time point in Fig.2). Since CspI shows the highest identity to cold shock-inducible CspG, we analyzed the effect of temperature downshift on cspI-lacZ expression. After the temperature downshift from 37 to 15°C, the β-galactosidase activities of both the transcriptional and the translational fusion constructs dramatically increased and were both approximately twofold higher than that of the cspA-lacZ translational fusion, as shown in Fig.2, indicating that cspI is a cold shock-inducible gene likecspA, cspB, and cspG.
Cold shock induction of β-galactosidase activity. Strain AR134, harboring various plasmids, was grown to mid-log phase at 37°C in LB medium containing ampicillin (50 μg/ml) and then transferred to 15°C. Samples were taken at 0, 1, 2, 3, and 5 h after the temperature downshift, and β-galactosidase activity was measured. The assay was carried out at least in duplicate at each time point. Symbols: ○, pNWI3; ●, pNWI4; □, pCspA-LacZ; ▵, pRS414.
Although the expression of cspA, cspB,cspG, and cspI is cold shock inducible and the primary amino acid sequence of CspI is highly homologous to those of CspA, CspB, and CspG, a putative 5′-UTR sequence for cspIdoes not show high similarity to those for cspA,cspB, and cspG, suggesting that cspImight be regulated somewhat differently. To identify the 5′-UTR ofcspI, the transcription start site of cspI was determined by primer extension analysis with primer 8272, which is specific for cspI. This primer corresponds to the complementary strand for cspI codons 14 through 19. Total RNA of strain JM83 was extracted from cells grown at 37°C and from cells grown for 0.5 and 3 h after the temperature downshift to 15°C. Primer extension products of cspI from pre-cold-shocked cells were hardly detected (Fig.3, lane 2). However, at 0.5 h after the temperature downshift, the amounts of primer extension products dramatically increased (lane 3), indicating that the amount ofcspI mRNA greatly increased upon cold shock. At 3 h after the temperature downshift, the amount of cspI mRNA was reduced to a new basal level (lane 4), which is slightly higher than that at 37°C. The pattern of cold shock induction of thecspI mRNA is very similar to those of the cspA,cspB, and cspG mRNAs (4, 23), indicating that cspI is also transiently induced upon cold shock. The cspI mRNA was not induced during stationary phase at 37°C (lane 5).
Primer extension analysis of the cspI mRNA. Strain JM83 was grown in LB medium at 37°C. RNA extraction and primer extension analysis were carried out as described in Materials and Methods. The primer corresponds to the complementary strand for codons 14 to 19 of cspI. Lanes: 1, without RNA; 2, with RNA extracted from exponentially growing cells at 37°C; 3, with RNA extracted from cells at 0.5 h after the temperature downshift to 15°C; 4, with RNA extracted from cells at 3 h after the shift; 5, with RNA extracted from stationary-phase cells at 37°C. Primer extension products were analyzed on a denatured polyacrylamide gel together with a sequencing ladder. The sequence is shown at the right; the arrow indicates the transcription start site.
On the basis of the primer extension experiment described above, the possible transcription start site and the deduced promoter region, the -35 and -10 sequences (TTGCTA and GTTAAT, respectively) are identified as shown in Fig. 1B. The promoter sequence of cspI is very similar to those ofcspA, cspB, and cspG. Upstream of the -35 region of cspA, cspB, and cspG is an AT-rich region called the UP element (25), which is believed to play an important role in maintaining the high promoter activity of cspA at both 37 and 15°C (22). The UP element also exists in the cspI gene and is likely to play an important role in cspI transcription at low temperature.
The primer extension experiment (Fig. 3) also reveals that thecspI mRNA contains a long 5′-UTR consisting of 145 bases, which is comparable to the 5′-UTRs of cspA (159 bases),cspB (161 bases), and cspG (156 bases). Although the sequence of the 5′-UTR of cspI is not highly homologous to those of cspA, cspB, and cspG, the 5′-UTR of cspI still contains a well-conserved motif, termed the cold box, which is believed to be involved in autoregulation at the end of the acclimation phase (6, 14, see below). Farther downstream in the 5′-UTR, there is a 12-base conserved sequence designated the upstream sequence, which may be involved in the translation efficiency of cspA (36). It should be noted that cspA, cspB, and cspG all have a downstream box downstream of the translation initiation codon, which has been shown to play an important role in cold shock induction at the level of translation (22). As shown in Fig. 1B,cspI has exactly the same downstream box as cspBand cspG, suggesting that the cspI downstream box also plays an essential role in translation at low temperature.
cspI mRNA stabilization upon cold shock.Based on the analysis of the cspI-lacZ fusion constructs,cspI expression seems to be regulated by transcription and/or mRNA stability (Fig. 2). It has been shown that mRNA stability plays a critical role in the cold inducibility of cspA and that the stability of mRNA is regulated by its long 5′-UTR (3, 5,8). Therefore, we examined the stability of the cspImRNA at both 37 and 15°C by primer extension analyses. As shown in Fig. 4, the cspI mRNA was very unstable at 37°C, with a half-life of approximately 30 s, somewhat more stable than the cspA mRNA (half-life, approximately 20 s). However, at 1 h after the temperature downshift, the cspI mRNA and the cspA mRNA were stabilized with half-lives of 14 and 12 min, respectively. These results suggest that mRNA stability also plays a major role in the cold shock induction of cspI.
Analysis of mRNA stability. A culture of strain JM83 grown in LB medium at 37°C was shifted to 15°C. (A) For measurement of mRNA stability at 37°C, a culture preincubated at 15°C for 30 min was shifted back to 37°C. Rifampin was added to the culture to a final concentration of 200 μg/ml at the point of the temperature upshift. RNAs were extracted at 0 (lanes 1 and 6), 1 (lanes 2 and 7), 2 (lanes 3 and 8), 3 (lanes 4 and 9), and 5 (lanes 5 and 10) min after the addition of rifampin. (B) For measurement of the mRNA stability at 15°C, rifampin was added 1 h after the temperature downshift and RNAs were extracted at 0 (lanes 1 and 6), 5 (lanes 2 and 7), 10 (lanes 3 and 8), 20 (lanes 4 and 9), and 30 (lanes 5 and 10) min after the addition of rifampin. Primer extension was carried out with a primer for cspI (lanes 1 to 5) and with a primer forcspA (lanes 6 to 10) as described in Materials and Methods. (C and D) Graphical presentations based on the results obtained in panels A and B, respectively. The radioactivities of primer extension products were measured and plotted, with the product at time zero set to 100%. Symbols: ○, cspI; ●, cspA.
When the 5′-UTR of the cspA mRNA was deleted,cspA expression was observed even at 37°C, indicating that the 5′-UTR has a negative effect on cspA expression at 37°C (22). To elucidate the effect of cspI5′-UTR on cspI expression, another transcriptionalcspI-lacZ fusion construct, pNWI5, which does not contain the 5′-UTR, was prepared (see Materials and Methods). At 37°C, the β-galactosidase activity in the cells harboring pNWI5 was 980 U, which was much higher than that in the cells harboring pNWI4 (29 U), which contains the 5′-UTR. This indicates that the cspI5′-UTR has a negative effect on its own gene expression at 37°C, as the cspA 5′-UTR does.
CspI induction at lower temperatures.CspA, CspB, CspG, and CspI are all cold shock inducible. However, upon cold shock, the temperature dependence of CspA induction is broader while that of CspB and CspG is restricted to lower temperatures and to a narrower temperature range (4). To examine the optimal temperature for CspI induction, two-dimensional (2D) gel electrophoresis was carried out with cells labeled with [35S]methionine at different temperatures. For this purpose, we first determined the spot corresponding to CspI by using a plasmid which overproduces CspI. As shown in Fig.5A, CspI migrated very close to CspB and its production was indeed induced upon cold shock.
Analysis of CspI protein by 2D gel electrophoresis. (A) Cultures of strain JM83 harboring pUC19 or pNWI2 were labeled with [35S]methionine at 37°C and labeled 30 min after the temperature downshift to 15°C. Total-cell extracts were analyzed by 2D gel electrophoresis, and autoradiograms were obtained. Only a portion corresponding to low-molecular-weight proteins is shown. (B) Cultures of strain JM83 were labeled with [35S]methionine 30 min after the temperature downshift from 37°C to 30, 25, 20, 15, and 10°C, and the one indicated by “15°C 3 hr” is a sample labeled at 3 h after the temperature downshift to 15°C. CspI is indicated by an arrowhead. The positions of CspA, CspB, and CspG are shown by labeled arrowheads in one of the panels in A and B: 1, CspA; 2, CspB; 3, CspG; and 4, CspI.
CspI production from the chromosomal cspI gene could not be detected at 37°C but became clearly detectable at 15°C (Fig. 5B), unambiguously demonstrating that cspI is a cold shock-inducible gene. Next, cells grown at 37°C to mid-log phase was transferred to different temperatures, i.e., 30, 25, 20, 15, and 10°C. At 30 min after the temperature shift, cells were labeled with [35S]methionine for 30 min and total cellular proteins were analyzed by 2D gel electrophoresis. In contrast to CspA, CspB, and CspG, CspI was induced only when the temperature was shifted to or below 15°C (Fig. 5B), indicating that CspI has the narrowest and lowest temperature range for its induction. CspI production was reduced to a lower level at 3 h after the temperature downshift, as can be seen from the gel (Fig. 5B), which is in good agreement with the results of the primer extension analysis as shown in Fig. 3. This indicates that CspI production is transiently induced during the acclimation phase upon cold shock, as for CspA, CspB, and CspG (4,10, 23, 29).
It is interesting that the rate of CspI synthesis is much lower than that of CspA (Fig. 5), although the β-galactosidase activity of thecspI-lacZ translational fusion construct is higher than that of the cspA-lacZ translational fusion construct (Fig. 2). In both fusion constructs, the first 13 codons of cspI orcspA were translationally fused to lacZ as mentioned above. Since transcription initiation and translation initiation from the fusion constructs are likely to occur in the same manner as those from the chromosomal copy of cspA andcspI, we examined any difference in protein stability between CspA and CspI. Their half-lives were measured by pulse-chase experiments 30 min after the temperature downshift and found to be longer than 5 h, although CspI was somewhat less stable than CspA (data not shown). The chasing in the 2D electrophoresis in Fig. 5 was only 5 min. Therefore, it is unlikely that the low production of CspI is due to protein stability. These results therefore suggest that the difference between CspA and CspI production at low temperature may be at the level of translation elongation.
Derepression by overexpression of the cspA orcspI 5′-UTR.It has been reported that when thecspA 5′-UTR was overproduced during cold shock treatment, CspA and CspB expression were no longer transient and a high level of CspA and CspB expression was still observed after the acclimation phase (6, 14). This phenomenon, called derepression, was also observed when the region from +1 to +25 of the cspA 5′-UTR was overexpressed. Within this region, a highly conserved sequence, designated the cold box sequence, was found (Fig.1B) (14). Conversely, deletion of the cold box region abolished the derepression effect of the cspA 5′-UTR (6). It has been proposed that a factor might bind to the cold box to repress the cspA expression at the level of transcription at the end of the acclimation phase (6, 14). The overproduction of the 5′-UTR containing the cold box is thus expected to sequester this factor to derepress cspAexpression.
As mentioned above, the cspI 5′-UTR possesses a cold box sequence. To investigate whether the cspI cold box has a similar effect as that of cspA, we constructed a plasmid pNWI6 that is able to overexpress the cspI 5′-UTR from +1 to +113. By primer extension analysis, we confirmed that thecspI 5′-UTR was effectively overexpressed (data not shown). pUC19-600 that can overexpress the cspA 5′-UTR (14) was used as a positive control, and pUC19 was used as a negative control. Before and at 1 h after temperature downshift, the patterns of CspA, CspB, CspG, and CspI expression were essentially the same among cells harboring pUC19, pUC19-600, and pNWI6 (Fig.6A, panels a to f). At 3 h after the temperature downshift, all four proteins were greatly repressed in cells harboring pUC19 (Fig. 6A, panel g) while production of all four proteins became derepressed in cells overexpressing either thecspA or the cspI 5′-UTR (Fig. 6A, panels h and i, respectively). As shown in Fig. 6B, overexpression of both thecspA and the cspI 5′-UTRs has a derepression effect, although the effect of the cspI 5′-UTR is weaker than that of the cspA 5′-UTR. These results suggest that thecspI 5′-UTR probably plays a role in the autoregulation of the cspI gene at the end of the acclimation phase.
Effect of cspI 5′-UTR overexpression on CspA, CspB, CspG, and CspI expression. (A) Cultures of strain JM83 harboring pUC19 (a, d, and g), pUC19-600 (b, e, and h), or pNWI6 (c, f, and i) were labeled with [35S]methionine at 37°C (a, b, and c), and at 1 h (d, e, and f) and 3 h (g, h, and i) after the temperature downshift to 15°C. Total-cell extracts were analyzed by 2D gel electrophoresis, and autoradiograms were obtained. Only a portion corresponding to low-molecular-weight proteins is shown. The cold shock proteins are indicated: 1, CspA; 2, CspB; 3, CspG; 4, CspI. (B) The amounts of the four proteins were quantitated with a phosphorimager, with ribosomal protein L11 as a reference. The amounts of the proteins at each time point upon cold shock are given as the ratio to the amount of the L11 spot. Since the CspA and CspG spots are not separated, we counted them together. The ratio of the amount of protein at 1 h upon cold shock to that at 3 h upon cold shock is its repression rate. The derepression rate is the ratio of repression rate in control cells to that in the 5′-UTR overexpression cells. Lanes: 1, control cells; 2, cells overproducing cspA5′-UTR; 3, cells overproducing cspI 5′-UTR.
Concluding remarks. E. coli has nine cspgenes, cspA to cspI (33). Of these,cspA (10), cspB (19),cspG (23), and cspI (this study) are cold shock inducible. All these csp genes share several important features. (i) They all contain a UP element immediately upstream of the promoter, which contributes to maintain the high promoter activity even at low temperatures (9, 22). (ii) They all contain a long 5′-UTR in their mRNAs (159, 161, 156, and 145 bases for cspA, cspB, cspG, andcspI, respectively). As found for the cspA mRNA (22), these 5′-UTRs are believed to exert a negative effect on their expression at 37°C, while they cause a positive effect on their cold shock inducibility. (iii) They all have the cold box at the 5′-end region of their 5′-UTRs, which plays a role in autoregulation to repress their own gene expression at the end of the acclimation phase (6, 14). (iv) They all contain a downstream box downstream of the translation initiation codon, which plays an essential role in the cold shock induction by enhancing translation (22). Taken together, expression of all four cspgenes appears to be regulated essentially in the same manner. It should be mentioned, however, that the optimal temperature ranges for the induction of these genes are different. CspI is induced at a relatively lower temperature range than the others.
How are the differences in the temperature range of induction achieved? It is unlikely that the difference in optimal temperature is caused at the level of transcription initiation, because the putative promoter region and the UP element are very well conserved amongcspA, cspB, cspG, and cspI, as shown in Fig. 1B. It is also unlikely that it is caused at the level of translation initiation, because their Shine-Dalgarno sequences, downstream boxes, and coding regions are also quite well conserved (see Fig. 1B). In contrast, the nucleotide sequences of their 5′-UTRs are different, suggesting differences in their mRNA secondary structures and therefore in their stabilities. Thus, the 5′-UTRs of thecsp genes exert a negative effect on their expression at 37°C, affecting their mRNA stabilities and translation initiation efficiencies (22, 36). These are likely to be differently modulated upon temperature downshift, depending upon the secondary structure of each mRNA. A larger temperature difference might be required for cspI expression, while a smaller temperature difference would be enough for cspA expression.
It is interesting that although the cspA gene was dispensable for cell growth at both high and low temperatures, the production of CspB and CspG significantly increased in acspA deletion mutant (2). This indicates that the CspA function may be at least partially complemented by CspB and CspG. It has been reported that in Bacillus subtilis, which contains three csp genes, at least one of the three csp genes is required for cell growth (12). It seems likely that the functions of CspA, CspB, CspG, and CspI overlap. To examine this possibility, we are attempting to construct multiple-deletion strains including a quadruple-deletion mutant. This approach may reveal a possibility that CspA, CspB, CspG, and CspI each play their own specific roles in the cells.
We thank R. M. Simons for plasmids. We also thank S. Phadtare for comments.
This work was supported by a grant (to M.I.) from the National Institutes of Health (GM19043).
(1981) Evidence for two functional gal promoters in intact Escherichia coli cells. J. Biol. Chem. 256:11905–11910.
(1997) CspA, the major cold-shock protein of Escherichia coli, negatively regulates its own gene expression. J. Bacteriol. 179:7081–7088.
(1996) Post-transcriptional regulation of CspA expression in Escherichia coli. Mol. Microbiol. 19:231–240.
(1996) Differential thermoregulation of two highly homologous cold-shock genes, cspA and cspB, of Escherichia coli. Genes Cells 1:171–178.
(1997) Promoter-independent cold-shock induction of cspA and its derepression at 37°C by mRNA stabilization. Mol. Microbiol. 23:355–364.
(1998) Role of the cold-box region in the 5′ untranslated region of the cspA mRNA in its transient expression at low temperature in Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 180:90–95.
(1998) Solution NMR structure and backbone dynamics of the major cold-shock protein (CspA) from Escherichia coli: evidence for conformational dynamics in the single-stranded RNA-binding site. Biochemistry 37:10881–10896.
(1996) Differential mRNA stability of the cspA gene in the cold-shock response of Escherichia coli. Mol. Microbiol. 19:241–248.
(1997) Role of Escherichia coli cspA promoter sequence and translational apparatus adaptation in the cold shock response. Mol. Gen. Genet. 256:282–290.
(1990) Major cold shock proteins of Escherichia coli. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 87:283–287.
(1990) The ATP-dependent Clp protease of Escherichia coli: sequence of clpA and identification of a Clp-specific substrate. J. Biol. Chem. 265:7886–7893.
(1997) A family of cold shock proteins in Bacillus subtilis is essential for cellular growth and for efficient protein synthesis at optimal and low temperatures. Mol. Microbiol. 25:741–756.
(1993) Phenotypic revertant mutations of a new OmpR2 mutant (V203Q) of Escherichia coli lie in the envZ gene, which encodes in the OmpR kinase. J. Bacteriol. 175:1956–1960.
(1996) The role of 5′-end untranslated region of the mRNA for CspA, the major cold-shock protein of Escherichia coli, in cold-shock adaptation. J. Bacteriol. 178:4919–4925.
(1997) CspA, the major cold-shock protein of Escherichia coli, is an RNA chaperone. J. Biol. Chem. 272:196–202.
(1994) The cold-shock response—a hot topic. Mol. Microbiol. 11:811–818.
(1987) Induction of proteins in response to low temperature in Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 169:2092–2095.
(1987) The physical map of the whole E. coli chromosome: application of a new strategy for rapid analysis and sorting of a large genomic library. Cell 50:495–508.
(1994) Family of the major cold-shock protein, CspA (CS7.4) of Escherichia coli, whose members show a high sequence similarity with the eukaryotic Y-box binding proteins. Mol. Microbiol. 11:833–839.
(1986) Mutations in a new chromosomal gene of Escherichia coli K-12, pcnB, reduced plasmid copy number of pBR322 and its derivatives. Mol. Gen. Genet. 205:285–290.
(1992) A short course in bacterial genetics—a laboratory manual and handbook for Escherichia coli and related bacteria. (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y).
(1997) Deletion analysis of cspA of Escherichia coli: requirement of the AT-rich UP element for cspA transcription and the downstream box in the coding region for its cold shock induction. Mol. Microbiol. 26:321–335.
(1996) A novel member of the cspA family of genes that is induced by cold-shock in Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 178:2994–2997.
(1994) Solution NMR structure of the major cold shock protein (CspA) from Escherichia coli: identification of a binding epitope for DNA. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 91:5114–5118.
(1993) A third recognition element in bacterial promoters: DNA binding by the α subunit of RNA polymerase. Science 262:1407–1413.
(1994) Crystal structure of CspA, the major cold shock protein of Escherichia coli. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 91:5119–5123.
(1987) Improved single and multicopy lac-based cloning vectors for protein and operon fusions. Gene 53:85–96.
(1992) Identification of the promoter region of the Escherichia coli major cold shock gene, cspA. J. Bacteriol. 174:3867–3873.
(1998) Cold shock and adaptation. BioEssays 20:49–57.
(1990) Gene-protein database of Escherichia coli K-12: Edition 3. Electrophoresis 11:1131–1166.
(1998) The CspA family in Escherichia coli: multiple gene duplication for stress adaptation. Mol. Microbiol. 27:247–255.
(1997) Growth-phase-dependent expression of cspD, encoding a member of the CspA family in Escherichia coli. J. Bacteriol. 179:5126–5130.
(1994) Cloning, sequencing, and characterization of multicopy suppressors of a mukB mutation in Escherichia coli. Mol. Microbiol. 13:301–312.
Yamanaka, K., M. Mitta, and M. Inouye. Unpublished data. | 2019-04-21T14:21:15Z | https://jb.asm.org/content/181/5/1603?ijkey=084217fd208abf3e3779aa0b039bcabfed9b3fbc&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha |
I was born in Siracusa on August 22nd, 1979.
• 1998-2003: Master Degree in Theoretical Physics. University of Catania. Title of my Thesis: “Historical and Epistemological aspects of Quantum Mechanics and “Non-locality” consequences”.
• 2006-2010: Ph.D. (with fellowship) in History, Philosophy and Didactics of Science. Title of my Ph.D. Thesis: “Reversibility and Universality in Quantum Computation”.
• 2009: Member of Project (supported by Regione Sardegna): Regional programme (POR Sardegna 2000-2006, Misura 3.6, Azione 3.6.a) against high school wastage.
• 2009: Elected “Expert on the subject on Logic” – University of Cagliari.
• 2010- 2012: Post-doc fellowship “Foundational research for young researchers – POR Sardegna FSE 2007-2013, L.R.7/2007” sponsored by Regione Sardegna. Principal Investigator of the project: “Logical-Algebraic Approach to Quantum Computing: Theoretical Aspects and Possible Implementations” (120.000 euro).
• 2010: Visiting Scholar at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Indiana University, Bloomington.
• 2012: Fellowship for the National research project P.R.I.N. 2009: “Non-classical Logics for the ontology representation in the informatics archives ”, University of Cagliari.
• 2013: Member of the project: “Modeling the uncertainty: Quantum Theory and Imaging Processing”, supported by Regione Sardegna (Legge Regionale 7 Agosto 2007, n.7, Promozione della ricerca scientifica e dell’innovazione tecnologica in Sardegna).
• 2013: Member of the P.R.I.N. Project: “From Models to Logic: Structures Logification and the Equivalence between Logics”.
• 2013: National Scientific Qualification for the position of Associate Professor (Scientific Area 11/C2: Logic and Philosophy of Science).
• 2014-2016: Researcher at the University of Cagliari, for the F.I.R.B. project: “Structures and Dynamics of Knowledge and Cognition” (M.I.U.R. code: RBFR126ZA6) funded by M.I.U.R.
• 2014: National Scientific Qualification for the position of Associate Professor (Scientific Area 01/A1: Mathematical Logic).
• 2015: Member of the European project “Syntax Meets Semantics: Methods, Interactions, and Connections in Substructural logics” (H2020-MSCA-RISE-2015 code: 689176) funded by the European Commission.
• 2016-current: Tenured Researcher at the University of Cagliari.
• 2017-current: Principal Investigator of the Project: “Logical-time evolution of correlated microscopic systems“, Founded by Regione Autonoma della Sardegna (50.000 euro).
• 2017-current: member of the Ph.D in Philosophy, Epistemology and Cultural history – University of Cagliari.
• 2017-current: Secretary of the Italian Society of Logic and Philosophy of Science (SILFS).
• 2017-current: Principal Investigator of the Project: “Strategies and Technologies for Scientific Education and Dissemination“, Founded by Fondazione Sardegna (64.500 euro).
• 2018: National Scientific Qualification for the position of Full Professor (Scientific Area 11/C2: Logic and Philosophy of Science).
• 2018-current: Member of the project: “Superposiciones cuánticas en el procesamiento de información cuántica: un enfoque lógico, categorial y computacional“. Project number 80020170100058UJ (Resolución: N° 148/18 de fecha 29/06/2018), principal investigator Dr. de Ronde. Founded by UNAJ (Universidad Nacional Arturo Jauretche) (12.000 pesos).
• 2018-current: Member of the Council of the International Quantum Structure Association (IQSA).
• 2018-current: Member of the project: “For a semantic extension of the Quantum Computational Logic”, founded by Regione Sardegna.
• 2019-current: Local Coordinator of the project: “For an interdisciplinary dialogue among Logic, Philosophy and Communication Science”, founded by Italian Ministry of Education (MIUR) (130.000 euro).
M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini, R. Leporini, G. Sergioli (2018). Quantum Computation and Logic – How quantum computers have inspired logical investigations; TRENDS IN LOGIC, n.48, ISBN:978-3-030-04470-1, Springer.
M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini, G. Sergioli, R. Leporini (2016). Abstract quantum computing machines and quantum computational logics. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF QUANTUM INFORMATION, Vol. 14, 1640019. ISSN:0219-7499, World Scientific. Download.
M. Giunti, A. Ledda, G. Sergioli (2016). I modelli nelle teorie scientifiche. CAROCCI, ISBN: 978-88-430-8221-6.
• 2005: Member of S.I.F. (Italian Physics Society).
• 2008: Member of I.Q.S.A. (International Quantum Structures Association).
• 2009: Member of the Alophis research group (Applied Logics, Philosophy and History of Science, University of Cagliari).
• 2010: Member of S.I.L.F.S. (Italian Society of Logic and Philosophy of Science).
• 2012 : Member of S.I.F.A. (Italian Society of Analytic Philosophy).
• 2005: I was awarded with the prize S. Notarrigo, by S.I.F. (Italian Physics Society) for my master thesis: “Historical and Epistemological aspects of Quantum Mechanics and “Non-locality” consequences” (1000 euro).
• 2017: Winner of the “funding of basic research activities” (Ffabr) (3000 euro).
Reviewer for the Research Fund Flanders (FWO) Foundation (Brussel).
Reviewer for the MIUR (Italian Ministry of Education and Research) for the evaluation of the quality of the research (VQR).
“Quantum, Logic and Music” – Special Issue of Soft Computing (Springer), with M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini, E. Negri, S. Smets.
“Logic, Pluralism and Translation” – Special Issue of Topoi (Springer), with F. Ervas, A. Ledda, F. Paoli.
“Quantum Structures & Quantum Information Theory” – Special Issue of Soft Computing (Springer), with M. Bosyk, H. Freytes, F. Holik.
• 2004: 13-17 September. VII summer school on Philosophy of Physics University research center on Philosophy and Foundation of Physics. Cesena.
• 2004: National conference: “Foundation of Quantum Mechanics. State of art and further developments”. University of Lecce.
• 2005: National conference: “Natural Processes and Models of Computation”. University of Bologna. Bologna.
• 2005: National conference: XCI National Conference of S.I.F. (Italian Physics Society). University of Catania.
• 2005: International conference: “Second Florence-Vienna workshop on Logic and Computation”. University of Florence.
• 2006: June. International conference: “Ordered Structures in Many-Valued Logic”. Massa Lubrense (Sorrento). Naples.
• 2007: 5-6 October. Organizer of the International meeting: “First Catalan-Sardinian Workshop on Algebraic and Fuzzy Logic”. Title of my talk: “Algebras and logics from quantum computation”. University of Cagliari.
• 2008: May. International conference: “ManyVal ’08: Applications of Topological Dualities to Measure Theory in Algebraic Many-Valued Logic”. Title of my talk: “Stone -Weierstrass Type Theorem for Density Operators”. University of Milan.
• 2008: 6-12 June. International conference: “9th Biannual IQSA Meeting, Quantum Structures, Brussels-Gdansk”. Title of my talk: “Approximation in Quantum Computational Logics”. University of Danzig.
• 2008: 24-29 October. International conference: “Italian Quantum Information Science Conference”. University of Camerino.
• 2008: 11-12 December. International conference: “Studia Logica International Conference, Trends in Logic VI”. Title of my talk: “Reversibility and Irreversibility in the Logic of Quantum Computation”. University of Bruxelles.
• 2009: 10-11 September. Italian Conference: Research on “Logic in Italy”. Title of my talk: “Logic and Quantum Computation”. University of Milan.
• 2010: 6 October. Invited Speaker at the Logic Seminar, Mathematics Department. Title of my talk: “Irreversibility and Universality in Quantum Computation”. Indiana University, Bloomington.
• 2010: 8 October. Invited speaker at the Colloquium Series, Spring 2010. Department of History of Philosophy of Science. Title of my talk: “Entanglement – From an Embarrassment to an Asset”. Indiana University, Bloomington.
• 2010: 1 December. Invited speaker at the Logic Seminar, Mathematics Department. Joint talk with Amit Hagar. Title of the talk: “Counting your steps: A New, Finitist and Objective Interpretation of Probability in Physics”. Indiana University, Bloomington.
continuous t-norms in quantum computation with mixed states” and (joint talk with Amit Hagar) “Counting your steps: A New, Finitist and Objective Interpretation of Probability in Physics “. University of Bergamo.
Bochum-Cagliari workshop on Non-Classical Logic”. Title of the talk: “Epistemic Quantum Computational Structures”. Ruhr University of Bochum.
• 2012: 12-14 June. Cagliari/Urbino Workshop “Metafora e Argomentazione”. Title of the talk: “Metaphor and equivocation fallacy” (joint talk with C. Ternullo). University of Cagliari.
Quantum Structures. University of Cagliari.
• 2012: 13-14 December. Florence. First Annual Conference of the Humanistic Informatics and Digital Education. Title of the talk: “L’ontologia BIA-Net: una base per la ricerca di informazioni secondo rapporti di rilevanza nella Bibliotheca Iuris Antiqui.” (joint talk with M.Giunti, G. Vivanet). University of Florence.
• 2012: 12-15 September. S.I.F.A. (Analytic Philosophy Italian Society) 20th anniversary conference. Title of my talk: “How Do Metaphors Influence Quaternio Terminorum Comprehension?” (Joint talk with F. Ervas). Alghero. University of Sassari.
• 2012: 26-28 September. Italian Quantum Information Science (I.Q.I.S.) conference 2012. Title of my talk: “Knowledge Operations as Quantum Channels”. University of Padua.
• 2013: 27-28 May. Metaphor, analogy, reasoning. Title of my talk: “Entanglement and holistic structures in quantum computation”. University of Urbino.
• 2013: 29-31 May. Silfs2013 Postgraduate Conference. Title of my talk (joint talk with E. Gola, F. Ervas, A. Ledda): “The Persuasive Force of Metaphors in Argumentation”. University of Urbino.
• 2013: 15-17 June. Logic, Quantum and Music. International Conference. Title of my talk (joint talk with E. Beltrametti, R.Leporini):“Quantum Entanglement and Logical Semantics”. University of Florence.
• 2013: 16-18 September. Language, Logic and Mind. 3^th SIFA Graduate Conference. Organization Committee. University of Cagliari.
• 2014: 17-20 December. Vagueness via Nonclassical Logics. International Conference. Title of the accepted abstact (joint abstract with A. Ledda): “Vagueness, uncertainty and fuzziness in quantum computational logics”. Talk introduced by A. Ledda. University of Sidney.
• 2014: 8-9 January. Invited speaker at the “FoPim – Foundations of Physics” meeting. Title of my talk: “Holistic structures in Quantum Computation. An application to Werner and Isotropic States”. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Florence.
• 2014: 18-22 February. Graded Logical Approaches and their Applications. 35^th Linz Seminar on Fuzzy Set Theory. Title of the accepted abstract (joint abstract with M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini, R. Leporini): “An approach to first-order quantum computational semantics”. Talk introduced by M.L. Dalla Chiara and R. Leporini. Johannes Kepler Universitat, Linz.
• 2014: 31 March-2 April. Invited speaker at the Amsterdam Quantum Logic Workshop (joint talk with H. Freytes): “Fuzzy Structures in Quantum Computation with Mixed States”. Univesiteit Van Amsterdam.
• 2014: 18-21 June: SILFS triennial conference 2014. Title of my talk: “Entanglement and Holistic Conjunctions in Quantum Computation”. University of Roma3, Rome.
• 2014: 23-27 June: 12th biennial IQSA meeting. Title of my talk: “Entanglement and Holistic Conjunctions in Quantum Computation”. University of Olomouc.
• 2014: 23-25 July: Member of the organizing committee of the International Meeting “Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Information. Physical, Philosophical and Logical approaches”. Title of my talk: “Quantum Computation with qutrits. A work in progress”. University of Cagliari.
• 2015: 30-31 January: International Meeting “Quantum Computation, Quantum Information and the Exact Sciences”. Title of my talk: “Non-separability in the representation of Fuzzy Structures in Quantum Computation”. Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy, Ludwing-Maximillians Universitat, Munchen.
• 2015: 20-21 February. Invited speaker at the “FoPim2 – Foundations of Physics” meeting. Title of my talk: “Non-separability in the representation of Fuzzy Structures in Quantum Computation”. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Florence.
• 2015: 10-13 June. International Symposium “Quantum Theory: Advances and Problems – QTAP”. Title of my talk: “Quantum Turing machines, quantum computational logics and cognitive processes” (talk introduced by M.L. Dalla Chiara). International Center for Mathematical Modeling in Physics, Engineering, Economics, and Cognitive Science Linnaeus University, Växjö-Kalmar.
• 2015: 23-24 July. Organizing Committee of the II International Workshop Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Information: Physical, Philosophical and Logical perspectives. Titles of my talks: “Non-separability in Quantum Computation: representing continuous t-norm” and “Quantum Pattern Recognition”, VUB Brussels free University.
• 2015: 24-26 September. SIFA Conference: Truth and Persuasion. Titles of my talk: “Does Expertise Favour the Detection of the Metaphoric Fallacy?” (join talk with F. Ervas, E. Gola, A. Ledda; talk introduced by F. Ervas), University of Sassari.
• 2015: 21 October. Model of explanation: logic, science and cognition. Titles of my talks: “A non-standard application of Quantum Theory: modeling the uncertainty”, University of Bologna.
• 2016: 2-6 February. Linz Seminar on Fuzzy Set Theory – Functional Equations and Inequalities. Titles of my talks: “Equations and Inequalities in Quantum Logics”, (join talk with M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini, A. Ledda, R. Leporini; talk introduced by M.L. Dalla Chiara), Johannes Kepler University Linz.
• 2016: 13-16 June. International Symposium “Quantum and Beyond”. Title of my talk: “Quantum Pattern Recognition”. International Center for Mathematical Modeling in Physics, Engineering, Economics, and Cognitive Science Linnaeus University, Växjö-Kalmar.
• 2016: 16-18 June. III International Workshop on Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Information. Title of my talk: “Quantum Pattern Recognition”. Physical, Philosophical and Logical Perspectives. Sadaf – UBA, Universidad de Buenos Aires.
• 2016: 22 June. Seminarios y Coloquios. Title of my talk: “Quantum Pattern Recognition”. Istituto de Fisica, Universidad Nacional de La Plata.
• 2016: 11-15 July. Biennial Meeting of the International Quantum Structures Association “QS Leicester 2016”. Title of my talks: “Qudit-spaces and a many-valued approach to quantum computational logics” (join talk with M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini, R. Leporini; talk introduced by M.L. Dalla Chiara) and “Fuzzy representation of Fredkin gate for a conservative quantum computational logic with mixed states” (join talk with R. Venkatrama; talk introduced by R. Venkatrama). University of Leicester.
• 2016: 3-4 November. Organizer of the International Workshop on Applied Mathematics & Quantum Information . Title of my talk: “A Quantum-inspired version of the Nearest Mean Classifier”. University of Cagliari.
• 2016: 12-14 December. Invited speaker at the VI Conference on Quantum Foundations. Title of my Skype-talk: “Quantum Computational Logic with Qutrits”. Science and Technology Center – Conicet, La Plata.
• 2017: 21 March. Invited to introduce the book “I Modelli nelle teorie scientifiche”. Scuola Superiore Catania, University of Catania.
• 2017: 3-7 July. QPL/IQSA meeting 2017 (Quantum, Physics & Logic / International Quantum Structures Association meeting 2017). Title of my talks: “Entanglement, Holism and Contextuality in the Logic of Quantum Computation” (with M.L. Dalla Chiara, R. Giuntini and R. Leporini) and “An Operational Approach to Quantum Circuits“, Radboud University, Nijmegen.
• 2017: 25-26 September. BuCal2017 – First Bucharest-Cagliari Logical meeting. Title of my talk: “A Block-matrix representation of Quantum Circuits. Towards a new approach to the Quantum Computational Logic“, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Bucharest.
• 2017: 29-30 September. Invited Speaker at the Worlds of Entanglement Symposium. Title of my talk: “A Quantum approach for Pattern Recognition“, Free University of Brussels.
• 2017: 6-8 November. QTML2017 – Quantum Technology in Machine Learning. Title of my talk: “A Quantum inspired version of the Nearest Mean Classifier“, Department of Computer Science, University of Verona.
• 2017: 6-8 December. Invited Speaker at the International workshop of Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Information – Physical, Philosophical and Logical perspectives. Title of my talk: “Towards a multi-target quantum computational logic“, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianópolis.
• 2018: 16-20 July. 14th Biennial IQSA Conference. Title of my talk: “A Block-Matrix representation of Quantum Circuits: towards a Multi Target Quantum Computational Logic“, Kazan Federal University, Kazan.
• 2018: 08-10 October. Organizer of the Quantum Cagliari 2018 – Quantum Structures & Quantum Information Theory. Title of my talk: “Quantum-inspired version of the Classification Process“, University of Cagliari, Cagliari.
• 2019: 14 March. V International Workshop on Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Information. Physical, Philosophical And Logical Perspectives. Title of my Skype talk: “Quantum-inspired version of Binary Classification“, Conicet, Buenos Aires, Argentine.
Quantum Computation, Quantum Communication and Quantum Logic; Game Theory; Logic and Argumentation Theory. Non standard application of Quantum Theory.
2006–2010: Cofacilitator for the chair of Logic and Basic Mathematics, at the Department of Education Science. University of Cagliari.
2006–2010; 2012-2013: Cofacilitator for the chair of Logic and Critical Thinking, at the Department of Communication Science . University of Cagliari.
2009: Creation of a SCORM course on Logic and Methodology of Science for e-learning application.
2008–2010; 2012-2013: Cofacilitator for the chair of Logic and Methodology of Science at the Department of Communication Science . University of Cagliari.
2012: Logic and Basic Mathematics, at the Political Science Department. University of Cagliari.
2013: Creation of a SCORM course on Logic for e-learning application.
2014: Basic Mathematics, at the Department of Education, Psychology, Philosophy. University of Cagliari.
2014: Physics Laboratory, at the Department of Education, Psychology, Philosophy. University of Cagliari.
2015-2016: Laboratory of Didactics of Mathematics, at the Department of Education, Psychology, Philosophy. University of Cagliari.
2016: Methodology of Applied Sciences, at the Department of Education, Psychology, Philosophy. University of Cagliari.
2016: Logic and Basic of Mathematics, at the Department of Medicine. University of Cagliari. | 2019-04-24T06:49:45Z | http://people.unica.it/giuseppesergioli/curriculum/ |
3. Tucson, AZ. The area is warm in winter, blessed with sunshine almost 300 days per year, and has beautiful surroundings. At 233 performing arts dates per year, it also has one of the nation’s highest numbers of arts performances. To see 70 and more reader comments and an inside look on Tucson retirement, see “Why I Retired to Tucson“.
4. Green Valley, AZ. Near near the hiking and birding areas of the Santa Rita Mountains in extreme southern Arizona, Green Valley is an unincorporated retirement community composed of 59 Homeowner Associations. It consistently ranks as the #1 or #2 most popular retirement town on Topretirements.com.
5. Charleston, SC. “The Holy City” is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful cities in the U.S. as well as being one of its top tourist attractions. Located on the coast of South Carolina, until the mid 1800’s it was one of the 10 largest cities in North America. The area around it, including Kiawah Island, is very popular with tourists and retirees alike.
6. St. George, UT. Saint George has spectacular red rock bluffs overlooking the town, a mild climate in winter, and amazing recreational opportunities.
8. Bellingham, WA. If there was ever a town with momentum it is Bellingham Washington. Kiplinger’s called Bellingham one of the top retirement communities in the U.S. It boasts unbelievable natural scenery from Puget Sound on the west and Mount Baker to the east.
9. Portland (ME) Maine’s largest city is an ideal retirement community – in fact it is often mentioned as one of America’s most livable small cities. It combines New England history (founded in 1632) with a vital downtown centered on the Old Port District, pristine beaches, and a friendly, small town feel. Portland has many attractions for active adults, and is bursting with good restaurants and interesting stores. In fact, Bon Appetite thinks Portland is the Restaurant City of the Year. It is certainly cold in Portland, but for people who want to be snowbirds its summers are ideal.
10. Pittsburgh (PA) Pittsburgh consistently makes the “Best Places to Live” lists, and attracts a community of retirees who want to reside in a livable city with many colleges and cultural opportunities. It has a beautiful setting where two major rivers, the Allegheny and the Monongahela, combine against a backdrop of steep hills to form the Ohio River. Pittsburgh has a solid economy, low cost of living, and growing educational, cultural and medical infrastructures.
What do you think? Please use the Comments section below to share your opinion about the best places to retire. Do you live or are you considering a town that should have made the list? What in your opinion are the best criteria for selecting a place to retire?
It is hard for me to believe that The Villages, FL is not on this list. There is no place on this earth with more activities than The Villages. No matter your interest you will find it in The Villages. There are the most golf holes in the world (more than twice as many as second place), 80+ swimming pools, 185 pickleball courts (the most in the country), about 35 recreation centers, and over 3000 clubs and activities.
Why anyone would ever want to retire to Portland Maine is beyond me. Lived there for 4 years. It’s winter 8 months of the year and if you’re lucky, you get one week of summer. Downtown Portland is nice, but not something you would want to visit on a weekly basis. It’s just plain very cold!
Re The Villages.. To each his own. I visited friends there and it would be the last place I would ever want to live for exactly the reasons that Bart stated. As far as the friends were concerned the husband loved it and his wife hated it. After living in Florida for 46 years, I am leaving to become a “halfback” and heading for So. Carolina. Much better weather and much less crowds during snowbird season 6 months of the year.
Central Florida and the Villages is too hot most of the year. We chose NE Florida, specifically Palm Coast. If you buy a beachfront home, you always get a cool ocean breeze, much lower chance of a hurricane than the Carolinas, and the beaches are empty of people. Numerous country clubs, lots of golf, just an “old Florida” feeling.
This is so depressing. I’ve lived in #10 Pittsburgh (south hills) for my entire life, and can’t tolerate the gloom, snow, or pollution anymore. If you need clean air and lots of sunshine, this isn’t the place. We were rated the 4th gloomiest city in America, right up there with a Portland, Seattle and Buffalo. Just yesterday with the wind coming from the SE, the stench from the Clairton Works was overwhelming, and we’re 13 miles away, usually upwind. Luckily most Pittsburgers have lost their sense of smell by retirement age so they don’t notice. Fracking has only exacerbated the air and water pollution. I could start yacking about our warring medical community of two giants holding the rest of us hostage as they battle it out for a monopoly, but enough. Yes, I expect blowback from the “no place is perfect” crowd, but now that we’re retired, family is dead and we’re and free to leave, I’ll check out #1- 9 instead.
I find articles like these puzzling. There should be a better way to find out how to choose a dream retirement place than where other people are looking.
Ashville is number one? I like visiting Ashville, but there are no adult (over 55) communities even close. And If you’re an outsider forget making friends with the locals. Lots of people make look at Ashville and visit the Biltmore (over rated) but I don’t think many over 55 people move there.
I laughed out loud when Pittsburgh was on the list. Although I have never been a resident of that city, I did spend 20 years of my career working there, from a few days to weeks at a time. The city itself has changed for the good during the past 30 years. The weather is gloomy a great deal of the time when it’s not snowing. Traffic, like most cities, is a nightmare but it’s much worse in Pittsburgh because of the 3 rivers and all the bridges. If you want any amount of sunshine, Pittsburgh is NOT the place. All the urban development can’t change the weather.
Well, I live in Green Valley, near Tucson, and agree that both are great places. Only thing to watch in green Valley is what happens in the next board election. There is a group that wants progress at all cost and would hike dues each year. Hopefully the ones who want to maintain it as the wonderful community it has been will prevail. But this is something that one needs to investigate for any move.
Other than that this is a great place with much to see and do, almost no crime, and beauty all around you.
The Villages is very homogeneous in terms of its residents. There are exceptions, of course, but, having visited it on several occasions, it seems like a conservative Stepford Wives for seniors. And though Orlando and Tampa are 60-90 minutes away, I prefer my culture and truly major medical facilities to be considerably closer than that. But, to each his or her own.
Just want to give a shout out for Portland, MAINE. We moved to, just outside, Portland a year ago (from the southeast) and we LOVE it! Hot weather was killing us and, BTW, 2018 summer was HOT in Maine. Snow? Bring it on! The towns keep the roads and parking lots clear. There is so much to do here we haven’t had time to settle in or get bored. If anyone wants more info – my e-mail is: [email protected].
I love reading these lists and the comments that follow. Just goes to show that there is not one perfect place to retire where everyone would be happy…..again, to each his own, and you can learn a lot from the follow up comments/opinions. I myself find it interesting that FL and SC are the two most spots of interest in surveys. I have lived on both coasts of Florida over 46 years coming from a town in Westchester County, NY. And have missed the change of seasons, the winding roads, the hills, mountains, waterfalls etc. all that time. Florida is flat, hot and humid 11 months of the year and the lovely little beach town on the Atlantic thatI have lived in for 43 years got discovered by too many people, developers have moved in replacing the citrus groves with cookie cutter mansions and beach condos. Forget about going out to dinner 6 months out of the year unless you want to wait over an hour at least to be seated once the snowbirds hit town. Hurricanes have taken the toll with my homes too many times and insurance rates go up yearly. So, I am heading for the hills! At the tender age of 72 I am heading to a small town in mid state SC that I first read about on this site as a great place to retire. Visited twice, checked it out, love the location, very affordable. Can take quick short day trips to the beautiful mountains in SC and NC,get my fill of leaf peeping in the Fall, and if I ever wanted to see another beach again, a quick short trip in the other direction to SC shore. I can deal with 3 months of hot humid summers as opposed to 11 and winters are very mild. Anyone want to buy a house in FL? LOL ?
Diane, would you mind sharing the name of the little town in mid-South Carolina that you are moving to.
My husband and I live in New England and would like to relocate. Not interested in Florida but having difficulty finding a place in the Carolinas. Thanks for your post it was very helpful.
Very interesting list and totally enjoy reading the comments too! So far, the vacations we have enjoyed the best were either in NE or PNW – as in ME, WA, and OR. Visiting these coastal states provided many beautiful scenic experiences from hiking in local parks to wonderful eateries. The extreme humidity / heat of the southern states during summer months does not appeal to us. Likewise, desert landscape in AZ may not work long term either. My guess is we will may end up in a state not far from the coast with four seasons – just not NJ anymore!
Diane,would you want to share the town you are moving to? Are there major hospitals and good medical care nearby? I would like to move out of Florida for the same reasons but have found it much more cost effective to stay here especially when I am so close to the services I need. Enjoy your new home!
Virginia, Aiken SC does have a regional medical facility……Aiken is located just across the Savannah River from Augusta GA and less than an hours drive from the SC state capital, Columbia, and airport. Very nice downtown area, stores, very reasonable home prices……also winter home to many NE thoroughbred horse lovers, and weekend races. Rolling green fields, cotton fields, a definite change of scenery and climate.
Oh, boy this list is puzzling! Pittsburgh??? I wouldn’t want to spend more than a weekend there. Wow! I have never in my life heard of anyone dreaming about retiring to Pittsburgh! Very strange!
My hub & I considered the Pittsburgh area but got a bit spooked by comments about traffic. We first retired to Greenville SC (which I liked), then to Summerville SC to be closer to the ocean and to Charleston. Surprise! Traffic is so bad here that we are considering going back to Greenville. Things move very slowly here and “the powers that be” have finally started discussing the traffic & roads situation (it’s SC after all). I also don’t care for being stuck out in the middle of nowhere with limited choices for shopping. Everyone is looking for something different as far as weather, culture, shopping, privacy, etc. and that’s ok. I really agree with what many have said about renting – we did that but apparently it wasn’t close enough to where we are now as far as highway access. Oh well!
Diane and Virginia – we loved Aiken – great downtown, fbeautiful area but the air/pollution is bad for respiratory problems. Not sure what causes it but it had a very bad rating.
Diane and Dian Thanks for the information about Aiken. It sounds nice and no place is perfect. I’ll need to do more research on it and see where it falls on my “must have” list.
In defense of Pittsburgh, I loved my 30 or so years there. It had great, friendly people along with good public transportation. There are two excellent medical systems with hospitals everywhere, including specialty hospitals. Medical care seems to be enhanced by having highly regarded medical, dental and nursing schools in the city. The Pittsburgh area has 2 award winning daily newspapers, all of the usual stores & movie theatres, sports (Steelers, Pirates & Penquins) with relatively affordable tickets, and multiple universities (including Carnegie Mellon, University of Pittsburgh, Duquesne University, Robert Morris University, LaRoche University, a huge community college with several campuses, and others). Most of the colleges offer senior programs. The airport was a former US Air hub and has lots of parking. There are multiple state-of-the art movie theatres, a symphony, a casino with free indoor parking, Kennywood Amusement Park, a theatre district that gets Broadway shows & top performers, ballet, museums, a great zoo, science center, large public libraries, and other entertainment offerings. The city and the suburbs offer many free senior programs (including free senior transportation), have good community centers, free concerts, festivals, etc., and there are two large outlet malls within driving distance of the city. There’s no problem finding reasonable and reliable service people like handymen, cleaning services, plow guys, landscapers etc. The malls have walking programs for seniors, sponsored by the health care systems. Pensions and 401k withdrawals as well as Social Security are exempt from the state income tax. Sales tax doesn’t apply to clothing, medicine and most foods, and there is no personal property tax on cars or boats. Pittsburgh is an easy drive for visits to other cities like Columbus, Cleveland, Charleston WV, or even Buffalo/Toronto and Niagra Falls. Yes, there are also negatives. Real estate taxes are very high to support all those amenities. When sites talk about very low housing prices, they are talking about more undesirable neighborhoods or fixer uppers. Finding updated, one-level senior housing (garages tend to be built under homes) is not easy, it’s a Seller’s market and prices are climbing. The weather can be bitterly cold in the winter, even though Pittsburgh may not be subject to hurricanes or tornadoes. The hilly terrain on 3 sides of the downtown (and getting through the tunnels out of the city on two sides) can make for challenging winter driving, although the natives are very used to handling “slippy” roads. There are a lot of older, narrow roads and countless bridges over the three rivers. Natives tend to identify themselves by whether they live on the north, south, west or east of the city because the rivers and hills have created natural barriers. Most Pittsburgh suburbs are low-crime with great public schools. In recent years, a few small 55+ communities have been constructed to accommodate the older population, but they don’t offer the amenities of the large Sun Cities and similar communities of FL, AZ and the Carolinas.
I spent a few years in the Carolinas (Charlotte area) for work, and found the cost of living was less there primarily due to the real estate tax difference. My annual home & auto insurance and utility costs were similar, and food expenses in SC/NC were slightly higher. I adjusted to the hot summers and shorter winters quickly, and definitely preferred the Carolinas weather. IMO, I thought the quality of medical care was better in Pittsburgh. I considered retiring back to Pittsburgh, but ended up moving elsewhere to be near family. Pittsburgh will always feel like “home” to our family, and I find myself missing many of its wonderful amenities. I also liked that Pittsburgh has a very down-to-earth, comfortable feeling. Want to wear sweat pants to the grocery? No problem. That lady next to you in the produce section may be a multi-millionaire, wearing her own sweat pants. Getting your car worked on? The mechanic will profusely apologize if the cost is high, and offer to try to figure out ways of cutting the bill. Need a ride to a doctor? Neighbors will volunteer to drive, or you can call a senior service for a free ride. Looking for a nursing home? Easy to find a good one near your home. Have a yen for an Italian rum cake, French macaroon or unsmoked, fresh kielbasa? Ethic stores can be found that carry anything your heart desires. Sigh. Great community.
One more note about Pittsburgh. When I returned for visits from the Carolinas, Pittsburgh did look kind of drab and beat up compared to all of the new buildings and housing in the Charlotte area. Houses didn’t look as fancy or as cared for. Lots of potholes from the weather lol. A lot of it is due to the age of the cities. Some of it is due to Pittsburgh’s working class history even though the steel mills are gone now. Pittsburgh and its suburbs is very down-to-earth.. As an example, I even encountered Big Ben shopping in our Walmart once. That can be very relaxing, especially when you can afford to head to warmer climates during part of the winter.
Your last line says it all, Kate. A lot of us are willing to trade Big Ben and all three rivers full of kielbasa for more sunshine. It all depends on what you need most to feel happy and healthy.
Portland Maine? They are having a refugee problem in Portland Maine. The WSJ recently ran a story about the problems there. Add the lousy weather to the mix and one would think it would be on a list of places you wouldn’t want to retire.
We moved from Venice, Fl to Camden, Tn. Everyone says; WHY? The snowbirds come in at the most beautiful time of the year. You can’t enjoy the weather because you will get run over by the 4 or more to 1 increase in population. Med costs are usually higher, due to all of the older people needing more of it. Oh yes, I’m over 70 and look for the best med I can find; and afford. Paris, Tn is only a few miles from us; first class Dr.s and hospital, if needed, Nashville is very close, with top med/hosp & Drs. I’m a motorcyclist and love the beautiful roads and places to go are all over the place! We have all 4 seasons; sometimes a little colder than I like, but doesn’t last long. Homes are very reasonable, taxes are do-able for retirees. My wife and I love it.
Have you done any research about retiring on Marco Island? | 2019-04-26T04:26:07Z | https://www.topretirements.com/blog/great-towns/10-best-of-the-best-places-to-retire.html/ |
Tall, slim and handsome – that's the iPhone 6 Plus next to the Note 3, yet it's even more unwieldy to carry around, akin to its newfangled phablet status.
The iPhone 6 Plus is a plus-sized phablet indeed. It is way taller than the Note 3, which is already uncomfortable to carry around in a pocket, but is slimmer and less wide, so one-handed operation is a tad easier on Apple's biggie. Apple had to fit the inevitable Touch ID sensor underneath the display. That same fingerprint scanner comes rather uncomfortable to use on such a large device with one hand, as you have to stretch your thumb pretty hard each time you want to hit on the home key, or initiate an Apple Pay authorization, for instance. Not that the Note 3's home key placement is any better, though. As a whole, we wouldn't recommend you to use any of these two huge phones with one palm – these big phablets are designed for usage with both of your hands.
When it comes to the looks and build, the 6 Plus has the upper hand, as it sports a very slim, 7.1mm profile, and premium aluminum unibody that feels very light and classy in the palm. Samsung compensates the relatively thick and plastic-y design with more flexibility, such as the option to swap the battery at will, or expand storage with the supplied microSD slot. It also offers a stylus, called the S Pen, tucked neatly in the silo at the lower right, as an additional input method for those keen on doodling, handwriting, or precision-clipping on their phablet's display.
Apple's signature bright color-accurate panels make their way into its first phablet, too, whose screen tops the Note 3 on most all counts that matter.
Both Apple and Samsung went with 1080x1920 pixels of resolution, which is the typical option for most flagships out there. Due to the Note 3 having a tad larger screen size – 5.7”, against Apple's 5.5-incher, it flaunts 386ppi density, while the 6 Plus crosses into the 401ppi count. Both pixel densities are up to snuff, though, and you won't notice any jaggies or pixelization from a normal viewing distance.
The color representation round goes to the iPhone 6 Plus. It has more accurate colors and color temperature, while the Note 3 display is colder and colors are largely inaccurate, exhibting very saturated, even gaudy colors in all screen modes it has.
The Note 3 screen also sports a pretty low peak brightness, which makes it harder to tell outdoors, compared to the luminant iPhone 6 Plus display. Samsung's panel does sport a pretty good anti-reflective coating, which minimizes the light sent back to your eyes, and still Apple's _phone_ looks noticeably more legible in bright sunlight.
The Note 3 screen also sports a pretty low peak brightness, which makes it harder to tell outdoors, compared to the luminant iPhone 6 Plus display. Samsung's panel does sport a pretty good anti-reflective coating, which minimizes the light sent back to your eyes, and still Apple's phone looks noticeably more legible in bright sunlight.
Flanked by its S Pen sidekick, Note 3 is a multitasking powerhouse, while Apple's first foray into the phablet category wisely includes a landscape interface mode, unlike TouchWiz.
We won't be extolling the virtues of one mobile operating system before the other here, as you can refer to our thorough Android vs iOS comparison for that. Being the large phones that they are, however, it's important that the iPhone 6 Plus and the Note 3 have one-handed interface modes. Apple's one is called Reachability, but the phone also provides a landscape viewing regime for the whole interface, a feature that is sorely lacking in Samsung's TouchWiz Android overlay. The Note 3's one-handed mode is way easier to evoke, though, as it requires simply a quick swipe back and forth at the edge of the screen with your thumb, while you have to stretch all the way beneath the display on the 6 Plus, and then double-tap on the home key. You get used to doing it quick, but it's just not very comfortable. Moreover, what Reachability does, is simply slide down the interface, so you can reach whatever you couldn't grab before at the top of the display, while Samsung's approach shrinks the whole interface left or right, as if you are using a handset with a much smaller screen.
Samsung allows you to split the screen in two with its Multi-Window mode, and run any two apps simultaneously, for a true multitasking experience. You can also hover up to five windowed apps, like a calculator, browser, or notes, on top of whatever runs underneath, and resize or move them around at will. These take the Note 3 more into the productive device category, than the merely big-screen-for-media-consumption league that most phablets are in, including the 6 Plus. The Galaxy Note 3 also sports an extra input method, thanks to the embedded S Pen stylus, and the interface options to match. You can clip content from websites with it, annotate PDFs, doodle and handwrite on the display, or simply use it to scroll or hover over links for added convenience.
Helped by its new A8 chipset, Apple propels the iPhone 6 Plus performance past last year's Note 3.
Apple uses a new (again 64-bit, of course) 1.4 GHz dual-core A8 CPU with Cyclone cores, built on the frugal 20nm process, with souped-up hexa-core PowerVR GX6650 graphics. It is both faster and more efficient than the A7 in iPhone 5s or iPad Air, and cross-platform benchmarks indicate it to be roughly in the realm of Snapdragon 805 on a per-clock basis, meaning that if it was running at the 2.5 GHz speeds of the 805, it would have similar performance. The LTE version of the Note 3 is powered by last year's Qualcomm finest - a 2.3 GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800, clocked at 2.3 GHz. There is also a global variant with Samsung's Exynos 5 Octa CPU, which combines four 1.9 GHz ARM Cortex-A15 cores with four 1.3 GHz ARM Cortex-A7 ones.
An advantage Note 3's silicon has before the iPhone 6 Plus are its 3 GB of RAM, against the one gig on Apple's phablet, and you'll need every bit of that random-access memory when you take advantage of the split-screen multitasking action. When it comes to storage options, the iPhone 6 Plus comes in a wide range of configurations, from the 16 GB starter, all the way to an expensive 128 GB version, while the Note 3 ships with 16 GB, and offers you a microSD slot for adding up to 128 GB more, if you are so inclined.
Browsing on these two is a joy for the senses, but when it comes to delivering those data speeds, the 6 Plus holds the record LTE bands count.
Using Apple's stock Safari browser on the large display of the 6 Plus is a joy for the senses – it is snappy, fluid, and renders pages very well. Text reflow is also flawless, but the scrolling inertia is still a chore in iOS 8 as it has ever been, meaning non-existent, which somewhat hinders the experience, especially when you compare it with Android's dynamic scrolling that can take you to the end of a page and back up in no time, based on the speed of your finger-flick. Browsing on the Note 3 is also seamless, though the stock TouchWiz browser looks less polished than Safari, with its squarish interface elements. It is very fast, though, and functional, too, offering you the ability to display Adobe Flash content, if you sideload the APK file from Adobe's website. The S Pen stylus of the Note 3 offers you a way to easily select text, pictures, and cut sections of a website for sharing or inserting in a note, too.
The iPhone 6 Plus is the undisputed king when it comes to 4G LTE connectivity, as it offers anywhere from 16-20 LTE bands, depending on the model, which means that you can use it almost anywhere in the world. The Note 3 also has a 4G LTE version (the Snapdragon one) – it doesn't support as many bands as the 6 Plus, so pay attention to the carrier you want to be using it on. Both phablets have an LTE Cat. 4 modems, with theoretical download speeds reaching 150 Mbps maximums, though in real life it will be much less, of course. The phones support almost all other wireless connectivity options you can think of - Wi-Fi/ac, Bluetooth, A-GPS, DLNA and NFC, with the Note 3 adding Wi-Fi Direct and an infrared sensor for controlling home electronics. You can use the iPhone's NFC for Apple Pay – Cupertino's own mobile payment network, which has already signed up some of the largest retailers, and authorize purchases with the Touch ID finger scanner.
As for wired connectivity, the iPhone 6 Plus depends on Apple's proprietary Lightning connector, which requires an adapter to plug it into an HDMI port for TV-out purposes. Note 3 has a proprietary MHL connector in its turn, which can either be plugged directly, if your TV has an MHL port, or via an HDMI adapter.
The Note 3 camera is no slouch, yet the optically-stabilized unit of the 6 Plus dishes out better low-light shots, and steadier video.
The camera on the iPhone 6 Plus is an 8 MP one, while the Note 3 flaunts a 13 MP sensor. However, the iPhone sports larger, 1.5 micron pixels, compared to the 1.1 micron size of Samsung's unit. The 6 Plus also dabbles in the so-called phase detection auto-focus (or Pixel Focus, as Apple calls it). It is a feature borrowed from high-class cameras allowing the camera to focus even faster on its subject. Another great extra Apple placed in its first phablet, is the optical image stabilization system for keeping the frame steady, reducing handshake. Apple again uses a TrueTone LED flash, which balances out colors, making them look more natural, and the Note 3 issues similar claims for its high CRI (Color Rendering Index) LED flash. The frontal cameras are 2.1 MP, in the case of Note 3, and a 1.2 MP unit on the 6 Plus.
Opening the camera app and taking pictures is instantaneous with the iPhone 6, with no tangible lag between photos. The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 camera app loads quickly and exhibits little to no shutter lag, which is great for capturing events as they happen. The camera UI of the Note 3 is way more cluttered with functions you may or may not use than the clean, easy iPhone 6 Plus snapping interface. Both phones offer Panorama and Burst modes, as well as HDR for pictures and video, but Samsung adds plenty of shooting modes and color effects to the roster, while the iPhone keeps it simple, leaving those to 3rd party apps.
Both phones take fine looking photos, that aren't gaudy or saturated. The iPhone 6 Plus white balance measurements often nudge the scene towards a slightly warm overcast, while the Note 3 photos are slightly colder than in real life, but these are just minor inaccuraties. The phablets capture a good amount of detail in good lightning conditions, but the Note 3 13-megapixel pics are slightly more detailed than the 8mp ones of the 6 Plus. Where the iPhone excels, however, are the tricky low-light scenarios. Most every phone takes decent pics when there is plenty of light shining on the scene, but the larger pixels of the iPhone 6 Plus, coupled with the OIS and Apple's excellent camera software, make for very clear, well-defined and sharp indoor shots, with credible color representation, and less noise than what the Note 3 musters. Apple's TrueTone LED flash also does a better job at illuminating our test scene, with stronger and more evenly distributed light output.
In terms of video, Apple continues supporting 1080p only, so there is no 4K utlra high-resolution video, which the Note 3 can capture. Both handset are capable of 1080p recording with extra smooth 60fps, too. An upgraded slo-mo mode allows the 6 Plus to capture at twice the frame-rate for a twice more pronounced effect: 720p at 240fps, while the Note 3 does it up to 120fps.
The iPhone 6 Plus records some amazing looking 1080p videos that are filled with plenty of sharp details, lively (if somewhat warmer) colors, and smooth exposure adjustment. The optical image stabilization kicks in each time your hand trembles, for some steady-looking, free-flowing footage. The new iPhone now comes with excellent continuous autofocus, too, which shuttles quickly and seamlessly between close-ups and the background. The recorded audio is also clean and vibrant sounding, thanks to the quality noise-canceling mic set.
Hardly a surprise, the Note 3 is also great with its video recording quality. Just as long as there’s sufficient lighting around, the Note 3’s videos come to life with its smooth recording, sharp details, accurate color reproduction, and clear audio recording. What’s not to like, right? Well, its quality naturally hits a speed bump with lower lighting, but it’s still pretty good looking in our opinion. Out of everything, noise becomes more apparent under this particular circumstance, and it's details that tend to be affected the most – a trap that the 6 Plus manages to avoid.
The iPhone 6 Plus is made for media consumption, but Note 3 supports a wider variety of formats, in addition to the large display.
The stock iOS 8 gallery offers grid-style thumbnail view of your photos, and editing options that are built into the interface, just as Samsung does. Of course, the S Pen stylus offers options for more precise clipping, editing, and annotating photos, if you venture to do those on your phone's screen.
The iOS 8 stock music player is pretty, with minimalistic interface, and song categorization by artists, albums, playlists, genres and so on, as well as album arts support. The sound equalizers are still located in the general iPhone settings menu, though, whereas the Note 3 has them embedded in its aging TouchWiz music player.
Video playback looks gorgeous on both phones, on account of the large, high-res display, though the stock iOS 8 player file format support is very limited, compared to the Note 3, which plays everything thrown at it, including DivX/Xvid/MKV files, at up to 1080p resolution, and with plenty of extras like subtitle support, or floating the player on top of the interface.
Good microphones and average earpiece sound marks the call quality course of the two phablets.
Call quality with the iPhone 6 Plus is pretty decent. For the most part, voices are audible through the earpiece, thanks a great amount to its strong volume, which makes it usable in noisy environments. The speakerphone, however, sounds slightly subdued in comparison with the best out there. Our callers had an easy time on their end making us out, thanks to the excellent noise-canceling microphone set on the iPhone 6 Plus.
Note 3 is not the best sounding phone we’ve used for phone calls, but nonetheless, it's effective enough for the occasion. Through the earpiece, voices pop with authority thanks to its strong volume – though, there’s a hint of crackling when it’s placed at the loudest setting. It’s noticeable, but quickly remedied by lowering the volume a couple of notches. Still, voices through the earpiece sound very natural in tone. However, we can’t say the same on the other end of the line, as voices tend to sound robotic. Switching to the speakerphone, we’re neither impressed or disappointed, as it works enough to get us through our conversations.
With their unremarkable endurance, both Note 3 and iPhone 6 Plus will make you reach for the charger at the end of the day.
Apple doesn't cite the exact battery capacity of its iPhone 6 Plus, though dismantling efforts peg it at 2915 mAh, which is in the phablet category ballpark. Apple cites 12 hours of browsing on Wi-Fi, and 14 hours of video-watching on a charge, which are excellent numbers. On our demanding battery benchmark, however, it scored six hours and a half, or close to what the Note 3 musters. Of course, your mileage will vary, depending on the workload and the screen brightness, but overall the 6 Plus should get you through one full day on a charge with normal usage, and even further with light one.
Note 3's huge 3200 mAh battery might have delivered impressive battery life last year, but this year most flagships and midrangers made huge strides in that regard, pushing the Note 3 down the endurance ladder, about equating it with Apple's phablet. Samsung cites 21 hours of talk time on a charge, and 22 days on standby.
The iPhone 6 Plus comes with excellent camera, which excels in low-light and video capture, thanks to its large pixels and optical image stabilization. Apple's phone also supports a record number of LTE bands, for a truly globetrotting experience.
Note 3 isn't too shabby either – its camera is also great, and it has some software and alternative input aces up its sleeve like split-screen multitasking, or the embedded S-Pen stylus.
For a few years now, Samsung dominated the phablet segment that it created. However, after seeing rivals pop up from most other companies, Apple is now also joining this game, and its model is on par with the best. | 2019-04-25T20:43:57Z | http://review-mobile.appspot.com/apple-iphone-6-plus-vs-samsung-galaxy-note-3.html |
Taurolidine (TRD) is a novel agent with multimodal antineoplastic effects. We present the case of a tumor remission after intravenous administration of taurolidine in a patient with gastric cancer re-recurrence.
A 58 years old male patient suffering from a gastric adenocarcinoma was submitted to partial gastrectomy and partial liver resection (pT2, pN1, pM1L (liver segment 2), N0, V0). 24 months later a local recurrence was diagnosed and the patient was reoperated. Postoperatively the patient underwent a palliative chemotherapy with eloxatin, FU, and leucovorin. A subsequent CT-revealed a liver metastasis and a recurrence adjacent to the hepatic artery. After successful radiofrequency ablation of the liver metastasis the patient was intravenously treated with 2% taurolidine. The patient endured the therapy well and no toxicity was observed. CT-scans revealed a stable disease without a tumor progression or metastatic spread. After 39 cycles the patient was submitted to left nephrectomy due to primary urothelial carcinoma and died 2 days later due to myocardial infarction. Postmortem histology of the esophageal-jejunal anastomosis and liver revealed complete remission of the known metastasized gastric adenocarcinoma.
The intravenous treatment with 2% taurolidine led to a histological remission of the tumor growth without any toxicity for the patient.
Surgical resection remains the only treatment modality offering the possibility of cure for patients with gastric cancer. Nevertheless, the extent of resection required for potentially curative operations remains controversial. Opposite to japanese studies (D3 and D4 lymph node dissection) , different trials in Europe and USA showed significantly lower morbidity and mortality rates with no survival difference when a less radical lymph node dissection of perigastric- (D1) or regional lymph nodes outside the perigastric area (D2) was performed [2–4]. So far, adjuvant chemotherapy in gastric cancer has failed to improve survival (e.g. 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) plus high dose methotrexate plus doxorubicin (FAMTX), etoposid plus cisplatin (EAP), etoposide plus leucovorin plus 5-FU (ELF), and epirubicin plus cisplatin plus 5-FU (ECF) [5, 6]. In a locally advanced gastric cancer or in case of relapse the prognosis is very poor. Therefore, new chemotherapeutic agents are tested in order to improve survival and the quality of life.
The antineoplastic substance taurolidine was found to suppress intraperitoneal gastrointestinal tumor growth after laparotomy and laparoscopy in animals [6, 7]. A single intravenous injection of 0,5% taurolidine did not affect tumor growth in rats [8, 9]. Unpublished data showed a reduction of advanced intraperitoneal neoplasm after an intravenous long-term treatment (unpublished). Taurolidine induces apoptosis and inhibited tumor growth in various cells lines in vitro [10–13]. The agent was found to decrease the production of Tumor Necrosis Factor alpha (TNFα) and Interleukin-1β (IL-1β) in peritoneal macrophages as well as the TNFα and the VEGF secretion by gastrointestinal neoplasms .
Based on these data, a male patient with a gastric cancer re-relapse was palliatively treated with this agent, undergoing 42 cycles of a 7-days'-intravenously treatment. The effects on relevant blood parameters, tumor markers, side effects, and tumor size were analyzed.
A 58-year-old man (83 kilo gram, kg) presented to our Surgical Department because of a gastric cancer eight years ago. The past medical history was significant for higher PSA levels for 10 years without clinical relevance, an acute myocardial infarction which was treated with coronary arteries' stenting and an arterial occlusive disease (Fontaine IIb). The patient was submitted to surgery and a subtotal gastrectomy with a gastrojejunostomy and a partial liver resection were performed (pT2, pN1, pM1L (liver segment 2), N0, V0). No adjuvant chemotherapy was carried out.
During the follow-up a local recurrence has been detected in the abdominal CT-scan 24 months after surgery. The patient was then submitted to a total gastrectomy with Roux en Y esophagojejunostomy. A palliative chemotherapy (eloxatin, 5-fluoruracil, leukovorin) was performed for 10 months but no remission was observed. Twelve months later the CT-scan revealed a stable tumor disease despite chemotherapy adjacent to the hepatic artery. Then the patient underwent a palliative intravenous therapy with 2% taurolidine for seven days (per months) with a daily dose of 300 mg per kg body weight. After twelve cycles the CT-scan revealed a tumor mass reduction and the therapy was terminated. Three months later the patient experienced abdominal discomfort. Diagnostics showed one liver metastasis in segment 8 which was successfully treated with radiofrequency ablation (Figure 2). The patient was treated with taurolidine monthly ever since. After the chemotherapy no. 32 an additional primary urothelial carcinoma in two different sites of the urinary tract (left kidney, urinary bladder) The lesion in the bladder was localy excized (pTa, G2) while the kidney lesion was put under observation by the urologists. After treatment with a total of 39 cycles with taurolidine the patient was in a good clinical condition and showed no life quality deficit. At this time the CT-scan (Figure 3) showed no tumor progression next to the hepatic artery (stable disease). Four weeks after the completion of the treatment the patient was admitted to the urology department of our hospital in order to be submitted to surgical treatment of his urothelial carcinoma. A left nephrectomy was performed. Although there were no intraoperative problems the patient unexpectedly died of an acute myocardial infarct 48 hours after surgery.
Peripheral leukocyte counts during therapy (values of every fifth cycle is shown).
Region of thermoablation, liver segment 8.
A stable disease of the gastric carcinoma surrounding the hepatic artery (arrow) could be detected after the 36 cycles chemotherapy (clips).
Post mortem histology of the esophageal-jejunal anastomosis and liver revealed surprisingly no signs of the known adenocarcinoma. We thought this finding was extremely interesting as we had actually been in front of a complete remission of his gastrointestinal tumor.
The antineoplastic agent taurolidine was intravenously applied in a 2% solution (Geistlich Pharma AG Wohlhusen, Switzerland) using a port catheter system. The monthly therapy (300 mg/kg/day according 24,9 g taurolidine/day) was given for 5 days in four hours' therapy sessions and 2 hours' intervals. Tumor markers (carcino embryonal antigen-CEA, CA 72-4) were determined at the beginning and at the end of the therapies. Blood counts and biochemistry were examined every day. Disease progression was radiologically followed-up with an abdominal CT-scan every two months.
Quality of life was assessed using the EORTC QLQ-C30 questionnaire , a 30- questionnaire score composed of multi-item and single-items scales reflecting the quality of life multidimensionally. It incorporates five functional scales (physical, role, cognitive, emotional, social), three symptom scales (fatigue, pain, nausea, vomiting) and a global health and quality-of life scale. The remaining single items evaluate additional symptoms commonly reported by cancer patients as well as the perceived financial impact of the disease and treatment.
GCP guidelines and Helsinki declaration for studies on humans were complied with. The Ethics Committee of the Charité Campus Mitte, University Hospital, Universitaetsmedizin Berlin, Germany, approved the study design.
The patient tolerated the therapy sessions well. As far as toxicity is concerned, we have to emphasize on the fact, that the administered taurolidine concentration (2%) did not impair the leukopoiesis or the patient's quality of life (Table 1 and 2). Tumor markers, conjugated bilirubine, creatinine or urea did not increase. Additionally the agent infusion is electrolytes-free no other side-effects from taurolidine treatment in the blood parameters were observed. Low toxicity is a main beneficial feature of taurolidine, which substantially differentiates the substance from traditional chemotherapeutic agents, which are quite often related to devastating toxic complications. According to standardized clinical and CT-scan criteria with consecutive comparisons of the CT scans during the taurolidine treatment, we were able to detect no progression of the tumor growth, so the disease was classified as stable. Moreover, it could be shown that after radiofrequency ablation liver tissue regenerates again. It has to be pointed out, that although consecutive CT-scans showed stable disease, the post mortem histological examination of the esophageal-jejunal anastomosis and liver surprisingly confirmed the absence of any residual disease.
The intravenous taurolidine treatment did not impair the above mentioned blood parameters after 39 cycles (Wilcoxon test, p = not significant).
The incidence of gastric cancer has decreased worldwide. Despite this decrease, gastric cancer remains an important surgical topic, as much as its epidemiology is changing, thus making therapy for the disease more demanding. At this time, surgery is the only potentially curative therapy for this malignancy [2, 4, 17, 18]. The aim of any surgical approach to gastric carcinoma should be complete resection with no residual tumor left behind at the end of the operation (R0 resection). Nevertheless, radical surgery after relapse is often extremely difficult – or even impossible – and a standardized chemotherapy does not exist. A beneficial effect of adjuvant therapy is currently controversial. A meta analysis of 11 published trials including 2096 patients showed no significant benefit for patients who had adjuvant therapy after R0 resection . Opposite to the western world, several studies clearly favoring adjuvant therapy in patients with gastric cancer have been reported from Japan, where adjuvant therapy is considered a standard modality and is initiated immediately during the postoperative period or even intraoperatively .
The limited therapy options with traditional chemotherapeutic substances led to intensive research for new antineoplastic agents. Taurolidine, a synthetic product derived from the aminosulfone acid taurine, consists of two aromatic rings, which are connected with a CH2-group; MW 284. There are several reports in the literature about the immune modulating and antineoplastic potential of this substance. Taurolidine reduced the production of TNFα (2 h contact, IC50 0.5 mM) as well as VEGF (6 h contact, IC50 1.5 mM), which is a major proangiogenic factor, might indicate a possible influence on various malignancies . The agent inhibited tumor growth of many entities with poor responses to current therapeutic regiments [11, 21, 22]. Dose-dependent findings are supported by McCourt et al. and Calabresi et al, . They showed a four-fold increase of tumor cell necrosis after treatment with increasing doses in several different malignancies in vitro. The intravenous application of taurolidine had no significant side effects at a maximum concentration of 300 mg per kg per day.
We decided to treat our patient with taurolidine because he did not respond to the standard adjuvant iv chemotherapy with eloxatin, 5-fluoruracil, leukovorin. The patient developed a new local recurrence after successfully surgical treatment of his first relapse. Under these conditions taurolidine treatment appeared to be a final palliative option for our patient since traditional therapeutic modalities failed to control disease progression. In our palliative intravenous study no side effects were observed. After an intravenous therapy, leading to partial remission, the chemotherapy was terminated following the patient's wish. After a successfully radiofrequency ablation of one liver metastasis (S8) the taurolidine therapy was initiated again leading to a radiological (CT) stable disease. The patient died due to a postoperative complication after urological surgery, but post mortem histology of esophago-jejunal anastomosis and liver revealed no tumor at all. This finding was a really surprising one as it seems that taurolidine had caused a complete remission of the gastointestinal tumor (gastric cancer). This result could be only poorly expected with the conventional chemotherapy. There are literature reports that the agent might be effective in the treatment of other tumors as well. Taurolidine seems to have a multimodal efficacy on different malignancies both in human as well as in animal models. Stendel et al, noticed a partial remission of glioblastoma in two patients which were treated with 20 g taurolidine per day. The substance has been found to exert a direct and selective effect on glial and neuronal brain tumor cells via presently unknown apoptotic pathways . The suppression of tumor growth could be also explained by intracellular effects causing apoptosis presumably by a mitochondria cytochrome c-dependent apoptotic mechanism , reduction of the TNFα and VEGF production on malignant tumor cells . Moreover, recently the suppression of protein biosynthesis was found to lead to cell death in malignancies (IC50 approximately 1.4 mM) . For example for abdominal lavage 0.5% taurolidine corresponding to approximately 16 mM are used for short time periods such as 2 hours in our clinic. The current patient received a weight-adjusted treatment (reaching up to 1.6 mM blood concentration) opposite to the glioblastoma patients (20 g each) whose therapy was successful. On the contrary, urothelial carcinoma was not affected. These findings might suggest that concentrations used exert dissimilar antineoplastic effects on different entities. The specific anti-tumor consequences have been assessed to purge tumor cells from chimeric mixtures of bone marrow resulting in a selective and complete elimination of viable cancer cells . Taurolidine has been described to have immune modulating effects . Therefore, peripheral leukocyte counts were analyzed to determine leukopenia which is a common side effect of other chemotherapeutic agents. In the current case leukopoesis and thrombopoesis, which occurs in the bone marrow, were not impaired. This fact should be considered as a major advantage of this agent compared to the devastating cytotoxic effects of conventional chemotherapeutics and it might implicate that the intravenous use might be safe even in immune suppressed patients in advanced tumor stages. Moreover, these findings will become more evident by using higher concentrations for other malignant entities. It is obvious that toxicity can not be assessed only in one patient. A new phase III clinical study about influence of taurolidine on gastrointestinal tumor recurrences in over 25 patients is currently being conducted in our Department. Results are expected with great interest, but first unpublished data show a favorable outcome as far as toxicity is concerned.
Taking the current findings together, the antineoplastic efficacy seems to be a mixture of the mentioned mechanisms. The intravenous 5-day-therapy of 2% taurolidine is safe and anti-tumorigenic in the advanced gastric cancer. On the contrary, urothelial carcinoma was not affected. A clinical phase clinical III study has been set up to evaluate the benefit of the intravenous efficacy on progressive tumor growth. The results are expected with great interest.
Written consent was obtained from the patient for publication of this case report. We thank Professor Dr. J. M. Mueller, the Director of the Department of Surgery, for continuous support.
The substance (taurolidine) which was administered during this phase III clinical study was supplied by the Geistlich Pharma AG, Wohlhusen, Switzerland.
C. B. monitored the patient, collected and interpreted the data, and wrote the manuscript. G. W. collected the follow-up data and did the statistical analysis. P. R. was responsible for radiology diagnostics. C. M. was involved in drafting the manuscript and participated in the sequence alignment. C. A. J. contributed to the idea, designed the protocol, conceived and coordinated the study, gathered the data, and reviewed the manuscript. C. A. J. and C. B. are guarantors of the report. | 2019-04-20T20:51:14Z | https://wjso.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1477-7819-4-34 |
Sitel Group (or the “Company”) believes that conducting business with a high standard of professional conduct, ethics and proficiency is critical to our success and the success of our clients. We continually strive to improve our processes and procedures to achieve the highest quality standards and the best results for our clients. We further believe we can only achieve these goals, among other things, by conducting business with integrity in accordance with the highest ethical standards, in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations, and by respecting accepted international standard for human rights. We recognize that this Global Code of Conduct and Ethics (the “Code”) cannot address every situation that might arise. It is not a contract. Our Code is, though, a summary of principles to guide our business dealings, our communications and conduct that is incorporated into or referenced in many Company policies.
We strive for excellence in what we do – customer care outsourcing services – and how we do it. Sitel Group values honesty and integrity in our business practices and is committed to providing the best customer service through maintaining respectful relationships with all of our stakeholders. The commitments contained in this Code are our guide and they extend to all of our Associates (including officers), directors, vendors, and other Company representatives.
We resolve to comply not only with the letter of applicable laws and regulations wherever Sitel Group conducts business, but also the spirit of those laws and regulations. Associates are not expected to know the details of every law, but rather are responsible for consulting appropriate members of the management team, Human Resources and the Legal Department to ensure familiarity with the applicable business and local laws and to comply with these laws.
Sitel Group prepares periodic reports capturing certain and other financial information required by regulating agencies or other Company stakeholders. It is our policy to make full, fair, accurate, timely and understandable reports in accordance with applicable disclosure standards and requirements. Our Associates have a responsibility to provide the information necessary to fulfil this policy. Each person designated by the Chief Legal Officer (“Designated Individual”) is responsible for maintaining familiarity with the disclosure requirements applicable to the Company as set out in the Company’s Disclosure Controls and Procedures. Designated Individuals are prohibited from knowingly misrepresenting, omitting or causing others to misrepresent or omit, material facts about Sitel Group to others that have a right to know such facts, whether inside or outside the Company, including our independent auditors. Any Designated Individual in a supervisory role in the disclosure process has an obligation to discharge his or her responsibilities diligently. Designated Individuals must report any actual or possible event, matter or issue that may impact the Company’s disclosures to the individuals designated in the Company’s Disclosure Controls and Procedures.
Sitel Group believes that our Associates are the core of our business and conducts its business with respect for and adherence to principles of diversity and equal employment opportunity. Sitel Group is committed to providing a safe and healthy work environment that minimizes the incidence of work related injury, is free from harassment, discrimination, harsh treatment and acts or threats of violence. It is our goal to promote an environment that encourages open communication, promotes mutual respect and teamwork, and develops leaders. Applicants and Associates are evaluated and compensated based on their qualifications, demonstrated skills, and achievements, in an environment free from unlawful discrimination. Associates should be familiar with local policies governing the workplace and reporting procedures. We encourage our Associates and our various stakeholders to report misconduct, raise concerns, and cooperate in investigations. Sitel Group protects Associates and stakeholders who act in good faith from retaliation.
Associates and stakeholders are expected to be respectful of customs and traditions of any host location where they may visit and honor the laws, rules and regulations of a host location in addition to their home location. We treat each other, our clients and their customers with respect, courtesy and dignity.
Sitel Group believes in being a responsible, environmentally aware company, minimizing, wherever possible, negative effects on the community, environment and natural resources. All Associates are expected to be respectful of the communities and environment within which we operate, safeguarding the health and safety of fellow associates and the public.
Sitel Group upholds its Associates’ rights to join or refrain from joining worker associations and the right to freely chosen employment. Sitel Group does not condone the use of child labor or forced or bonded labor.
Sitel Group supports the United Nations Global Compact initiative and has committed to comply with the compact’s 10 universal principles on human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption. More information on Sitel’s corporate social responsibility commitments may be found within Sitel’s Corporate and Social Responsibility Statement (located at https://globeportal.nac.sitel-world.net/Policies/Policy/Forms/AllItems.aspx). All Sitel Group Associates are expected to be familiar with and adhere to the principles contained in that statement.
Typically, a conflict of interest is a situation, arrangement, or circumstance where an Associate’s private interests interfere with or appear to interfere with Sitel’s interests.
Sitel Group strives to avoid matters and situations that appear to present conflicts of interest that may cast doubt on the fairness and integrity of our business processes.
Associates and directors of Sitel Group have a duty of loyalty to the Company and should not engage in any activity that is in conflict with Sitel’s interests.
Associates are expected to make business decisions that are in the best interest of Sitel Group and based on sound business judgment that is not motivated by personal gain or interest.
Below are some examples and guidelines to avoid conflicts of interest.
Associates are responsible for disclosing to Human Resources or the Legal Department any personal investment, business, or other relationship that creates an actual or appearance of a conflict of interest between the Associate and Sitel.
Associates may not have an ownership interest or serve as directors, officers, or employees of a competitor of Sitel Group and may not participate in any activity that enhances a competitor’s position in the market.
Associates may not serve as directors, officers, or employees of clients or suppliers.
Associates must immediately disclose to Human Resources or the Legal Department the possibility of doing business or working with a family member, a close personal friend, or an individual with whom you have a romantic involvement and avoid the appearance of preferential treatment.
Finally, Associates and third parties must exercise good judgment in giving or receiving gifts or entertainment. We do not accept or pay bribes or kick-backs. Hospitality, gifts or entertainment should enhance professional relationships and overall goodwill and should not appear to compromise integrity. Associates should not solicit clients, suppliers, or other business contacts for gifts, entertainment or hospitality and may only accept reasonable non-cash gifts or entertainment that do not influence or appear to influence objectivity or independence and in accordance with local requirements. Regular gifts from a supplier or a supplier representative are not acceptable. Associates should consult with Human Resources or the Legal Department if clarification of any of the foregoing requirements is needed in particular circumstances.
Associates of Sitel Group and third parties acting on the Company’s behalf must protect Company property by ensuring the proper use of Sitel’s property including Company funds, information, logos, trademarks, intellectual property, facilities, office supplies, equipment, computers, networks, software, telephone and internet services, voice mail and e-mail.
The resources, facilities, equipment, and systems of Sitel Group should only be used for appropriate and lawful business purposes of Sitel. Further, we safeguard clients’ and their customers’ personal, confidential, and financial information and access codes by only using the resources, facilities, equipment, and systems of Sitel Group and Sitel’s clients for appropriate and lawful business purposes. Company and client property must not be used for fraudulent or other inappropriate purposes or for personal gain.
Sitel Group is committed to protecting the confidential information of the Company, our Associates, our clients and their customers and other stakeholders. “Confidential Information” includes information regarding the development of trade secrets, business systems, proprietary processes, products, know-how and technology, customer lists, vendor lists, pricing lists, non-public sales and profit data, strategic business plans, trademarks, service marks, patents and copyrighted material, as well as internal reports, procedures, and other internal business-related confidential communications (for example, possible sales, mergers, and acquisitions). This also includes any such Confidential Information entrusted to the Company by our clients, their customers, and other third parties. We will handle all personally identifiable information and sensitive personal information in a manner that complies with all applicable data protection laws and Sitel’s Binding Corporate Rules program.
Certain Associates may be given access to sensitive personal identifying information about other Associates or our clients’ customers as part of their job duties, such as Associates’ and customers’ social security numbers, credit card information, bank account information, PIN numbers, or personal health information. This information is also included within the definition of “Confidential Information.” Associates who are granted access to such information as part of their job duties are responsible for protecting such Confidential Information from disclosure, inappropriate use, or theft. Confidential Information should only be accessed, disclosed, transmitted, used, stored, or disposed of with care and for appropriate business purposes and never for personal benefit or for any other inappropriate purpose.
Report acts, procedures, or systems that compromise the confidentiality of Confidential Information.
In addition to protecting the Company’s Confidential Information, Associates have a responsibility not to make unauthorized copies of copyrighted materials or unlawfully use the property or information of others is strictly prohibited. Consult with the Legal Department prior to using materials protected by copyright, trademark, or patent to avoid unlawful use.
Associates and directors may not use confidential information for personal benefit. Associates and directors cannot trade securities or tip others to trade securities of Sitel Group or other companies on the basis of material information before it is made publicly available to ordinary investors through appropriate media. Material information may include news about acquisitions, investments, new business relationships, financial results, important management changes and other information that has the potential to affect the price of securities of Sitel Group or another company. If you have questions about securities trading or insider information, contact the Legal Department.
Appropriately identify the true nature of business and financial transactions.
Finally, Associates must cooperate with internal and external audits sanctioned by Sitel.
Sitel Group believes in fair trade and competition. It is Sitel’s policy to sell our services based on our reputation and high quality service. We should not make defamatory comments about the services of competitors or unlawfully use the confidential or proprietary information of others. Further, Sitel Group recognizes the importance of compliance with antitrust laws. We should not share pricing, business terms, or marketing plans with competitors and should be cautious about discussing business terms outside the Company.
Although Sitel Group strives to obtain the best available terms when purchasing products or services, Sitel Group also insists on maintaining integrity in supplier business relationships. Associates should endeavour to act consistently in a fair and professional manner when dealing with suppliers.
Supplier selection and other purchasing decisions should be based on the value of the product, service suitability, price, delivery, and overall quality. Supplier selection and other purchasing decisions must also be consistent with the Associate’s purchasing authority and other Company policy.
As a United States-based company, many U.S. domestic laws apply to our business inside and outside the United States. In addition, many other countries in which Sitel Group operates have enacted similar anti-bribery laws. For example, the UK Bribery Act of 2010 prohibits bribery generally and requires that Sitel Group implement adequate procedures to prevent bribery on a global basis. Sitel Group also must comply with certain trade and financial transaction restrictions which prohibit dealings that could aid terrorists or organizations that support terrorists, and ensure that transactions are not used for money laundering.
Associates and third parties acting on Sitel’s behalf must comply with the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) and the UK Bribery Act (“UKBA”) and other applicable anti-corruption laws in jurisdictions in which Sitel Group does business. Sitel Group Associates or anyone acting on behalf of Sitel Group may not pay or give anything of value, directly or indirectly, to any employee or official of a foreign government, foreign political party, candidate for political office, Sitel Group client, vendor or other business partner to obtain or retain business (including non-government business) or obtain an improper business advantage or for other purposes prohibited by law, even when “facilitating payments” are allowed by the FCPA.
to induce the recipient to use the recipient’s influence to improperly affect or influence any act or decision.
Among other things, prohibited conduct can include paying for meals or entertainment, and making gifts.
Please contact the Legal Department with questions or concerns about conduct or transactions that may be restricted or prohibited by law.
Sitel Group strives to be a good citizen of the communities in which it does business and actively works to improve the quality of life of our Associates throughout the world. We volunteer time and donate resources to support charitable, civic, and public service organizations.
Sitel’s Corporate Public Relations Department is responsible for providing Sitel’s official position on any questions about Sitel Group from outside contacts and responding to media inquiries. Please refer media contacts to a representative to the Corporate Public Relations Department at +1.615.301.7100 or [email protected].
Managers and supervisors are expected to encourage the highest standards of ethical and responsible business conduct by setting a good example and motivating the making of ethical business decisions with regard to our Associates, our supplier partners and the diverse communities in which Sitel Group operates. Associates are expected to maintain a work environment in which every person acting on Sitel’s behalf knows that ethical conduct is expected of them and to take appropriate action to address any situation that may conflict with the Code or other Company policy.
Associates have a responsibility to prevent actions that may damage Sitel’s reputation and business, and to avoid complicity in any human rights abuses. Associates should disclose any activity that may have the appearance of being unethical.
Associates should report behavior, known or suspected, that involves fraud, dishonest acts, misappropriation of funds or other Company property, impropriety in the handling of confidential information or financial transactions, unauthorized destruction of property or records, or other violations of the law or this Code. Sitel Group respects the confidentiality and protection of ‘whistleblowers’ under applicable law.
Questions should be referred to management, Human Resources, or the Legal Department. Actual or potential violations of this Code or applicable law or questionable conduct may be reported to an Associate’s direct supervisor, another member of management, Human Resources, or the Legal Department. Ethical, compliance, and legal concerns also may be reported via the Sitel Group Ethics Hotline +1 800.245.2514 (within the United States) (local toll-free numbers may be found at www.ethicspoint.com for calls outside the United States) or www.ethicspoint.com, which is answered by an independent company and is available 24 hours every day. Reports may be submitted anonymously where permitted by law.
Sitel Group strictly prohibits retaliation against any person for making a report in good faith or cooperating in an investigation.
Changes to or waivers of obligations under this Code for any director or officer may be made only by the Board of Directors of Sitel, and will be promptly disclosed if and as required by law.
All Associates are required to comply with the Code. Failure to comply with the Code may result in disciplinary action, up to and including separation of employment.
In conducting disciplinary action, Sitel Group treats all personnel with dignity and respect. Sitel Group does not engage in or tolerate the use of corporal punishment, mental or physical coercion, or the verbal abuse of Associates.
The provisions in this Code are intended to comply with applicable laws and regulations in all locations where Sitel Group does business. In the event of a conflict between a provision of this Code and applicable law in your area, applicable law shall control.
Sitel Group reserves the right to amend this Code at its discretion. | 2019-04-21T16:14:53Z | https://www.sitel.com/fr/global-code-of-conduct-and-ethics/ |
Last edited by CnC on Tue Apr 16, 2019 8:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Just to play the devil's advocate, common sense dictates that you retired in 2000 or 1929 at 45 and watch your stocks lose 50% of their value immediately after you simply get a new job and continue like literally every other 45 year old out there.
Retirement at 45 is the same as quitting a job, over the next ±5 years you can simply go get a new one. You miss a year or two of wages and go about your business still better off than 95% of people out there.
Calling it retirement while continuing to work (to avoid plan failure, not just by choice) ain't that kosher.
"desires", or "has to" ?
However even a 5% withdrawal rate does not have a very large chance of failure at least based on historical data.
Compare present yields to historical data.
I don't know the exact numbers but for many people a 20% chance of having to interrupt "retirement" for several years out of several tens still sounds like a good deal. The other option is working 100% percent of the time for the next decades.
Or plan better investments and however why you put "working for decades" one one side and "interrupting retirement" (for how long ?) on the other ?
Yes, plan to collect SSA and write down the numbers, instead of hiding them. Total figures are what count.
The unemployment rate was 25% during the Great Depression. You couldn’t count on simply getting a new job after the crash.
Anytime there is a very large stock downtown, there are dislocations in the economy that can make finding a job tough.
I think there is an allure of "dropping out of society" and being self sufficient, survivalist meets Timothy Leary and John Bogle, that is Mr Mustache cult.
Yes, that is called "retirement police".
It is obvious for everybody that most 40y olds din't retire in the sense that they cannot touch any work (especially paid) because God's fury will strike them. They just have the flexibility to do what they want.
This what retirement is: to do what you what when you want. Yes, it could be what other people define as work.
And employed people (with less savings) will be in better shape because of.... what? You don't have to work during the great depression, you can do something lucrative and decrease your SWR ahead of it.
Why do we even discuss a century old event?
And you would be no worse than every other singe person who lost their job during the recession/depression.
You do realize that come 2025 when I am 40 and I retire at 40 and you are however old you are and still working and the economy crashes and we both are jobless the fact I retired and you were laid off will not in any way affect either one of us and our ability to get a job.
* Note not meant towards you in any way just easier to write directly at someone than a generic somebody.
MMM advocates a 4% withdrawal rate not 5% because of the Trinity Study and that 4% has been almost bulletproof in the past.
He uses 5% as a rate of growth of investments while employed so that one can figure out about how many years they may need to work prior to financial independence. This is not a withdrawal rate.
Let's compare 1930? Someone who has reached financial independence (25x expenses) at 40 with a 60/40 portfolio and the market drops 90% vs someone who has only reached 5x expenses at 40 with a 60/40 portfolio and loses their job.
Seems to me that the person who FIRED at the very least has 8 years socked away in bonds and will survive while the other guy is likely going to starve unless something comes up to help. I would rather be the one who is financially independent.
The other benefit to early FI is that you don't necessarily need to quit working. You can work another year, you can semi-retire, you can find more meaningful work at another company, you can get a job as a bartender at a Jazz venue or comedy club, or you can start your own business doing something you love. Early FI buys freedom and options. And guess what, freedom and options makes me happy.
Just one more note to all the people who are placing too much weight on a great depression crash the year or 5 after you retire.
You are arguing an unbalanced equation. That leads to some extremely irrational thought. I view dying before I retire as a failure. Certainly more of a failure than going broke after I am 100 years old.
Because of that working until 67 has a much higher failure rate than retirement at 45 with 25x income 4% spending and a grasp of finance.
I get your point. While I would urge those retiring prior to about age 60 to shoot for closer to 30-35x, I agree that the risk of a 'premature' death seems to be widely underestimated by many. Further, if the masses who retire with little or nothing beyond Social Security find someway to make ends meet, which most of them clearly do, how much easier should it be for a knowledgeable Boglehead with a seven figure portfolio to do so? The attitudes exhibited by some which strongly appear to indicate that reducing their standard of living (e.g. moving from their VHCOL area, no longer driving new model luxury automobiles, flying first-class exclusively) would be a fate worse than death smacks of snobbery, to put it mildly.
Also, I believe that trying to devise a plan as to how we would navigate through the Great Depression is fraught with issues. Frankly, in a situation where stocks fall by 89% in value, no routes would likely be considered as truly 'safe'. How secure would even government-issued bonds be in a situation where an economic implosion seems likely? Annuities certainly wouldn't be viewed as rock-solid. Further, I have grave doubts as to how many would 'stay the course' with a buy-and-hold strategy if that were to occur. It's one thing to see your stocks fall by 50%, but almost 90% is an order of magnitude worse.
I don't think 30x-35x is necessary for those younger than 60 year olds. I think 25x with having the flexibility to drop to 30x-35x during bad times is better because that does not necessitate working an additional 3-5 years. As you said, some may not be willing to give up the first class flight or the latest luxury automobile and willing to work 5 more years to guarantee those luxuries. To each their own.
Yes, if a person has significant flexibility (e.g. can reduce their withdrawals by 30% or more) in the event of poor portfolio performance, then 25x is probably fine for a younger retiree.
Rather than a definition of work vs. retirement issue, I think it is an issue of "do what they want" vs. "do what they have to do". Find a job, in this case at hand.
Yes, but do you realize that if you were employed to begin with, your chances of being employed following a recession are higher that if you were unemployed to begin with ?
If one does not withdraw at all any portfolio is fine for any length of time.
The point of (good) planning is to retire with enough assets to live the desired lifestyle under almost any circumstance. Planning for concrete chances to have to go back to work, or drastically reduce lifestyle is flawed at start. In short that's half of FIRE's cardinal sin. The other half is planning to live a below one's means/spartan/destitute life while working.
Now is a matter of opinion? I thought MMM was all wrong and that. If it's is just a matter of opinion, what is to discuss?
I am not sue how to make this more clear.
Talking unconstrained part time jobs, with no pressure, is pretty much retirement. You don't have to watch TV or play golf.
The difference between having to go to work o pay mortgage etc vs the luxury of choosing to work or not (to maybe decrease your SWR this year although it is not mandatory) makes a big difference.
There is no clear line between FI and retirement. It's a continuum. The emphasis is on FI in FIRE. First big step is to decrease expenses and save money to have a 4% SWR. This is the main part of MMM philosophy, not siting around and watching TV.
The chance of surviving a great recession starting from a 25X portfolio is much higher than starting it with a job and debt. Like, you know, normal people.
Last edited by Starfish on Wed Apr 17, 2019 1:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I beg to differ. Say I retired in 1999 and you were fired in 2000 if we had the same skillset I seriously doubt any employer would say wow one guy left his job 1 year ago and one guy was terminated 6 months ago. The man who was terminated clearly is much more employable.
Now if I were to retire in 1994 5 years before the 2000 crash sure I would be less employable than you. But I would also still have a huge nest egg even larger than the 25x I retired with. Infact even at the bottom of the 2000 crash my portfolio would be up +40% from what I retired at.
Do you understand how cherry picking the worst case scenarios where the stars all have to align really doesn't make sense?
Last edited by CnC on Wed Apr 17, 2019 2:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I credit MMM for getting involved with Lending Club. I also credit MMM for warning that they had turned around, and I got out in short order. Why Pete simply stopped investing and didn't pull out, I gotta think they were a site sponsor. It was blatantly obvious that the time had come to get out and he didn't.
I credit lots of sites for added income and bonuses. MMM forum for tradeline sales and small balance forgiveness, and MMM, Reddit, Bogleheads and other random places for pointers to new, good bonuses for moving money into accounts or opening a new card.
Ok....to the original question. SWR. It's really easy to take 5% out a year when there's a separate $400k a year income to back you up if something goes wrong. It's altogether different when that portfolio where the 5% is coming from is everything. It ain't hard to say "weeeee, quit your job, work for free as a construction worker, spend all your money on overpriced beer and buy buildings with money (that came from where?) to rent out" when you have lots of back up.
I do give Pete credit and thank him for the added wealth he opened my eyes to........while I drive my Wrangler on oversized tires (the Wrangler is the hated poster child of stupid vehicles of MMM) to the offroad meets where I'm in 4x4 low all day getting 0.8 mpg. But it's sorta tough to mount my snowplow on a Leaf.
Who says you have to live a spartan/destitute life to be financially independent early in life? We are far from destitute or spartan. Also, the 25x starting point survives some of the worst times in history. The need to go back to work is such tiny percent chance especially if one can cut back a little which historically has also been very rare. We travel several weeks a year times a year. I'm okay traveling one or two weeks for a few years if need be. I think my family and I will survive. Wouldn't yours? We keep our cars for about 10 years. I'm sure if times are tough I can keep that car an extra year or two with insignificant loss in happiness.
Once you eliminate the wasteful spending that purchases little or minimal happiness in your life it becomes pretty easy to save more money and not feel like you are depriving yourself. Believe it or not, you gain happiness because you divert some of those savings towards things that create long standing joy. I have friends who purchase 1-2 coffees a day. We make our own cappuccinos which are much tastier than Starbucks for a fraction of the cost. We have friends who eat fast food / take out every day. We cook most of our meals at a fraction of the cost that are healthier and taste better. And, that is some basic everyday stuff we see. Those two choices alone are worth hundreds of thousand of dollars over 20 year time frame if invested. Even more if you consider working till 65 or one's entire life.
It is all about choices and what one finds important or valuable to them. I believe once an average person takes a real look into themselves they can easily find lots of waste in their lives that purchases little to no happiness that can easily be removed without deprivation.
He never said withdrawing 5%. Somehow this mistakes keeps coming up, but he recommends a 4% withdrawal rate to be safe.
He does talk about 5% average growth while employed to guesstimate how many more years one may need to work before they are FI.
Which would indicate that they "retired" with around 35X the baseline amount, wouldn't it?
[Math: $70K expenses, with a 30% reduction is $49K. $70K times 25 is $1.75M, which is also around 35x $49K].
I know a two retirees who still do some minor consulting work.
Some retirees on this forum spend a small portion of their free time getting IRA transfer bonuses, banking bonuses and credit card bonuses.
I know 1 retiree that bartends at private events every so often.
Just because someone stopped working their full time job does not mean they must sit at the beach sipping coronas. Most early retirees will find meaningful things to do with their lives and often times end up making some money on the way.
Also, in a great depression event I would rather be 25x with 40% bonds and unemployed vs 5x and 40% bonds with a job that just laid me off. 25x with 40% bonds has 10 years of living expenses built in. 5x is screwed.
You can not deny that having financial independence earlier in life is better. Period!
You can argue and each person's desires are different on how much they need to be financially independent. We argue about that all day long on this forum. MMM postures that many of the luxuries we buy don't actually make us happier but instead weaker less happy individuals. The most extreme example I can think of is one of my older colleagues who gets upset and proclaims a miserable time if they don't get the best table at a restaurant, VIP treatment at some event, or first class seating on even a short haul flight. This person has pampered themselves so much that anything below this ridiculous standard creates stress and unhappiness. Everyone is different, while some are just confused.
"25x" "5x" mean nothing. "x" of what ? Planning to live under a bridge, eating at the shelter may make any portfolio become a "100x"
The key is that the tenets of FIRE plan for a spartan worklife and early and spartan retirement. Good personal financial planning tries to maximize lifestyle during worklife and in retirement, based on an acceptable retirement age, available compensations and market returns.
I do deny it, if "independence" is conditional to a reduced lifestyle.
MMM postures that many of the luxuries we buy don't actually make us happier but instead weaker less happy individuals.
That's why MMM should open a church instead of giving financial advice. St. Francis predicated the same, but he never went around Assisi advocating withdrawal rates and assets allocations.
I'm surprised MMM spends any time discussing or being concerned about SWR. He generally advocates self-employment, which is traditionally some of the most lucrative paid work that there is (reference, for example, TMND and the most common type of millionaire), and doesn't really recommend that anyone stop working. Heck, he works so hard, that not only does he do his main occupations (yes, plural), but he also then goes home and does all of the chores there too instead of hiring help. MMM is a very hard worker, and has a very high level of income, most of it being earned income. I imagine I'll retire far sooner than he ever will (I have 10 years left).
I'd consider going into self-employment myself, but it sounds too stressful, and I don't really like the variable work schedule. It's probably more work that I do too. I just work 40 hours a week.
Sure it is subjective, but once we move away from objective financial targets, monks, hermits and hippies moving to Nepal come to mind.
Being a monk in Nepal sounds pretty cool to me.
X is spending and always has been. The great thing about using multiples and percentages is that it doesn't matter if you want to live a spartan lifestyle or a luxurious one. The numbers don't change. Just because some FIRE people want to live a spartan lifestyle I'm not sure why that matters. I plan on FIREing and plan on living the same lifestyle I've always lived, upper middle class. I use the same X variable as everyone else.
That can be one objective, but it depends in part on how much certainty you want to maintain a certain level of spending. For me, I'm okay with the historically unlikely possibility of needing to reduce or largely eliminate discretionary spending (50% of our planned retirement spending) if our portfolio suffers like it did for year 2000 retirees. I would personally rather accept that possibility (which is actually a possibility no matter what your withdrawal rate is) and retire 5-10 years earlier than continue working those 5-10 years in an effort to maintain the luxuries that we might need to reduce or eliminate.
It's not logical to treat all expenses as fixed and necessary. For many of us, that's simply not true. As I noted in my reply above, 50% of our planned retirement spending will be on discretionary purchases that could be reduced or eliminated if the need was there.
This is exactly what I was going to post.
Anyway I'm sure this has drifted far enough off topic it will be locked. But before it is I wanted to put one last comment in.
If you separate what you want to spend from what you *need* to spend it's a very different ball game. If you have have to spend a minimum $40,000 a year or else you will be hungry and on the streets then no, do not plan on retiring at 45 years only with only $1,000,000 in the bank.
But if you spend $40,000 on necessities and another $20,000 on shoes every year you will likely be pretty safe at $1,500,000. Just realize that if the market tanks you may have to wear the same pair of shoes all year. Perhaps you won't get any new shoes for a few years and if you really *need* some pair advertised you might just have to find a job you enjoy and work a couple hours a week to buy them till the markets come back.
Last edited by CnC on Wed Apr 17, 2019 3:08 pm, edited 2 times in total.
I'm losing track of what you really think the 25x should be.
It seems to me that it would be a lot easier to simply say, "I'd like to live on Y for the rest of my life. Thus, I'll have at least 35 times that amount before I retire, should I do so before I turn 60."
Doing it that way avoids the whole discretionary v. non-discretionary split of one's expenses while still providing a reasonable level of safety, would it not?
Is he? 10 years of prime life is what, 20% of your most precious asset, right? are those years worth nothing? Give that up for an improbable great recession?
If you work only a small percentage of your time, and otherwise do what you want, yes. If you work the entire day 5/7 and are afraid of being fired, no.
It does, but I think it's a pretty unreasonable way to calc assets.
What if I want to buy a $40,000 truck one year. That's going to mess up my Y amount for the rest of my life. What if I want to go on a $20,000 cruise around the world does this affect my Y?
Rather than try to average and say I want to take $150,000 worth of trips buy $75,000 worth of fine dining and $200,000 worth of vehicles in my lifetime amortized over 40 years of retirement means my Y must be 35x the yearly average of all those things + all other expenses.
Many of us calculate what our actual required expenses are and assume x% of fun money extra to enjoy each year and she a few years of fun money to buy the newest toy we want. This keeps us at a historically Rock solid 4% srw but allows us to cut back if needed.
I'll use our planned numbers to illustrate.
Our planned retirement spending is $80k, 50% of which is discretionary. As such, I'd have no problem retiring at age 55 with $2 million (i.e. 4% withdrawals). To the extent that the future is like the past, we shouldn't need to worry about reducing our portfolio withdrawals, but if we encounter a really poor sequence of returns, especially during the first decade of retirement, we could reduce our spending all the way down to $40k. With the number 'retirement spending' calculator at Portfolio Charts, this can be historically backtested easily.
It may be slightly easier for the purposes of calculation to ignore the essential/discretionary split, but if you treat all of your spending as essential, you significantly raise the bar for your needed 'number'. I'd personally rather take a small chance on not having as much discretionary funds available as I'd like and retire 5-10 years earlier than otherwise, but some clearly don't want to take that route.
Can't argue with that, but how many hours and days of one's life must you use to get to 40x? What does one give up to get to 40x? is it family relationships, is it health, is it being less happy or is it nothing and all?
Choices, values, and more choices.
Can't argue with that, but how many hours and days of one's life must you use to get to 40x? Choices, values, and more choices.
I calculated it not long ago, and assuming a 20% withdrawal rate and ~5% real returns, it would take 5 years to go from 25x to 33x. If real returns were 2%, it would take 10 years. So it would obviously take even longer to get to 40x. For many people, that sounds like a very poor trade-off.
This is where we differ. You call it reduced lifestyle or some form of deprivation. And I call it not wasting money on stupid crap that buys nothing more than maybe a temporary rush at best.
No one is forcing you to get early financial independence. Your life, your choices. I am happy in my non depraved lifestyle being financially independent in my 40s, eating well, skiing, car racing, traveling, spending time with family and friends, volunteering, and plenty more I am not listing. Wow my life is so depraved. How will I ever survive?
From what objective financial targets do you think people are moving away?
. . . means my Y must be 35x the yearly average of all those things + all other expenses.
That seems like a reasonable way to calculate the desired asset amount to me, but I think that we are essentially saying the same thing.
But I do not believe that a 4% withdrawal rate is safe for anyone younger than 60 (and, even at that age, I'm not so sure), and I am not convinced that upon "retirement" I will be willing to cut back on anything. It is one thing to say that one would be okay doing so, but it is another to actually be required to do it.
Considering that 4% included some of the worst times in history, for 4% to fail, times have to worse than what history has offered. Although 4% is not bullet proof, the odds are really high.
As for cutting back, it all depends. If cutting back for you is the difference between 3 vacation a year to only 1, and instead of going out to dinner once a week to once a month for 2 years, I doubt that will so bad. If cutting back means from eating nothing but rice and beans while staying at home doing nothing, well that is not a happy place to be and I fully agree with you.
In all honesty I bet anyone who has been able to amass 33x or 40x expenses will be cutting back on spending when times are tough because it is that type of mentality that allowed them to get rich in the first place. So, I don't care if you are at 25x or 40x. You will likely be cutting back no matter what.
The great thing about RE is that it does not have to definitive.
You take trial run for 1-2-3 years. You spend too much? You don't like it? You can came back and work for a decade more. There is not much risk in it and is reversible.
But working? That is not reversible. You cannot go back in time and RE.
Since my wife and I lived below the poverty line for four years and were happy as clams, I have no doubt that we could spend triple that amount today (which would still be a 50% reduction of what we plan to spend in retirement) and still do just fine. IMHO, far too many people equate spending with life satisfaction, happiness, joy, and contentment.
And your point, EnjoyIt, regarding cutting back on spending when times are tough is spot on. I'm not so sure that some here are being honest with themselves if they think that they'll continue a level of spending associated with a lavish lifestyle by first-world standards (meaning one that only a relatively small proportion of the population can afford) when their portfolio is tanking and everyone is saying that Great Depression Part Two is on the horizon.
This is true, I am certain that even if my plans go flawlessly my pension is solid and social security is fixed and I have +30x expenses when I retire early.
If I'm only withdrawing 3% per year and going on 3 luxury vacations a year I can guarantee you that if stocks drop 60% and stay down for a whole year I certainly will not be going on those same 3 vacations the next year. I probably won't eat beans and Ramin but I certainly wouldn't bump my spending up as per inflation and blindly keep spending.
But it does matter. A spartan life is worse than a luxurious life. If you doubt the previous statement find someone who would chose the former over the latter everything else being equal.
Furthermore, planning for a spartan life is intrinsically riskier than planning for a luxurious life: if you live a spartan life and things go worse than forecasted you go directly to "destitute life".
Finally, if we begin to assess financial results based on personal preferences rather than on objective and measurable parameters as much as possible, what stops one from eventually considering a -10% return more desirable than a +10% one ? You'll say that it makes no sense, but to me it does not make no sense trying to work as little as possible in order to live a spartan and uncertain life.
I guess the difference comes from some people believing the main uncertainty in life is how much time we have left, and others believing the issue is how much money they have left. | 2019-04-22T03:10:55Z | https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=266780&p=4498731 |
The recent development of x-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) is in the process of transforming macromolecular crystallography for both structural analysis (1) and time-resolved molecular imaging (2). Extremely bright and ultrashort x-ray pulses enable high-resolution data collection from micrometer-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal radiation damage. Because each crystal is destroyed by a powerful XFEL pulse, crystallographic data sets are typically collected using the serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) approach, in which microcrystals are delivered to the intersection with the pulsed XFEL beam in a continuous hydrated stream (3). A fast detector operating at the XFEL pulse repetition rate collects diffraction images from microcrystals intersecting the beam at random orientations. After identification of diffraction peaks and indexing, structure factor amplitudes are determined by averaging reflection intensities measured in each diffraction pattern over stochastic variables, such as the microcrystal size and the orientation of individual crystals (4).
Recently developed enhancements to the basic Monte Carlo integration method enable more accurate data to be obtained from fewer diffraction patterns (5, 6). Meanwhile, the development of viscous crystal delivery media and special injectors (7–10) has allowed a marked reduction in crystal consumption for both membrane and soluble proteins. One of the most successful approaches to date involves the application of the gel-like lipidic cubic phase (LCP) for growth and delivery of microcrystals across the pulsed x-ray beam (11–13). The use of microcrystal injectors bypasses the need for mounting the crystals, whereas femtosecond-duration x-ray pulses from the FEL obviate cryocooling and extensive crystal optimization for challenging membrane proteins and their complexes with soluble partners. Combined with the improvements in data processing, this enables the determination of accurate reflection intensities from much smaller amounts of protein than previously possible.
Most protein structures obtained by SFX so far have been determined using the molecular replacement (MR) method for solving the crystallographic phase problem. However, experimental phasing of XFEL data without using previous models is difficult because all existing approaches require a very high accuracy of structure factor amplitude measurements, as compared to MR. The first successful experimental phasing of SFX data was demonstrated with lysozyme crystals using single-wavelength anomalous dispersion (SAD) on gadolinium, which provides a very strong anomalous signal (14). Recent attempts to use SAD phasing of SFX data from another test soluble protein, luciferin-regenerating enzyme, with a more conventional mercury compound were initially unsuccessful, but the collection of additional data on native crystals and the use of the SIRAS (single isomorphous replacement with anomalous signal) method made it possible to solve the structure (15). Both of these methods rely on the incorporation of heavy atoms into protein crystals, which requires extensive screening of various compounds, many of which are toxic or suffer from poor solubility. Quite often, efficient incorporation is not attainable, and using native elements for phasing is therefore preferable. For example, native copper ions were used to phase SFX data for copper-nitride reductase (16); however, copper or other heavy atoms are not widespread in biological macromolecules.
A more general phasing method that uses anomalous signal from native sulfur atoms, which are ubiquitous in most proteins, was introduced more than 30 years ago (17) but has not been commonly used for a long time because of the extremely low level of the anomalous signal and the challenges associated with data collection and processing. During the past decade, the method was revisited and started gaining popularity because of the advances in synchrotron radiation sources and in the data processing software (18, 19). However, the conventional wisdom was that, for this method to be successful, one needs a nearly perfect, large crystal that diffracts to high resolution and withstands radiation damage. A few years ago, it was shown that sulfur SAD phasing could be achieved by averaging data from multiple weakly diffracting small crystals (20), and an optimized method for routine sulfur SAD phasing at synchrotron beamlines was published (21). Recently, successful reports of sulfur SAD phasing of SFX data for test soluble proteins, lysozyme (22) and thaumatin (23), have been published. Phasing SFX data from weakly diffracting crystals of membrane proteins and complexes represents a next level of difficulty. Here, we demonstrate the ability to automatically solve a macromolecular structure by native sulfur SAD using SFX data collected at room temperature from micrometer-sized crystals of the human A2A adenosine receptor (A2AAR), which belongs to the pharmaceutically important but difficult-to-crystallize superfamily of G protein–coupled receptors (GPCRs).
Anomalous SFX data were collected at the Coherent X-Ray Imaging (CXI) end station (24) of the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), as previously described (11). Microcrystals (average size, 5 × 5 × 2 μm3; fig. S1) of the A2AAR with apocytochrome b562RIL (BRIL) fused into its third intracellular loop (A2AAR-BRIL) (25) in complex with the antagonist ZM241385 were grown (26) and delivered inside LCP using a viscous medium microinjector (7). An x-ray energy of 6 keV (wavelength, 2.07 Å) was used as a compromise between the strength of anomalous scattering from sulfur atoms (K-edge, 2.472 keV), the efficiencies of the Kirkpatrick-Baez mirrors and of the detector, as well as the detector-size and wavelength limits on resolution. The sample was injected within a vacuum chamber to minimize background scattering, and the XFEL beam was attenuated to ~14% of its full power (~170 μJ per pulse) to prevent oversaturation of the Cornell-SLAC (Stanford Linear Accelerator Center) pixel array detector (CSPAD). At this x-ray energy, the anomalous difference in structure factors is expected to be less than 1.5% (17), requiring a very high precision of collected data and therefore a very high multiplicity (many measurements of each reflection). Within ~17 hours, a total of 7,324,430 images were collected at 120 images/s, in which 1,797,503 crystal diffraction patterns were identified using the Cheetah hit finding software (27). We successfully indexed 593,996 of these hits using the CrystFEL software package (28). The final reflection list was obtained by merging data from 578,620 indexed patterns using iterative scaling and resulted in a data set at 2.5 Å resolution. This resolution was limited by the x-ray energy, detector size, and minimal achievable sample-to-detector distance. To further extend resolution, we collected additional data at an x-ray energy of 9.8 keV (wavelength, 1.27 Å). This high-resolution data set was assembled from 72,735 indexed patterns and was truncated at 1.9 Å resolution on the basis of the correlation coefficient (CC*) >0.5 criterion (table S1).
The structure was solved with a two-stage sulfur SAD phasing procedure using the A2A_S-SAD anomalous data set collected at the x-ray energy of 6 keV. In the first stage, SHELXD (19) was used to determine the sulfur atom substructure. The A2AR-BRIL construct contains 24 sulfurs (15 Cys and 9 Met) per 447 residues (Cys+Met residue content, ~5.4%), including 8 sulfurs engaged in four disulfide bonds. The resolution cutoff was the most critical parameter for the successful sulfur atom search, with optimal results obtained at 3.5 Å resolution (fig. S2A). A scatter plot of SHELXD correlation coefficients between the observed and calculated E values (CCall/CCweak; fig. S2B) showed the main cluster of random solutions with a few strong ones, which were well separated from the main cluster. A sharp drop in the occupancy of sulfur atoms from 0.72 to 0.42 (fig. S2C) was used as an indicator for distinguishing 16 correct sulfur atoms (Fig. 1) from five incorrect ones in the found solution, with CCall/CCweak = 32/12. In the second stage, the partial sulfur substructure solution found with SHELXD was used as an input for substructure refinement, log-likelihood gradient map substructure completion, and phasing with Phaser EP (29). The resulting phases were improved by density modification and phase extension using Resolve (30). Although density modification clearly improved the maps, it was not used at its full potential because of the absence of noncrystallographic symmetry and a relatively low solvent content (53%). The model was traced automatically with phenix.autobuild (31) to 59% completeness. The resulting model contained all eight receptor helices, with only the BRIL fusion and some loops missing. The electron density maps at the different stages of the phasing process are shown in Fig. 2. Density for the ligand ZM241385 became clear after automatic tracing (fig. 2C), validating the correct structure solution. Subsequently, we tried running the same diffraction data through an automated structure-determination pipeline, X2DF, which explores a wide range of settings (32). Several additional combinations of different parameters were found to yield structure solutions (fig. S3). The success in the phasing of SFX S-SAD data has been made possible by recent advances in data processing software. In particular, the new scaling algorithm introduced in CrystFEL version 0.6.1 appeared to be critical for improving data quality and solving the structure. Partiality correction was not necessary to achieve this result, and in fact appeared to slightly decrease the data quality (fig. S4), and did not lead to structure determination.
Fig. 1 Sulfur peaks in the anomalous difference A2AAR Fourier map.
Sulfur density is contoured at 3 σ and overlaid on the A2AAR crystal structure. Twenty sulfur atoms could be identified from the map. BRIL fusion moiety containing one ordered sulfur atom (M1033) is not shown. Three sulfurs (M-24, C-13, and M1058) are disordered and do not have electron density.
Fig. 2 Improvements in electron density at different stages of the phasing process.
(A) Phaser EP map. (B) Resolve density modified map. (C) Autobuild autotraced map. Omit electron density around the ligand is shown on the top panels. 2mFo-DFc electron density map for helix III is shown on the bottom panels. All maps are contoured at 1.0 σ.
The final data set used for the structure solution contained 578,620 indexed patterns. To find the minimum number of indexed patterns necessary for successful structure determination, we performed phasing, density modification, and autotracing using data ranging from 100,000 to 550,000 indexed patterns in 50,000 pattern increments (fig. S5). All phasing attempts with a number of patterns lower than 500,000 have failed, even when the correct sulfur atom positions were used, highlighting the requirement of collecting data with high multiplicity for accurate calculation of anomalous differences from weak anomalous sulfur scattering. With 550,000 indexed patterns, structure determination was straightforward, and autotracing yielded a 46% complete model with 19 cycles in phenix.autobuild. However, with 500,000 indexed patterns, autotracing produced a 36% complete model with 19 cycles and required twice as many cycles (38 cycles) to produce a similar model with all receptor helices (53% complete) as the one obtained from 550,000 patterns.
Reducing the number of indexed patterns also had a negative impact on the initial sulfur atom search using SHELXD. With 550,000 patterns, 15 sulfur atoms were found with the same parameters as for the full data set. With 500,000 and 450,000 patterns, 14 sulfur atoms were found, but this required optimization of the search parameters in SHELXD (such as the resolution cutoff) and increase in the number of trials from 1000 to 5000. With 400,000 patterns, only six sulfur atoms were found after an extensive search, and with 300,000 patterns and lower, the substructure could not be found.
Because the sulfur content in proteins varies, to analyze the effect of the number of sulfur atoms in the substructure on the success of phasing, we consecutively removed the 10 weakest sulfur atoms from the complete 21-atom substructure and performed phasing, density modification, and autotracing using the complete data set. With nine sulfur atoms removed, the phasing was successful with a figure of merit (FOM) of 0.371 and with 45% of the structure built automatically. However, the removal of 10 sulfur atoms carried a negative effect, and no model was produced with 36 cycles of autotracing. Therefore, in this case, it was possible to solve the structure starting from as low as 12 sulfur atoms per 447 residues (2.7%).
After solving and refining the structure at 2.5 Å with the A2A_S-SAD data set, the resolution was extended to 1.9 Å using the additional A2A_High-Res data set collected at 9.8 keV. The final, 1.9 Å room temperature A2AAR-BRIL structure (A2A_S-SAD_1.9) contains 396 of 447 residues (excluding disordered N- and C-terminal tags and one BRIL loop 1045–1055), the ligand ZM241385, 3 cholesterols, 21 lipids, 1 sodium ion, 1 polyethylene glycol (PEG), and 105 water molecules (table S2 and fig. S6). Alternatively, we solved the structure using MR with the A2A_High-Res data set truncated at 1.9 and 2.5 Å. Comparison of the A2A_S-SAD_2.5 and A2A_MR_2.5 structures (fig. S7) showed minimal differences as expected, with a root mean square deviation (RMSD) of 0.43 Å for Cα atoms of all resolved residues in the protein (0.60 Å for all atoms). Discrepancies were mostly observed in the solvent-exposed regions on the protein surface, where side chains of bulky residues adopted alternative conformations and could not be unambiguously modeled. Also, the B factor distribution showed no substantial deviations of one structure from the other (fig. S8). Functionally important protein regions, such as the ligand-binding pocket and the sodium ion binding site (25), have very similar quality of electron density maps (fig. S9).
Furthermore, we compared the room temperature A2A_S-SAD_1.9 structure with the previously solved structure of the same protein at a synchrotron under cryo-conditions [Protein Data Bank (PDB) ID: 4EIY (25)]. Both structures overlay very well in the receptor part with an RMSD of 0.24 Å for all resolved Cα atoms, excluding the BRIL fusion protein (fig. S10). Most differences are observed in the loop regions of the receptor and in BRIL, which is tilted out from the receptor, accounting for the larger unit cell dimensions in the room temperature structure. As expected, the average B factor of the room temperature structure is ~20 Å2 higher than that of the cryocooled structure; nevertheless, the relative distribution of B factors in both structures is very similar, with higher B factor values in the loop regions and on the protein termini (fig. S11). Similar to the previous results (11), we observed slight improvements in the strength of most interactions that involve charged side chains in the room temperature structure (table S3), even though B factors for the interacting atoms usually increased. The current room temperature XFEL structure also provides important insights into water and ion binding to the receptor under close to physiological conditions (Fig. 3). A total of 101 ordered waters that interact with the receptor are observed in the XFEL structure (compared to 166 waters in PDB: 4EIY), of which 88 waters are located at the same (within 1 Å distance) positions. Most of the waters preserved at room temperature have relatively low B factors in both structures and form multiple polar contacts with the protein residues. At the same time, most high–B-factor waters are lost in the XFEL structure, suggesting that they do not have well-defined bound conformations at room temperature. Whereas most of the mobile waters are located in the intra- and extracellular loop regions of the receptor, tightly bound waters form two contiguous clusters. The first cluster is defined by close proximity (5 Å) to the ligand, supporting the notion that ligand binding is strongly mediated by a network of water interactions (33). The second cluster of waters, highly conserved in class A GPCRs, fills the binding pocket of the sodium ion, which itself has an identical position in both structures, emphasizing the stability of the extensive network of ionic and polar interactions around the sodium ion, which plays a key role in the receptor activation mechanism (34).
Fig. 3 Comparison of resolved water molecules between the room temperature XFEL structure (A2A_S-SAD_1.9) and the cryocooled synchrotron structure (PDB: 4EIY).
(A) Cartoon representation of the XFEL structure with overlaid waters. Water molecules from the XFEL structure are shown as semitransparent spheres, whereas waters from PDB: 4EYI are shown as dots, colored by location: green, close proximity to ligand (<5 Å); red, sodium ion pocket (<10 Å); cyan, other regions. (B) Conservation of the water positions between PDB: 4EIY and XFEL structures. For each water molecule in PDB: 4EIY, the distance to the closest water in the XFEL structure is shown on the y axis, whereas its B factor is shown on the x axis. Data points are colored the same way as in (A). Positions of water molecules can be considered as conserved if the distance between corresponding water molecules in two structures is less than 1 Å.
Compared to the previously reported S-SAD phasing of SFX data for the soluble proteins lysozyme (22) and thaumatin (23), phasing of A2AAR data required approximately four times more indexed patterns (table S4). In addition to lower crystal symmetry and lower sulfur content, the diffraction power of A2AAR microcrystals is substantially (one to two orders of magnitude) lower compared to lysozyme crystals of comparable size. At the same time, the background scattering from an LCP stream 50 μm in diameter, in which A2AAR microcrystals were delivered, is substantially higher (8) than the background from a liquid stream 5 μm in diameter used to deliver thaumatin crystals. These factors, together with potentially lower isomorphicity of A2AAR microcrystals, contribute to the challenge of native sulfur phasing of SFX data for difficult membrane proteins. Here, protein consumption required for de novo phasing was very reasonable (~2.7 mg) due to the very efficient operation of the LCP injector (7). Our results that ~600,000 indexed patterns are potentially sufficient to phase GPCR data starting with 12 ordered sulfur atoms per 447 residues (2.7%) can be placed in perspective with the fact that over 88% of all human proteins have Cys and Met residue content higher than 2.7% (fig. S12). Thus, our report provides an important reference point reassuring that most human proteins could be phased by S-SAD for de novo structure determination with XFELs.
Although this experiment took only two shifts (24 hours) of LCLS beam time, including experiment and sample changeover time, the scarcity of beam time is definitely currently a limiting factor for all XFEL experiments including de novo phasing and time-resolved studies. Future XFEL sources will have higher pulse repetition rates, enabling the acquisition of similar amounts of data in much less time. New XFEL facilities are coming online in the next few years (European XFEL, SwissFEL, PAL, and LCLS-II), providing additional capacity through an increased number of beamlines to choose from. New detectors will also have higher dynamic range, improving the quality of data. Further developments of the data processing software should result in determination of more accurate structure factors from fewer diffraction patterns. Therefore, we expect that within a few years, native sulfur phasing with XFELs will become a routine exercise.
Expression and purification of A2AAR construct engineered for crystallization, containing BRIL fusion protein in the third intracellular loop (A2AAR-BRIL), were done as previously described (25). Briefly, A2AAR-BRIL was expressed in Spodoptera frugiperda (Sf9) insect cells for 48 hours at 27°C using recombinant baculovirus at a multiplicity of infection of 5. Cells were harvested by centrifugation and stored at −80°C until use.
Frozen insect cell pellets were thawed on ice and disrupted by dounce homogenization in a hypotonic buffer containing 10 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 10 mM MgCl2, 20 mM KCl, and EDTA-free cOmplete protease inhibitor cocktail (Roche). Insect cell membranes were collected by centrifugation at 150,000g for 45 min. Extensive washing of the isolated raw membranes was performed by repeated dounce homogenization and centrifugation in a high osmotic buffer containing 1.0 M NaCl, 10 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 10 mM MgCl2, and 20 mM KCl (three times) to remove soluble and membrane associated proteins. Purified membranes were resuspended in a storage buffer containing 10 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 10 mM MgCl2, 20 mM KCl, and 20% glycerol, flash-frozen in liquid nitrogen, and stored at −80°C until further use.
Before solubilization, purified membranes were thawed on ice in the presence of 4 mM theophylline (Sigma), iodoacetamide (2.0 mg/ml; Sigma), and EDTA-free cOmplete protease inhibitor cocktail (Roche). After incubation for 30 min at 4°C, membranes were solubilized by incubation in a buffer containing 50 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 800 mM NaCl, 1% (w/v) n-dodecyl-β-d-maltopyranoside (DDM) (Anatrace), and 0.2% (w/v) cholesteryl hemisuccinate (CHS) (Sigma) for 3 hours at 4°C. The unsolubilized material was removed by centrifugation at 250,000g for 45 min. The supernatant was incubated overnight with TALON immobilized metal affinity chromatography resin (1 ml of resin per 1 liter of expression culture; Takara-Clontech) in the presence of 20 mM imidazole. After overnight binding, the resin was washed with 10 column volumes of 50 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 800 mM NaCl, 10% (v/v) glycerol, 25 mM imidazole, 0.1% (w/v) DDM, 0.02% (w/v) CHS, 10 mM MgCl2, 8 mM adenosine 5′-triphosphate (Sigma), and 100 μM ZM241385 (Tocris; prepared as 100 mM stock in dimethyl sulfoxide), followed by 5 column volumes of 50 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 800 mM NaCl, 10% (v/v) glycerol, 50 mM imidazole, 0.05% (w/v) DDM, 0.01% (w/v) CHS, and 100 μM ZM241385. The receptor was eluted with 3 ml of elution buffer containing 25 mM Hepes (pH 7.5), 800 mM NaCl, 10% (v/v) glycerol, 220 mM imidazole, 0.01% (w/v) DDM, 0.002% (w/v) CHS, and 100 μM ZM241385. Purified receptor was concentrated to ~60 mg/ml with a 100-kDa molecular weight cutoff Amicon concentrator (Millipore). Receptor purity and monodispersity were analyzed by SDS–polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and analytical size exclusion chromatography.
Concentrated protein samples of A2AAR-BRIL in complex with ZM241385 were reconstituted into LCP by mixing with molten lipid using a syringe mixer (35). The protein-LCP mixture contained 40% (w/w) protein solution, 54% (w/w) monoolein (Sigma), and 6% (w/w) cholesterol (Sigma). Crystals for SFX data collection were obtained in Hamilton gas-tight syringes using the following procedure (26). Approximately 6 μl of protein-laden LCP was injected into a 100-μl syringe filled with 60 μl of precipitant solution [28% (v/v) PEG-400, 40 mM sodium thiocyanate, and 100 mM sodium citrate (pH 5.0)] and incubated for 24 hours at 20°C. After crystals had formed, excess precipitant solution was carefully removed, followed by the addition of ~3 μl of 7.9 MAG (monoacylglycerol) (36). The 7.9 MAG was used to prevent the appearance of a lipidic lamellar crystal phase due to rapid dehydration and cooling upon injection of LCP into vacuum (10−4 torr). The microcrystal samples were characterized on site at LCLS by optical and ultraviolet fluorescence imaging. The average microcrystal size was 5 × 5 × 2 μm3 (fig. S1).
Experiments were performed using the CXI instrument (24) at the LCLS at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. The LCLS was operated at a wavelength of 2.07 Å (6.0 keV), delivering individual x-ray pulses of 45-fs pulse duration and ~1.7 × 1011 photons per pulse focused into a spot size of approximately 1.5 μm in diameter using a pair of Kirkpatrick-Baez mirrors. Microcrystals of A2AAR-BRIL/ZM241385 were delivered in the LCP medium using a microextrusion injector (7) with 50-μm nozzle running at a flow rate of ~220 nl/min. Diffraction images were recorded at a rate of 7200 patterns/min (120 Hz) with the 2.3-megapixel CSPAD (64 independent detectors of 194 pixels × 184 pixels with a pixel size of 110 × 110 μm2 each tiled to cover an area of 200 × 200 mm2) (37). Background subtraction and detector correction were performed with the Cheetah software (27). Pedestal signal arising from the detector was removed by subtracting an average dark image from each frame and using unbonded pixels as a shot-to-shot dark reference for common mode corrections. Hot pixels were identified and masked. The software was also used to discriminate the patterns containing crystal diffraction, which were named “hits,” from the rest of the blank shots by locating pixel clusters that lie above a given threshold. These images were processed with the CrystFEL software package (version 0.6.1) (28). The unit cell parameters were first determined using a subset of the collected data. Subsequent indexing was performed by comparing the resulted unit cell parameters to the determined ones, allowing a tolerance of 15% in reciprocal space axis lengths and 3° in reciprocal space angles. The detector geometry and the sample-to-detector distance were first optimized using a virtual powder pattern from lysozyme crystals, which were collected at the beginning of the experiment, and further refined at this stage using geoptimiser (38). Multiple indexing runs were performed, each by using finer detector geometry corrections to get the final stream of processed data. The complete set of scattered intensities was obtained by merging (treating Friedel pairs as separate reflections) and iteratively scaling all the reflections using partialator (CrystFEL package) without partiality correction. Specifically, the algorithm first generates a reference set, averaging the reflections from single diffraction patterns and applying polarization corrections, followed by applying linear and Debye-Waller scaling of the diffraction patterns using least-squares minimization of residuals on a logarithmic scale, similar to the method previously described (39). Three cycles of scaling were used to generate the final data set. Through these scaling cycles, 15,376 crystals were rejected because they had either not enough common reflections with the merged data set to permit scaling or relative Debye-Waller factors greater than 100 Å2 or lower than −100 Å2. The final A2A_S-SAD data set was truncated at 2.5 Å resolution using the CC* >0.7 criterion (fig. S4A and table S1).
The high-resolution data set (A2A_High-Res) was collected using a similar setup as for the A2A_S-SAD set, except for the x-ray energy of 9.8 keV (1.27 Å), and the flux of ~6.4 × 1010 photons per pulse. A total of 948,961 images were collected, 232,283 of which were identified as hits with the Cheetah program (24.5% hit rate). Of these hits, 72,735 were successfully indexed and merged using the standard CrystFEL pipeline of Monte Carlo averaging. The merging procedure was performed using per-pattern resolution cutoff with the “pushres 1.8” option and without an additional scaling step. Scaling and partiality refinement were tested but did not result in any significant improvement of data quality. The final A2A_High-Res data set was truncated at 1.9 Å resolution using the CC* >0.5 criterion (table S1).
Integrated and scaled intensities of the A2A_S-SAD data set in CrysFEL format were converted to the XSCALE (40) format, followed by conversion to the CCP4 mtz and SHELX formats. Anomalous signal strength was analyzed with phenix.xtriage (31) and was found to extend to ~3.6 Å (fig. S2A). The substructure was found with SHELXD (19) (OS X version 2013/2) using the graphical user interface hkl2map (41), varying the resolution cutoff from 3.0 to 3.6 Å in 0.1 Å increments, the Emin from 1.5 to 1.2, the number of sites from 10 to 20, the number of disulfides from 0 to 4, and the number of trials from 1000 to 5000. A clear drop in occupancy from 0.72 to 0.42 at the 3.5 Å resolution cutoff (fig. S2C) was used as an indicator for the correct solution. After removing the five low-occupancy atoms, the substructure was used as an input in Phaser EP (29) for log-likelihood gradient map substructure completion and phasing. The resulting phases for both enantiomorphs with an FOM of 0.418 and a log-likelihood gain of 505 were subjected to density modification and phase extension using Resolve (30) with the mask type “Wang.” The correct hand was identified by success in autotracing. The model was traced automatically with phenix.autobuild (31), and it was possible to build 264 of 447 residues (59%) with R/Rfree = 0.31/0.34.
Alternatively, we applied the automated crystal structure determination pipeline X2DF for the structure determination. X2DF automatically performs heavy atom search, S-SAD phasing, phase extension, density modification, and automated model building using different programs based on the “parameter-space screening” strategy (32). In the current version of X2DF pipeline, the parameters are different crystallography programs, such as phenix.autosol or SHELXC/D/E for heavy atom searching and phasing; DM or Parrot for density modification; phenix.autobuild, ARP/wARP, or BUCCANEER for model building; and high-resolution cutoff values and incremental step values for heavy atom search, phasing, phase extension, number of heavy atoms, solvent content, space groups, etc. For difficult-to-solve structures, such as S-SAD phasing, only a limited number of combinations of parameters may lead to successful structure solutions. Taking advantage of high-performance computer cluster’s parallel computing power, X2DF pipeline explores a much larger multidimensional parameter space than what a human can do manually.
In this case, the 2.5 Å data set was subjected to the following steps of structure solution determination using the X2DF pipeline. The pipeline was configured to use SHELXC/D for sulfur atom substructure determination, Phaser EP for phasing, DM for phase extension, and phenix.autobuild for model building. Three-dimensional parameter-space screening was performed. The three screening parameters were (i) number of heavy atoms (screening range, 1 to 24 based on the sequence), (ii) high-resolution limits for heavy atom search (screening range, 2.5 to 4.0 Å; step, 0.1 Å), and (iii) high-resolution limits for phasing (screening range, 2.5 to 4.0 Å; step, 0.1 Å). A total of 7843 computing jobs were created, of which 200 jobs returned the correct structure solutions. The best combination resulted in a structure solution with 294 of 447 residues (66%) automatically traced, an R value of 28.7%, and an Rfree value of 30.2%. The best number of sulfur sites in the search was 10; however, SHELX yielded 18 sites, from which six low-occupancy sites were removed automatically before phase calculation. We observed that multiple combinations of high-resolution limits for sulfur site search and phasing could lead to structure solutions (fig. S3). The best high-resolution limits for sulfur site search and phasing were 3.60 and 3.25 Å, respectively. This result demonstrates that the X2DF pipeline could be used as a powerful tool for S-SAD structure determination with SFX data.
The structure was further built and refined by repetitive cycling with phenix.refine (42) using experimental phase restraints with MLHL (phased maximum likelihood) target function followed by manual examination and rebuilding of the refined coordinates with Coot (43). The final model (A2A_S-SAD_2.5), refined to R/Rfree = 17.4/22.8 against the 2.5 Å A2A_S-SAD data using isotropic ADPs and three TLS groups consisting of residues −2 to 208, 1001 to 1106, and 219 to 308, contains the complete A2AAR-BRIL construct sequence, except for an unresolved gap (1045–1055) in one of the BRIL loops, ligand ZM241385, 3 cholesterol molecules, 20 lipids, and 70 waters. The overall structure had a good stereochemistry with no Ramachandran outliers (99.0% in favored and 1.0% in allowed regions), as determined with MolProbity (44).
Resolution was then further extended to 1.9 Å by refining against the A2A_High-Res data set while using the same Rfree set, extended to 1.9 Å, and experimental phase restraints from the 2.5 Å A2A_S-SAD data. The final A2A_S-SAD_1.9 model, refined to R/Rfree = 17.3/20.8 using isotropic ADPs and three TLS groups consisting of residues −2 to 208, 1001 to 1106, and 219 to 308, contains the complete A2AAR-BRIL construct sequence except for an unresolved gap (1045–1055) in one of the BRIL loops, ligand ZM241385, 3 cholesterol molecules, 21 lipids, and 105 waters. The overall structure had a good stereochemistry with no Ramachandran outliers (99.0% in favored and 1.0% in allowed regions), as determined with MolProbity (44).
In parallel, we applied MR using the previously obtained A2AAR structure (PDB: 4EIY; without BRIL, ligands, and waters) as a search model, using the A2A_High-Res data truncated at 1.9 and 2.5 Å resolution. The MR structures were refined by repetitive cycling with phenix.refine (42) using the same Rfree set as for the S-SAD structures, followed by manual examination and rebuilding of the refined coordinates with Coot (43). The final refinement was done with three TLS groups, consisting of residues −2 to 208, 1001 to 1106, and 219 to 308. The final model was fully completed with no gaps except missing residues 1044–1055 in BRIL. The overall structure contained a good stereochemistry with no Ramachandran outliers (99.0% in favored and 1.0% in allowed regions), as determined by MolProbity (44). The crystallographic refinement statistics are shown in table S2.
fig. S1. A2A-BRIL/ZM241385 microcrystals used for data collection.
fig. S2. Strength of anomalous signal and sulfur atom search.
fig. S3. Parameter-space screening results for S-SAD phasing using the X2DF pipeline.
fig. S4. Effect of different data processing methods on data merging metrics.
fig. S5. Dependence of anomalous signal measurability on the number of indexed patterns.
fig. S6. Final 1.9 Å XFEL room temperature A2AAR-BRIL structure (A2A_S-SAD_1.9).
fig. S7. Structure-factor amplitude difference Fourier map between A2A_S-SAD_2.5 and A2A_MR_2.5 structures.
fig. S8. B factor comparison between A2A_S-SAD_2.5 and A2A_MR_2.5 structures.
fig. S9. Comparison of 2mFo-DFc electron density maps for the ligand- and sodium-binding pockets obtained by S-SAD and MR phasing.
fig. S10. Cα-Cα difference distance matrix between A2A_S-SAD_1.9 and previously determined A2AAR structure (PDB: 4EIY).
fig. S11. B factor comparison between room temperature A2A_S-SAD_1.9 and previously determined cryocooled A2AAR structure (PDB: 4EIY).
fig. S12. Distribution of Cys and Met residues in human proteins.
table S1. Data collection statistics.
table S2. Data refinement statistics.
table S3. Comparison of interactions involving charged residues between PDB: 4EIY and A2A_S-SAD_1.9 structures.
table S4. Comparison of protein and data collection parameters for successful S-SAD phasing of XFEL data.
, Serial femtosecond crystallography: The first five years. IUCrJ 2, 246–255 (2015).
, Time-resolved serial crystallography captures high-resolution intermediates of photoactive yellow protein. Science 346, 1242–1246 (2014).
, Femtosecond X-ray protein nanocrystallography. Nature 470, 73–77 (2011).
, Structure-factor analysis of femtosecond microdiffraction patterns from protein nanocrystals. Acta Crystallogr. A A67, 131–140 (2011).
, Post-refinement method for snapshot serial crystallography. Philos. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B Biol. Sci. 369, 20130330 (2014).
, Enabling X-ray free electron laser crystallography for challenging biological systems from a limited number of crystals. Elife 4, e05421 (2015).
, Lipidic cubic phase injector facilitates membrane protein serial femtosecond crystallography. Nat. Commun. 5, 3309 (2014).
, A novel inert crystal delivery medium for serial femtosecond crystallography. IUCrJ 2, 421–430 (2015).
, Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase. IUCrJ 2, 545–551 (2015).
, Grease matrix as a versatile carrier of proteins for serial crystallography. Nat. Methods 12, 61–63 (2015).
, Serial femtosecond crystallography of G protein–coupled receptors. Science 342, 1521–1524 (2013).
, Structure of the angiotensin receptor revealed by serial femtosecond crystallography. Cell 161, 833–844 (2015).
, Crystal structure of rhodopsin bound to arrestin by femtosecond X-ray laser. Nature 523, 561–567 (2015).
, De novo protein crystal structure determination from X-ray free-electron laser data. Nature 505, 244–247 (2014).
, An isomorphous replacement method for efficient de novo phasing for serial femtosecond crystallography. Sci. Rep. 5, 14017 (2015).
, Redox-coupled proton transfer mechanism in nitrite reductase revealed by femtosecond crystallography. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 113, 2928–2933 (2016).
, Structure of the hydrophobic protein crambin determined directly from the anomalous scattering of sulphur. Nature 290, 107–113 (1981).
, Phasing on anomalous signal of sulfurs: What is the limit?. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D59, 1020–1027 (2003).
, Experimental phasing with SHELXC/D/E: Combining chain tracing with density modification. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D66, 479–485 (2010).
, Structures from anomalous diffraction of native biological macromolecules. Science 336, 1033–1037 (2012).
, Fast native-SAD phasing for routine macromolecular structure determination. Nat. Methods 12, 131–133 (2015).
, Native sulfur/chlorine SAD phasing for serial femtosecond crystallography. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D71, 2519–2525 (2015).
, Protein structure determination by single-wavelength anomalous diffraction phasing of X-ray free-electron laser data. IUCrJ 3, 180–191 (2016).
, The Coherent X-ray Imaging instrument at the Linac Coherent Light Source. J. Synchrotron Radiat. 22, 514–519 (2015).
, Structural basis for allosteric regulation of GPCRs by sodium ions. Science 337, 232–236 (2012).
, Preparation of microcrystals in lipidic cubic phase for serial femtosecond crystallography. Nat. Protoc. 9, 2123–2134 (2014).
, Cheetah: Software for high-throughput reduction and analysis of serial femtosecond X-ray diffraction data. J. Appl. Crystallogr. 47, 1118–1131 (2014).
, CrystFEL: A software suite for snapshot serial crystallography. J. Appl. Crystallogr. 45, 335–341 (2012).
, Maximum-likelihood density modification. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D56, 965–972 (2000).
, PHENIX: A comprehensive Python-based system for macromolecular structure solution. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D66, 213–221 (2010).
, Parameter-space screening: A powerful tool for high-throughput crystal structure determination. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D61, 520–527 (2005).
, New insights from structural biology into the druggability of G protein-coupled receptors. Trends Pharmacol. Sci. 33, 249–260 (2012).
, Allosteric sodium in class A GPCR signaling. Trends Biochem. Sci. 39, 233–244 (2014).
, Crystallizing membrane proteins using lipidic mesophases. Nat. Protoc. 4, 706–731 (2009).
, Rational design of lipid for membrane protein crystallization. J. Struct. Biol. 148, 169–175 (2004).
, X-ray detectors at the Linac Coherent Light Source. J. Synchrotron Radiat. 22, 577–583 (2015).
, Accurate determination of segmented X-ray detector geometry. Opt. Express 23, 28459–28470 (2015).
, Processing of X-ray snapshots from crystals in random orientations. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D70, 2204–2216 (2014).
, XDS. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D66, 125–132 (2010).
, HKL2MAP: A graphical user interface for macromolecular phasing with SHELX programs. J. Appl. Crystallogr. 37, 843–844 (2004).
, Towards automated crystallographic structure refinement with phenix.refine. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D68, 352–367 (2012).
, Features and development of Coot. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D66, 486–501 (2010).
, MolProbity: All-atom structure validation for macromolecular crystallography. Acta Crystallogr. D Biol. Crystallogr. D66, 12–21 (2010).
Acknowledgments: We thank A. Walker for assistance with manuscript preparation. A. Batyuk thanks A. Plückthun for helpful discussions. Funding: This work was supported by NIH grants R01 GM108635 (V.C.), U54 GM094618 (V.C., V.K., and R.C.S.), U54 GM094599 (P.F.), and R01 GM095583 (P.F.); by the Ministry of Science and Technology of China grant 2014CB910400 (Z.-j.L.); and by the NSF Science and Technology Center award 1231306 (J.C.H.S, U.W., W.L., and P.F.). C.G. thanks the PIER Helmholtz Graduate School and, together with L.G., A. Barty, and T.A.W., the Helmholtz Association for financial support through project-oriented funds. P.A.P. and V.C. acknowledge support from the Russian Ministry of Education and Science project 5-100. Parts of the sample delivery system used at LCLS for this research was funded by the NIH grant P41 GM103393, formerly P41 RR001209. Use of LCLS at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) National Accelerator Laboratory is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences under contract number DE-AC02-76SF00515. Author contributions: A. Batyuk prepared the samples, participated in data collection, solved the structure, analyzed the data, and wrote the paper; L.G. processed and analyzed the data and contributed to the writing of the paper; C.G. participated in data collection and processed and analyzed the data; A.I., B.S., M.-Y.L., and W.L. prepared the samples, participated in data collection, and analyzed the data; G.W.H. performed structure refinement; M.P. and Z.-j.L. analyzed the data and contributed to the writing of the paper; G.N., D.J., C.L., and Y.Z. operated the LCP injector; U.W. designed and operated the LCP injector and contributed to the writing of the paper; P.A.P. and V.K. analyzed the results and contributed to the writing of the paper; S.B., M.S.H., A.A., and M.L. set up the CXI beamline controls and data acquisition, operated the beamline, and performed the data collection; P.F. assisted with sample characterization and data collection; A. Barty and T.A.W. wrote the data processing software and contributed to data processing and the writing of the paper; J.C.H.S. contributed to data analysis and to the writing of the paper; R.C.S. supervised GPCR production; V.C. conceived the project, designed the experiments, supervised the data collection, analyzed the results, and wrote the paper. Competing interests: U.W. and J.C.H.S. have filed a patent application (US 20160051995) for the LCP injector. All other authors declare that they have no competing interests. Data and materials availability: Coordinates and the structure factors have been deposited in the Protein Data Bank under accession codes 5K2C (A2A S-SAD_1.9 data set), 5K2D (A2A MR_1.9 data set), 5K2A (A2A S-SAD_2.5 data set), and 5K2B (A2A MR_2.5 data set). Additional data related to this paper may be requested from the authors. | 2019-04-25T15:44:55Z | https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/2/9/e1600292 |
Charging order made shortly a bankruptcy order.
Limitation points - in particular charging order made more than 12 years ago not made unenforceable by Limitation Act 1980.
Tomlin order - created a trust which ranked in priority over a subsequent charging order.
A charging order that charges the legal estate may be protected by the entry of a notice.
A charging order that charges a beneficial interest under a trust of land cannot be protected by way of notice but can be protected by a restriction in standard form K.
An interim and final charging order may each be protected by the entry of a notice or restriction as appropriate.
For more information about the effect of a notice or restriction and how to apply for their entry or removal, see Practice Guide 19 – Notices, restrictions and protection of third party interests in the register.
An application to the court for a charging order on the legal estate is a pending land action and is capable of protection by entry of a notice.
However, an application to the court for a charging order in respect of a beneficial interest under a trust cannot be protected by notice because it does not appear to be a pending land action, as the applicant is seeking a charging order over an interest in a trust, not in land. As an application to the court does not give the applicant a beneficial interest such an application cannot be protected by a restriction.
A charging order on property was allowed to stand where it had been made shortly before a bankruptcy order was made, even though the court making the charging order was unaware of the petition. The court did have a discretion to set aside the charging in order in these circumstances but "some additional feature" was needed; the default position was to let the charging order remain.
In a conventional mortgage lending situation we know that the date on which the right to receive the money accrues depends on the terms of the mortgage, typically following two months arrears or following a demand for repayment (see further here). But does s20 apply in respect of a charging order, and if so, since there are no terms and conditions for repayment, when does the right to receive the money accrue for the purposes of limitation? These issues were resolved in this claim, in relation to a trustee in bankruptcy, who was seeking to enforce a charging order over the bankrupt's share in a residential property.
Lindsay J held that s20(1) Limitation Act 1980 (12-year limitation period on actions to recover principal money secured by a charge on property) extended to legal charges imposed by the Court (in favour of a trustee in bankruptcy), and that the "right to receive the money" for the purposes of that section accrues concurrently with the making of the charging order. Accordingly, on the facts, the trustee's application for sale was out of time. The trustee in bankruptcy appealed.
The Court of Appeal held that in the context of the Limitation Acts and the accrual of "rights to receive" it was implicit that the right to receive was a present right to receive. Time did not run in respect of future causes of action. A charge imposed under s313 Insolvency Act 1986 (such as this one) secured a future obligation and until the obligation was a present one no right to receive the principal sum secured could accrue. It followed that time had not started to run under s20(1), and would not do so until an order for sale had been made.
A charging order that was not enforced for more than 12 years was not made unenforceable by the Limitation Act 1980.
A bank obtained a money judgment against the defendant ("D") and a charging order against his interest in a property. However, it took no steps to enforce the judgment or charging order for more than 12 years.
D then applied to set aside the charging order. He contended that under s20(1) of the Limitation Act 1980 no action could be brought to recover any principal sum secured by a mortgage or charge on property after the expiry of 12 years, and that the charging order was therefore unenforceable.
The bank argued that judgment debts were outside the ambit of the Limitation Act and the mere fact that the judgment had been secured by a charging order did not bring it within the Limitation Act.
The Court of Appeal was constrained to follow Ezekiel v Orakpo 1 WLR 340. That case concerned a slightly different point. There the court held that a judgment creditor with the benefit of a charging order was entitled to interest for more than six years, and that s20(5) did not apply. Since the language of s20(5) was precisely comparable to s 20(1) it would follow that s 20(1) had no application in respect of principal monies secured by a charging order. The Court of Appeal did not consider that the findings in Ezekiel v Orakpo were per incuriam and accordingly held that there were no provisions in the Limitation Act 1980 which affect the enforcement of the charging order by the bank.
It also followed that National Westminster Bank Plc v Ashe EWCA Civ 55 - extinction of mortgagee’s title by virtue of s 17 Limitation Act 1980 - did not apply (and so make the charging order unenforceable) either because the holder of a charging order did not have a right to possession such that time can run against it under s15 and that extinction of title could not occur under s17.
The Court of Appeal also distinguished Gotham v Doodes EWCA Civ 1080 (see above) in which the Court had held that s20(1) did apply to a charging order on the basis that in that case it was a different kind of charging order created under s313 Insolvency Act 1986 in favour of a trustee in bankruptcy.
Further, there was nothing inconsistent with the decision of the House of Lords in Lowsley v Forbes 3 WLR 501 which provided that s24(2) Limitation Act 1980 applied so as to limit the arrears of interest that can be secured by a charging order, when first made, to six years.
It was not anomalous to conclude that the holder of a charging order was in a position less vulnerable to a limitation defence than the holder of a legal mortgage. In the case of a charging order the creditor has already brought, and succeeded in, his proceedings on the debt. In such a case it is unnecessary to protect the defendant from stale claims on the basis that it may be difficult to collect together the relevant evidence. The parties’ rights have been established by court proceedings and it is only then a question of enforcement.
This is a useful decision not just because it confirms that charging orders obtained by judgment creditors remain enforceable regardless of limitation, but because it also provides some useful clarity on a number of other limitation related issues affecting charging orders.
On its proper construction, a Tomlin Order created a declaration of trust in respect of certain property and ranked in priority over a subsequent charging order obtained by a judgment creditor.
CSS sued Mr D. H Solicitors acted for him. The claim was settled with a Tomlin Order, the Schedule to which provided for the sale of a property and for the gross proceeds of sale to be applied (a) in discharge of a prior mortgage; (b) in payment of £100,000 to CSS; (c) in discharge of the costs and fees of sale; (d) in discharge of certain other debts; and (e) for the balance (if any) to be paid to CSS.
H Solicitors signed the Tomlin Order for D. H Solicitors subsequently ceased to act for D and obtained judgment for their unpaid fees and interest amounting to just over £19,000. They secured the judgment by way of a final charging order against the property before it was sold, protected by a unilateral notice.
When the property was eventually sold it only left net proceeds after discharging the prior mortgage of £49,000. According to the Tomlin Order, that was due to CSS. H Solicitors claimed that it had priority by reason of its equitable charge.
CSS claimed that the Tomlin Order gave it an equitable charge ranking in priority to H Solicitors, or that it amounted to an effective declaration of trust. H Solicitors argued that the Schedule to the Tomlin Order was insufficiently clear to secure a proprietary interest.
Did the Schedule confer on CSS a proprietary interest in the property?
Did H Solicitors obtain priority by reason of its charging order and unilateral notice?
It was held as to the first issue, that the Schedule conferred on CSS a beneficial interest, not by way of equitable charge, but by way of trust.
As to the second issue, the basic rule as to priority is that the first in time prevails, but this is subject to the rule that where a registrable disposition of a registered estate is made for valuable consideration, completion of the disposition by registration has the effect of postponing to the interest under the disposition any interest affecting the estate immediately before the disposition whose priority is not protected at the time of registration (see Land Registration Act 2002, ss. 28-30).
It was for H Solicitors to show that their charging order was a disposition made for valuable consideration (Halifax Plc v Curry Popeck EWHC 1692 (Ch)). The debtor receives no consideration from the judgment creditor and therefore the judgment creditor is a volunteer (United Bank of Kuwait Plc v Sahib Ch 107 per Chadwick J).
At first instance the court held that the final charging order obtained by H Solicitors was ineffective to confer priority over CSS’s beneficial interest.
The principal issue before the Court of Appeal was whether the effect of the compromise agreement embodied in the Tomlin Order was to create a proprietary interest in the property, or only an unsecured personal obligation of D.
The need for an intention to create a proprietary interest had to be clearly shown – per Tradegro (UK) Ltd v Wigmore Street Investments Ltd EWCA Civ 268. A mere agreement for valuable consideration that a fund shall be applied in a particular way will not amount to an equitable assignment – per Palmer v Carey AC 703 per Lord Wrenbury at pp 706-707.
However, the structure of the agreement embodied in the Tomlin Order was such that the entire net proceeds of sale of the property were to be paid to CSS, subject to satisfaction of certain costs and liabilities. The property was therefore wholly appropriated to the settlement and the judge was right to analyse the agreement as one which gave CSS the whole of D’s net equity in the property (subject to the costs and liabilities). He was therefore under a positive obligation to sell the property and it was an agreement which the court would enforce by an order for specific performance. The agreement therefore created an equitable interest in favour of CSS.
As to whether the proprietary interest created by the equitable interest ranked in priority to H Solicitors’ equitable charge, it was accepted by H Solicitors that their charging order was not “made for valuable consideration”.
Even assuming that the obtaining of a final charging order is a registrable disposition of a registered estate, the basic rule as to priorities applies. Equitable interests rank in priority according to the time of their creation (save where s29 or s30 provides otherwise). Accordingly the interest created in favour of CSS by the Tomlin Order ranked in priority to H Solicitors’ charging order.
The court has jurisdiction to make a charging order whenever it is satisfied that the judgment debtor has an interest in relevant property, even though the extent of the interest cannot be quantified at that time.
Mr & Mrs W lived in a property which was registered in the sole name of Mr W but in respect of which Mrs W initially claimed to have an equitable interest. Mrs W commenced proceedings against Mrs A for breach of contract relating to the sale of a pony. The claim was dismissed with an order for costs in Mrs A’s favour (with a payment on account of £30,000). In default of payment, Mrs A sought and obtained a charging order in respect of Mrs W’s interest with a further order for costs.
Mrs W was given permission to appeal subject to directions for disclosure with an order that in the event of non-compliance, the appeal should be dismissed. The directions for disclosure were not properly complied with and at the substantive appeal hearing the Circuit Judge held that the appeal had been dismissed, subject to permission to apply for relief from sanction which he also dismissed.
Mrs W appealed (with permission of the High Court Judge) against the refusal to grant relief from sanction and in respect of the court’s jurisdiction to grant a charging order against an unquantified beneficial interest in land.
The High Court Appeal dismissed the appeal. The Court held that the Circuit Judge had applied the correct test in refusing relief from sanction.
As to the jurisdiction to grant a final charging order, it was sufficient for the purposes of giving the court jurisdiction to make a charging order under the Charging Orders Act 1979 that the court is satisfied that the judgment debtor has some beneficial interest in relevant property, even though the precise extent of that interest cannot be quantified at the time the charging order is made (First National Securities v Hegarty 1 QB 850). The obvious juncture at which the court would be likely to be called upon to resolve the precise extent of the judgment debtor’s beneficial interest in the property would be if and when the judgment creditor decided to apply for an order for sale, although there is nothing inappropriate in having to resolve the precise extent of the judgment debtor’s interest some time after the final charging order is made. The decision whether to grant an order for sale is a very different discretionary decision to the decision to make the charging order final. On the application for an order for sale, a variety of other factors must be taken into account, including rights under Article 8 ECHR.
As to timing, the general rule is that a chargee can look to his own interests in deciding whether and if so when to enforce his security by seeking to exercise a power of sale, see, for example, Silven Properties Ltd v RBS 1 WLR 997. The same must apply to the holder of a charging order.
Provided the court is satisfied the judgment debtor has an interest in relevant property, the court will usually make a charging order. In practice, the quantification of the interest (and the determination of competing claims) usually takes place when the court considers whether to make an order for sale. If at that stage the court determines that the judgment debtor has no interest, it will discharge the charging order.
The High Court reviewed the principles upon which a court could, without notice, amend a charging order under the slip rule.
S obtained against O a money judgment for £5,000 and an order for costs to be assessed, subject to an interim payment of £10,000, which O did not immediately pay. S obtained a final charging order which recited that (1) the interim charging order shall continue, and that (2) O’s interest [in the property] shall stand charged with £15,000 owing under the judgment together with further interest becoming due, and £408 for the costs of the application.
S applied by letter to the district judge (which was not copied to O) to amend the order under the slip rule on the basis that (1) the interim charging order had been made final, and (2) the order should also include S’s costs awarded under the original order which had by then been provisionally assessed at £40,617.26.
The district judge exercised her power under the slip rule (without notice to O) to amend (1) to recite that it was a final charging order on all sums due under the original order with interest, and (2) to recite that O’s interest shall stand charged with the payment of the amount now owing under the judgment together with further interest and fixed costs of £408.
S’s costs were subsequently assessed at £42,717.86 and in default of payment of the judgment sum and the total amount of costs (£55,997.44). S issued a Part 8 Claim for an order for sale.
O subsequently issued an application to set aside the amended final charging order (but then paid the amount claimed with further costs).
The district judge refused the application and (upon payment having been made) ordered that the amended final charging order be discharged. She also required S to notify the court upon discontinuance of the Part 8 Claim, but when the order was drawn up it recited that the Part 8 Claim be dismissed.
O appealed on various grounds, but essentially challenged the court’s jurisdiction to amend the order under the slip rule and to dismiss the Part 8 Claim.
The court’s jurisdiction to make a charging order under s 1(1) Charging Orders Act 1979 extends to the payment of any money due or to become due under a judgment or order.
The court may at any time correct an accidental slip or omission in a judgment or order.
A party may apply for a correction without notice.
Although CPR 40.12 uses the word ‘slip’, its real purpose is to ensure the order conforms with what the court intended, even if the error which has originally been made in drawing up the order is substantial. There should genuinely have been an accidental error or omission: the slip rule should not be used to permit the court to have second or additional thoughts or to add a provision having substantive effect which was not in the contemplation of the parties or the court at the hearing (Bristol-Myers Squibb v Baker Norton Pharmaceuticals (No. 2) RPC 45 considered).
The core question is what was the true meaning and effect of the amendments made by the district judge under the slip rule?
The meaning of the amendment to paragraph (1) was tolerably clear – it made clear that the intention of the district judge was to make a final charging order.
The meaning of the amendment to paragraph (2) was to include the unpaid interest which had become due on the judgment sum of £15,000 to the date of the charging order together with any further interest that might become due after that date and fixed costs. Since the costs had not been assessed by then, no such amount was ‘now owing’ and it was therefore not included in the amended final charging order.
Had it been intended to include an uncertain future amount within the scope of the charging order, the charging order would have had to refer to costs ‘becoming due upon final assessment’ or similar wording. The amendment could not be characterised as substantial. The only change made was to remove the number of £15,000 to allow for accrued interest. The district judge was not persuaded to include the costs ordered to be assessed.
S, at least by implication, overstated the scope of the amended final charging order in making her Part 8 Claim, but whether S could include the increased amount but not covered by the amended final charging order was a matter for O to raise at the hearing of the Part 8 Claim. It was not relevant to the appeal.
The appeal against the dismissal of the Part 8 Claim was hopeless. It was within the case management powers of the district judge to make orders dealing with the Part 8 Claim. The court could see no reason why either the discontinuance or dismissal of the Part 8 Claim should in any way inhibit or prevent O from seeking to recover an alleged overpayment.
This is a slightly unusual case on the facts, but it helpfully indicates that the purpose of the slip rule is to ensure the order as drawn reflects what the court intended, even if the outcome is substantial, and that this can be achieved without notice to the other party (although if the applicant, or the court anticipates argument on the proposed amendment, it would be just and proportionate to list the matter or hearing on notice to the other party).
Perhaps the most significant point made by court is that a charging order can, with appropriate wording, extend to include costs which had been awarded but not yet assessed. These had not been included in the charging order made by the district judge and had been wrongfully included in the subsequent Part 8 Claim for an order for sale. The fact that the defendant paid the full amount did not preclude him from seeking to recover them. | 2019-04-25T22:33:41Z | http://propertylawuk.net/mortgagechargingorder.html |
Google AdWords API is now updated to v201809.
Team admins can now see the list of the default dashboard templates along with the team templates in a Dashboard .template designer. There is also an option to unable/disable the templates.
Facebook and Facebook ads API is now updated to v3.2.
You can now drill down the FreshDesk tickets date right down to minutes.
Split function is now available for SaaS data sources.
A dimension Date of Last Activity is now available in Organizations dataset for Insightly.
We also have fixed a number of bugs and made some local improvements.
FreshDesk connector: new measures ‘First Response Time’ and ‘Time To Resolution’ were added to the Tickets Dataset.
You can now drill down the FreshDesk tickets date right down to hours.
Insightly connector: new ‘User Responsible’ field was added to the Projects dataset.
You can now create aliases for column headings in a Simple table chart.
FreshDesk connector: new “Freshdesk Quarter Overview” dashboard template added.
Year-on-Year calculation now works for the Weeks dimension level.
Floating range filter: fixed the behaviour of the filter when it is added to several dashboard sheets.
Mongo DB conenctor: added an ability to filter charts by measure.
QuickBooks connector: “Company name” and “Customer name” fields were added to QuickBooks datasets.
We have released a new authorization type (OAuth) for Pipedrive connector.
Added ability to use CREATE, DROP and INSERT in SQL queries in datasets.
You can now add comments to your SQL queries in Slemma.
Team member list optimization: we have added a pagination and improved the speed of uploading big lists of new users.
Pipedrive connector optimization: big datasets are now updated fast.
Chart Descriptions are now available for the dashboards shared by public links.
Insightly connector: new “Organizations” dataset added.
Several changes and improvements for our Pipedrive connector.
Mongo DB integration: additional options are added to the integration settings.
New Dropbox Business connector is now available.
Google AdWords integration: supported API version updated to v201802.
Some changes in SSO settings for custom domains.
Salesforce integration: added an ability to create your own datasets using SOQL.
Insightly connector: new fields added to the Opportunities dataset.
QuickBooks integration: new Transactions dataset.
We have fixed a number of bugs and made some local improvements.
Wrike connector: new “Projects” dataset added.
We’ve added a “Single selection” option to the Format>Interaction menu of the Chart Editor. Enable this option if you wish to disable multiple selection of chart elements when working with Actions, for example.
In the Cross-table chart type, we now merge column and row headers when they repeat.
New Date format available in the Account settings (DD MMM YYYY).
We’ve added an ability to create folders via our API.
New Zoom levels for Scroll (1 day and 1 week).
You can now upload data from Google Sheets by URL (without creating integration with Google Drive).
You can now view and and restore recent versions of Dashboards, Reports and Presentations. Slemma keeps 10 older versions of objects. To access versions, right-click the infographics and select Details>Versions. Click a version to open it in a new tab (it won’t change the current version until you click the Save button).
When sharing a dashboard by a public link (Share & export>Get link option), you can now limit the list of IP addresses for which the object will be accessable.
Data blending: you can now blend two or more sources by one dimension in a Cross table (earlier, this option was available for the Combo chart type only).
New pre-build Calculations: year-over-year and year-on-year (compare your data for selected period with same period 1 year ago).
Pipedrive: we’ve added an ability to to set a time period for data from your Pipedrive to be uploaded and represented in each dataset.
Slemma now allows to add users (clients or team members) into multiple groups.
A brand new mechanism of working with foreign keys in the datasets created on database sources.
We’ve added an ability to open any chart in a “Full screen” mode. To do that, double click a chart when viewing a dashboard, or right click a chart and select Full Screen. Also, if you enabled drilling for your chart, the detailed diagram will be opened in the full-screen mode.
Salesforce Cubes connector: custom fields are now available for all datasets; new “Lead owner” dimension in the “Leads” dataset.
We’ve added an “open in a new tab” option to the dashboard’s menu in Navigator (main page).
Cross table: you can now add three dimensions to Rows and three to Columns (previously, only two dimensions were available for adding).
Insightly connector: new “Contact owner” dimension in the Contacts dataset.
Teams with White Label can enable SSO (Single Sign On) for the team.
We’ve changed our authorization form a bit to make it more convenient to login in a single click.
Team owners now have an ability to add user bundles via Slemma interface (Admin>Plan page). Adding bundles is available for Standard and Client Reporting plans.
On the Admin>Team members page, you can now see the current number of users in the team, and the total number of users available for the team.
Teams with Branding feature enabled can now choose which elements of the report header they want to include to exported PDF .
In the account settings, you can now select the Time format which will be displayed in all your charts (12/24 hours).
You can now add new team members right from the sharing menu.
Hubspot connector: new ‘Deal Stages’ dataset.
For clients and team members, we’ve added an ability to leave a team.
For teams with White Label and Custom Domain feature enabled, we now provide the aibility to configure the services for oAuth authorization.
Facebook connector: a bunch of new measures and dimensions are added to “Post Stats (Lifetime)” and “Page Stats by Day” datasets.
Pipedrive connector: new “Deals with Organization” dataset added.
ActiveCampaign connector: new “Deals” dataset added.
Toggl connector: new measures and dimensions are added to the “Time Entries” dataset.
MailChimp connector: new “Members” dataset added.
QuickBooks connector: new ‘VendorCredit’, ‘Deposit’, ‘Purchase’, ‘Journal Entry’ data in the ‘Expenses’ dataset.
Twitter connector: new ‘Tweet Type’ field in the ‘User Tweets’ dataset.
All dashboards, saved charts and presentations will now have team logo and Product name in the header. Teams with Branding feature enabled will be able to change or remove Slemma’s logo.
For fields which have the ‘currency’ type, you can now select any currency existing in the world.
Zendesk connector: new ‘SLA Stats’ and ‘Community Stats’ datasets.
When closing the Chart editor, you’ll now get a confirmation window if you have any unsaved changes.
If you got any errors during manual or auto refresh of a dataset based on a database connection, you can find the text of the error in the Details>Timelog menu of the dataset.
When sharing a report to Slack, you’ll see a peview picture appeared.
We’ve added an ability to use pre-built calculations in Google Analytics, Google AdWords, NewRelic and Mixpanel connectors.
PayPal connector: new Payments dataset.
You can now change field names in the dataset even if you have charts built on these fields. Renaming will not break your charts.
In Dashboard filetrs, you can now use WildCard selection (this allows, for example, to exclude items that contains/starts with a certain set of symbols).
In order to increase security, we prohibit using any third-party text formatting in dashboard’s text blocks.
Facebook Ads connector: new ‘Tags’ and ‘Busuness Name’ dimensions.
Hubspot connector: we optimized loading time for ‘Contacts’ dataset.
For measures calculated inside the dashboard, you can now set number format when creating or editing calculation.
New level for Date dimensions: you can now dig into your data up to the minutes.
New Date Range filters: if your Date dimension have hours or minutes date levels, you’ll see the new “Last N hours” and “Last N minutes” filter options.
Please note that ‘minutes’ and ‘hours’ levels are not enabled for date dimensions by default. To show hours or minutes in your charts, go to the Dataset editor, click your Date dimension and change the minimum possible date level.
In Presentations, you can now set a Slide timer. It will automatically switch slides in Presentation view mode and if you share your presentation to a device.
It is now available to show Sum in label for stacked columns.
Vertica connector: supported API version updated to 8.1.
Facebook Ads connector: supported API version updated to 2.10.
You can now change the Team owner by going to “Admin” > “Team settings” tab.
In PDF for exported objects, you can now enable a header, which contains the name and the logo of your company, and the object title (available for accounts with enabled “Branding” feature).
Stripe connector: new “MRR” dataset.
For dashboard filters, you can now click the “Pin” icon to display the pane with added filters at the top of the screen when scrolling.
For fields calculated in a dataset, you can now set “Geography” field type, or make such fields invisible in the Chart editor if needed.
You can now set “Geography” field type for any field in SaaS datasets. Earlier, field types in SaaS datasets were not editable.
Google Adwords connector: supported API version updated to v201705.
DropBox connector: supported API version updated.
When applying ‘highlight’ dashboard interaction from any chart to the table chart, the table will scroll to the highlighted values.
WooCommerce connector: new “Sales” dataset.
You can now set number format for measures calculated in dataset.
In the account settings, you can now configure decimal and thousands separators which will be displayed in all your charts.
Jira connector: new “Jira tickets worklogs” dataset.
Pipedrive connector: new “Stage Move Date” dimension in the “Deal Stages” dataset.
Added an ability to customize connectors with oAuth authorization via Admin section.
You can now create dashboard templates based on the dashboards shared with you by other team members.
Stripe connector: new “Net New MRR” dataset.
When generating a link to share your dashboard (Share & export > Get link), you can now edit the text and form your own link.
Security improvement: to avoid unauthorized changes and data leakage, the system logs you out after 15 minutes of inactivity. After logging back into the system, you’ll continue the session from the point you’ve stayed.
Check our new concise and informative website with both valuable information and downloadable content.
We’ve changed our plans and pricing. Click here to learn how current customers are affected by the Slemma 8.0 update.
Data refreshing mechanism has been completely updated.
We’ve made it easier to view and change refresh rates of all the dashboard’s data sources. Now, when you set a time for updates, the data will actually load at the time. When you open the dashboard, the data will already have been loaded into the system. This will create an extremely fast user experience! No more waiting for your dashboard to load.
The data refresh interval will be set on the Integration level. If you want an individual dataset to load the data more or less frequently, you can change the default on the dataset level as well. The data for all the dashboards associated with that integration, will be loaded according to the schedule.
Slemma now offers a library of Dashboard templates – the collection of quickstart dashboards. You can also create your own templates and share them with your team.
Updated Dynamic Filtering feature allows a single dashboard to be shared to many different team members, team member groups, clients and client groups with the data filtering by an Attribute Value. This Attribute Value is set for each custom attribute and will correspond to a field in the user’s data source.
Added an ability to change a knowledge base link so the link will lead to your own KB.
Added an ability to specify an email address to be displayed instead of the Support service when clicking on the Support button.
New ‘Show xero values’ feature. By default, if your data contains zero values for some dimension elements, they are displayed in a chart. If you want to hide such elements, disable Show zero values option in the Format > Chart menu.
After the end of the trial or when the subscription is cancelled, we don’t delete the account now – it goes into a “deactivated” stage for 6 months (for trial accounts) or for 60 days (for cancelled accounts).
We’ve fixed a number of bugs and made some local improvements.
For SaaS datasets, the ability to add Distinct-count measures is now available.
We’ve added the ability to change the order of filters on the Filter pane (drag and drop to reorder your filters).
When filtering chart by measure, you can now specify if you want to apply filter by aggregated values from the chart, or by raw values from the data source. To use raw values, enable the ‘Apply filter to raw data’ option.
Now it is possible to use filters, even when the chart uses parent level of calendar dimension, and the filter uses the child level. For example, you can filter a chart which displays data by Months level, using filter by Days level.
Running Total option is now available not only for Date dimensions, but also for Date Index dimensions.
In the Time Series chart type, you can now display the dates which are missing in your data source. Navigate to Format>Elements>Show skipped dates to enable this option.
When exporting a dashboard or a report to PDF, all the filters you’ve set are exporting and displayed at the top of the page.
You can now set the additional connection settings when you create or edit your database integrations. To change the settings, click the integration, select Edit and switch to the Advanced tab.
For standalone Slemma versions, we added an ability for Administrators to switch on/off any connector from the Administrator page.
New feature: dynamic filtering. This enables you to flexibly configure the users’ access rights within one dataset.
A new “Add scroll” button will appear on your bar chart, combo or timeline, if you have too many elements to display them properly.
Inside the “Abbreviate thousands and millions” setting, you can now configure the style you wish to apply to the abbreviations of numbers (10k, 1M and so on).
We’ve added a “Reload” option to the context menu of each chart. This button will be available in the View mode of the dashboard. When choosing this option, chart will re-calculate its data (similar to clicking on the Apply button in the chart editor).
Intercom connector: authorization type changed to oAuth.
Fixed: when applying the ‘TOP’ and ‘BOTTOM’ filters to a chart, the ‘Others’ element was always attached to the end of the chart (after the last element), unless you apply a sorting. Now the sorting doesn’t influence the position of this section, regardless of the sorting type.
BrainTree connector: optimized data loading to the Payments dataset.
You’re now able to customize the axes names of the chart.
Jira connector: several cusom fields added to the ‘Jira Tickets’ dataset.
We also have fixed a number of bugs.
For Jira, Pipedrive and Zendesk connectors, we’ve added an ability to enable incremental updates for datasets.
Pipedrive connector: ‘Time in Current Stage’ and ‘Deal Lifetime’ measures added to the ‘Deals Stages’ dataset.
Infusionsoft connector: ‘Tags’ dimension added to the ‘Deals’ dataset.
‘Contact Count (distinct)’ measure added to the ‘Subscriptions’ dataset.
The latest bug fixes are included in this version.
We removed the restriction on the maximum column width in the table chart.
Now you are able to export all data from the raw table chart, and not only 200 displayed rows.
Improvements on the Stripe and Pipedrive connectors.
Now when opening a report, you can see what kind of operation is happening at the moment, also all this information will be available in the report details.
Minor changes in the “Date range” filter in dashboards.
New connectors: Benchmark Email and BaseCRM.
We added the possibility to sort filter elements by alphabet and by data source.
Made some changes to increase the system performance.
We continue working on our Dashboard filters. Adding Date Range filters became faster and simpler, and it is now possible to add several Date Range filters at the same time.
For Gauge and Progress Bar chart types, it is now possible to display absolute values instead of percent.
You’re now able to change number of decimals in the Growth indicator for Single Value charts.
In the settings for White Label teams, in addition to favicon, you can save the logo and use it in email templates.
We also have fixed a number of bugs and made a general improvement.
You’re now able to change settings for Weeks in your datasets. You can choose, which day of the week will be be first in your datasets, and select the way how the numbering of the weeks works.
White label and standalone versions: the settings for custom support systems improved. Now if you didn’t specify the support system, when user clicks the Help button, an email form will appear. For standalone versions, it is now available to set the default support system.
Stripe connector: added Description field to the Charges dataset.
Infusionsoft connector: added Owner field to Stages dataset.
New connectors: Facebook and Instagram.
You’re now able to create calculated measures based on the calendar dimensions, for example you can create the following measure: “The number of days overdue” = Today – DueDay, where DueDay is a calendar dimension.
BrainTree datasets now store all the data instead of the last 20.000 records (as it is restricted by their API).
We have simplified the chart editing process. Now by clicking the chart element, you can go directly to its formatting panel.
If you have a report inserted to a dashboard, you can open this report separately in one-click, without having to look for it on the Navigation page.
You can now change a name of integration or dataset immediately upon creation.
You can clear all the dashboard filters at once without clearing each of them separately.
Now a dashboard URL (public link) will include a current dashboard filter selection. You can share the same dashboard with different filter selections by different URLs.
Now dashboards sending to device (tv.slemma.com) will update only if data were changed, they won’t blink every 15 sec anymore.
New connectors: Facebook Ads and Twitter.
Added an opportunity to create WooCommerce integration over HTTP.
When installing Slemma app in your QuickBooks account, QuickBooks integration will be automatically created in your Slemma account.
The update also includes general fixes and improvements.
Slemma has updated its data warehouse, and now datasets based on files and SaaS connectors will load data much faster. The update also includes general fixes and improvements.
Fixed some bugs related to the new chart designer. | 2019-04-24T04:49:18Z | https://support.slemma.com/knowledge_base/topics/release-notes/ |
Lightweight Clojure editor, repl, and documentation browser ala processing.org.
Brief Explanation: A considerable amount of work has been done towards a viable predicate dispatch implementation for Clojure. However quite a few more enhancements to core.match are required before it can be used for this purpose. The work should account for other Clojure dialects ClojureCLR / ClojureScript.
Expected Results: A usable implementation of predicate dispatch.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Familiarity with Clojure. Familiarity with Chambers / Chen efficient predicate dispatch paper and Luc Maranget's paper on compiling pattern match expressions into good decisions trees.
Brief Explanation: Adding constraint logic programming facilities to core.logic would widen the scope of problems that core.logic can be applied to - including predicate dispatch. We would like to adapt the cKanren extensions to core.logic with an eye for obvious improvements to the their design in terms of generality as well as performance.
Expected Results: core.logic with cKanren extensions.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Familiarity with Clojure. Familiarity with Chapter 3 of William Byrd's dissertation and the recent cKanren paper.
Brief Explanation: It would be useful to have a simple tool that encourage good Clojure style. Given that we now have three actively developed Clojure implementations - Clojure, ClojureCLR, and ClojureScript - a tool that warned on reliance on host-y features would simplify the design of libraries that are useful across Clojure implementations. It might be useful to take at a look at the new Kibit tool as well as Ambrose's analyzer work (which is being used in Typed Clojure).
Expected Results: A Clojure linter.
Brief Explanation: Currently, Clojure has a relatively heavyweight bootstrap process that is troublesome for embedded and hosted environments with limited computing power and for scripting where the JVM/Clojure bootstrap undesirably dominate execution time. There are a number of ideas on how to accomplish this, including removing metadata and the compiler from non-development builds and changing the compiler to generate static method calls instead of invoking functions on function objects. The goal for this project would be to implement and refine one or more of these or similar ideas to help Clojure perform better in lightweight applications and limited environments.
Expected Results: A lightweight build of Clojure that bootstraps more quickly and uses less memory.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Familiarity with Clojure, especially with the Clojure compiler.
Brief explanation: Clojure includes the vector-of function that creates persistent vectors that store primitives in an unboxed fashion. This makes them more memory-efficient, but still requires boxing operations when adding or retrieving items from the vector. This can significantly hurt performance. With Clojure 1.3, it is no longer necessary to box longs and doubles when crossing function boundaries. For this project, the developer should add to the Vec implementation so that there is a interface for accessing and manipulating the vector without doing any boxing at all.
Expected results: New Vec implementations that support unboxed long and double access.
Brief explanation: Clojure works perfectly under JVM, but slow startup with large memory usage makes it unsuitable for scripting, older computers and embedded devices. There has been attempts to built Clojure native binary with gcj without success, but it is still possible (gcj with option -findirect-dispatch can build binary from prepared jar file). Also, VMKit can be explored as alternative; VMKit authors already had success building large projects like Eclipse and Tomcat.
Expected results: Clojure native binary, runnable without JVM.
Brief explanation: Currently, Clojure does not have (official) optimizer on source level. Clojure built-in bytecode manipulation framework has option to eliminate dead blocks, but things can be improved. LISP's are popular for using tree shakers directly on source level and this option can be explored. As starting point, LispWorks has good tree shaker implementation but is closed source; also there is some alpha shaker for SBCL. Due to language functional nature, optimizer needs to know a bit of Clojure semantics and be able to recognize common patterns, making things challenge-able to implement.
Expected results: Provide optimizer (as library) or built-in inside Clojure forked branch.
Brief explanation: Clojure currently does not have a static type system. By utilizing the results of the Clojure Compiler's analysis phase (via analyze), we can build a static type checker, provided a la carte, as a library. Typed Racket is an example of adding a satisfying type system to an existing dynamically typed language, while preserving programming idioms and supporting interaction with untyped code. We will test the generality of ideas used in Typed Racket, such as Non-Uniform Variable Arity Polymorphism (typing complex variable arity functions like 'map') and occurrence typing (a type inference strategy).
There are also other potentially novel problems to be solved/found, some are detailed in this draft research proposal for Typed Clojure.
Typed Racket is divided into two main parts: a type system and a system managing interaction across module boundaries (eg. using typed code from untyped). This project will concentrate on adding a type system to Clojure.
Expected results: Optional Type System as a Library for Clojure, identification of major obstacles and challenges of type checking Clojure code.
Brief Explanation: The CoLa Framework(http://piumarta.com/software/cola/) seems like a promising basis for a native Clojure compiler. I have previously tinkered with a simple implementation of Java based on CoLa(http://www.hpi.uni-potsdam.de/hirschfeld/projects/delmdsoc/index.html). The potion language, which is currently maintained by Mr. Fogus is also based on some cola code. Write a Clojure-compiler for cola. The compiler should generate native code, but allow interactive/incremental development. Maybe write a C FFI.
The cola compiler should pick up from there and do the native code generation.
Knowledge Prerequisite: CoLa or alternatively C, Scheme and smalltalk. Parsing and compiler construction.
Skill Level: Medium to hard.
-Symbolic: Take the source code of a program and generate the source code of the program that computes the derivative.
-Automatic: Trace the execution of a program, replace the calculations with calculations for the derivative.
Numeric differentiation is inexact, and Symbolic differentiation is tricky because of unpredictable control flow.
An autodiff library for clojure would be very valuable for machine learning and optimisation. At first we should implement forward-mode autodiff in Clojure, then reverse-mode autodiff. The implementation should be composable and avoid this bug: http://eprints.nuim.ie/566/1/Perturbation.pdf. Maybe it should be integrated with Incanter, so we can compute the derivatives of matrix operations quickly.
As a proof-of-concept, learning in SVMs or neural networks would be nice, because reverse mode autodiff is a generalisation of backprop.
Expected Results: A library with differentiation- and gradient- operators.
Skill level: Easy to Medium.
Brief explanation: Currently everyone using Overtone must setup a clojure environment and editor, but it would be great if people who are unfamiliar with software development and/or clojure (e.g. musicians, artists, etc...) could download a single application to easily experiment with pre-existing instruments, sequencers, samplers, fx-racks made for guitars or other external instruments, etc. The app would let someone browse a built-in library of examples, evaluate code, experiment in a repl, open and save text files. The processing.org or SuperCollider applications are examples of this kind of system.
This kind of app would probably be useful for other Clojure projects too, so as part of it there would probably be a number of general purpose elements that could be made available as standalone libraries.
Expected results: An app implemented with the seesaw gui library (and maybe upshot for the JavaFX webkit widget for documentation) with a simplistic text editor that syntax highlights clojure, allows for selecting and evaluating chunks of code, and a repl panel.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Familiarity with Clojure and a bit of swing or other GUI experience.
Brief explanation: While programming synthesizers and setting up a mixing board system are great in Clojure, visual representations can be great for teaching, learning, and performance, because they represent the flow of audio and control data in a direct way that can be easier to follow than tracing a series of nested function calls. It would be great if Overtone had a graphical editor similar to Max/MSP, which allowed someone to choose from a library of unit-generators (DSP functions) and then wire them up together. The ugens in Overtone have extensive meta-data about their types, rates, functionality, and arguments, so this would primarily be a GUI programming and graphic design project.
This widget could also be useful for other projects that want to display or manipulate graph or tree structured data, so some of the underlying functionality could be made available as a separate library.
Expected results: A node editor widget implemented using a 2d scenegraph using Dave Ray's upshot library (https://github.com/daveray/upshot) on top of JavaFX 2. Synth designs could be loaded or saved by the widget.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Programming with Clojure, and ideally some experience using a node based editor (a couple evenings doing Max/MSP or PD tutorials would be sufficient).
Brief explanation: Create a standalone application that any musician could download and use as a pure software effects processor on their computer. The idea is to create a simple to use, open-source platform that lets people easily experiment with and contribute new FX to the application by writing effects synthesizers in Overtone.
Expected results: Implement a library of nice sounding audio effects using Overtone, and then package them up in a simple Swing application using seesaw so non-programmers could plug an instrument into their sound-card and easily apply a chain of effects to the audio.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Programming with Clojure, sufficient knowledge of audio DSP to research and implement a collection of audio effects.
Brief explanation: Currently Overtone is lacking any end to end testing. This is because the Overtone's output is audio and we don't currently have a way of automating the verification of audio produced. This isn't so much the verification of "yeah, that sounds great" but more "yeah, that's the sound my synth should make with these params". Achieving this doesn't require as much voodoo as you expect. As audio is represented with buffers of floating point data, it would be sufficient to test the data produced by a synth with a 'master' version to see if they were similar. However, in order to make this automated it would be necessary to build the test machinery to automatically create audio buffers, pipe the synth audio into said buffer and then test it against a known buffer.
Expected results: A simple set of test synths with 'master' audio data and a lein plugin to run them against the current Overtone source.
Brief explanation: Synths in Overtone are essentially directed graphs of ugens (unit generators). Given that there are over 450 ugens the space of possible combinations is daunting. In addition, SuperCollider server makes no attempt to sanity check the synth designs Overtone sends it. The result being that 'bad' synth designs can easily crash the SuperCollider server process. We'd like to start building tools to help us start detecting classes of synth designs that will result in server crashes before sending them to SuperCollider. This is essentially a graph analysis problem.
Expected results: A basic framework for describing and detecting error-classes of synth designs.
Brief explanation: Ugens in Overtone are simple building blocks for designing synthesisers. There are over 450 of them and are implemented in C in the SuperCollider source code. In order to use them, Overtone maintains a metadata map for each ugen. This metadata is then used to generate the ugen functions and all the documentation that is so essential to a live programming environment. We would like to explore ways to improve the ugen metadata - both in terms of the accuracy of our version and also the kind of information we store. For example, we don't currently store which of each ugen's arguments is required by SuperCollider - something that would be very useful to report to the user and also to help reduce errors by raising a warning when a ugen is used without required args.
Expected results: A documented process with which to work through each ugen's C source to harvest the appropriate information. The more automated his process, the better - but we acknowledge that much of it may need to be done manually. The process should therefore be clear enough for other members of the community to execute concurrently.
Knowledge Prerequisite: Clojure skills, Reading C code, Patience, a wish to understand the internals of sound synthesis.
Brief explanation: Composable helper functions are essential in a data visualization library.
These include scales (linear, power, log, ordinal, color, &c.), data pre-processors (histogram/density estimators), layout calculators (partitioning for pie charts/treemaps, clustering functions, graph physics engines, &c.), map projections, and SVG path generators.
The library is in production use at Keming Labs, and was recently open sourced at Clojure/West. See http://keminglabs.com/c2 and http://github.com/lynaghk/c2.
Expected results: Much of the functionality provided in D3.js will be implemented in pure Clojure. Rather than a naïve port, the new functions will take advantage of Clojure's facilities for object-orientation. Workflow/toolchain for optimal sharing and testing of pure Clojure code between JVM Clojure and ClojureScript will also be established.
Brief explanation: Constraint-based layouts allow one to declaratively specify a user interface without having to manually perform arithmetic related to element width, height, separation, &c.
Cassowary is the solver used in OS X's Autolayout and a similar high-level API to its string-based DSL for UI layout is needed.
Expected results: A friendly API for doing declarative layout; e.g. the string "[el1]-12-[el2(==2*el1)]" suffices to calculate the absolute positions of two elements separated by 12 pixels with the second element always twice as wide as the first. Primary target is the web via ClojureScript, but ideally can be implemented in pure Clojure and used on the JVM (Cassowary is already written in Java). Also provide examples of using the system for impossible-with-CSS layouts (e.g. positioning of SVG children). This work may be published in an academic statistics journal (with GSoC candidate authorship, of course).
Knowledge Prerequisite: Familiarity with Clojure. Background in logic programming and creation of domain-specific languages also helpful.
Easiest way to compute with clojure, and then share the code and results with the community. Vastly simplify creating active web content with clojure.
Clojure has a critical need for a good novice-friendly IDE.
a click-and-go distribution (both in the form of an Emacs "meta"
for clojars might be awesome when choosing dependencies for a project.
kind of new users support.
Familiarity with Clojure and Clojure/Emacs development tools.
Similar to rubygems.org, Clojars is a critical component of the Clojure community library ecosystem.
Expected Results: Improved overall performance verified by a benchmark suite.
Brief Explanation: ClojureScript currently has very limited introspection support. Currently it's impossible to view macroexpansion, to examine docstrings, examine vars or namespaces, etc.
Expected Results: Improved introspection facilities more in the line with those provided by Clojure.
Expected Results: A compiler that can easily be extended to generate source / bytecode for other languages.
Brief explanation: There is currently a fork of Clojure designed to support Android. This fork is designed to support dynamic compilation on the Dalvik virtual machine. It also contains some workarounds to ensure that Clojure will work (even without dynamic compilation) on older versions of Android. It would be great to have some of these changes integrated into the main Clojure repository. Also, Clojure 1.3 and newer do not work with versions of Android older than Gingerbread.
Expected results: Integrating Android-friendly features into Clojure and ensuring newer versions of Clojure work with Android platforms Eclair and newer.
Knowledge prerequisite: Clojure, Dalvik VM.
Brief explanation: There is the start of a library for Android development using Clojure. It is quite incomplete and needs significant enhancements, for example adding macros such as defactivity to help ease the boilerplate for generating new Android component subclasses, creating utilities to help manage coordination between the UI and background tasks in a Clojure-friendly way, or even creating a Leiningen plug-in to help developers get started.
Expected results: The developer will need to propose a series of enhancements to the toolkit, implement them, and provide documentation on how to use them.
Brief explanation: appengine-magic is a library for writing web applications in Clojure and deploying them on Google App Engine. App Engine has some interesting scalability characteristics which some applications may find desirable. Unfortunately, appengine-magic has lagged behind Google's releases. It also does not fully support the features of the App Engine SDK.
Expected results: Feature parity between the latest releases of Google's App Engine SDK and the appengine-magic project. All changes to appengine-magic must be thoroughly documented.
Brief explanation: Noir is a clojure microframework for creating websites. This project would use Noir's route table to output static websites from a simple command much like how jekyll creates static blogs.
Expected results: A leiningen command that takes a simple configuration file and outputs a completely useable fully static version of a noir website.
Brief explanation: Korma currently enables you to easily write queries for use with SQL, but the syntax is more generally applicable to any kind of relationally oriented data. This project seeks to bring the semantics of korma to other potential data sources, whether it be with some key-value datastore or just a collection of objects in memory.
Expected results: A subset of the Korma semantics working over data in memory and the beginnings of applying those semantics to something like mongo.
Brief explanation: Korma up to this point has explicitly not tried to abstract away the differences between DB providers (Postgres vs. MySQL vs Oracle ...) and as such requires some knowledge of how the vendor specifics affect your queries. This project revolves around creating a general purpose mechanism that allows the semantics of Korma to remain oblivious to the underlying implementation, but still manage to do the right thing for different vendors. More than the simple abstraction, the important part here is the ability to add these in over time by creating a very robust extensibility mechanism.
Expected results: A general extensibility framework for Korma's SQL compiler that enables replacement/addition/subtraction of SQL parts in different cases.
Brief explanation: Based on Bret Victor's "Inventing on Principle" talk, I built a live game editor for ClojureScript. This project would focus on making what's built even more general, allowing any game to be built this way. It also seeks to add the ability to further manipulate time and adjust values through sliders and color pickers. The ultimate goal, however, is to go well beyond that and begin to think of what more could be done in a world where you can touch and instantly manipulate the elements of your game.
Expected results: A generalized version of the editor that allows you move forward and back in time, select elements to project, and has the ability to quickly adjust values using widgets.
Brief explanation: Taking the editor out of my live game editor for ClojureScript, we could create a more general purpose code editor for use with Clojure/ClojureScript. Emacs, VIM, and CCW certainly work wonderfully for editing clojure, but their UI paradigms don't allow for more complex interactions. With the recent creation of code analysis tools, we can start to add much more interesting visual signals that can help you write better code. For examples of what can be done in this space, take a look a Dr. Racket.
Expected results: A fully capable editor that can save, read, compile files from a browser interface. Also, the beginnings of work on in-place UI to help with coding, e.g. visualizing the call stack when an exception occurs. | 2019-04-21T19:09:11Z | https://dev.clojure.org/display/community/Google+Summer+of+Code+2012 |
Supply chain challenges in the South African automotive sector: Do location, size and age matter?
The South African automotive industry makes an important contribution to the South African economy. However, there are deficiencies within the local automotive component manufacturers' (ACMs) supplier base and therefore automotive assemblers, or original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), have to import many of their parts requirements. These deficiencies are caused by ACMs' lack of technology, global supply capability, cost competitiveness and their geographic location (ACMs are scattered across the country). A study was conducted to explore the supply chain challenges South African ACMs face and whether the location, size and age of participating ACMs have a bearing on whether they face the same challenges. The results revealed that the most significant supply chain challenges in South Africa were in the customer relationship category. From the hypotheses testing, the conclusion could be drawn that, in general, participating ACMs face common supply chain challenges, irrespective of their location, age and size. This article contributes to the published research on the topic and the findings reveal that business opportunities in the automotive industry exist for entrepreneurs aspiring to enter into the automotive component industry.
'A successful automotive industry is often seen as a symbol of economic success and as a sign of mastery of modern technologies' (TISA, 2003:3). The automotive industry has grown to become the leading manufacturing sector in South Africa's economy, and as a result of its growth, is recognised as a mature industry (Bandyopadhyay, 2010). The industry contributed 6.2 per cent to the country's gross domestic product and employed a total of 93 100 people in 2010 (AIEC, 2011). In terms of its international contribution, South Africa was responsible for approximately 73 per cent of Africa's vehicle output and produced 0.61 per cent of the world's vehicles in 2009 (OICA, 2010). For example, in 2010, the automotive industry exported 11.9 per cent (to the value of R585 billion) of the total exports from South Africa, mainly to China, the USA, Japan, Germany and the United Kingdom (AIEC, 2011). However, the local content in vehicles produced in South Africa is only 35 per cent.
Automotive assembly plants have to import too many parts as there is a lack of local suppliers in the markets (Ambe & Badenhorst-Weiss, 2011; Pitot, 2007). Automotive assembly plants have to import too many parts as there is a lack of local suppliers in the markets.
The automotive supply chain consists of parties, links and logistical processes that function together to deliver the end product to the final customer. Globally, the industry is very competitive, and world-class management philosophies and practices such as just-in-time production (JIT), total quality management (TQM) and continuous improvement (CI) are already in use in these supply chains, and have been for many decades (Naude, 2009). Despite the use of these management practices, the industry's supply chains face realities and challenges that have an impact on delivery in terms of components being delivered at the right place and time, and higher inventory holding at every stage of the supply chain if logistical services are unreliable and irregular.
The South African automotive industry compares favourably with similar industries in developing countries with regard to infrastructure, raw material availability, emerging-market cost advantages, flexible production capability and government support. However, despite these positive aspects, the South African automotive industry's competitiveness is under severe pressure (Barnes, 2009), as it experiences challenges such as high labour costs, poor infrastructure and dated technology. This is particularly true with regard to South African ACMs that compete against cheap imported parts and, in some cases, counterfeit parts (Ambe & Badenhorst-Weiss, 2011; Moodley, Morris & Barnes, 2001). As a result, increasingly demanding customers are squeezing component manufacturers on both price and non-price factors (Barnes, 2009). The survival and growth of these ACMs in an increasingly competitive global market are vital for the South African economy. ACMs will only grow if they are able to compete globally.
Given the above context, this article explores the supply chain challenges South African ACMs face. It provides insight into whether the ACMs' geographical location, size with regard to the number of employees, and age have a bearing on whether they face common challenges.
Mazzarol and Choo (2003) observe that one of the challenges facing businesses is deciding where to locate the business. This decision is critical to future success as poor selection of a business location can have a negative impact on the business's access to markets, suppliers and labour. The South African automotive industry grew organically over a considerable period of time, and automotive assembly plants are based in Pretoria, Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth, East London and Durban. As a result, their supplier base is scattered across the country, with the greatest concentration being in Gauteng and Port Elizabeth.
The size and age of a business may have various implications for its performance, some positive and some negative (Aldrich & Auster, 1986). For example, very young businesses may enjoy the advantage of owner/founder commitment and involvement, but are also likely to be deficient in resources such as financial capital and expertise, which could have a negative impact on their relationships with suppliers and customers (Brush & Chaganti, 1998).
This article is based on a descriptive and exploratory study that includes a brief review of existing literature, informal semi-structured interviews with automotive assembly plants and an opinion survey questionnaire among ACMs. The article comprises four sections: (1) a literature review, (2) the research methodology, (3) the analysis of the findings and 4) concluding remarks.
1) Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) or automotive assemblers. This category comprises both passenger and commercial vehicle assemblers.
2) Automotive component manufacturers (ACMs). The ACMs supply components to OEMs, original equipment suppliers (OESs) and the independent aftermarket. The ACMs can be seen as the first-tier supplier in the automotive supply chain.
3) Original equipment suppliers (OESs). This category comprises automotive parts and accessory sales through the OEMs.
1) From a geographic perspective, do ACMs in South Africa face the same supply-chain challenges?
2) Do the size and age of a business have a bearing on the supply challenges it faces?
Producing products with shorter life cycles, strong competition among businesses and a high level of customer satisfaction in today's global market have forced organisations to focus more on their supply chains (Manzouri, Rahman, Arshad & Ismail, 2010). The concept of supply chain management (SCM) is described in various ways. Drawing insights from the literature, an effort is made to determine the various dimensions and key factors in the SCM approach.
Hugo and Badenhorst-Weiss (2011) acknowledge that the movement of materials through the supply chain is the core of any supply chain, since it is essentially aimed at creating a competitive advantage by providing outstanding customer service (by means of delivery). This enables a company to differentiate itself from its competitors in the market and enhances current and future profitability by balancing costs and service levels.
encompassing the planning and management of all activities involved in sourcing and procurement, conversion, and all logistics management activities. Importantly, it also includes coordination and collaboration with channel partners, which can be suppliers, intermediaries, third-party service providers, and customers. In essence, SCM integrates supply and demand management within and across companies.
Other scholars view SCM as a collaborative approach within and across companies that includes various role players in the supply chain, who significantly contribute to improved product quality, shorter lead times, and a higher responsiveness of the supply chain, at lower cost and improved customer satisfaction levels (Bennet & O'Kane, 2006; Humphreys, Huang, Cadden & McIvor, 2007; Lockström, Schadel, Harrison & Moser, 2009).
From these definitions, it is clear that SCM includes all those activities involved in the flow of materials through the supply chain, that SCM extends from the ultimate customer back to Mother Earth, and that there is some kind of relationship, collaboration or cooperation between supply chain parties. Therefore, SCM in the manufacturing of motorcars can be regarded as the inputs needed at each level or tier of the supply chain, to be transformed into finished automotive components. Inputs include information from customers, raw materials, inventory, equipment, machinery, labour and finances. The transformation process is the management of the modification process that converts inputs (such as raw materials and labour) into outputs (finished goods and services) that are distributed to the customer at the next lower level of the supply chain. This process is continued at all levels of the supply chain until the end product (the motorcar) reaches the final customer.
The size of a business is measured by the number of full-time employees and the age of the business is measured by the number of years it has been in operation. Among the structural characteristics of businesses, size and age have been emphasised as particularly important features of the economic outcome (Loscocco, Robinson, Hall & Allen, 1991).
In South Africa, it is recognised that small and medium-sized businesses have a significant potential to generate employment and thereby alleviate poverty (Booyens, 2011). As indicated by Lepoutre and Heene (2006), small and large businesses basically possess different resourcess and capabilities such as: financial turnover; assets, market share; numbers employed; and ownership. Small businesses have less access to resources and are less powerful than their larger counterparts.
Business size and business age are recognised to be two of the determinants of a business's inclination to innovate and of business growth (Evans, 1987; Booyens, 2011). As not much research has been undertaken to determine whether a business' size and age have an impact on the supply chain challenges it faces, one of the objectives of this article is to compare the supply chain challenges ACMs face to their age and size, and to determine whether these are statistically significant.
In this study, most of the responding ACMs (24.5 per cent) had been operating for between 11 and 20 years; 17 per cent had been operating for 21 to 30 years, and another 17 per cent for 41 to 50 years. The remainder of ACMs had been operating for 1 to 10 years, or 51 to 60 years (11.3 per cent each) (Figure 1). One could therefore say that the responding ACMs were mature and well established (88.7 per cent were older than 10 years), an assessment that ties in with the literature indicating that the automotive industry in South Africa is mature (Bandyopadhyay, 2010).
The size of automotive component manufacturers is measured in terms of number of employees (NAACAM Newsletter, March 2009). As can be seen in Figure 2, the responding ACMs in this study employ a total of 29 346 workers.
It is clear from Figure 2 that 37.7 per cent of the responding ACMs employed between 1 and 150 employees, and 47.2 per cent between 151 and 1 000 employees. It is important to note that 9.4 per cent of responding ACMs employed between 1 001 and 1 500 employees and 5.7 per cent more than 1 500, making it impossible to generalise the findings as being applicable only to, say, small-to-medium or large ACMs.
'Location, location and location' is a well-known phrase in marketing and has been identified as the one of the most important determinants of the value of a property (Nieman, Hough & Nieuwenhuizen, 2008; Stevenson, 2012). The right choice of location is vital for a new business venture or for existing businesses that are investigating expansion opportunities. Poor selection of a business location can have a detrimental impact on a business's access to suppliers, customers and labour (Mazzarol & Choo, 2003). The selection of a suitable location can improve the competitive advantage of a business. The advantages could include an increase in production capacity, additional profit, an increase in shareholders' wealth, improved service delivery and a reduction in costs (Jungthirapanich & Benjamin, 1995).
Pycraft, Singh, Phihlela, Slack, Chambers and Johnston (2010) indicate that the objective of the decision on where to locate a business is to achieve a balance between: (1) the spatially variable costs, (2) the service level the business is able to offer its customers, and (3) revenue potential. Nieman, Hough & Nieuwenhuizen (2008) identify access to markets, the availability of raw materials, support and technical infrastructure, transport infrastructure, the availability of labour and skills, climatic conditions, and political and social stability as factors that have an impact on the physical establishment of a business.
The automotive industry in South Africa has grown over a number of years and is geographically dispersed across three provinces: Gauteng, the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal.
Most of the major global OEMs are represented in South Africa and are located in three of the country's nine provinces. These vehicle manufacturers include BMW, Nissan, Fiat and Ford (incorporating Mazda) in Gauteng; Volkswagen, DaimlerChrysler and General Motors in the Eastern Cape; and Toyota in KwaZulu-Natal. It is estimated that there are 300 ACMs (which supply these OEMs) and another 150 spread throughout the country, producing parts for the automotive industry, as well as for other sectors such as light engineering, mining, construction and defence (South African Automotive Yearbook, 2008). Just under half of these suppliers are located in Gauteng, a third in the Eastern Cape, a quarter in KwaZulu-Natal and a few companies in the Western Cape (Mbiko, 2006).
One of the aims of this article is to compare the supply chain challenges faced in the provinces and determine possible challenges related to geographic location. Most of the respondents in this study (34 per cent) are located in more than one geographic area, followed by those located only in Gauteng (20.8 per cent), KwaZulu-Natal (18.8 per cent), the Eastern Cape (18.8 per cent), the Western Cape (5.7 per cent) and North West (1.9 per cent) (Figure 3).
This article reports on a study that was conducted to investigate the SCM challenges of ACMs as important role players in the South African automotive industry. The study is by nature descriptive and exploratory, contains quantitative and qualitative aspects, and benefits from triangulation across methods.
The study consists of two phases.
The first phase of the primary data collection for the research consisted of semi-structured interviews with senior managers at two leading OEMs in the country. These interviews were conducted in order to obtain insight and identify possible supply chain challenges facing ACMs in the country from the OEMs' perspective. The knowledge obtained from the literature and the qualitative interviews was then used to design an opinion survey questionnaire.
The opinion survey questionnaire consisted of two sections: section A consisted of the company profile and section B of a number of questions - using a seven-point Likert response format, varying from 1 (to a lesser extent) to 7 (to a greater extent) - identified from the literature review and the semi-structured interviews. The questionnaire also made provision for qualitative inputs in the form of an optional motivation for respondents' answers. The questionnaire was used as a tool to identify supply chain challenges facing ACMs, to consider the reasons for and impact of these challenges, and to seek solutions.
The second phase of the data collection process consisted of sending out the questionnaire to all ACMs that were members of the National Association of Automotive Component and Allied Manufacturers (NAACAM). About 60 per cent of the largest and most important ACMs are members of NAACAM. A total of 178 questionnaires were sent out and a response rate of 30.6 per cent was achieved.
3) to compare these challenges with regard to the age and size of an ACM in order to determine whether age or size has an impact on an ACM's challenges.
In order to address objectives two and three, three hypotheses were formulated to guide the research.
H01: From a geographic perspective, ACMs in South Africa face the same supply chain challenges as one another.
Ha1: From a geographic perspective, ACMs in South Africa face different supply chain challenges as one another.
H02: The number of years a business has been supplying its target market has no bearing on the supply challenges it faces.
Ha2: The number of years a business has been supplying its target market has a bearing on the supply chain challenges it faces.
H03: The size of a business (number of fulltime employees) has no bearing on the supply challenges it faces.
Ha3: The size of a business (number of fulltime employees) does have a bearing on the supply chain challenges it faces.
The completed questionnaires were coded and the responses captured in Excel and then exported into SPSS. Descriptive and mean response ratings were used to determine the significant supply chain challenges of automotive supply chains. The statistical nonparametric tests that were conducted were the Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance by rank, Spearman's rank order correlation coefficients and binomial tests.
In Table 1 the most significant challenges with a mean rating of above 4 are listed together with those that the Kruskal-Wallis test identified as significant challenges in the testing of the hypotheses. It is clear that of the 75 challenges identified, the most significant was in the customer relationship category (that is the relationship between ACMs and OEMs).
The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to determine whether the geographic location of the businesses had an effect on the extent of supply chain challenges they faced. The Kruskal-Wallis test identified only two significant challenges, namely on-time delivery and materials availability. This is indicated in Table 2.
The Kruskal-Wallis table gives the Chi-square value, degree of freedom and significance. The values indicate that on-time delivery and material availability do significantly differ across the geographic areas at a 5 per cent level of significance (p < 0.05).
material availability (Table 1): 2.98.
The hypothesis only tests whether there is a statistically significant difference between the geographic regions with regard to the extent of the supply chain challenges, not if the challenges per se are significant. One could argue that in terms of material availability and on-time delivery, statistically these challenges differ nationally for two reasons.
Firstly, the geographic location of suppliers poses a problem because the OEMs' and the ACMs' supplier base is scattered across the country. Hence closeness to suppliers, distance from key industrial areas, and excessive distance from the ports could be a reason for the challenges of on-time delivery and material availability differing significantly from region to region.
A second reason could have been the capacity of suppliers, who tend to over commit themselves in terms of what they can actually deliver. This emerged as a problem in the first stage of the empirical research, where one of the participants indicated that from an OEM's perspective, there was a tendency among many suppliers to over commit themselves in terms of what they could deliver. As a direct result, these suppliers were unable to meet the demand for a certain product with all their customers. The perception of over commitment by ACMs could be caused by (1) the ACMs' suppliers, who are not able to deliver on time because of the geographic spread of suppliers, or (2) by the fact that the required material to produce the components ordered may not be available.
In view of the fact that of all the identified supply chain challenges faced by responding ACMs, the Kruskal-Wallis test identified only two challenges to be statistically significant between geographic areas, the conclusion could be drawn that in general, from a geographic perspective, the extent to which ACMs in South Africa face supply chain challenges is the same.
The objective of hypothesis 2 was to determine whether the age of a company plays a significant role in the type of supply chain challenges it faces. The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to determine whether the age of the businesses had an effect on the extent of supply chain challenges ACMs face. The test identified two significant challenges, namely 'output based on rigid marketing forecasting' and 'integrating technology with suppliers and customers' (Table 3).
The Kruskal-Wallis table gives the Chi-square value, degree of freedom and significance. The values indicate that 'output based on rigid marked forecasting' and 'integrating technology with suppliers and customers' did differ significantly across the age of a business at the 5 per cent level of significance (p < 0.05).
integrating technology with suppliers and customers (Table 1): 3.67.
The hypothesis only tests whether there was a statistically significant difference between the age of a business and the extent of the supply chain challenges facing the business.
Of all the identified supply chain challenges faced by responding ACMs, the Kruskal-Wallis test identified only two challenges that differed statistically significantly with regard to the age of a business. One could therefore conclude that, in general, the age of a business does not have an impact on the supply chain challenges it faces. However, this result should also be viewed in light of the profile of the responding companies, where 88.7 per cent were older than ten years, 62.2 per cent older than 20 years and 45.2 per cent older than 30 years.
The objective of hypothesis 3 was to determine whether the size of a business (number of fulltime employees) has an impact on the supply chain challenges it faces. The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to determine whether the size of a business does have an effect on the extent of supply chain challenges it faces, and identified no statistically significant difference between the business size categories with regard to the extent to which the businesses perceive there to be challenges.
One could therefore conclude that, in general, the number of full-time employees or the size of a business does not have an impact on the extent of the supply chain challenges it faces.
The South African automotive industry has grown to become the leading manufacturing sector in the economy. Even though the industry is very competitive and many world-class management practices are already in use in the industry, the business environment has changed over the past few years. There is pressure on South African ACMs to compete with the best in the world from a cost and quality perspective in order to survive. The automotive industry is under severe pressure and faces many supply chain problems that are a result of rapid developments in supply chain management, technological advancements, high labour costs, poor infrastructure, globalisation and increasingly demanding customers who are squeezing their suppliers on price and non-price factors.
The role of ACMs in the competitiveness and the survival of the automotive industry is vital, as ACMs are the main contributors to employment in the automotive industry and they can make a great contribution to the cost-competitiveness of the South African automotive industry.
The research findings indicate that from a geographic perspective only two out of all the identified supply chain challenges are found to be statistically significant. Therefore the conclusion drawn is that ACMs in South Africa face the same supply chain challenges and that the age of a business has no impact on the supply chain challenges they face. With regard to size, the Kruskal-Wallis test identified no statistically significance difference between the business size categories with regard to the perceived challenges experienced by the businesses.
In conclusion, this article provides a number of insights, but these should be viewed in terms of two limitations: firstly, only component manufacturers who are members of NAACAM were included in the study and therefore the findings cannot be generalised to all ACMs in South Africa; and secondly, the focus was on the challenges experienced at one stage of the supply chain (at ACMs) and are judged from the ACMs' viewpoint.
The article builds on existing research on supply chain challenges in the South African automotive industry and provides a perspective on the topic for potential entrepreneurs aspiring to enter into the automotive component industry. Automotive assembly plants in South Africa have to import too many parts as there is a lack of local suppliers in the market, and this presents an opportunity for trade with aspiring entrepreneurs. | 2019-04-22T04:33:58Z | http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S2222-34362013000400004&lng=es&nrm=iso&tlng=es |
There is disclosed a programmable analog or mixed analog/digital circuit. More particularly, this invention provides a circuit architecture that is flexible for a programmable electronic hardware device or for an analog circuit whose input and output signals are analog or multi-valued in nature, and primarily continuous in time. There is further disclosed a design for a current-mode integrator and sample-and-hold circuit, based upon Miller effect.
This patent application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/173,414 filed Dec. 23, 1993 now abandoned.
This invention provides a programmable analog or mixed analog/digital circuit. More particularly, this invention provides a circuit architecture that is flexible for a programmable electronic hardware device or for an analog circuit whose input and output signals are analog or multi-valued in nature, and primarily continuous in time. This invention further provides a design for a current-mode integrator and sample-and-hold circuit, based upon Miller effect.
Analog circuits are a necessary component of many modern signal and information processing systems. The "real world" is primarily analog in nature and almost every digital system that interacts with the "real world" must have analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog interfaces. Analog circuits are continuous in time with a continuous signal, whereas circuits such as CNN's (cellular neural networks) operate in a discrete time (d-t) mode. In several applications (e.g., anti-aliasing and smoothing (reconstruction) filters, or pulse-slimming circuits in computer disk memories), analog circuits cannot be replaced by digital circuits either for reasons of speed or for analog's unique ability to work in a continuous-time (c-t) mode. Digital information can be processed in analog form to gain speed (e.g., image processing requiring many multiplications). Moreover, even if a digital solution exists, an analog solution may be smaller, require less power, generate less noise and be more reliable (e.g., a smaller number of elements to go wrong). Analog circuits have been avoided in the art since analog designs are often more difficult than digital and have often had to consider low-level circuit interactions, and since analog system have suffered dependencies, such as on temperature, fabrication run and time. Therefore, there is a need in the art for a novel analog architecture that is flexible and can even accommodate mixed signal (digital and analog) system designs.
In some signal processing applications, analog circuits are preferred over digital circuits for their relative simplicity. In the field of analog c-t circuit design and architecture, full programmability (i.e., one of parameters and structure) has not been achieved commercially. Previous analog programmable circuit designs have favored flexibility (universality) of the architecture (i.e., pattern of connections in a programmable device) rather than performance. There is a wide spectrum of architectures of analog circuits which do not comprise any particular "pattern" or architecture of interconnection schemes. Therefore, programmable devices for analog circuits in the art feature long global signal interconnection schemes. The common characteristic of long global interconnection schemes of current programmable analog circuits is that they achieve greater flexibility of interconnection patterns, sometimes allowing every cell in a programmable device to be connected with every other cell. Such an approach favors flexibility of a programmable device, but jeopardizes high frequency performance. This also causes parasitic problems associated with long signal lines and crosstalk between long analog lines and digital lines on the same chip increasing noise and stability problems in analog and mixed signal (analog and digital) designs. Such problems are most acute in a high-frequency (HF) domain where analog circuits have their most desired applications.
There are many published circuits for multiple-valued logic and continuous or fuzzy logic circuits, there are no programmable devices for multiple-valued, continuous or fuzzy logic circuits. Therefore, there is a need in the art for a field-programmable analog array (FPAA) that can be used for implementation of a wide class of multi-valued logic, fuzzy logic and other continuous logic circuits.
Programmable hardware devices for digital circuits include such devices as programmable logic arrays (PLAs), programmable logic devices (PLDs), and field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). "Programmability" in this context means the ability of a hardware device to change its configuration and function in response to some kind of programming information, in order to perform a required task. This programmability is distinct from "software" programmability (such as the programmability of a microprocessor), which directs a sequence of steps to be performed but does not necessarily produce changes in the hardware characteristics of the device. Programmable hardware devices for discrete-time signal processing are limited to relatively low frequencies when used to process analog signals. Such circuits also cannot substitute for continuous-time circuits in applications such as anti-aliasing. Programmable hardware devices for analog, continuous-time signal processing, however, are not commercially available.
Programmability opens up new ways of designing and building circuits for a given domain. For example, as soon as a technical means for realizing digital programmable circuits became available, new techniques of implementing digital circuits emerged. However, techniques for attaining programmability of digital circuits are inappropriate for analog circuits, for at least two reasons. First, to attain flexibility for creating various topologies of digital circuits realized by means of programmable devices, long global signal interconnections are often employed. These long interconnections introduce signal delays and phase errors that are tolerable, although undesired, in digital circuits. Such delays and errors would be fatal to analog circuits. Secondly, digital programmability techniques usually employ some kind of electronic switches. All realizations of such switches of practical interest for integrated circuits (ICs) suffer from considerable parasitics, namely substantial resistance in the "on" state, and parasitic capacitances. The net result of these parasitics is the introduction of phase errors in transmitted signals, an effect similar to that caused by long signal interconnections. Again, whereas these errors are tolerable in digital circuits, they are fatal for analog circuits. The foregoing problems are most severe for the fastest (i.e., HF analog circuits) which are the most desirable ones.
The development of various analog integrated circuits (ICs) has led analog IC design to the point where it is desirable and advantageous to have universal analog and mixed-signal programmable circuits. Multi-valued and fuzzy-logic circuits are often based on the same or similar circuit techniques as analog circuits and analog programmable circuits could be used for their implementation.
Circuits can generally operate in current-mode or in voltage mode. The majority of circuit designs operate in a voltage mode. Advantages of current-mode operations of circuits are speed and immunity or resistance to noise.
Low frequency (e.g., acoustic range) analog programmable circuits can be built easily in MOS subthreshold technology. In this technology processing elements (i.e., cells of the programmable device) can work in subthreshold mode, whereas the switches (for programming the programmable device) can be realized as MOS transistors working in inversion mode. This approach would be suitable for low-frequency applications only. Consequently, even though a field-programmable analog array is theoretically possible, the realization of such a programmable device would have a most limited scope of applications, limited to artificial neural networks (ANN's) and low-frequency signal processing. One advantage of analog c-t processing is speed. Slower applications can be adequately served by digital or switched-capacitor (SC) circuits, where programmability is easier to achieve. Fully programmable SC circuits are commercially available.
The nature of cellular neural networks (CNNs) is different than that of fully programmable circuits. CNNs are massively parallel collections of information processing units called cells, having memory (state information). CNNs are capable of attaining one of many equilibrium states due to a complex pattern of cell interactions through exclusively local interconnections. A CNN is either in one equilibrium state, when state and output information in cells is constant over time, and represents a solution of a certain problem, or is in the process of changing state and output information of its cells in order to attain one of its equilibria. Such a process of changing state and output information of its cells is actually the computation performed by a CNN. It is initiated by providing initial state information and input information.
CNNs are not programmable devices in any sense. CNNs are, instead, special processors dedicated to solving certain information processing problems. Although the computation of a CNN can be performed continuously in time and in signal domain, the state and output information of CNN cells is not meaningful until the CNN reaches an equilibrium. Thus, a CNN is, de facto, a d-t processor, since meaningful output information is available only at time intervals when it remains in an equilibrium. Moreover, since the set of equilibria in a CNN is discrete, the output information of a CNN is also in discrete form.
Field-programmable gate arrays for digital circuits are available from a few sources. However, field-programmable gate arrays for analog circuits are not available. Field-programmable gate arrays for analog circuits have to overcome several problems such as bandwidth, linearity, signal-to-noise ratio, frequency response and the like. One approach has been attempted by Lee and Gulak ("Field-Programmable Analogue Array Based on Mosfet Transconductors" Electronics Lett. 28:28-29, 1992). Lee and Gulak attempted to achieve full programmability by having connections between configurable analog blocks realized using MOSFET transconductors and controlling conductance by varying the gate voltage defined by a multivalued memory system.
In another attempt using a digital system, Furtek (U.S. Pat. No. 4,918,440) describes exclusively digital programmable logic cells and arrays of such cells having an integrated logic and communications structure which emphasizes local communication.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for a programmable analog device suitable for high frequency analog operation, a family of general-purpose mixed (analog and digital) signal-processing cells, and a method of creating architectures, i.e., patterns of interconnections of collections of such cells, suitable for a wide class of analog, multi-valued and fuzzy logic, circuit applications.
An integrator is a basic building block for many analog signal processing systems, such as filters (Schaumann et al., "Design of Analog Filters" Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.Y., 1990). The main requirement for an integrator design are low excess phase, high linearity (frequency range and slew rate), high DC gain, and availability of electronic tuning. In one OTA-C (operational transconductance amplifier and capacitor) technique of filter implementation, integrators are realized by loading a transconductor (OTA) with a capacitor. The output signal is taken directly from the capacitor and the circuit has high output impedance, inherited from the OTA. To alleviate the loading effect of other OTAs typically connected to the integrator's output, techniques, such as parasitic absorption (Schaumann et al. infra.) have been developed. Another solution is a voltage-to-voltage, or current-to-voltage integrator, based on the Miller effect. A voltage-output Miller integrator was followed by an OTA ((Haigh, "Continuous-time and Switched Capacitor Monolithic Filters Based on LCR Filter Stimulation using Current and Charge Variables" in Analogue IC Design, the current-mode approach, ed. Toumazou et al., Peter Peregrinus Ltd. 1990) to realize a current-to-current integrator. In this arrangement, the linearity of the integrator depends on the linearity of the OTA. However, there is a need in the art for an integrator with current input and current output, and good linearity and high speed. This invention was also made to address this need.
The full speed potential of analog circuits can be utilized by c-t Field-Programmable Analog Arrays (FPAAs). However, there are two problems that first need to be overcome. The first is to provide an architecture (interconnection scheme) complex enough to be programmable, yet contributing little interference, crosstalk and noise problems that are major problems in analog designs. The present invention overcomes this first problem. The second problem is designing a flexible, universal unit of a FPAA without explicit use of electronic switches in the signal path to attain programmed functionality. Switch parasitics, such as finite on resistance and stray capacitances, lead to frequency performance degradation. The present invention overcomes this second problem as well.
This invention provides a programmable analog or mixed (i.e., analog/digital) circuit, called a FPAA. More particularly, this invention provides a circuit architecture that is flexible for a programmable electronic hardware device or for a predominantly analog circuit whose input and output signals are analog or multi-valued in nature, and primarily continuous in time.
The invention provides a circuit architecture scheme for designing an analog circuit or a mixed analog/digital circuit device comprising an array of analog signal processing cells wherein each cell comprises an analog signal processing portion and a control circuit, wherein the array of cells are connected by a plurality of local signal interconnects. Preferably, the signals carried by the local signal interconnects are in a current-mode.
The invention further provides a programmable analog device comprising an array of programmable analog signal processing cells, wherein each analog signal processing cell comprises an analog signal processing portion and a control circuit, wherein the control circuit controls the operation of the analog signal processing portion and may also take part in auxiliary information processing, wherein the cells in the array are interconnected by one or a plurality of local signal interconnections to form the programmable analog device. A signal interconnection is considered local in that the number of cells connected to the signal interconnection does not change as the number of cells in the programmable analog device varies. For example, if the number of programmable analog signal processing cells is doubled to provide for a larger programmable device, the number of cells connected to then-existing local signal interconnections does not change. Preferably, the programmable analog device further comprises one or a plurality of global signal interconnections for connecting various cells of the array together. A signal interconnection is considered global in that the number of programmable analog signal processing cells connected by a global signal interconnection changes as the number of cells in the array varies.
The invention further provides a method for making the inventive programmable device comprising, (a) deriving a circuit interconnection labeled multi-graph from a schematic diagram of a representative circuit within a class of circuits, (b) adding nodes and edges to the circuit interconnection labeled multi-graph according to a predetermined strategy to create a superset of the circuit interconnection labeled multi-graph, (c) grouping together one or more selected edges and nodes from the graph to form an interconnection labeled multi-graph to impart functionality to the cells within the programmable device, and (d) deriving a floor plan of the programmable device, whereby the total length of signal interconnections in the floor plan is minimized.
The invention further provides a method for mapping a particular circuit onto a programmable device to form a programmed device, comprising (a) providing a programmable device comprising an array of signal processing cells connected by local and global signal interconnections, wherein the array of signal processing cells is described by an interconnection labeled multi-graph defined by a particular number and arrangement of signal interconnections to each cell, (b) deriving a circuit labeled multi-graph of electrical connections from a schematic diagram of the particular circuit, and (c) embedding the circuit labeled multi-graph into the interconnection labeled multi-graph by selectively programming cells or signal interconnections in the device. Preferably, the embedding step may comprise selecting signal interconnections in the programmable device, according to a predetermined strategy to minimize overall length of interconnections within the programmed device (as defined by its floor plan), wherein the predetermined strategy comprises a one-to-one mapping of the circuit labeled multi-graph into the interconnection labeled multi-graph, whereby the total length of interconnections is minimized.
The invention further provides a method for programming an electronic subcircuit, comprising (a) providing a programmable electronic subcircuit comprising a signal path and one or more transistors controlling signal flow through the signal path, wherein each transistor comprises multiple operating points that determine the signal propagation characteristics of the transistor, (b) providing a source of control current or voltage to part of the transistor, with the source being removed from the signal path, and (c) changing the operating point of the transistor by changing the control current or voltage sufficiently to switch the transistor on and off and thereby turn on and off the signal flow through the signal path of the circuit. Preferably, the electronic subcircuit comprises a two-transistor current mirror using bipolar or field-effect transistors. Preferably, the electronic subcircuit further comprises a differential pair of transistors. The analog subcircuit comprises a part of the analog signal processing portion of the cell. The analog subcircuit adds switching capability without introducing additional switching devices into the signal path of the circuit.
There is further provided a programmable current-mode integrator/amplifier having a circuit based on the Miller effect, wherein the current-mode integrator/amplifier is capable of integrating or amplifying a current-mode signal input into a current-mode signal output. The current-mode integrator comprises a current buffer, having an input signal and an output signal, an operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) input stage, having an input signal connected to the output of the current buffer and an output signal, connected to a current amplifier, wherein the current amplifier comprises an additional voltage mode output, and a capacitor or a plurality of capacitors connected to the voltage mode output of the current amplifier and to the input of the OTA, whereby a feedback connection typical of the Miller integrator is created. The current-mode output of the amplifier is proportional to its voltage-mode output signal, which represents the integral of the input current-mode signal. In this feedback arrangement, the OTA works with a very small input voltage swing (provided that the gain in the loop is high) which provides for high linearity of the circuit. The circuit also has a high DC gain (up to 90 dB or more). In one implementation, the current-mode integrator comprises a highly linear, no feedback, current path having a Gilbert amplifier cell and a voltage feedback path with capacitors, realizing integration.
FIGS. 1A-C illustrate exemplary block diagrams of cells and local and global signal interconnections in field-programmable analog and mixed signal array devices. This illustrates a FPAA based upon a regular, square array of current-mode processing cells, interconnected on two levels, local and global. Each cell is connected to its four nearest neighbors by a two-way current-mode signal interconnection and is able to receive four different signals produced by those neighbors, whether all of them or just selected ones. FIG. 1A shows the local signal interconnections of the FPAA, FIG. 1B shows the global signal interconnections of the FPAA, FIG. 1C shows non-planar signal interconnections of the FPAA, and FIG. 1D shows hexagonal signal interconnections of the FPAA. The cell's own output signals are programmably distributed to the same four neighbors (FIG. 1A). The global interconnection pattern is superimposed on the local one, but it is shown separately to avoid clutter (FIG. 1B). Each cell can broadcast its output signals to any of the four global lines to which the cell is connected (possibly to more than one line at a time). The presented schemes of interconnections are planar. To allow realization of non-planar circuits in the FPAA, a non-planar structure of signal interconnections can be used. Such a structure can be easily obtained from any planar structure (such as that shown in FIGS. 1A and 1B) by adding non-planar connections (such as two diagonal connections shown in FIG. 1C).
FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary functional block diagram of a cell within the array, showing an analog signal processing portion and a control circuit. The design of the cell is a result of a compromise between the circuit's power and its simplicity. The illustrated cell processes current-mode differential signals. The analog processing portion provides required operations on signals processed by the cell. The control circuitry determines the operation of analog processing portion: the operations performed by the analog blocks and the parameters of analog blocks based on the feedback received from the analog processing portion and the programming signals.
FIGS. 3A-H show exemplary DC transfer characteristics of the cell which are achieved by combining (summing) the characteristics of two clipping (saturation) blocks. Some of those characteristics are necessary for multi-valued logic (MVL) and fuzzy logic applications such as triangle or trapezoidal ones shown in FIGS. 3B, C.
FIG. 4 shows an elementary building block of the cell based on the Gilbert current amplifier cell. In its simplest form the circuit comprises only transistors Q1 -Q4 and current source IB +. Current sources IA represent the circuits input signals.
FIG. 5 is an exemplary functional block diagram of the control circuit of the cell shown in FIG. 2. The control block directs the operation of the analog processing circuits of the cell and enhances functionality of the cell, enabling nonlinear operations such as a min/max follower, signal-controlled generation of programmed waveforms, signal-to-frequency conversion (VCO), and MVL operations. FIG. 5B shows a current-mode comparator as a part of a current-mode cell of the FPAA. It comprises two differential current-mode inputs IA =IA + -IA - and IB= IB + -IB -, two constant current sources IC, and a current mirror Q5, Q6. It produces a single-ended voltage signal Vout, representing logical value of the condition IA >IB.
FIGS. 6A and B shows a current-mode integrator and sample-and-hold circuit.
FIGS. 7A, B show a programmable current mirror and a programmable differential pair. FIG. 7C shows a differential, current-mode analog demultiplexer with independent tuning of output weights, which contains a multi-output version of the circuit shown in FIG. 7B. FIG. 7D shows its block diagram symbol of the demultiplexer shown in FIG. 7C. The signals are depicted by single lines, even though they are preferably differential. FIG. 7E shows a schematic of a differential, current-mode analog signal multiplexer/summer with independent tuning of input weights. Additional summation (without independent tuning) is realized by connecting a number of signals to each input. FIG. 7F shows the block diagram symbol of the multiplexer/summer shown in FIG. 7E. The signals are depicted by single lines, even though they are differential. FIG. 7G shows a schematic and FIG. 7H explains the operation of a Zener diode D1 (FIG. 7G). The Zener diode is connected in the path of current signal in reverse direction, i.e., when the current I switch is off, the diode does not pass the signal. When the I switch is turned on, the diode enters the breakdown region (FIG. 7H), provided that the reverse voltage forced across the diode by the current source is sufficiently high, and the signal can now pass through the diode. Due to very small incremental resistance of the diode in the breakdown region this makes an almost ideal switch.
FIGS. 8A-E illustrate an example of constructing an FPAA for a matrix product tracking circuit. A circuit representing a class of circuits of interest is selected and its schematic diagram obtained. FIG. 8A shows the result of these steps. Next, a circuit labeled multi-graph for the matrix product tracking circuit is derived, as shown in FIG. 8B. The multi-graph is then generalized to a superset, as shown in FIG. 8C. In the current-mode, summing is performed on signal lines. Global signal interconnections are selected because if the matrices are scaled up, the number of nodes connected to the summing interconnections grows, so does the number of nodes connected to the input signal interconnections. The contents of the individual cells are then determined, as shown in FIG. 8D. Connections between the cells are made according to the graph of FIG. 8C, yielding a floor plan shown in FIG. 8E.
FIG. 9 illustrates an electrical schematic of an eight-order, elliptic band-pass filter realized as an OTA-C (operational transconductance amplifier and capacitor) ladder. This is a voltage-mode circuit, since each OTA takes a voltage signal as input, and although it produces a current signal, this current is always turned into voltage, either by the integrating operation of a capacitor. Each signal created in this circuit is going to be fed to some OTA (which can accept only voltage-mode signals as input) or connected to the output terminals of the circuit, which also require a voltage-mode signal. This circuit, and other voltage-mode circuits, can be realized in an equivalent current-mode form in the structure of the inventive device, if current-mode implementation of the device is preferred. The circuit preferably employs current sources Iswitch in the fashion shown in FIGS. 7B, C, which are not shown to avoid clutter.
FIG. 10 shows a labeled multi-graph of the ladder filter of FIG. 9. It demonstrates that the filter has a topology comprising only local interconnections.
FIG. 11A shows how the elements of the filter of FIG. 9 can be grouped into "cells".
FIG. 11B shows how 11 "cells" of FIG. 11A, interconnected only locally, comprise the entire filter. This figure also demonstrates the topology of the realization of the filter in the inventive FPAA structure. Dashed lines represent inactive cells and signal interconnections. FIG. 11C shows the functionality of the FPAA cell in example 7.
FIG. 12A shows a block diagram of a single cell of an analog rank filter and FIG. 12B shows how it can be mapped into the structure of the inventive FPAA. Two cells of the FPAA are necessary to implement one cell of the rank filter. The left cell in FIG. 12B implements the left-hand part of the rank filter cell, and the right cell the right-hand part. One of ordinary skill in the art can identify functions performed by each cell in FIG. 12B. A required number of such cells can be placed next to each other to realize a rank filter circuit of arbitrary size.
FIG. 13 shows the structure of a matrix product tracking circuit implemented in the structure of the inventive device realized in current-mode. It takes two time-varying matrices A(t)= aij ! and B(t)= bij !, both 3×3, and creates their product C(t)=A(t)·B(t) (a factor of 3 is required to account for the distribution of each input signal to 3 cells; alternatively the gain k (FIG. 2) of each cell could be increased by the same factor). The circuit can be generalized for any rectangular conformable matrices. Each element cij (t) of the product matrix is produced by a "local" group of cells along a diagonal global signal line. However, to distribute the input signals and to collect the results signals, global connections are necessary. Each diagonal output line is used to sum elementary products aij ·bjk, j=1, . . . , n, comprising the product element cik.
FIG. 14 illustrates a circuit solving a system of 3 algebraic equations with 3 unknowns x1 (t), . . . , x3 (t). The global connections in this circuit carry internal feedback signals, although the distance traveled by these signals is small.
FIG. 15 is a continuous-time circuit for solving a linear programming problem: given a set of constraints g(t)=F(t)·x(t)= g1 (t), . . . , gm (t)!'≦0 (the inequality is supposed to hold for every element of the vector; F is a rectangular matrix of constraints coefficients, g is a vector representing individual constraints), minimize the objective function ε(x1, . . . , xn)=ε·x=ε1 x1 + . . . +εn xn, where ε= ε1, . . . , εn !. Application of the method of steepest descent leads to a system of equations x=-μ·ε'-2a·A·diag(g)·U(g), where U(g) denotes the step function, diag(g) denotes a diagonal matrix with elements of vector g on the main diagonal, and μ and a are constants (μ→0, a→∞). This system can be solved by the circuit shown in FIG. 18.
FIGS. 16A and B show the tables for addition and multiplication in Galois field of four elements (GF(22)), respectively. Each of these operations can be realized by the FPAA cells; only two of the cell's inputs are used at a time. Addition can be realized as a ⊕ b=ƒ(a+b) for a≠b (FIGS. 16C and D), and a ⊕ b=0 otherwise. The condition a=b can be detected by the control block of a cell. Instead of function ƒ(x) (FIG. 16D) a smooth function ƒ1 (x) (FIG. 16E) can be used. This function can be realized by adding two characteristics of the clipping blocks shown in FIG. 16F. If the function of the form shown in FIG. 16D is required, it can be realized by providing more clipping blocks in the cell. Multiplication a × b in (GF(22)) (FIG. 16B) can be realized as a × b=((a+b-2) mod 3)+1 for a≠0 and b≠0, and a × b=0 otherwise. Mod 3 operation can be realized, as shown in FIGS. 16G, by adding two characteristics of the clipping blocks shown in FIG. 16H.
FIG. 17A shows a block diagram of a structure realizing an orthogonal expansion of a 4-valued function of input variables X1, X2, . . . , Xm, over GF(22). Each column realizes one orthogonal function over GF(22). Multiplied by a constant from GF(22), this function is added to the other orthogonal functions. All operations are in GF(22). FIG. 17B shows an example of realization of one of the functions ƒi.
FIG. 18A shows a structure for implementations based upon generalized Shannon expansion of MVL functions. Some input variables need to be connected to more than one diagonal line. More general forms of the same kind are possible, based upon other operators than > used for separation, for instance even vs. odd parity, based on matrix orthogonality, which is a generalization of an approach for two-valued functions. FIG. 18B shows functions performed by each cell.
FIG. 19 shows an example of a fuzzy controller. FIG. 19A shows the implementation of a controller with m input variables and n fuzzy inference rules. FIG. 19B shows details of each rule implementation. Fuzzy membership function is implemented as a trapezoidal transfer function of the kind shown in FIG. 3C. Activation values wi are multiplied by centroid values of the fuzzy rules consequents ci, and their areas Ii, yielding two sums computed on two horizontal global lines. The final expression for the defuzzified output variable vk is produced by a two-quadrant divider shown in FIG. 19C.
FIG. 20 shows an electrical schematic of an integrator. Transistors Q1 ÷Q4 form a Gilbert "type A cell", working as the input buffer with current sources IA biasing the input pair Q1, Q2. This circuit is characterized by excellent linearity and high bandwidth (simulated -3 dB bandwidth for unity gain is better than 6 GHz). Transistors Q5 ÷Q8 realize the OTA input stage. The current-mode amplifier, again based on the Gilbert "type A cell" is realized by Q9 ÷Q12. Loaded by current sources IH, it provides high voltage gain. Its output voltage signal is connected to the emitter follower Q13, Q14, providing an output current, Iout, and output voltage connected to the capacitors.
FIG. 21 shows the frequency response of the integrator of FIG. 20.
FIG. 22 shows tuning the gain of the integrator of FIG. 20.
FIG. 23 shows an implementation of a programmable current-mode amplifier/integrator, based on the inventive current-mode Miller integrator design (the block diagram of the amplifier/integrator is shown in FIGS. 6A, B).
FIG. 24 shows the frequency response of the circuit of FIG. 23 in integrating mode and FIG. 25 shows its frequency response in amplifying mode. It is important that programming of the function of the circuit is attained without any switches in the signal path.
FIG. 26 demonstrates an application of a single cell of the inventive device as a digitally-controlled oscillator. The const value is downloaded to the logic control block via the programming signals connection.
FIG. 27 illustrates another variation as a signal-controlled oscillator. It is based on using one of the input signals X1, n . . . , Xn (or a mathematical function thereof, see Table 2) instead of const to be compared against the output of the integrator. In this case, one of the input multiplexer/summers (e.g., 22) is used to derive the desired signal to be used for comparison in place of const.
Analog signal (continuous signal) is a signal that can assume any value in a certain interval. Each value of the signal in such interval conveys useful information. All other types of signals are special cases of an analog signal.
Bipolar device is a bipolar transistor or diode.
Bipolar signal is a signal that can assume positive, as well as negative values; two-directional signal.
Continuous-time (c-t) signal is a signal which conveys useful information in every instance of time.
Current mode signal is an electric signal which is represented by a current in a circuit branch, or a mathematical function of a number of currents (such as a difference of two currents).
Digital signal is a binary (two-valued) signal.
Discrete-time (d-t) signal is a signal that conveys useful information (is defined) only at certain predetermined periods of time or points in time. At all other times the signal values do not necessarily convey useful information (the signal is undefined). Discrete-time signal may be associated with some kind of a clock signal, or a system of clock signals, and the time periods (points in time) when the signal is defined are sometimes referred to as clock ticks in which case it is a synchronous signal. If there is no clock signal, and the time periods when the signal is defined are determined in another way (e.g., as a sequence of events), the signal is called asynchronous.
Discrete signal (multi-valued signal) is a signal which can possibly assume any value from a certain interval, but only a finite number of such values (called levels) convey meaningful information. Depending on the particular purpose of the signal, values of the signal other than the levels are assumed to convey information of one of the neighboring levels, or to convey undefined (illegal) information. Multi-valued signal can have two levels in particular, in which case it is called a binary signal.
1. a process of assigning groups of nodes and edges of a first graph to the groups of nodes and edges of a second graph, such that a number of nodes and edges of the first graph is assigned to a number of nodes and edges of the second graph.
2. a result of such process.
Floor plan is a general diagram showing location of circuit blocks or elements in space (or on a plane).
Global connections. A cells is considered globally connected in that the number of cells connected to a given cell by programmable analog signal connections connected to the cell changes when the number of cells in the structure varies.
Local connections. A cell is considered locally connected in that the number of cells connected to a given cell by programmable analog signal connections connected to the cell does not change as the number of cells in the structure varies.
Labeled multi-graph is a generalization of a graph, having edges incident with two or more nodes, and both edges and nodes having symbols assigned to them (those symbols are called labels).
Line (signal line) is the same as signal interconnection.
Mapping of a labeled multi-graph into another labeled multi-graph: an embedding where for each node and each edge of the first graph there is assigned exactly one edge and node, respectively, in the second graph, and the nodes and edges assigned to each other in the two graphs have matching labels.
Minimum embedding is an embedding of a circuit labeled multi-graph into an interconnection graph which does not lead to using cells as "wires" or "repeaters" i.e., cells programmed to merely transmit information (cells realizing only identity operation).
One-time programmability is one that can be applied only once.
Other Electron Devices mean electron devices having two, three, or more terminals, and displaying (a) linear or (b) nonlinear relationship(s) between electrical quantities such as voltage, current and charge, on those terminals, whereby the linear or nonlinear relationship is required to achieve amplifying, rectifying or similar operation, such as the operation of a transistor or a diode.
Port means a single entry point for the signal (input port), or an output point for the signal (output port). Since signals can be transmitted on a plurality of wires (e.g. pairs of wires), it is more convenient to talk about ports than about wires.
Programmability means an ability of a hardware device to perform a function or a composition of functions according to programming information, originating in the outside of the device. Programmability can be of software kind or of hardware kind. Software programmability does not necessarily involve changes in device's hardware characteristic. Hardware programmability involves such changes. Hardware programmability can be of two kinds: (i) tunability, which normally does not involve changes in the structure (configuration) of the device (structure of the signal path for signals processed by the device), also called parameter programmability, and (ii) structure programmability, involving changes in the structure (configuration) of the device (signal path for signals processed by the device). Finally, full programmability is programmability combining tunability and structure programmability. The term "reconfigurability" is used in literature to denote structure programmability.
Programmable circuit (device) is (1) a circuit (hardware device) exhibiting any kind of hardware programmability, or (2) a circuit (hardware device) exhibiting full programmability.
Repeated programmability is one that can be applied many times.
Voltage mode signal is an electric signal which is represented by a voltage between circuit nodes, or a mathematical function of a number of voltages (such as a difference of two voltages).
The present invention was made as part of an effort in designing analog programmable circuit architecture suitable for high-speed, high performance fully programmable analog operation. The highest performance can be achieved by reducing the length of signal interconnect lines, if possible, using only local signal interconnects. There is a tradeoff between the complexity of connections of a programmable device (and hence its functionality) and performance. Use of only local signal interconnects limits the class of such programmable analog devices to applications such as ladder continuous-time filters and other circuits. The present invention provides an architecture of a fully field-programmable analog array using primarily local signal interconnect architecture to create complex analog designs without compromising high-performance for the sake of functionality. Global interconnections can be incorporated into the inventive architecture and used only when absolutely necessary.
The control circuit, as used herein, includes, for example, a means for exchanging information to and from the control circuit, a means for storing information, a means for processing information, or a means for communicating with an associated analog processing portion of a cell. With such means, the control circuit is programmed to determine the operation of the analog processing portion of the cell. The analog processing portion of a cell, includes, for example, a means for performing one or more mathematical and other functions, including, but not limited to, weighted summing, multiplication, integration, exponentiation, logarithms, trigonometric functions, and the like.
The essential feature of the inventive device is that the length of the local signal interconnections in the array is minimized. Preferably, the cells of the array are arranged to minimize the length of local signal interconnections required to form the programmed device. Additionally, the total length of unprogrammed local and global signal interconnections is preferably minimized (for a given graph of connections between the cells). This architecture will minimize undesired noise effects and other signal distortions such as phase errors in the device.
The present architecture, described and exemplified herein, is suitable for the realization of a wide class of analog circuits. This specific architecture results from the general premise to use local signal interconnections whenever possible, and global signal interconnections only when absolutely necessary. The design of individual cells, and specific details of the architecture, were determined upon consideration of the perceived applications of the device, i.e., fast dynamic systems and fuzzy and multi-valued logic circuits. Although only continuous time examples are provided herein, the inventive device is capable of discrete-time operation as well.
The inventive device, and particularly, the inventive general purpose field-programmable analog array can be used for the implementation of various analog and logic circuits. We have shown that the realizations of MVL functions based upon orthogonal expansions as well as more general ones based on sets of not necessarily orthogonal functions, lead to regular circuit structures which can easily be mapped to the inventive FPAA. Other circuits, such as ladder filters, have the same property. Therefore, the inventive FPAA is an excellent tool for fast prototyping of various circuits and provides a skilled artisan with an opportunity to experiment with hardware realizations of various circuits without the necessity of their physical design and fabrication. The examples provided herein demonstrate the simplicity of realization of a wide class of such circuits, which also enables the implementation of design automation procedures.
FIGS. 1A and 1B illustrate structure (floor plan) of a field-programmable mixed (analog/digital) array (FPMA) or field-programmable analog array (FPAA). These arrays are based on a regular array (10) of programmable analog signal processing cells (12), interconnected at two levels: local (FIG. 1A) and global (FIG. 1B). The array shown in FIGS. 1A and B is for illustration only; regular arrays of various patterns may be utilized such as shown in FIG. 1C.
FIG. 1A shows the local signal interconnections (14) for interconnecting cells (12) of the array to form the programmable device. Each local signal interconnection (14) connects a fixed number of cells (12) together. That is, a signal interconnection is local in that the number of cells connected by the signal interconnection does not vary as the number of cells in the array varies. For example, in FIG. 1A, cell (12a) is connected to its four nearest neighboring cells by two-way signal interconnections (14a-d). Cell (12a) is able to receive four different signals produced by these neighboring cells, collectively or selectively, and can distribute its output signal to the same four neighboring cells. If the size of the array (10) were increased by adding additional cells to the array's borders, the number of cells connected by local signal interconnections (14a-d) does not change.
FIG. 1B shows a pattern of global signal interconnections (16) superimposed on the pattern of local signal interconnections (14). Each cell (12) can broadcast its output signal to one or more of four global interconnection lines (16a-d) to which the cell is connected. Unlike local signal interconnections, a signal interconnection (16) is global in that the number of cells connected by the signal interconnection changes as the number of cells in the array (10) varies. For example, if a row of additional cells (12) were added to the upper border of the array, one of those cells would connect to global interconnection (16a).
Typically, a cell will have only one output signal, the same signal being distributed to the local neighbors and to the global lines, although in a general case a cell can produce a plurality of output signals (by outputting signals from various processing blocks of the cell). If a plurality of different output signals is produced, different signals can be sent to different destinations (i.e. local neighbors or global signal lines).
In the preferred current-mode realization of global signal lines, the signals sent to a given global line by different cells are summed on those lines (by virtue of Kirchhoff's Current Law (KCL)). Also, each cell can receive signals from global lines to which it is connected, selectively (from some lines) or collectively (from all lines). The signals from global lines can be received by single or multiple cells, although single cells are preferred. If a signal from a global line is received by more than one cell, it gets divided evenly by those cells, e.g. if n cells receive signal X present on a global line, each cell actually receives signal X/n. Whether one or more cells receive a signal from a global line, is determined in the process of programming the input multiplexer/summers of the receiving cells.
Each cell can broadcast its output signal to any of the four global lines to which the cell is connected (possibly to more than one at a time). If the signals are in a current-mode, they are summed on the global lines, and if more than one cell receives the signal from a given global line, the signal will be divided evenly by the receiving cells. Each cell can then send and receive signals to and from any of its four nearest neighbors and any of the global lines to which it is connected. In the example of FIG. 1, each cell has eight input ports and one output port (or eight output ports with copies of the same output signal).
The input and output signals of cell can be (i) in voltage or current form, (ii) single-ended or fully differential (balanced). The first choice (voltage or current) will lead to four classes of cells: voltage-to-voltage, voltage-to-current, current-to-voltage, and current-to-current. A differential mode input will preferably imply a differential mode output and vice-versa, although one can create cells with, for instance, differential input signals, and a single-ended output signal. At least eight types of cells can be created: the four types listed above for single ended signals, and the same types for fully differential signals.
Selection of the type of signals will be based among other criteria on the required interconnections between cells in the structure of the programmable circuit device. If the output signal of a given cell needs to be distributed to many places in the structure, it is more convenient to have it in voltage form, although current form can be used as well. If, on the other hand, summing of output signals of several cells is desired, current output signals are better. Current mode signals are generally more immune to noise and are usually faster. Therefore, a current-to-current cell design is preferred. The presented architecture and principles can be used for the design of an FPAA with cells using other signal combinations (voltage-to-voltage, etc.).
The Analog Signal Processing Portion. A block diagram of cell is shown in FIG. 2. Preferably, the cell processes current-mode differential signals. The cell has two essential parts: a signal processing portion and an associated control circuit (32). The associated control circuit preferably is included within the body of cell, but can alternatively be located partly or wholly outside the cell body. All of the details of communication (e.g., signals from the processing portion to the control circuit) are not shown in FIG. 2 to avoid clutter but are described together with the control circuit. The signal processing portion may include a number of subcircuits that provide desired signal processing functions, such as a multiplier (24), an integrator (26), clipping circuits (28), and various support circuitry such as analog multiplexer/summers (20, 22) and analog demultiplexers (30). A multiplier, for example, may include a Gilbert multiplier cell combined with a wide band, current-mode amplifier, tunable in a wide range (such as 0-80 dB). The wide tunability range is required primarily by dynamic system type of applications, such as filters, differential equation solvers and others. The multiplier can perform other signal processing functions, such as phase detection and balanced modulation.
The multiplexer/summers selectively pass the input signals, multiplying them by the programmable weights wi and wj, which can be positive, negative or zero, and then summing. Two input sums (one from each multiplexer/summers) are then passed to the multiplier. Therefore, a product of two independently selected sums of input signals is created. If no multiplication is desired, a constant signal (Max,±Max representing the range of the signals processed by the cell) is selected and fed to an input of the multiplier, or Max is selected on the input of one of the multiplexer/summer. Each of the input or output ports can be independently turned off by means of programming the input multiplexer/summer or the output demultiplexer.
An integrator (26) has a programmable pole α, which can be turned down to a value as close to zero as a practical circuit realization allows, in order to realize an "ideal", or "lossless" integration. It can also be programmed to a non-zero value (in the range depending on a particular circuit implementation) to realize "lossy" integration (a single-pole circuit function). Finally, the integration function can be programmably bypassed internally in the integrator, and the circuit realizes amplification function only, with gain programmed in a wide range, such as 0-80 dB. The integrator can be used as a short-term analog memory or a sample-and-hold circuit.
In a preferred embodiment, the analog processing portion comprises two multiplexer/summers, a multiplier, a programmable integrator/amplifier, a number of clipping (saturation) blocks, and an output demultiplexer. Each of the multiplexer/summers produces a weighted sum of the input signals. The weights, which can be positive, negative, or zero, are determined by the control circuit. A constant signal, Max,±Max representing the range of the signals processed by the cell, is connected to one input of each multiplexer/summer. This allows the multiplexer/summers to produce more variety of its output signals (for instance complements of signals to Max). The two sums (from the two multiplexer/summers) are fed to the multiplier block. On each of the inputs of the multiplier block a signal from a multiplexer/summer or a constant value Max can be selected. This allows bypassing the multiplication (when Max is selected on one input of the multiplier). When Max is selected on one input of the multiplier, the corresponding multiplexer/summer can be used for the calculation of weighted sums or complements of signals used by the control block. Each clipping block provides limiting of the output signal of the cell between two independently programmable values a and b, -Max≦a≦0, 0≦b≦Max, as well as programming the zero z of the characteristic and its slope (gain) k.
The control block, preferably, not only sends control signals to the analog processing blocks, but also receives output signals from those blocks. This feedback allows the control block to perform comparisons and other operations on the analog signals processed by the cell in order to produce more variety of control signals and more variety of functions realized by the cell.
The programming signals connected to the control block from the outside of the cell determine the operation of the control block, and via control block--the operation of the entire cell. The clock signal(s) allow(s) discrete-time operation of the cell, if desired.
Through a feedback connection (43), the output signal can be connected to the inputs of the cell, which is required for certain circuits for certain applications. The output demultiplexer produces the desired number of copies of the output signal Y.
FIG. 4 shows a preferred embodiment of the elementary building block of the cell. In its simplest form the circuit contains only transistors Q1 -Q4 and current source Ib +. Current sources IA represent the circuit's input signals. The circuit is fully differential, i.e., both input and output signals are represented by differences of currents in two wires. The sum of currents IA +, which can be expressed as IA (1+X) is the positive "half" of the input signal, and IA -, which can be expressed as IA (1-X), is the negative "half". The input signal is then IA (1+X)-IA (1-X)=2IA X, wherein X is called a modulation index. Likewise, the output signal is the difference I+ out -I- out, expressed as IB (1+Y)-IB (1-Y)=2IB Y. Current gain is determined by the ratio IB /IA and in practice can be tuned over several decades from a fraction of unity to about 10. The circuit has an excellent linearity and a wide bandwidth, limited by the ƒT of the transistors. In a bipolar process used for prototyping, ƒT is of the order of 8 GHz and the simulated unity gain bandwidth of this circuit is over 6 GHz.
FIG. 3A shows the DC transfer characteristic of the circuit of FIG. 4. The slope k in the linear range can be changed by adjusting the gain. The width and height of the linear range are determined by the currents IA and IB respectively. By adding (subtracting) currents on the input and on the output of the circuit (by additional programmed current sources, FIG. 4B) one can change the location of the zero z of the characteristic, as well as the two clipping (saturation) levels a and b.
This circuit has many variations. By including transistors Q5 and Q6, one achieves an ability to invert the signal (negative weight). If another input is connected in place of the tail current sources IB + and IB -, a current-mode Gilbert multiplier is realized. More output (inner) transistor pairs can be added (dashed line) to obtain more independently tuned outputs.
A current-mode comparator is a part of a current-mode cell of the FPAA. The comparator is shown in FIG. 5B. It comprises two differential current-mode inputs IA =IA + -IA - and IB= IB + -IB -, two constant current sources IC, and a current mirror Q5, Q6. It produces a single-ended voltage signal Vout, representing logical value of the Condition IA >IB. It operates as follows: The two input current-mode differential signals IA and IB (in FIG. 5B produced by differential pairs Q1, Q2 and Q3, Q4, such as the ones found at outputs of an analog multiplexer/summer, shown here to demonstrate how the comparator may be connected to analog circuitry of the cell), are connected to constant current sources IC. By virtue of KCL, I1 =IC -IA - -IB +, and I2 =IC -IA + -IB -. If IA >IB, it follows that IC -IA - -IB + >IC -IA + -IB - and consequently, I1 >I2. For sufficiently high β of Q5, I5 ≅I2. The current mirror Q5, Q6 provides I5 ≅I6. Therefore with no load connected to the collector of Q6, Vout will be driven high (near the positive voltage supply VCC), which represents desired output of the comparator. Analogously, it can be demonstrated that when IA <IB, the output Vout will be driven low (near 0). A suitable output buffer can be added by those skilled in the art to provide sufficient drive for logic circuits connect to Vout, without causing undesired loading of the node Vout.
FIG. 7E shows a schematic of an analog multiplexer/summer with independent tuning of input weights, in a differential, current-mode implementation. Additional summation (without independent tuning) can be realized by connecting a number of signals to each input.
A demultiplexer can be realized in a similar fashion by placing more inner (output) pairs of transistors (FIGS.. 7C, D). Circuits from this family can be connected is cascades by adding current sources (sources IC in FIG. 7E). Then the difference between the (constant) current sources IC from such sources and the output signal of one stage can be fed to the next stage. This arrangement is well suited to the IC fabrication process with good quality vertical npn devices and poor quality lateral pnp devices, as it has better frequency response. By cascading several stages based upon the circuit of FIG. 4, a wide-band current amplifier tunable in a wide range (such as 0-80 dB or more) is obtained.
Two (or more) clipping (limiting) blocks (28), shown in FIG. 2, are realized as single amplifier stages of FIG. 4B. With two blocks, one achieves many nonlinear characteristics, some of which are shown in FIGS. 3A-H.
There is further provided a programmable current-mode integrator/amplifier having a circuit based on a Miller effect, wherein the current-mode integrator/amplifier is capable of integrating or amplifying a current-mode signal input into a current-mode signal output (FIG. 6). The current-mode integrator/amplifier comprises an operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) input stage (60), having an input signal and an output signal, connected to a current amplifier (62), wherein the current amplifier comprises an additional voltage mode output, and a capacitor or a plurality of capacitors connected to the voltage mode output (64) of the current amplifier and to the input of the OTA. The current-mode output of the amplifier is proportional to its voltage-mode output signal, which represents the integral of the input current-mode signal. In this feedback arrangement, the OTA works with a small input voltage swing (provided that the gain in the loop is high). Due to the feedback operation, the voltage on the capacitors is only slightly disturbed by any nonlinearities within the loop. Therefore, the linearity of the circuit is primarily determined by the linearity of the relationship between the voltage-mode and the current-mode output signals, which is good if there is proper design of the output stage.
The OTA input stage linearity is not critical. This design inherits all good features of a classical Miller integrator employing a voltage-to-voltage amplifier (an op amp). This design provides an ability to realize a low-frequency pole (ideally, an integrator's pole should be at zero) with a small capacitors value, mostly independent of the impedances of the source of the input signal and the load. This is because the capacitors see an extremely high impedance (typically of the order of tens or even hundreds of GΩ). In the traditional design of a current-to-current integrator, the Miller integrator (or even a capacitor) is followed by an OTA, converting the full range of voltages developing across the capacitor into the output current. In such a design, the linearity of the OTA limits the linearity of the integrator, even though (in the Miller integrator) the voltage on the capacitors is a nearly perfect linear integral of the input signal.
The pole can be moved by changing the operating conditions of the circuit. If a high frequency pole is desired, the output signal can be fed back to an additional input of the OTA to simulate resistors connected to the output.
The inventive circuit has additional advantages over the classical design. For example, the input signal can be fed directly into the current amplifier, making the voltage on the capacitors track the input signal. When desired, the input stage of the current amplifier can be turned off, and the capacitors will hold the last value of the signal, thus realizing the sample-and-hold function. Finally, when no integration or sample-and-hold operation is necessary, the voltage output is turned off and only the current amplifier is used. Then, the circuit works as a tunable amplifier.
Advantages of the exemplified current-mode integrator include (1) better linearity (the only intrinsically nonlinear part is the voltage-to-current stage (OTA input stage), which works with very small voltage swing and in a feedback loop), (2) good frequency response (the circuit is almost entirely current-mode, except for the two pairs of high-impedance points where the capacitors are connected). With C of 0.8 pF, the simulated frequency response shows its wide range of useful frequencies, wherein the phase response is tunable to -90°±0.5°, in the range of about 92 kHz to over 160 MHz. Operation up to about 670 MHz and more (depending on the technology) is possible in simplified design of the circuit shown in FIG. 20.
To maximize ADC and minimize fp one should maximize Rin, k2 and gm and minimize g0 (i.e., maximize both input resistance of the OTA and the voltage gain in the loop. High voltage gain in the loop additionally results in low V1 swing, relaxing the requirements on the OTA linearity.
is a constant in the particular circuit implementation. Therefore, k2 should not be used for tuning of the integrator, as its changes result in changing g0. The gain of the input current buffer, k1, should be used instead. The buffer has low input impedance and it isolates high-impedance input of the core circuit from the signal source, whose impedance is not critical for circuit performance. Additionally, the buffer blocks the common mode input signals. The output of the integrator has high impedance and can be connected to the input of another integrator.
A simplified schematic of a particular implementation is shown in FIG. 20. Transistors Q1 ÷Q4 form a Gilbert "type A cell", working as the input buffer with current sources IA biasing the input pair Q1, Q2. This circuit is characterized by excellent linearity and high bandwidth (simulated unity gain frequency is better than 6 GHz). The buffer blocks common-mode input signals and provides tunability of k1, at least in the range of -20 dB to 20 dB (by means of changing the ratio IA /IB). Current sources IG, are necessary to achieve high impedance at the OTA input and eliminate the common-mode component of the collector currents of Q3 and Q4. Transistors Q5 ÷Q8 realize the OTA input stage. Changing IC and ID allows tuning of gm. The current-mode amplifier, again based on the Gilbert "type A cell" is realized by Q9 ÷Q12. Changing ID /IF allows tuning of k2 over at least 40 dB. Active loads IH provide required voltage gain in the feedback loop. The voltage signal is connected to the emitter follower Q13, Q14, providing also an output current. Lineraity of the emitter resistors RE (Eq. 6, 7) in the follower is critical to the linearity of the integrator.
For proper operation, the circuit contains two common-mode feedback subcircuits, one of which is shown in FIG. 20B. Their function is to assure adequate DC voltages at the two pairs of high-impedance points in the integrator, that is at the collectors of Q3, Q4 and the collectors of Q11, Q12. The circuits sense voltages on the emitters of the respective current gain cells and compare them with constant voltages, Vb1 and Vb2. Any mismatch of the collector currents at the high-impedance points is corrected by adjusting the base-emitter voltages of the respective current mirror transistors, by means of dumping additional current onto their emitter resistors (R1 and R2 in FIG. 20B). The gain of the common-mode feedback circuits can be adjusted by changing the tail currents Ib1 and Ib2.
The foregoing illustrative circuit was tested by computer simulation. With C of 0.8 pF, the circuit phase response of -90±0.5° in the range of 1 MHz to 670 MHz (FIG. 21). The gain was adjusted by changing the tail current IB of the input buffer (FIG. 20). The low-frequency pole was moved down to about 3 Hz by changing the operating conditions of the circuit. With sufficiently high gain in the feedback loop, the circuit had THD of less than 0.052% for an output signal current of over 2.8 mApp (Table 1).
Emitter area mismatches in the current gain cells will lead to nonlinearities which can be eliminated by applying measures described in Gilbert (J. Solid State Circuits SC-3:353-365, 1968). Mismatches of emitter resistors in the current sources can be eliminated by applying correcting currents in a similar manner as in common mode feedback circuits. Proper values of RE resistors are important for high frequency operation of the circuit because of a parasitic pole-zero pair near 500 MHz. However, even considerably higher departures from required values can be corrected by changing current IE. IE can also be used to correct excess phase.
The foregoing illustration of a current-mode integrator illustrates the invention. The illustrated circuit combines good properties of voltage-output Miller integrator with excellent linearity and speed of gain cell. The design is a core of a programmable amplifier-integrator for a FPAA described below. Also voltage output from the integrator is possible if desired.
The Amplifier/Integrator can also work as a sample-and-hold circuit. To attain sample-and-hold operation the entire circuit is activated, as opposed to using only parts of it in the amplifying mode and in the integrating mode (FIG. 23). The parts indicated by dashed line in the figure are all active. In such a case there is a direct path from the input to the output, and the circuit realizes a transfer function a/(sC+b)+d, where a, b, and d are constants. By changing bias currents in the circuit (IE11 through IE33 and IC13 through IC36 in FIG. 22) one can change a, b, and d in the above equation. For the sample mode, when the circuit follows the input signal, it is desired to have a as small, and b and d as large as practically possible. Then the voltage on the capacitors follows the changes in the input signal. When it is desired that the circuit entered the hold mode, IE11, IE12, and IC13 -IC16 (FIG. 22) are turned down to zero. Then the circuit holds the last value of the signal, working as an integrator with no input signal (because the input signal has been disconnected by deactivating bias current sources IE11, IE12, and IC13 -IC16). The held value is available as the output current.
FIG. 26 demonstrates the application of a single cell of the inventive device as a digitally controlled oscillator. The const value is downloaded to the logic control block via the programming signals connection. The multiplexer/summer 52 is programmed to pass const to the comparator 54. The other input of the comparator 54 is connected to the output signal Y via the feedback connection 34. The input multiplexer/summer 20 is programmed by the logic control block to produce a scaled constant value derived from Max. This constant value is fed to the input of the integrator via the multiplier (which has Max connected to its second input, not shown in the figure to avoid clutter). In this arrangement the multiplier passes its input signal to the integrator. Thus the integrator receives a constant signal, which causes it's output signal to ramp up. When the output signal Y of the integrator rises to the level equal to const, the comparator sends a signal to the logic control block. Then the logic control block reverses both the weight of the input multiplexer/summer 20, and the value of const. The first event results in feeding a constant signal of opposite polarity to the input of the integrator. This in turn causes the output signal of the integrator to ramp in opposite direction, i.e. down. When it crosses -const, the above cycle starts over again, which yields a triangle waveform on the output Y. One of the internal signals in the logic control block represents the sign of const. The changes of this signal comprise a square waveform synchronous with the triangle waveform observed on the integrator's output. This square waveform can be communicated to other cells via the connections existing between control blocks in the array.
Alternatively, it can be used to program the weights of the output demultiplexer 30 of the cell (FIG. 22), so that it outputs a constant derived from Max (by turning on only the weight associated with Max), or that constant negated in the second half of the waveform cycle. Numerous variations of the above presented scheme of waveform generation can be easily derived by those skilled in the art. One can manipulate the values of const, -const, the weights of the multiplexers and demultiplexers, the gain k of the intergrator (all that by downloading appropriate programming information to the logic control block), to achieve waveforms with duty cycle other than 50% (sawtooth in particular), or with absolute values of the maximum and minimum levels equal to each other or different, as desired.
Another variation of the presented scheme is based on using one of the input signals X1, . . . , Xn (or a mathematical function thereof, see Table 2) instead of const to be compared against the output of the integrator. In this case one of the input multiplexer/summers (e.g., 22, FIG. 27) would be used to derive the desired signal to be used for comparison in place of const. This value would then be selected by the multiplexer/summer 52 instead of const. The other multiplexer/summer would work as in the scheme described above. This way an oscillator controlled by a(n) (combination of) input signal(s) would be attained (what is known in the art as VCO, voltage-controlled oscillator, even though strictly speaking this would be a current controlled oscillator, since the signal is in current mode in the preferred embodiment of the cell). Again, numerous variations of this modified oscillator scheme could be easily derived by those skilled in the art.
Other schemes of controlled waveform generation are possible. One can connect two cells of the FPAA to implement a circuit with two conjugate poles on the imaginary axis of the complex plane to generate a sinewave. Such circuit would require both cells to be programmed to perform integration. Appropriate scheme of parameter adjustment to achieve a stable waveform of desired frequency and amplitude could be easily derived by those skilled in the art. Another application of the inventive device, related to the controlled oscillators described above, is a phase-locked loop (PLL). PLL typically comprises a VCO, a low-pass filter, and a phase detector. A phase detector can be realized by a single cell of the inventive device, whereby the Gilbert multiplier block would be used as a phase detector (e.g., Alan B. Grebene, Bipolar and MOS Analog Circuit Design, John Wiley, 1984). Other blocks can be realized easily in the structure of the inventive device, and connected appropriately to implement a PLL.
The control block stores programming information (loaded to it via a control signals connection) and sends programming signals to the analog processing blocks of the cell. One way to arrange storage of information is by means of digital memory, such as RAM. Another way is by storing electrical charge on floating gates of MOS devices, such as EEPROM cells. Programming signals sent to the analog processing blocks can be derived by methods known in the implementations of digital-to-analog converters (DACs). Since the control block has access to input and internal signals of the cell as well, it can produce control signals as a function of instantaneous input and internal signals values. This feature of the control block is important for certain operations, such as a minimum (maximum) follower (min, max).
FIG. 5A shows a preferred embodiment of the control block. It contains a logic control circuit, which can be realized as a combinatorial circuit or as a finite state machine such as those known in the art, and may contain logic circuits, registers, RAM cells, EEPROM cells, DACs, and other elements typically used in digital and analog-digital (mixed-mode) circuits known in the art. Further, the control block comprises a number of comparators for comparing signals in desired mode (e.g. current-mode), having analog inputs and digital outputs, and an analog multiplexer/summer, such as the one described above. One input of each comparator is preferably connected to one of the input signals, while the other input is connected to the output of the multiplexer summer. The multiplexer/summer's select input is controlled by the control circuit. The inputs of the multiplexer/summer are connected to the internal signals of the analog processing part of the cell (i.e. the output signals of the analog processing blocks of the cell). Additionally, a constant signal created by the control block is connected to one input of the multiplexer/summer. Thus the control circuit can choose one of the internal signals processed by the cell or its own programmed constant to be compared with any of the input signals X1, X2, . . . , Xn, (or the output signal Y, which is connected to the input of the cell via the feedback connection 34). The outputs of the comparators are connected to the control circuit.
The control circuit programmably operates to compare the analog input signals (or the output signal) against one of the values produced by any of the analog processing blocks or their weighted sum obtained in the multiplexer/summer 52. In one implementation, the comparators each produce two binary signals corresponding to the conditions a≦b and a ≧b, where a and b are input signals to comparators. Two signals of equal value on the output of a comparator indicate equal input signals. A preferred implementation of current-input comparator is shown in FIG. 5B. Ordinary comparators, such as those known in the art, can be used instead. In this way, control circuit produces control signals as a function of certain conditions of instantaneous input and internal signal values (e.g., equality of two or more signals, relationship between a number of signals and zero or another constant).
This feature also realizes minimum and maximum followers (min, max), absolute value (abs), and other operations. To realize min and max operations, the control circuit detects the smallest (largest) signal and selects this signal on the input of cell. This selection is accomplished by comparing the output signal of the selected multiplexer with the input signals. If one or more of the input signals is smaller (larger) than the multiplexer output, the control circuit sends appropriate signals to the multiplexer to adjust its weights until the smallest (largest) signal is selected. When realizing the absolute value function, control circuit changes the sign of input weights if the weighted sum is negative.
Variations of the presented cell can be derived. By changing the arrangement of the blocks comprising the cell, the functions of those blocks, or the physical nature or type of the signals, one can obtain equivalent designs of the cell. In particular, one can design a cell having voltage input signals and current output signals, simply by adding appropriate front-end and back-end circuits such as OTAs. Alternative cell implementations, namely voltage-to-current, voltage-to-voltage and current-to-voltage versions of the cell, can be built. The design decision as to the physical nature of the input and output signals of the cell has an impact on the design of the interconnection network of the programmable circuit device. For instance, voltage output signals can be, in principle, easily distributed to multiple inputs of other cells. Current output signals, on the contrary, work best if they are "sent" to one destination only. Therefore, if one output signal in current form needs to be distributed to several cells' inputs, preferably only one of those cells opens its input port for the current. Alternatively, the output current may be mirrored (copied), for instance by an analog demultiplexer such as the one presented above, and individual copies sent to the several cells' inputs. Also, signals of current form can be freely added in electrical nodes, which is not possible for signals in voltage form.
The topology of the circuit realized in the programmable device (the mapping of the circuit into the structure of the programmable device) is independent of the physical nature of the input and output signals of the cells of the programmable device. It is determined by the flow of signal in the circuit. That is, if a mapping of a given circuit to the resources of the programmable device of a given arrangement of physical natures of signals (e.g., current-to-current) is known, the same mapping can be used for this circuit if it needs to be implemented in a programmable device of a different arrangement of physical natures of signals (e.g., voltage-to current), with the possible exception of the additions performed in current-mode on signal lines by virtue of KCL, which would have to be implemented differently in voltage mode.
Some operations, important for dynamic systems, multi-valued, fuzzy and other logic applications, performed by cell are summarized in Table 2 below. Xi denotes inputs signals and Y denotes an output signal. The symbol k represents a programmed constant (gain). No distinction is made between local and global signals, since the cell processes them in the same manner.
The cell performs summing of input signals selected by the control circuitry, multiplication of two signals (squaring of one signal), or multiplication of two independently derived weighted sums of input signals. Further processing includes lossless or lossy integration, and clipping, max, min, etc. These functions are important for implementation of continuous-time dynamic systems, and multi-valued, fuzzy, and continuous (such as Lukasiewicz) logic circuits.
The inventive architecture of the device is motivated by the desire to enable circuit realizations with minimal signal delays. Examples include an elliptic eighth-order ladder bandpass filter (Tan, "Design and Automatic Tuning of Fully Integrated, Transconductance-Grounded Capacitor Filters" Ph.D. Thesis, Univ. Of Minn. 1988), a rank filter cell (Paul et al., "A Simple Analog Rank Filter", ISCAS, pp. 121-24, 1992), a circuit for tracking the product of two matrices, a circuit for tracking a solution of a system of linear equations, a circuit for tracking a solution of a linear programming problem by the method of steepest descent, and a fuzzy controller (Kosko, "Neural Networks and Fuzzy Systems. A Dynamic Systems Approach to Machine Intelligence", Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1992).
The programmable support circuitry within a cell are preferably designed to minimize parasitics incurred by introducing switching capability. Parasitics, such as additional resistance in the signal path and stray capacitances, would be unavoidable if switching devices of any kind available in IC technologies were used. The net result of these parasitics is the introduction of phase errors and other distortions in transmitted signals, which compromise circuit's performance, such as speed and accuracy. Therefore, the present invention, preferably, does not employ switches, directly in the signal path of the device, but uses circuits which attain switching function without additional switching devices in the signal path. FIGS. 7A-F show a number of preferred embodiments of circuits with switching capability that minimize such parasiticis. FIG. 7A, for example, shows the basic form of a programmable current mirror that includes transistors Q1 and Q2 and emitter degeneration resistors R1 and R2. The circuit 40 within the dashed box is a common current mirror with emitter degeneration. However, by connecting a current source Iswitch to the emitter of Q2, this circuit becomes programmable. When there is no current supplied by the source, the mirror 40 simply copies the input current Iin into the output current out. When the Iswitch current source is turned on and supplies a current large enough to raise voltage on the emitter of Q2 sufficiently to turn Q2 off, the mirror shuts off. By controlling Iswitch one can control how deeply Q2 goes into cutoff. This way desired programmability of the signal path is realized. The programmability is attained without introducing any additional elements in the signal path, such as switches connected in series with other circuit elements. Therefore there is only a negligible degradation of performance of the circuit, caused by output capacitance of the current source. Since this capacitance is in parallel with other parasitic capacitances already present at this node, it does not change the local topology of the circuit, and the undesired effects it causes can be taken care of in the same way as for those capacitances. This is much easier than for series switches, which actually change the local topology of the circuit. The circuit of FIG. 7A then is a programmable one, with repeated programmability of the signal path attained substantially without sacrificing the circuit's performance, such as speed and accuracy.
A programmable analog electronic circuit according to the invention comprises a programmable electronic circuit that includes a signal path and one or more active devices such as transistors controlling signal flow through the signal path. Each active device has multiple operating points that determine the signal propagation characteristics of the device. The circuit also includes a source of control current or control voltage to a part of an active device in the circuit, the source being removed from the signal path. The source changes the operating point of the active device from one point to another by changing the delivered control current or control voltage sufficiently to switch the device on and off and thereby turn on and off the signal flow through the signal path of the circuit.
Another useful embodiment of the programmable support circuitry is shown in FIG. 7B. The circuit comprises a differential pair 42 (in the dashed box)--which in this figure is not a complete circuit but rather a generic building block from which many specific circuits are derived, by adding resistors, transistors, other differential pairs or other devices. The circuit in the dashed box is tunable/programmable by virtue of changing the current Ibias. To shut both Q1 and Q2 off, one needs to turn Ibias down to zero. Then, additional current Iswitch can be provided to drive Q1 and Q2 deeper in cut-off.
FIG. 7C shows a programmable analog demultiplexer circuit 44. The circuit mirrors the differential current-mode input signal on a number of outputs. Each output signal is an amplified, attenuated, or identical copy of the input signal, depending on the values of bias currents Ibias. The bias currents can be tuned independently of each other. Each output can be turned off by turning off the corresponding bias Ibias,i or providing corresponding current Iswitch,i >Ibias,i. The same concept of signal-path programming is used to build multiplexer/summers (FIGS. 7E, F).
FIGS. 7D and F show block-diagram symbols of the analog demultiplexer and multiplexer/summer blocks, respectively. FIG. 7G shows a schematic and FIG. 7H explains the operation of a Zener diode D1 (FIG. 7G). The Zener diode is connected in the path of current signal in reverse direction, i.e., when the current I switch is off, the diode does not pass the signal. When the I switch is turned on, the diode enters the breakdown region (FIG. 7H), provided that the reverse voltage forced across the diode by the current source is sufficiently high, and the signal can now pass through the diode. Due to very small incremental resistance of the diode in the breakdown region this makes an almost ideal switch.
The structures of individual FPAAs may differ depending on the class of analog circuits for which they will be used. A structure is determined in accordance with the following steps of a method. This method may be implemented in a number of ways, but preferably is carried out with a computer to reduce computation time. The present invention provides a method for designing a FPAA, comprising: (1) selecting a representative circuit from a class of circuits of interest (e.g., if the class of circuits is active filters, an example filter of reasonably high order is selected); (2) creating a schematic diagram of the representative circuit (e.g., the filter); (3) deriving a circuit labeled multi-graph from the schematic diagram; (4) adding nodes and edges to produce a superset of the multi-graph; (5) grouping together selected edges and nodes from the superset of the multi-graph to form an interconnection multi-graph of desired cells and determine the functionality of individual cells, (6) realizing a cell in a desired technology; and (7) determining connections between the cells. Such connections are made according to the multi-graph derived in #5 above and the cell contents. Some circuits can be scaled up and down (e.g. for filters, scaling usually means changing the order of the filter). In a matrix product tracking circuit, scaling means changing the sizes of input matrices. If in the process of scaling the circuit up and down the number of edges incident with a single cell (the cell represented by a number of nodes of the superset of the circuit labeled multi-graph) changes, these edges should be realized as global connections. If, on the other hand, in the scaling process the number of such edges does not change, they should be realized as local connections. With the addition of control circuit in one of the ways described above, a field-programmable mixed array device is now complete, constructed for a particular class of circuits.
An example of constructing an FPAA is shown in FIGS. 8A-E for a matrix product tracking circuit. A circuit representing a class of circuits of interest is selected and its schematic diagram obtained. FIG. 8A shows the result of these steps. Next, a circuit labeled multi-graph for the matrix product tracking circuit is derived, as shown in FIG. 8B. The multi-graph is then generalized to a superset, as shown in FIG. 8C. Global signal interconnections are selected because if the matrices are scaled up, the number of connections to the summing nodes grows. If the output matrix has more than one element as a result of scaling up, the same input signals must be distributed to more than one product element, which also leads to global signal interconnections. The contents of the individual cells are then determined, as shown in FIG. 8D. Since current-mode summation can be done directly on a signal line, there is no need to realize Σ nodes as part of cells. A single cell will contain the multiplication operation. The cell is realized as a current-mode one. Connections between the cells are made according to the graph of FIG. 8C, as shown in FIG. 8E. Various programmable devices, created by the method described herein for different classes of circuits, such as filters and matrix multiplication circuits, can be merged after creation to provide a programmable device capable of accommodating circuits of both classes. Such merge operations will typically lead to the extension of functionality of individual cells of the programmable device for the circuit of the first class by the operations necessary to realize the circuits of the second class, and the like extension of the interconnection scheme. For instance, functionality of the cell can be extended by whatever is required to implement circuits, such as filters. If filters are considered, integration and summation would be added to the functions performed by individual cells. FPAA can be customized for the various classes of circuits.
The present invention further provides a method for programming (i.e., mapping a particular circuit onto a programmable device such as an FPAA to form a programmed device) comprising: (1) obtaining a schematic diagram of the desired circuit (FIG. 9); (2) grouping circuit elements of the desired circuit into clusters that can be realized by single cells within the programmable device to form a schematic diagram with clustered elements (e.g., 3a,b,c in FIG. 9); (3) deriving a circuit labeled multi-graph from the schematic diagram with clustered elements (as shown in FIGS. 10, 11A--see Example 1 for details); and (4) embedding the circuit labeled multi-graph into an interconnection labeled multi-graph of the programmable device (shown in FIG. 1A) to form a programmed device (shown in FIG. 11B). In the example illustrating the above process, for instance, OTAs labeled 3a,b,c in FIG. 9 are grouped together and represented by edges 3a,b,c in the graph of FIG. 10, and the capacitor CC4 connected to the OTAs is represented by a node of the graph labeled accordingly. Then the edges 3a,b,c and the node CC4 are all mapped into a single node of the graph of FIG. 1A. Such a node represents a group of OTAs and a capacitor shown in FIG. 11A, and can be realized by a single cell of the programmable device. Eleven such cells can be mapped into the programmable device as in FIG. 11B.
The following examples are intended to illustrate possible applications of a programmable analog device according to the invention. They are not exclusive by any means. Those skilled in the art can readily find many other applications.
This example illustrates a continuous-time ladder filter constructed using the inventive FPAA and having only local signal interconnections. FIG. 9 shows an electrical schematic of an eight-order, elliptic band-pass filter realized as an OTA-C ladder. This is a voltage-mode circuit, since each OTA takes a voltage signal as input, and although it produces a current signal, this current is always turned into voltage, either by the integrating operation of a capacitor (possibly only parasitic input capacitor of (an)other OTA(s)), or by another OTA with a feedback connection, which is equivalent to a resistor. Each signal created in this circuit is going to be fed to some OTA (which can accept only voltage-mode signals as input) or connected to the output terminals of the circuit, which also require a voltage-mode signal. This circuit, and other voltage-mode circuits, can be realized in an equivalent current-mode form in the structure of the presented device, if current-mode implementation of the device is preferred.
At first, the network of the filter does not exhibit much regularity, nor locality of connections. The easiest way to see both is by drawing the graph of connections of the circuit. Each pair of wires carries one differential signal, represented by a single node of the graph (FIG. 10). Each OTA is represented as a directed edge of the graph (FIG. 10). The graph reveals regularity which leads to a realization based on regular, locally-only interconnected structure. One particular way of deriving a regular structure for the circuit is by grouping all edges coming into a given node as a single unit. As an example, consider edges 3a-c (FIG. 10), representing OTA's with the same labels (FIG. 9) (as it is easy to notice, OTA's with outputs connected to the same pair of wires are labeled with the same numbers). OTA's 3a-c can be collected together as in FIG. 11A, forming a cluster with four inputs and one output (as for the realization of the whole filter circuit, nodes 1 and 10 would additionally require a feedback connection in one of the OTA's to realize lossy integration, and all four OTAs are required only in cell 6). Eleven such clusters can be connected locally only to comprise the whole filter, as is shown in FIG. 11B, wherein dashed lines indicate unused parts of the structure.
Instead of voltage-mode cells (OTA and C) current-mode cells of the programmable device may be used. The structure of connections is independent of the mode of signals, therefore, the cells in the programmable device are arranged in the same way as shown in FIG. 11B. Each cell works in an integrating mode, except cell 6, which realized "infinite" (i.e. very high) gain. Cells 1 and 10 realize lossy integrators, all others--lossless. All the signal interconnections are local, within the structure provided by the exemplified device. Since the input and output terminals are on the sides of the rectangular collection of cells in FIG. 11B, no extra global connections are necessary for this circuit, which can simply be placed in a corner of an array.
Most ladder filters of practical importance can be mapped into the structure of the exemplified FPAA in a similar way. Second-order (biquad) filters can be mapped too. Since every transfer function can be realized as a cascade of biquads and one-pole blocks (they can be realized by single cells), which can be then put next to each other in the array, the device provides a way of realizing continuous-time filters (in cascade or ladder topology) by means of local signal interconnections only.
This example illustrates an analog rank filter, a nonlinear circuit that is realized with local signal interconnections only. An analog rank filter is described, for example, in Paul et al., "A Simple Analog Rank Filter" ISCAS, IEEE, pp. 121-24, 1992. FIG. 12A shows a block diagram of a single cell of the exemplified analog rank filter and FIG. 12B shows how it can be mapped into the structure of the presented device. Two cells of the device are necessary to implement one cell of the rank filter. The left cell in FIG. 12B implements the left-hand part of the rank filter cell, and the right cell the right-hand part. One of ordinary skill in the art can identify functions performed by each cell in FIG. 12B. A required number of such cells can be placed next to each other to realize a rank filter circuit.
This example illustrates circuits also having global signal interconnections. FIG. 13 shows the structure of a matrix product tracking circuit. It takes two time-varying matrices A(t)= aij ! and B(t)= bij !, both 3 times 3, and creates their product C(t)=A(t)·B(t) (a factor of 3 is required to account for the distribution of each input signal to 3 cells; alternatively the input weights or gain k of each cell could be increased by the same factor). The circuit can be generalized for any rectangular conformable matrices. Each element cij (t) of the product matrix is produced by a "local" group of cells along a diagonal global signal line. However, to distribute the input signals and to collect the results signals, global connections are necessary. Each diagonal output line is used to sum elementary products aij ·bjk, j=1, . . . , n, comprising the product element cik.
The "globality" of connections results primarily from the need to distribute input signals and collect output signals. Creation of each matrix product is done "locally" (although using global signal lines). Global signal lines are used in this example only at the "terminals" of the circuit, such as for the input and output signals. Global lines are not involved in transmitting internal signals of the circuit.
If one modifies slightly the matrix product tracking circuit of FIG. 13, one can build a circuit tracking the solution of a system of linear equations. The solution x(t) of the system of algebraic equations A(t)·x(t)=b(t) can be found by solving a system x(t)+A(t)·x(t)-b(t)=0 of differential equations provided that the matrix A(t) is always positive stable. In many practical cases, matrix A will be time-invariant, but it is instructive to see the solution of a more general problem, i.e., with a time-varying matrix A(t). FIG. 14 shows a circuit solving a system of 3 equations with 3 unknowns x1 (t), . . . , x3 (t). The global connections in this circuit carry internal feedback signals, although the distance traveled by these signals is small.
A linear programming problem can be stated: given a set of constraints g(t)=F(t)·x(t)= g1 (t), . . . , gm (t)!'≦0 (the inequality is supposed to hold for every element of the vector; F is a rectangular matrix of constraints coefficients, g is a vector representing individual constraints), minimize the objective function ε(x1, . . . , xn)=ε·x=ε1 x1 + . . . +εn xn, where ε= ε1, . . . , εn !. Application of the method of steepest descent leads to a system of equations x=-μ·ε'-2a·A·diag(g)·U(g), where U(g) denotes the step function, diag(g) denotes a diagonal matrix with elements of vector g on the main diagonal, and μ and a are constants (μ→0, a→∞). This system can be solved by the circuit shown in FIG. 15. In the case of linear constraints matrix A will be identical to matrix F, nevertheless a more general circuit not assuming this equality is shown as an illustration of the versatility of the inventive device. A simplified circuit, with only matrix F input, can be easily derived.
This example illustrates Galois field GF(22) operations as part of MVL applications. FIGS. 16A and B shows the tables for addition and multiplication in Galois field 22. Each of these operations can be realized by the cells of FPAA, assuming that only two of the cell's inputs are used at a time. Addition can be realized as a ⊕ b=ƒ(a+b) for a≠b (FIGS. 16C and D), and a ⊕ b=0 otherwise. The condition a=b can be detected by the control block of a cell. This requires programming the weights of one of the input multiplexers/summers to calculate the difference a-b of the input signals, selecting constant 0 for comparison in the control block, and controlling the weights of the other input multiplexer to set them to zero if a=b was detected. Instead of function ƒ(x) (FIG. 16D) a smooth function ƒ1 (x) (FIG. 16E) can be used. This function can be realized by adding two characteristics of the clipping blocks shown in FIG. 16F. If the function of the form shown in FIG. 16D is required, it can be realized by providing more clipping blocks of the cell.
Multiplication a × b in the field (FIG. 16B) can be realized as a × b=((a+b-2) mod 3)+1 for a≠0 and b≠0, and a × b=0 otherwise. The two conditions for a and b can be tested independently by the comparators in the control block, and upon at least one of them being true the input weights of the multiplexer/summer would be turned down to 0. Mod 3 operation can be realized, as shown in FIGS. 16G and H. The control block performs the necessary logic operations. The realizations of GF(22) operations proposed in this example are similar to the ones presented in Zilic et al., "Current-mode CMOS Galois Field Circuits" ISMVL '93, p. 245-250.
This example illustrates an application of the addition and multiplication functions in GF(22) described in example 4 above to combinational functions synthesis method based on orthogonal expansions. FIG. 17A shows a block diagram of a structure realizing a function of input variables X1, X2, . . . , Xm. Each column realizes one base function over GF(22). Multiplied by a constant from GF(22), this function is added to the other base functions. All operations are in GF(22). FIG. 17B shows an example of realization of one of the functions ƒi. Since each cell can realize the identity operation (see Table 2), it is possible to omit certain input variables Xi, X3 in this example. More than one column of cells can be used for the realization of each ƒi if necessary. Also, it may be convenient to make certain input variables available on more than one horizontal global line. An alternative approach, based upon providing literals on horizontal lines, or some functions of single variables which are convenient for the creation of literals, is also possible. In one such approach the powers (i.e., multiple products in GF(22)) are used to create polynomial expansions of MVL functions.
The same structure illustrated in FIG. 17 is used for the implementation of Post logic. Each cell realizes min and max operations (See Table 1) instead of × and ⊕, respectively, and literals of the form shown in FIG. 3D. Each function ƒi is realized as in FIG. 17B, except that the cells realize min, max, or identity operation.
The structure of FIG. 17A can be used for realization of combinational functions with other methods. In such realizations, unlike the ones based upon orthogonal expansions, due to the availability of addition, multiplication (in the conventional sense), and nonlinear operations on signals, some combinational functions have very efficient implementations.
The topology of MVL circuits mapped into the inventive FPAA does not have to be constrained, such as the one shown in FIG. 17. Global vertical and diagonal signal lines can be used, if necessary, to achieve greater flexibility of the circuits' topology. FIG. 18 shows a structure for implementations based upon generalized Shannon expansion of MVL functions. Some input variables need to be connected to more than one diagonal line. More general forms of the same kind are possible, based upon other operators than > used for separation, for instance even vs. odd parity, based on matrix orthogonality, which is a generalization of an approach known for two-valued functions.
The integrator block is used as a memory element, enabling realization of sequential circuits. Since each cell is capable of realizing identity function, and global connections are available, larger, irregular structures, composed of combinational and sequential parts, can be built with the inventive FPAA.
This example illustrates an application of the inventive FPAA for fuzzy logic and continuous logic (such as Lukasiewicz logic) circuits, for example a fuzzy logic controller with correlation-product inference. A structure similar to the one shown is FIG. 17A is shown in FIG. 19A and used to implement a controller with m input variables and n fuzzy inference rules. FIG. 19B shows details of each rule implementation. Fuzzy membership function is implemented as a trapezoidal DC transfer function of the kind shown in FIG. 3C. Activation values wi are multiplied by centroid values of the fuzzy rules consequents ci, and their areas Ii, yielding two sums computed on two horizontal global lines. The final expression for the defuzzified output variable vk is produced by a two-quadrant divider shown in FIG. 19C.
Based on these these designs, other continuous-time matrix manipulation circuits, such as matrix addition, or inversion, and other circuits can be created according to the prior art knowledge in analog computers design. The methodology of realization of various circuits implemented in the programmable circuit device structure can be also a basis of more general circuit synthesis. For instance, if one designs a continuous-time filter (like the band-pass filter described above) in the structure of the device, the mapping of the filter components into the structure of the programmable device, together with the FPAA's floor plan, can be used as a basis for a standard custom design of such a filter, leading to the improved layout of the filter due to the use of local connections only. Other applications of the invention include but are not limited to classical neural networks; cellular neural networks; immunocomputers; Wiener and Kalman filters; state-space and other adaptive filters; differential and integral equation solvers; partial differential equation (PDE) solvers (by finite element method); combinatorial optimization solvers; consistent labeling problem solvers; Ricatti control circuits; reverse tracking robot and other robot control problems; cellular automata; gas Ising problems; and optimal control problems (e.g., Kurman chains).
Having illustrated and described the principles of the invention in a preferred embodiment, it should be apparent to those skilled in the art that the invention can be modified in arrangement and detail without departing from such principles. For example, discrete or integrated components of various types may be employed for the various parts of the programmable device, as is known to those of skill in the art. Technologies such as bipolar, MOS, NMOS, PMOS, ECL, and others may be used as desired.
This example illustrates a FPAA structure (ladder filter) with local interconnections (FIG. 11B). Each cell derives a weighted sum of selected signals from four nearest neighbors and optionally performs lossy or lossless integration to produce its own output signal (FIG. 11C). An eighth-order elliptic band-pass ladder filter has been mapped into the FPAA. Dashed lines show unused elements and connections. All cells in the structure are identical, however, in the filter they realize three different functions: ideal integration, lossy integration and amplification, with parameters varying from cell to cell. The illustrated design does not use any switches in the signal path. A straightforward implementation of amplification/integration in OTA-C (operational transconductance amplifier and capacitor) technique (Schaumann et al. infra. and Tan, infra.) leads to a capacitor connected to the OTA's output via electronic switches, degrading the frequency response.
A test circuit, containing an amplifier/integrator core of a cell (FIGS. 24 and 25A, B), was fabricated in a Maxim CPI transistor-array process. To avoid clutter, auxiliary bias and common-mode feedback circuitry was omitted in the figures. The input buffer k1 (FIGS. 6A, B), comprising transistors Q11 -Q16 (FIG. 23) was based on a Gilbert current-mode amplifier. When IE11, IE12 are off, no signal is passed to the cell (an inactive connection in FIG. 11B). When one of the sources is on, the signal is transmitted with optional gain (dependent of the bias) of up to about 10. The buffer also eliminates common-mode signals and separates high impedance gm input from other cells.
In the integrating mode (FIGS. 6A, 23) sources IE12, IC15 and IC16 are off. Outputs of the buffer are connected to a simplified gm cell (Darlington pairs Q25 -Q26, Q27 -Q28) and to the capacitors C. A two-stage current amplifier k2 (Q21 -Q24, Q31 -Q32, Q35 -Q36) follows gm. Q35, Q36 with active loads and emitter follower Q37 Q38 provide voltage output. With IE31 off, differential output current is IC33, IC34 minus collector currents of Q37, Q38 With capacitors C, this is a classic Miller integrator in differential form with an additional current output. The gain can be changed by changing bias of the input buffer.
In amplifying mode (FIGS. 6B, 23), IE11 is off, the gm cell receives no signal, and IE33 is off. Buffer k1 feeds current directly to the amplifier k2 (from Q15, Q16) The gain of this cascade can be turned up to 60 dB by changing the bias. The output current is IC33, IC34 minus collector currents of Q33, Q34.
FIGS. 24 and 25 demonstrate frequency response in integrating and amplifying modes, respectively. Adjustment of IE33 allows fine tuning of a phase response in the vicinity of -90°. Two common-mode feedback circuits (similar to the ones shown in FIG. 20B), assure proper voltage levels at the input of the gm cell, and the collectors of Q35 and Q36. Voltage emitters of Q21 and Q22, proportional to the common-mode voltage at the gm input, is compared to a reference level. Correction signals are sent to the bias sources IE11, IC13, IC14. A similar scheme is used for Q35 and Q36.
Changing voltage gain within the integrator results in shifting the useful range of frequencies along a frequency axis. Table 3 below summarizes main parameters of a single cell of this illustrative circuit.
The full cell should have five independently tuned input buffers: four to communicate with neighbors, and one to implement a one-pole function by feeding the integrator's output back to the input. Therefore, this example implements a fully programmable FPAA with exclusively local signal interconnections. The filter implementation in the FPAA does not suffer any more undesirable signal interactions than the ones unavoidably present in its non-programmable implementations. Ladders or other types of filters, as well as certain circuits modeling systems of differential equations can be mapped to this FPAA.
1. A programmable analog device comprising an array of programmable analog signal processing cells, wherein each analog signal processing cell comprises an analog signal processing portion and a control circuit, wherein the control circuit controls the operation of the analog signal processing portion and may also take part in auxiliary information processing, wherein the array of programmable analog signal processing cells are locally interconnected by one or a plurality of signal interconnections to form the programmable analog device, wherein a cell is considered locally interconnected in that the number of cells connected to a given cell by programmable analog signal connections connected to the cell does not change as the number of cells in the programmable analog device varies, whereby a total length of unprogrammed signal connections has been minimized.
2. The programmable analog device of claim 1, further comprising one or a plurality of signal interconnections for connecting various cells of the array together, wherein said signal interconnections result in some cells becoming globally connected, wherein a cell is considered globally interconnected in that the number of cells connected to a given cell by programmable analog signal connections connected to the cell changes as the number of cells in the array varies, whereby a total length of unprogrammed signal connections has been minimized.
3. The programmable analog device of claim 2 wherein the control circuit comprises a means for exchanging information to and from the control circuit, a means for storing information, or a means for communicating with an associated analog processing portion of a cell.
4. The programmable analog device of claim 3 wherein the control circuit is programmed to determine the operation of the analog processing portion of the cell, and the analog processing portion of a cell comprises a means for performing one or more mathematical and other functions.
5. The programmable analog device of claim 4 wherein the analog processing portion is programmed by changing the operating point (bias) of electron devices in the signal path and not by using switches in the signal path.
6. The programmable analog device of claim 5 wherein the analog processing portion comprises an amplifier/integrator, wherein the amplifier/integrator comprises an operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) input stage, having an input signal and an output signal connected to a current amplifier, wherein the current amplifier comprises an additional voltage mode output, and a capacitor or a plurality of capacitors connected to the voltage mode output of the current amplifier and to the input of the OTA, wherein the current-mode output signal of the amplifier is proportional to its voltage-mode output signal, which represents the integral of the input current-mode signal, wherein the amplifier/integrator further optionally comprises an input current buffer having a current-mode input and two current-mode outputs, whereby one output is connected to the input of the OTA and the other output is connected to the input of the amplifier/integrator.
Baktir and Tan, IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. 40:200-206, 1993.
Chua and Roska, IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. I 40:147-156, 1993.
Chua and Yang, IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. pp. 1257-1272, 1988. Chua and Yang I!.
Chua and Yang, IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. pp. 1273-1290, 1988. Chua and Yang II!.
Cimagalli et al., IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. II, 40:174-183, 1993.
Cruz and Chua, IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. 38:812-817, 1991.
Dalla Betta et al., IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. 40:206-215, 1993.
EL Gamal et al., IEEE J. Solid-State Circ. 24:394-398, 1989.
Gilbert, IEEE ISSCC Dig. Tech. Papers, pp. 286-287, 1984.
Gold Mavretic, IEEE Midwest Symp. Cir. Sys., pp. 984-987, 1988.
Harrer et al., IEEE Trans. Neural Networks 3:466-476, 1992.
Ismail et al., IEEE J. Solid-State Cir. 23:183-194, 1988.
Krieg et al., ISCAS, pp. 958-961, IEEE, 1990.
Lee and Gulak, 1991 IEEE ISSCC Dig. Tech. Papers, 34:186-187, 1991. Lee and Gulak I!.
Lee and Gulak, Electronics Lett. 28:28-29, 1992. Lee and Gulak III!.
Lee and Gulak, IEEE J. Solid-State Circ., 26:1860-1867, 1991. Lee and Gulak II!.
Lee and Gulak, Proc. EPGA '94 Workshop, ACM, Berkely, CA, 1994. Lee and Gulak IV!.
Loh and Geiger, ISCAS, pp. 2248-2251, Singapore, 1991.
Loh et al., IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. 39:265-276, 1992.
Manetti and Piccirilli, Proc. 6th Mediterranean ELectrotechnical Conference, pp. 355-358, Ljubljana, Yugoslavia, 1991.
Mashiko et al., ISCAS, pp. 1279-1282, 1991.
PMI, GAP-01, Analog Signal Processing Subsystem.
Rodriguez-Vazquez et al., IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. II, 40:132-146, 1993.
Roska and Chua, IEEE Trans. Cir. Sys. II, 40:163-173, 1993.
Sivilotti, Advanced Res. VLSI, Proc. Fifth MIT Conf., ed. Leighton, pp. 237-258, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1988.
Vallancourt and Tsividis, IEEE ISSCC Dig. Tech. Papers, pp. 208-209, 1987.
van den Broeke and Nieuwkerk, IEEE J. Solid-State Cir. 28:862-864, 1993.
Van der Spiegel et al., J. Solid-State Circ. 27:82-92, 1992.
Varrientos et al., IEEE Trans. on Cir. Sys. II 40:147-155, 1993. | 2019-04-22T02:42:56Z | https://patents.google.com/patent/US5959871A/en |
This past weekend I went on a well thought out, obsessively planned, bonsai road trip. I had an agenda, stops were scheduled, I was fitting as much into this one day on the road as I could.
I left my house at 7am, coffee in hand (of course), Nav system tuned into my first stop, and a back pack with snacks, water, and the necessary paperwork. My phone was charged up, the car charger on hand…and the baby goat was in the back of the car. It would take me 5 hours to get to my first destination, and I started up my audio book. I listen to books constantly, as I spend a lot of time on the road, and I love to read! Today was a Kate Wilhelm book in the Barbara Holloway series. I stopped to fill up my gas tank. I stopped to pee (lots of coffee!). I stopped to text and give updates to people on my agenda for the day.
At noon, right on schedule I pulled into my first stop. Tieton Farm and Creamery. I met Ruth, her rescue dog Jamie, and we became fast friends. Ruth and I unloaded Rafael (the baby goat) into his pen and she took me on a quick walking tour of her farm and set up. She runs a mixed herd of dairy goats and sheep and they make lovely artisan cheeses from the milk. I got to meet Bella, one of her livestock guardian dogs too! I love meeting dogs! LOL It was a lovely place, thick lush irrigated pastures, healthy and happy goats and sheep, cute dogs, and Ruth was a gem. Back at the car we did some paperwork, took a couple of selfies, and I was back on the road.
Nav system updated with the new destination, text message sent, book restarted, stop for gas and pee again, and I was off. A short 30 minutes later and I pulled into Red Robin and met up with Kristen for a lunch date. Kristen is a fellow MRKH warrior and is a spit-fire! She’s pierced and tattooed and currently sports a mohawk with bright blue in her platinum blonde! We’ve met before in a group setting, but spending sister time one on one is always special. No one quite gets you like another MRKH sister. We talked and ate, and talked some more. We talked about our physical limitations, symptoms associated with MRKH, and other random stuff. We talked about her “threenager” Dek. Kristen and her husband adopted Dek as a newborn. We talked about their adoption journey, and family planning as it relates to having MRKH. We talked about the research being done and trials being conducted for uterine transplants. We both agreed that if we were within 5 years of diagnosis and these transplants were being done we would be totally on board in considering this as an option. We talked about all the MRKH sisters we know who are doing or have done surrogacy. We talked about younger MRKH sisters we know and how as “big sisters” we can work to mentor them and share our experiences. We talked too about meeting sisters face to face, but also finding sisters our own age who can relate to what is relevant in our lives in the moment, and the value of sharing out experiences. I personally treasure every opportunity I have to spend time with my MRKH sisters, so was sad when our time was up and I needed to get back on the road. Several hugs, selfies, and promises to get together again soon…and we finally parted ways.
So Janine and I met in high school, well specifically, we met at the Sno-Isle Skills Center. A collaborative voc-tech school that served several school districts in the area. We were both in enrolled in the medical office assistant program. I don’t know why we hit it off so well, but I’m sure that God had a hand in it! We became good friends, sharing stories of our boyfriends, families, and life at our different high schools. When it came time for me to be scheduled for the diagnostic laparoscopy, it was Janine who would be the person who would drive me to the hospital at 5am and sit with me until time for my surgery. This was the surgery that confirmed my diagnosis of MRKH. The day I was told that I did not have a uterus, would never get my period, and would never carry a child. Janine was there for me that day. As I went back to school, and back to the Skills Center – she was there, and our friendship was cemented. She asked me to be a bridesmaid in her wedding, and I asked her to be in my wedding too. So our spring was filled with graduations, our summer with bridal showers, and that fall we both got married. I wore a red dress in her wedding, and she was supposed to wear a green dress in mine. A few weeks before my wedding, she got hit with a horrible bout of endometriosis and was in the hospital for a couple of weeks I think. She was not well enough to be in my wedding or even to attend. It was sad, but I found an alternate bridesmaid.
A few months later, we both ended up moving into the same apartment complex in Everett. Two very young couples with minimal furniture, but wanting so badly to be adults. We shared several dinners at each others apartments as we learned to navigate as married couples. As life continued we kept in touch when I joined the army and ended up in Colorado. Occasional phone calls, a few letters. This was before email and cell phones, so long distance calls were a luxury and an extra expense. I stayed in Colorado and we all know how that marriage fell apart. Janine and her husband moved to central Washington, but again, we stayed in touch every few months. When I met Jeremy, I told her of course, and when we decided to get married I asked Janine to be one of my bridesmaids again. I hadn’t seen her in probably 5 years, but I desperately wanted her to stand with me. She agreed, and we did dress measurements over the phone, made travel arrangements, and she came to Colorado to be in my wedding.
It was a wonderful few days with her. We talked and talked and talked and talked some more. About little things, and big things; light things and heavy things. We talked about family, and children, and infertility. We talked about my first marriage and divorce. We talked about grief and acceptance. And she was there on my very special day…again.
Right, back to Dennys 2016. Janine pulled in, and I gave her a giant hug as usual! We were seated, placed our orders and took up conversation as if it had never paused. She and her husband adopted a brother/sister pair through foster care about 10 years ago, and so I got the update on both kids, including the sick one! We talked about family, and cancer; children and infertility. We talked about my crazy schedule, the work I’m doing with Courageous MRKH and the Beautiful You MRKH Foundation. We talked about healing, and grief, and acceptance. We talked about our long friendship, and the roll we have played in each others lives. We talked about girl time and forming unbreakable bonds. We talked about God and the roll Faith plays in our lives. And all too soon we started talking about what time it was, how short time could be, and the fact that I had 3 more hours to drive before I would make it home. With deep regret, we hugged another 20 or so times…walked out and headed to our cars. She to go back to her family, sick kid and all. Me to head home to my own family.
Set the nav system for home, called hubby to let him know I was on the final leg, and restarted the audiobook. A quick stop to empty my bladder and fill my gas tank, and 14 hours after I had started, I made it home. 600 miles – 1 goat delivered; 1 MRKH sister meet up; 1 sister of the heart meet up, and I was ready for a glass of wine and some R&R.
Over the years I’ve come to deeply treasure special friendships. The ones where you connect on a truly visceral level; where words aren’t necessary, and even physical presence isn’t necessary. When I can walk into a room and know that person accepts me completely, understands me probably better than I understand myself; and we spend the time to build each other up…those are the beautiful sisters of the heart I cherish more than anything. I’m so truly blessed to have MRKH sisters that fill this role, but also a few very special girlfriends – sisters of the heart.
Newton’s first law of motion – the law of inertia: An object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.
Newton’s third law: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
So why exactly am I discussing physics???
Well, because it can be directly and metaphorically related to our own lives.
1st law: inertia…an object at rest stays at rest, an object in motion stays in motion. If you do nothing to change the path you are on, you just keep going in the same direction. It is the inaction that perpetuates the action.
2nd law: acceleration: the speed at which you move is directly proportional to the amount of force you put into it. If you exert more force/energy, the change will happen faster.
3rd law: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Think about a high 5 among 2 people. Each raises their hand in opposing directions, shifts their hands forward to meet, and then rebounds/retracts back from the contact. If one person uses more force, the other absorbs that impact and must respond with increased force to counterbalance it.
When we look at our lives along a continuum, we see times of inertia, we see times of acceleration, and we see times of adaptation or reactions. Depending on the amount of effort we put into a task will determine where it falls on our life’s continuum.
OK, back to the matter at hand…or “What the hell are you talking about, Heidi?” Well, it’s simple really: Your life isn’t going to change until you make an effort to change it. You will be stuck in inertia until you do something to accelerate change.
When I finally decided that I needed to get out of the relationship, and that I had no real future with him, lots of things changed. I gained confidence knowing the end was in sight. I still had a warped sense of responsibility – that so much of it was my fault, thus I had this compelling need to ensure that he was “set up” for being without me (self importance, much?). So I encouraged him again to “get a better job or go home to your dad.” I made the suggestion to him that maybe he should consider going back into the military – after all an E-4 is an E-4 no matter what job you did in which branch. I told him that you know, if he joined the army and did all the paperwork, we could probably be stationed together. It was step one in my acceleration plan: Get him to join, to have a commitment and a job to do that was honorable.
This isn’t one of Newton’s Laws, but you know the saying, everything happens for a reason? Well, I firmly believe this is true. I believe that people come into and out of our lives for a reason. I believe we have experiences that shape us and prepare us for future experiences. We may not always see the value of the experience in the moment it happens, but looking back, if we remain open minded, we see that we must have these experiences in order to shape our lives.
So the short story is this: He joined the military and went to training. He was supposed to fill out spousal accommodation paperwork. He didn’t. He got orders for Korea. He wouldn’t deny the orders or ask for spousal accommodation. He came back to Colorado for leave, and we couldn’t see eye to eye on anything, we fought constantly, and it was a miserable time. Bottom line we agreed that it was time to file for divorce. He took his belongings and went to stay with a friend. Over the course of about 2 weeks we completed all the necessary paperwork and filed for divorce. It was inevitable. I have never seen him face to face since the day we left the courthouse after filing the petition for divorce together (uncontested). 90 days later we would be divorced officially. He left for Korea a few days later.
Over the next couple of months there was additional paperwork to be filed in order for his personal belongings to be picked up and shipped to his home of record, and other reasons that we needed to speak and coordinate. I wanted it all to be over, his stuff to be gone, and the chapter to be closed for good. He hung on, not wanting the relationship to end. He was away from home and family, stationed in Korea, and called “just because” fairly regularly. I asked him not to call. His stuff was gone, the divorce was nearly final, I wanted closure. I wanted to move on with my life without the constant interruption from him.
I was dating, enjoying my new found freedom in being 21 and unattached. I had a social life, friends, weekend activities, my life in the Army of course. I was taking college courses and doing as much training as I could to further my career. And several times a week in the middle of the night usually, my phone would ring. He would be on the other end of the line.
We had a lot of conversations like that. Random phone calls in the middle of the night, wondering how I’m doing, if I’m ok. He just did not get the message that it was OVER. I had moved on. I told him repeatedly to stop calling. Eventually I used the strongest threat I possibly could. I threatened to call his commanding officer to alert him of my intention to file a restraining order. Our divorce was final. Our financial matters were resolved. His stuff was no longer in my possession. It was over. If he called me again, no matter the reason I would petition for a restraining order and call his commanding officer.
He never did call me again. Our divorce was final in September of 1993. I have talked to him on the phone perhaps 5 times since that day, mostly regarding the fact that he still had me listed as an authorized user on one of his credit card accounts, and it was showing up on my credit report, and his bill collectors were calling ME 15 years later. I think that I may have seen him in public one time about 5 years after the divorce, but I very quickly turned the opposite direction (in my car) and drove away. That would be Newton’s 3rd law – for every action (me seeing him) there was an equal and opposite reaction (me turning the other way and driving off).
Thoughts turn to intentions, intentions turn to action, and action compels momentum.
Whenever I’m faced with a dilemma, I often spend a lot of time analyzing, and considering what options I have. I spend a lot of time thinking about how a particular course of action might play out, what the consequences might be, potential reactions, and how that will affect the next steps. Once I’ve analyzed to death multiple courses of action, I generally settle on one and move forward.
My life is NOT what I expected it to be when I started my senior year of high school. Life threw me a few curve balls along the way, but after many deliberations, choices, missteps, do-overs, and triumphs…I am content with my life and the continued path my life is on. I will continue to improvise on the fly, adapt to changes, and overcome my obstacles. It’s what I do. I’m an MRKH Warrior.
After US Army Basic Training in Fort Dix, New Jersey, I was off to my next level of training. I arrived at Fitzsimons Army Medical Center (FAMC) in Aurora, Colorado in February 1991. I got short term barracks on base with the rest of my arriving class and settled into a routine fairly quickly. I did the necessary paperwork to be approved for off base housing because I was married, and started apartment hunting. This presented itself with several challenges, not the least of which was figuring out which bus to take to get to the part of town I needed to be in. I wasn’t the only one on the apartment hunt, but it was my first real introduction to city buses.
I was also simultaneously doing paperwork to have my belongings in Washington packed up and shipped to Colorado, which according to the military, also included my spouse! I found a suitable apartment complex, completed applications and set a move in date that coincided with the arrival of my spouse, and planned for shortly there-after, our belongings. We got settled in fairly quickly, and my training classes started up the beginning of the next month.
I was in training to be a 35G – Biomedical Equipment Technician. I studied anatomy and physiology, electronics, pneumatics, mechanics, and all sorts of other stuff. It was interesting and suited me just fine. I enjoyed getting to know my classmates, had some study groups, and generally enjoyed my life in the military. When we weren’t in classes, we were doing group PT and other basic military training. We spent a fair amount of time in and around the hospital in disaster training. There was a war going on, and Fitzsimons was a major orthopedic facility. So we did mass disaster training focused on transporting the wounded from helo pad to ambulance to medical facilities. We braced ourselves for the worst…but to my knowledge we never did get a wounded soldier transferred to FAMC for treatment.
So while I was focusing on being a soldier in training, my husband was looking for jobs “on the economy” and not really doing much with his life. It was kind of ironic really, the role reversal we found ourselves in. Our whole dating relationship he had been in the Marines and had planned to stay in. I had been a high school student, engaged to a Marine and planning to be a military wife. In fact, just before I graduated high school, it was brought to his attention that something was off with his re-enlistment paperwork, and he had the option to take a new agreement, or revert to his original enlistment. As a surprise to me, since he had this new option, he decided how great it would be for him to revert to his original enlistment and he would be done with the Marines and able to “come home”. Uh – yeah – he really didn’t know me at all, did he? This surprise was delivered at the airport in Florida when I arrived for what I thought was his leave. We’ve talked about how that trip already and all that happened.
Anyway, back to the role reversal. Now, close to 2 years later, I was the one in the military, and he was the spouse. He eventually found a job with a major security sub-contractor. AKA – he was a rent-a-cop making minimum wage. He had been doing menial labor kinds of jobs in Washington too, which is a whole lot of why I ultimately wanted to join the military – to make some sort of life for myself and “us”. So I was doing something meaningful and fulfilling and making a life and a career, and he was working for minimum wage.
It was frustrating. I started on a rant that became pretty common in our house – “get a better job or go back to your dad.” I wanted him to do more…to BE more – not just for me, but for US and for him. We argued a lot, and neither of us had the skills to discuss and compromise and find some resolution. We were young and immature in the relationship realm. We just fought, and used every trick we knew of to get what we wanted. We tore each other down and fueled the flames of resentment. We were unhappy but didn’t know how to deal with it.
It was during one of these arguments that things escalated beyond just the verbal mud-slinging that had become common place in our lives behind closed doors. I couldn’t tell you now what the argument was about or why it got physical, but it did. It went from verbal insults to pushing and shoving that night. I’d love to say it was an isolated event, but it wasn’t. I’d also like to be able to say that it was only him, but it wasn’t. I knew exactly what buttons to push to piss him off, and I tore at him (verbally) relentlessly. We both spewed venomous words at each other intending to hurt the other. But he was bigger than I was, so when it did eventually turn physical, I went defensive. I was shocked the first time he shoved me…and more than a little bit afraid. I had seen him mad…but I had never seen him fighting mad. I think the shock of it that first time hit us both, as it was so unexpected. Apologies followed of course, promises of never again were given, and we made up.
During the day, I wore my uniform and went to work and got on with my life in the military. I worked hard, I trained hard, I did whatever it took to be the BEST soldier I could be. I was proud of my accomplishments, I enjoyed the people I worked with, and I was encouraged to work hard for what I wanted – and plan for my future. I was praised for my accomplishments, recognized for the work I did. It was the positive reinforcement I had craved all my life, and seemingly only found in a military environment.
In the evenings, and in other quiet private times I really questioned where my life was going, what I wanted, and how I would get it. Wondering what it would take to get my husband to truly approve of me, to accept me, to be proud of me. I was convinced that I was less of a woman because I couldn’t make him a father. This was all my fault, and something truly insurmountable – and it was brought to my attention often. But how could we have a family when we would essentially have to BUY a child? If I could have gotten pregnant…the military would have paid all my pregnancy, labor and delivery costs…we would just have to pay for things after bringing the baby home. But I couldn’t get pregnant…so we would have to pay legal fees, adoption fees, agency fees and all that…plus pay for everything after bringing the baby home. It wasn’t fair, and it was one of many things we fought about.
I don’t honestly know at what point I finally realized that I had to get out of the relationship. I wasn’t a quitter…I was stubborn and hard headed and dammit, don’t tell me I can’t do something! But I did finally accept that there was not a healthy viable future with that man…and my choices started to change. Thoughts turn to intentions, intentions turn to action, and action compels momentum. Eventually the wheels of change started to pick up speed – and once again it was Improvise, Adapt, and Overcome. | 2019-04-18T18:44:23Z | https://sunsetpinesnaturals.com/blog/2016/09/ |
Tuberculosis control is one of the many jobs that besets many developing states particularly those with weak general wellness system. Philippines is among these states which have to make up one’s mind on the optimum usage of the limited homo, proficient and fiscal resources. On top of these critical determinations to be made, another major hindrance is the diagnosing and intervention hold which can be understood by measuring factors impacting the patient or the wellness supplier and wellness system.
TB Directly Observed Short Course ( TB-DOTS ) is the scheme to observe and bring around TB recommended internationally. It has up to 95 % remedy rate when efficaciously applied even in the poorest states and is cost effectual. TB Diagnostic Committees ( TBDC ) were besides established in order to better the truth of diagnosing ; a TBDC evaluates instances of TB symptomatic who are smear negative, but whose x-rays show lesions suggestive of TB.
The Philippines is an archipelago of 7,107 islands with 79 states. There is an increasing lack of specializer in the countryside that would be possible TBDC members. Telehealth may play a function in extenuating the negative consequence of this wellness human resource restriction. Through the usage of Ipath which is a platform for telemedicine, the distance spread can be eliminated and the diagnosing and intervention hold can be lessened.
The platform, known as iPath, has been developed as a intercrossed Web and e-mail application. Cases can be sent as electronic mails with the instance rubric as the topic of the electronic mail, the clinical description as the chief text and images attached as files. The electronic mails are automatically processed by iPath into web pages and imported into a specified user group harmonizing to the country of involvement of the transmitter. Pages can so be accessed by members of that group to supply remarks and take part in treatment. Members of the group can elect to have automatic e-mail presentment, for illustration when a new instance is entered into a group or a new remark is added to a instance.
Tuberculosis is a curable disease that infects one tierce of the universe ‘s population killing two million people every twelvemonth. In Asia, it is estimated to develop in 4.5 million people every twelvemonth and is the taking cause of decease among infective diseases. This largest continent has 10 of 22 high-burden states in the universe and among them is the Philippines being in 9th topographic point.
The planetary TB ( TB ) epidemic has leveled off for the first clip since WHO declared TB a public wellness exigency in 1993. The Global Tuberculosis Control Report by WHO finds that the per centum of the universe ‘s population struck by TB peaked in 2004 and so held steady in 2005. Since the 2007 WHO study, about 60 per cent of TB instances worldwide are now detected, and out of those, the huge bulk is cured. Over the past decennary, 26 million patients have been placed on effectual TB intervention thanks to the attempts of authoritiess and a broad scope of spouses. But the disease still kills 4400 people every twenty-four hours. However, despite marks that the epidemic may be decelerating ; there are major hindrances to rapid advancement against TB – prominent among them being uneven entree to diagnosing and intervention within states.
The Philippine National Tuberculosis Control Program ( NTP ) adopted the Public-Private Mix DOTS ( PPMD ) scheme, designed to increase instance sensing and to synchronise direction of TB among TB attention suppliers. The NTP endorses the PPMD scheme to further harmoniousness and complementation of TB services among public and private sectors in the state, thereby bettering the quality of DOTS execution. A typical TBDC chaired by the NTP Medical Coordinator, stand foring the populace sector. Its members come from the populace and private sectors – Terbium experts who represent assorted subjects, chiefly radiotherapists and internists. The TBDC is created at the state or metropolis degree, but a TBDC may besides be formed at the territory degree. This will cut down the degree of over-diagnosis and over-treatment among smear negative instances and guarantee that active instances of smear negative are detected and provided with the appropriate anti-TB intervention. Drug wastage is similarly prevented.
It takes two hebdomads to one month before a clinically positive patient ( but sputum negative ) is assessed by a TB diagnostic commission in a face-to-face meeting. The long delay is due to several grounds: one, the doctors involved need to be engaged to develop the committedness for the work amid busy agendas. Two, in footings of figure – there is an absolute deficiency of TB specializers [ radiotherapists, infective diseases and pneumonic medical specialty specializers ] in the state. Their pattern is basically urban based in big metropolis or provincial centres. Hence, services to peripheral municipalities are compromised. Three, there are chance costs ( i.e. lost clinic clip, travel disbursal ) when they participate in the TB diagnostic commission activities. This discourages them from giving precedence to the work. Members opt to keep meetings when a sufficient figure of instances has been pooled for rating in one sitting. In a state in the Philippines, up to 50 Terbium instances are evaluated every month. Four, the modest honorarium provided by the PhilHealth is non a compelling inducement. Many respect this as their duty to their larger community to guarantee TB control ; their ‘rewards ‘ are psychological, non pecuniary. Waisbord ( 2004 ) lists wellness system challenges those consequences in the hold in diagnosing of TB patients one time they present to the clinic. Four can likewise compared to challenges facing TBDCs described above – ( 1 ) clip, cost, and distance to finish the diagnosing, ( 2 ) deficiency of resources, including human, and ( 3 ) hapless quality of services [ waiting clip, clinic agenda ] .
The challenges confronting hold in diagnosing related to the infrequent meetings of the TB diagnostic commission are conformable to telemedicine solutions. A new system can be developed wherein specializers can convene as a TB diagnostic commission through on-line methods. This decreases the demand for them to go and to apportion clip for the face-to-face meeting. By utilizing the online system, they can interact electronically at their convenience without the accompanying disbursals.
A possible platform that can be used by TBDC is Ipath. Since 2001, the Department of Pathology of the University Hospital Basel has been developing the iPath package ( ipath.ch ) . This is an unfastened beginning model intercrossed Web- and e-mail-based telemedicine platform. iPath provides the functionality to hive away medical instances with affiliated images and other paperss into closed user groups. Within these groups, users can reexamine instances, and write remarks and diagnosing. In add-on, they can subscribe to have automatic e-mail presentment, for illustration, when a new remark is added to one of their instances or a new instance is entered into a group.
Technically, iPath is a Web application written in PHP. PHP is an unfastened beginning Web linguistic communication that is widely used as it is particularly suited for Web development and can be embedded into HTML ( hypertext markup linguistic communication ) . From a functional point of view, iPath is someplace between a content direction system and a group-ware tool. All users are organized into several treatment groups. Each treatment group has at least one moderator who can delegate other users to the group and who can cancel erroneous informations. Therefore, the system does non necessitate to be administered centrally as every group is self-administrating.
A really utile map of iPath, peculiarly for countries with limited resources is the automatic e-mail import. Users specify a group into which they would wish to hive away instances sent by electronic mail and so direct instances to iPath as an ordinary electronic mail from any e-mail client. When they send the electronic mail they type the instance rubric as the topic of the electronic mail, the clinical description as the chief text and attach images as files. The instances are automatically imported by iPath into the specified group.
In this survey, we will compare the sensitiveness and specificity of the usage of iPATH with the face to face determinations utilizing TB civilization as the gilded criterion. We will besides compare the efficiency of the usage of iPATH versus the current pattern which is the face to confront method.
Ipath version 2.0.7 was used as a platform for telemedicine among the TB Diagnostic Committee members. The instances from two countries viz. Pasay City and Capiz state were indiscriminately picked and read by TBDC members from a distant topographic point such that the instances of PASAY CITY are uploaded to TBDC A and are so browsed/decided upon by the TBDC members in CAPIZ PROVINCE and frailty versa the instances of CAPIZ PROVINCE are uploaded to TBDC B group in iPATH wherein it is browsed/decided upon by the TBDC members in PASAY CITY. The face to face determinations of a peculiar TBDC ( i.e. Pasay ) is compared to the electronic determinations ( iPath ) of another TBDC squad ( i.e. Capiz ) utilizing the same instances. The determinations are so compared to the civilization consequences. These determinations are besides recorded in a spreadsheet with their several clip casts and will be compared to the face to face determinations. The gathered informations includes the referral signifier ( incorporating patient ‘s history, physical scrutiny findings ) , sputum AFB consequences, sputum civilization consequences, x-rays, electronic consequences and face to face determinations.
There are four cardinal places in this undertaking which includes nurse TBDC coordinator, sphere experts, moderator and system decision maker. Each place plays a cardinal function in the undertaking as follows: 1 ) The nurse TBDC coordinator uploads the new instances in iPATH including the said collected informations of patients mentioned above ; 2 ) The sphere experts ( includes a radiotherapist, pulmonologist and an infective disease adviser ) reads, name, add remarks on the uploaded instances which determines intervention or no intervention of patients from a distant country, and doing determinations during the face to confront meetings happening on a 2 week/monthly footing ; 3 ) The moderator which set-ups the histories of the nurse TBDC coordinators and sphere experts, tabulates the information uploaded and troubleshoots iPATH jobs encountered by the nurse coordinators and sphere experts and 4 ) The system decision maker oversees the flow of activities in the platform, troubleshoots jobs which can non be handled by the moderator, delete/restore informations, and coordinates with the package coder for any jobs sing the plan.
There are cardinal constructs needed to be learned by each place as follows: 1 ) The nurse TBDC needs to larn how to register, login and alteration user scenes, scan referral signifiers, take a picture/scan X ray home bases, add new instances to the group and upload images ; 2 ) The sphere experts need to larn how to register, login and alteration user scenes, and instance direction. 3 ) The moderator needs to hold a cognition on all the iPATH rudimentss and how to set-up the histories of the nurse TBDC and sphere experts. 4 ) The system decision maker needs to cognize all about iPATH from the basic cognition to the progress maps which are merely available within their history. He/She besides needs to larn how to procure histories by allowing/ restricting the members and moderators in a designated group within the platform.
Using iPath as a platform for establishing online TBDC has its strengths and failings. Among the strengths encountered while utilizing the platform is its functionality to hive away TB instances with affiliated images such as X raies and referral signifiers and other paperss into a closed user group. The groups used for the survey was name TBDC A1, TBDC A2 and TBDC B. TBDC A groups comprises the instances uploaded from chosen Pasay Health Centers where in a aggregation of at least 45 instances is being targeted. Uploading of instances is done by the nurse TBDC after proper preparation of the rudimentss of Ipath. Before uploading the existent instances, they are given entree to try groups where in they can research the maps of the toolbars in iPath. Within these groups, users particularly the sphere experts viz. advisers ( Infectious Disease, Radiology and Pulmonology ) can reexamine instances, and write remarks and diagnosing. In add-on, they can subscribe to have automatic e-mail presentment, for illustration, when a new remark is added to one of their instances or a new instance is entered into a group.
Another advantage on the proficient facet is, iPath is a Web-based application which is described to be someplace between a content direction and a group-ware tool. This has fulfilled the easiness of accessing the instances by the TBDC wherever they may be located. The TBDC group has at least one moderator who can delegate other users to the group and who can cancel erroneous informations. Therefore, the system does non necessitate to be administered centrally as every group is self-administrating.
Other restrictions experienced are the frequence in look intoing electronic mails or login to iPATH, and stableness of the platform. Some sphere experts are immune to the procedure of sing slides in a computing machine screen, holding trouble accessing the platform and have n’t develop the attitude of inquiring a moderator to assist them with their problems accessing the site. This resulted to a lesser login to iPATH and deliberately ignoring presentments coming from the site. The platform is besides dependent on the host-server wherein once it crashes or there have been some problems, it can non be accessed or the procedures would be slower. Uploading images in the site was comparatively noted to be slow that sometimes ensuing to erroneous or repeated efforts to upload images.
Committedness to community [ and national ] TB control has already been developed among members of the TBDC despite meagre pecuniary inducements. This desire to assist can be nurtured farther by turn toing the hindrances [ i.e. Clinic clip lost due to clip allotted for the face-to-face meeting ] . Because of the nature of the medical scientific discipline, clinicians are technology-savvy. This characteristic can be tapped to even more increase their psychological buy-in to community TB control.
2 ) Revision of remark boxes by utilizing signifiers that would be in a cheque box format with determinations dainty, non handle or no action with an implicit in infinite for diagnosing, intervention regimen or farther remarks.
4 ) Automatic registration to try groups one time a user registries to enable them to already entree the full basic maps of iPath.
5 ) Activate the automatic e-mail import scenes wherein Users specify a group into which they would wish to hive away instances sent by electronic mail and so direct instances to iPath as an ordinary electronic mail from any e-mail client. When they send the electronic mail they type the instance rubric as the topic of the electronic mail, the clinical description as the chief text and attach images as files. The instances are automatically imported by iPath into the specified group.
6 ) Further preparation and standardisation of the protocol to accommodate the demands of sphere experts to actuate them to utilize iPath.
The usage of iPath by TBDC is a possible option to the current pattern of face to confront run intoing determination devising. Bing written in an unfastened beginning web linguistic communication ( PHP ) that can be embedded in HTML ( hypertext markup linguistic communication ) , it can make customized signifiers for structured response that would do it more efficient to utilize, easy understood and standardized for TBDC usage. It will besides salvage costs on traveling, paper usage and clip for sphere experts which can be easy accessed utilizing the web. This platform will besides revolutionise the storage and retrieval fusss by forestalling the loss of informations, x-ray movie devastation and faster handiness to stored informations and consequences. . By utilizing this telemedicine solution, they can interact electronically at their convenience without the accompanying disbursals. It will besides turn to the challenges confronting hold in diagnosing related to the infrequent meetings of the TB diagnostic commission with an easy accessible and standardised iPath. Hence, the lesser the hold in diagnosing and intervention, the shorter a TB patient is left untreated, the shorter the household and the community are exposed to the B and a more efficient TB control plan is expected. | 2019-04-26T06:38:38Z | https://nsukiasmlondon.com/2017/08/27/use-of-ipath-by-the-tbdc-information-technology-essay/ |
It was the first day I stepped foot into the office of Atlas Medstaff as the newest member of the sales team.
It was a whole new world for me. I had never worked in an office before. Heck, I hadn’t had a boss since my fry cutting days at In N Out Burger when I was a 16 year old kid just trying to earn some money to buy myself a car.
For nurses, for co workers, for your friends and for your family.
You know what he didn’t say?
What I do know is that it never pays to look out for your own interests at the expense of others.
“I just have to do what’s right for me,” etched into it’s mortar.
I hear it every day. From recruiters and account managers. From nurses, from hospital administration, HR, payroll, compliance, and the list goes on and on. It is not always spoken so plainly, but it is so often expressed in action, and in attitude.
Sorry if you have used that phrase recently. My goal is not to offend you, or push you away. If you know me at all, you know I love you. I just have this incessant desire to see people do things better. Especially people I care about.
Do whats RIGHT, not because someone deserves it, but because it’s right.
Do what’s right because because people matter more than money.
Do what’s right because at the end of the day, your integrity is all you have.
I have a friend in this industry that embodies for me what it means to do what is right, not because it benefits you, but because it is actually what is RIGHT.
This industry has chewed her up and spit her out. It has taken everything she has offered that is good and said it has no value. It has relegated her to the bench, even though she has more to offer in her pinky finger than most of the people that make it go.
Here’s the thing… she keeps doing what’s right, even when almost everyone else is doing what’s wrong.
She advocates for those who have no voice.
She helps, when she has nothing to gain.
She believes in people that have long since worn out their welcome.
She just seems to always do the RIGHT thing, and with nothing to benefit for herself.
In my short stint in this world I have become convinced of one thing. This industry, with all the money there is to make, on all sides, is spiraling toward it’s demise. The only ones keeping it afloat are the ones who are willing to acknowledge it’s not all about winning, or getting rich. Doing the right thing at times is going to mean sacrifice, loss, even hardship, but it is worth doing because people matter most, and a short second is our integrity as human beings.
I am crazy enough to believe that if we start choosing to do what’s right, instead of always doing whats right for “ME,” this industry would be a better place for everyone. probably even make everyone more money!
Regardless, my commitment is, to every day, wake up and do what’s RIGHT. Like Steve Ryan, my boss and president of Atlas Medstaff told me that fateful day.
Since my post a couple weeks ago, I have been stressing over what my next post would be. Well, I got inspired tonight, and it just kind of flowed out of me.
Me: Hey, I appreciate you, I hope you know that.
Nurse: What did I do?
Nurse: Umm, ok, now you are making me nervous, are you about to fire me?
Nurse: Too much tequila? That’s it, you are drunk texting, hahaha.
Nurse: Wait, you’re not quitting are you?
I have been in this industry for just over one year, and every day I feel like I learn something new. I know and understand people, because I listen, but there is still so much about this world I still don’t know, and this conversation clued me into something that I had a feeling about, but didn’t fully understand until now.
We live in a world, and I work in an industry, where someone genuinely caring about someone else is more likely to raise a red flag than it is to make someone feel valuable.
Go back up to the top and look again, read it again. What do you see? Maybe you see a funny text conversation, which it was, but if you look closer, you will see something else. If you read between the lines you will get a glimpse of what treating a human like a product does to that persons general approach to relationships.
My initial text to her was meant to convey that I care. That I value her. That the work she does is meaningful and appreciated. Words I said for the purpose of bringing a sense of pride and honor to this person were actually received as something else entirely. When I spoke value into her, all she could imagine, or see was that I had to have some kind of angle.
After all, it is difficult to imagine, especially when money is involved, that someone might just simply care. There has to be an agenda, something for them to gain. They must be after something right?
Why? Cuz people matter. Actually they matter more than anything else in the entire world. Not just some people, or a certain kind of people. All of the people. Yeah, the ones you love and the ones you hate. The ones that deserve it and the ones that don’t. The ones that are asking for it, and the ones who seem to be indifferent.
At the end of the day, nothing in this life matters more than people, and each person holds intrinsic value. Whether you can see it, or not.
Now, if you know me, you know, I lose very little love on Donald Trump. Sorry if the political reference turned you off to listening to anything else I am saying right now, but let it go, Donald Trump will be ok.
What I am actually saying is that this conversation reveals that same brokenness in me. There are people that I believe hold more value than others. This in and of itself is the very essence of evil in this world. For Real.
When we choose to designate a level of value to a human based on what they have done, where they live, and what we infer about them because of that, we are opening a Pandora’s box that can only lead to hurt, pain, and insecurity. In so doing we place ourselves in a position none of us have earned the right to be in. After all, who am I to think that I have the authority to tell one person who they are and that the way they live life makes them less important than someone else?
As I progress in this job, and in the travel nurse industry, my hope is that I can tear down some of those walls that have been built up between nurses an recruiters. My hope is that I can show people there is actually another way. There are such thing as people who do what’s right, even if it costs them on the bottom line.
I am thankful to work for a company that not only supports me in this approach to business, but actually values it too. I am so thankful to have found a home where people matter most, because, I couldn’t do it any other way.
For those of you in my life who wonder if my sentiments are genuine, I hope you know and never forget that, I am striving daily to love people more than the day before. Why? Because I just don’t see anything else in this world worth living for.
I would like to believe that I made a difference in that nurses life tonight, if not beyond. Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t but I do know that the attempt was worth it, cuz I feel most alive when I am living for what matters most. People.
This Christmas, maybe choose to let down your guard… love someone that maybe doesn’t seem to deserve it in your eyes. Maybe choose to lay your agenda down for the sake of showing someone else they matter. It will go a long way in breathing life into this broken world. Or at the very least, in you. That in and of itself will be worth your time.
My time is coming to an end.
As hard as this is for me to really connect with, it’s true. This church that I dreamed about, gave the best years of my life to, and sacrificed everything this world says is valuable for, is slipping though my fingers. Don’t misunderstand, it is not being taken from me, nor is it something I am losing, It is in fact, something I am willingly laying down for the sake of what matters most.
As of September, 2017, I will no longer be the pastor of Finding Life Church, because it is in fact what is best for Finding Life Church.
After 8 years, it is clear to me, that in order for this church that I have given blood, sweat and tears for to move into the next season of its development, I have to let it go, in spite of my natural instinct to hold on. If you are struggling to understand what I mean, imagine having a teenager that no longer seems to like you, but has fallen in love with some stupid kid that is promising so much but has the ability to come through with none of it.
This is how I feel if I am being totally honest.
Well, if you have ever loved something more than yourself, you understand what I am talking about and why I am making the decision that I am. Sometimes it just doesn’t work out the way you expect, the way you want. Sometimes, life just reminds you that none of it is about you.
Life is screaming that to me right now.
As hard as it has been to come to the conclusion that it is time to step away, never for a moment have I questioned whether or not it is right, it is good, it is the kingdom move to make.
And so here I am, giving up something that holds a place in my heart that is only rivaled by my wife and children, and doing it with great excitement and enthusiasm.
Why am I excited you ask?
Well, the only way to find that out is to show up at Finding Life Church, August 20th-Spetember 3rd. Those 3 weeks I will preach my last 3 sermons as the pastor. I plan to lay my heart out, and hopefully inspire this great community to only lean harder into what Jesus has called us to from day one.
I pray you join us. I pray you are inspired by what you hear. I pray these 3 weeks brings a level of commitment to this community that you never imagined you would have.
I pray Ephesians 3:20 (Look it up). Hope to see you then.
It’s cold… it’s rainy… its Saturday. The kids are out with dad, and will be all day. The smell of freshly brewed coffee swirls about her nose as it fills her favorite mug, steam rising in the air at the same pace as the elation in her heart over the idea of a day to herself. Peace, quiet, freedom.
She wants to do something, but nothing too intense. The TV would shatter the serenity that rarely described the atmosphere around the house, and the exhaustion of a long hard week being a wife, mother, sister, daughter, student, house cleaner, schedule maker, Tudor, retailer, etc, etc, etc… means she would be snoring on the couch like a wild boar after a holiday feast in just a page or two.
She goes to the closet, to see if anything sparks her imagination. She shuffles around the old board games, stacked high, and covered in dust looking for something she can do by herself, until she sees something.
One by one, she turns each piece over so that all 10,000 pieces are right side up, waiting to be put together to reveal Whatever was on the front of that box at one point when it sat in its packaging at the store.
In almost no time at all she has all the edge pieces separated and put together. Although this job was not very difficult, and reveals very little about the finish product, it gives her a sense of accomplishment, and after pouring another cup of coffee, she presses on.
As she fishes for pieces that look similar in color, separating them on different sides of the table, all the while searching for pieces that fit together, her sense of excitement begins to fade, giving way to the realization of just how long this puzzle is going to take to put together.
As the seconds, turn into minutes, and minutes turn into hours, her sense of excitement, begins to turn to anxiety.
“I have worked on this for so long already.
If I just quit now, no one would know I gave up.
I don’t want to be the kind of person that gives up.
So she hops up, leaves the table and heads to the kitchen for a mid morning snack.
As she walks back to the table, she notices a cluster of pieces that all seem to have a mix of tan and green colors on them… She begins to group them together and what do you know, they all go together. Even more exciting than that, she sees something she recognizes.
Pieces are going together, it’s fun… who knows, she might even get this thing finished at this pace.
But once again, as the minutes go by, the struggle returns… The pieces aren’t fitting as easily and she even wonders if she had forced some of the pieces together that she has already placed. To make matters worse, with every piece she finds, she becomes more and more convinced that what she thought was a hammock might actually be something else entirely.
“Did I waste my time?
will I ever finish this puzzle?
Is it too late to just put it away?
After this much time, shouldn’t I have some idea of what is happening in this puzzle?
As the hours role on, she is making progress here and there, but experiencing all kinds of emotions. She gets frustrated and then quickly reminds herself it just doesn’t matter that much. She tries to convince herself that she doesn’t really care about the finished product to try and relieve her frustration. She gets up, walks away, folds some clothes, comes back in, stares at the puzzle for a few moments, shakes her head, and walks away again. She can’t ring herself to give up on the puzzle, but also doesn’t want to look at it right now. The more she tries to distract herself, the more that unfinished card board nightmare begins to haunt her.
“Why did I even start that stupid thing to begin with,” she says to herself.
But on the others side it appears that she is putting together what looks like a glass of water sitting on a table indoors.
“How could those two things be in the same picture?
Is it possible that the puzzle maker wanted me to be confused at this point?
Puzzle makers are stupid and want to make me suffer.
Am I too dumb to understand?
Did I do something wrong in the early stages that have made it impossible to understand?
She cries as she considers how much time and energy she has put into this puzzle. The day she has wasted. She stares at it through tear filled eyes, wondering if she will ever know what it is. She knows she has gone too far to stop and that feeling alone makes her feel like a slave. Guilt, obligation, frustration and doubt consume her thoughts as she sits, and stares.
“What am I doing… its just a puzzle, why am I letting this consume me. I don’’t care if I finish this puzzle, and neither does anyone else… I’m done… Im out of here. I don’t care at all… and she storms out of the house to do some shopping.
it works… for a little while.
It doesn’t take long for memories of the puzzle to begin to haunt her. She knows she has this deep need to know whats in that puzzle. She knows she needs it to feel whole. Again, she pushes away her feelings, pours herself a glass of wine, and sits down to read a book.
She gets through one page, and realizes she doesn’t remember a single thing she read because her mind is consumed with the unfinished business that lies on the table only 10 feet away from her.
She has to build the puzzle, one piece at a time. She has to choose to set aside her desire to see it done, and embrace the process of doing it. She has to enjoy the mystery, accept the confusion, and acknowledge that reality that freedom in her struggle, and moving toward clarity means she has to trust that some day, some way, it will make sense. She will see it. But the only way, is if she is willing to keep putting pieces together, even when she doesn’t understand. Even when it isn’t working….
The second she says that. she feels a rush of freedom from her struggle, and a peace she has longed for since she put the last piece of the edge together.
“I don’t need to know what it is to enjoy putting pieces together,” she thought.
The truth is, when she first started, she wasn’t worried about the end. She was just in it to enjoy the ride. She was excited about the mystery and driven by the process.
“Just one more piece. All I have to do, is put together, one more piece. One. more. Piece. I can do that!” She thought.
She recognized that on her own, she would probably struggle to finish, so periodically she would invite friends and family over to help. To point out things she didn’t naturally see, and help her put pieces together that she didn’t know she had. It was good, it was a process, it was her process. Some days were great, others were hard. At times she felt great about her progress, other days she wondered if she would ever know what the puzzle would end up looking like. But she kept on looking, she kept on putting pieces together. Just one more piece.
With tear filled eyes, she walked over to the puzzle. She reached down, and placed the piece into an empty spot, right in the middle.
The moment it set in its place, she feels a rush of adrenaline. This one piece clarified everything. She immediately burst into tears. Tears of joy, of anger, of confusion and relief. It had been almost a year since she started that puzzle, and finally she knew what it was.
It wasn’t finished, no, far from it… but she knew what it was, and that gave her everything she knew she needed to keep putting the rest of it together. She knew she would continue to struggle at times, but she also knew that never again would she question the puzzle makers motives. Never again would she question whether or not it was worth it. Never again would she wonder if she was good enough smart enough or strong enough.
Your faith journey is much like the story above. You don’t have to have it all together, you just have to be willing to keep putting it together. One piece at a time.
Well, friends, this concludes my 25 day advent reflection. The link below is to my final post. It is a video, about 16 minutes long. Thanks for journeying with me. I pray you have a blessed Holiday season.
Today my family and I spent the day in Norfolk, Nebraska. This is a small-ish community in the north east part of the state. My mom was born and raised on a dairy farm there. We had lunch, played bingo, a family tradition, and visited with extended family we don’t get to see too often. It was a wonderful day.
The highlight for sure, was visiting with my great, great Aunt Helen, who is currently living in a nursing home, and dealing with lots of health problems that come very natural to a woman who has lived as long as she has. My Aunt Helen is one of those people that just warms your soul. She is old, and doesn’t move well, if at all. She forgets things, and repeats herself often, but when she looks you in the eyes, you feel as though she is peering into your soul, warming you from the inside out.
Today, when we walked into the room, she looked at me, as though she had never met me before. I introduced her to my wife, and my kids, told them their ages, and she seemed thankful to have people visiting her, but clearly didn’t remember me.
Her eyes lit up, she remembered me. She remembered me from our short interaction a decade ago.
She went on to tell me every detail of that day 10 years ago, when I picked her up from the airport, as if she was reminiscing with an old friend about that time she met a celebrity.
She grasped my hand tightly, she spoke softly, and she pulled me in close. She had a gleam in her eye that was so full of life, it was hard for me to believe I was speaking to a woman who’s days are coming to an end. It was surreal, it was even divine.
What really got me thinking, and the reason I am telling this story on day 24 of my Advent reflections is simple.
We are unaware of the impact we can have on the people around us. Just by caring.
One of the most powerful things about Jesus coming to earth, is that He planned to grow up, do some cool things, show us what it really looks like to be human, and then leave. What is most amazing about this, is that in His leaving, His desire was that you and I might become the vessels that would keep His life, His values, His gospel alive and transformational on this earth.
He chose you for impact.
He gave you His heart for people and longs to release you into a life of empowering others. He wants to use you to show the world how much HE loves them, to convey the value He holds for every human in a way that we all might accept it, and shift our course. He wants you to see every moment, every breath, every look and every action as an opportunity to pour the grace of Jesus into the life of the one we are face to face with in that moment.
Here’s the thing… like I was on that fateful day at the airport, we are often so oblivious to the impact, positive or negative, we can and do have on the people we interact with day in and day out. I didn’t know it, but just showing up, looking my Aunt Helen in the eyes, and showing her I loved her, when I didn’t really need to, changed her life. It gave her a memory that would carry her through long, hard days. I didn’t know I was doing anything, so I really can’t take credit for anything here, but I do want you to see something profound from this story.
Of course I said yes, and did, but it wasn’t just any prayer. It was profound in my life. I don’t know if Aunt Helen knew it, but she was speaking worth into me. She was telling me that I am enough. She was telling me that I am a child of God, called for His purpose and positioned for impact.
Today, Aunt Helen was for me, a tangible expression of the Christmas Story, and its intended impact on the world.
Know this today… everything you do matters. You can be an agent of hope, life and transformation, or not, it is entirely up to you. But the best way to honor our Savior during the season of His birth is to live a life of impact that someone might remember 10 years from now.
I love you all… Merry Christmas… thanks for coming along with me on this journey….
Christmas got under way today in the Brower family. If you know my family well, it would come as no surprise that we opened Christmas presents at 1:33 in the afternoon, on December 23rd. We don’t do anything the way most families do. Our longest standing tradition is having Chili and cinnamon rolls on Christmas eve. Only, I can’t remember the last time we had Christmas Eve on December 24th. We are really bad at traditions, but we understand each other, so it works.
The gift of an infinite gift.
I know, it sounds a little outside of the box… stay with me.
The gifts that we give one another on a annual basis surrounding this holiday, are one and done. That is the nature of gifts. Once they are given, they can no longer be given any more. Sure, they can continue to make us happy, or add value to our lives, but the gift itself is expired. It has been given. It can no longer be given again.
That is the nature of a gift.
The Father’s gift. The one He gave so many Christmas’ ago, on the first Christmas ever.
The gift of Jesus Christ. The Messiah.
That gift changed everything… it took a world, destined for depravity, hell bent on destroying itself, and set it on a new course. It’s new course was one of restoration, redemption and reconciliation. The gift of Jesus gave the world a new identity, that would forever change the way it spun on its axis.
Stay with me now. If Jesus had been a gift cut out of the mold of the kind we give on Christmas’ all around the world, it would have been a one time thing. If God had intended it to be a one time gift, He would have accomplished all of it’s intended purpose in the moment it was given. That’s one of the things that makes this gift so unique. It was given with the intended purpose of being a gift that we continue to receive for the rest of our lives.
Jesus didn’t put the world on auto pilot, He opened the door for a genuine experience of Himself.
This is outside of the way the human mind understands life, which is what makes it so hard for us to embrace. When we get a gift, we want it all now. We want it’s full potential to make our lives easier, and we don’t want to wait, we think we shouldn’t need to wait.
Yeah, God could have done that, but He didn’t, because this gift is not a thing, it is a person in that person comes the pathway to life, to grace, to hope. It is in relationship with Jesus that we find out what is worth living for. That we discover what we were designed for. This is the infinite gift of Christmas.
We get to experience the process of God restoring all creation to its original created form.
We get to watch the beautiful story of redemption as it unfolds in our lives and others.
We get to discover the wild adventure of journeying toward the Holy one, experiencing the intimacy we were created to live in.
The birth of the Christ child is an invitation calling us into this crazy adventure. No, it won’t transform you all at once. It won’t immediately wipe away your problems, or remove their consequences. That’s not what God wanted. If He did that, we wouldn’t see our need for that gift anymore.
No, instead this gift is beckoning you and I onto this journey… wanna accept it? Wanna start living into it? Wanna embrace it? It is what you were made for.
I pray Christmas 2016 would be the year you understand it, and step into it.
I know, I know, that sounds completely nuts. Keep in mind, I never said I like shopping. What I love about malls is the volume and diversity of people you find their. Especially this time of year. Today, my wife and I were walking through the mall, scrambling to get some last minute stuff done before the big day, and I found myself thoroughly distracted by the people I saw. Black, white, Short, tall, fat, skinny, rich, poor, and everything in between. The mall, at Christmas time, is one of the few places in a community like Omaha where you can get a real taste of the diversity of this city, all in one place. And I love it.
As I was walking around, it reminded me of my second favorite line from my favorite Christmas song of all time. O Holy Night.
The coming of Jesus to this earth said a lot of things, but nothing more profound than what this line of this song is attempting to communicate.
Your life holds immense value.
Maybe you are a person who knows this about yourself. Or, maybe the idea that someone, anyone could value you at all, is nearly impossible for you to believe… especially not the artist who crafted the rocky mountains peaks with His own hands.
I am fairly certain that the God who orchestrated this holy night over 2,000 years ago would want nothing more at this time of year than for you to fully connect with and embrace the value your creator places on your life. If it wasn’t so, why would He have come for you? If you weren’t enough, why would He have bothered?
If He didn’t place an amazing amount of value on your life, why would he have given up what He did, to come find you?
and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. 16 You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can’t even count them, they outnumber the grains of sand!
This is His heart for you, and He would love nothing more than for you to experience it this Christmas. Not just experience it, but have it become what defines you, in all ways.
He came here to tell you. He came here to show you.
He knows you, wants you, loves you and values you. Not because you are perfect, but because you are His.
Let Him love you the way He longs to. Let Him empower you in a way that might give great honor to His birth, life and death. Let Him tell you of your immense value and worth.
This Christmas, let Him tell you, even show you, that you are enough.
It is December 21, and if you are following along, you noticed there was no reflection posted for yesterday. I spent over an hour late last night staring at my computer before I decided to close it and go to bed. I wanted to get something up, and even wrote a few things down, but ultimately felt like whatever I might end up writing would be forced, and inauthentic, which is the opposite of why I am attempting to do this to begin with… So, tonight’s post is gonna be a two for one. Not because it’s twice is good, but because I am tired, overwhelmed and hoping it will suffice. Thanks for your patience.
You have a heard this before right? Probably felt it too?
It’s true, there is something about the feeling you get when you are giving. It really doesn’t matter what it is, as long as whatever it is, is a little more than what the person may have expected.
You hand the person the gift, they accept, with a face that says, “You didn’t have to do this.” Meanwhile you are thinking, “Yeah, but if I didn’t, you would have been hurt.” But you don’t say that, you just smile from ear to ear, and accept the compliment. It feels good. Then they open the gift. In predictable fashion, they gasp, semi-authentically, because while the fact that you got them the gift isn’t a big surprise, it is in fact more than what they were expecting. Yes! Just the reaction you were going for.
In a small way, we feel a little more human, by giving gifts to people that already have everything they need don’t we?
The point of this post is not to bash the Christmas tradition of giving gifts, so please try not to miss the point. It is however an attempt to contrast the semi-selfish, to selfish, giving we tend to default to at Christmas time, with the pure, unadulterated, life changing nature of the gift that God gave to humanity on the very first Christmas.
Which begs the question, what makes a gift pure?
It was in this the context God gifted to the world, the person of Jesus.
His gift attached very real STRINGS to a broken, finite, selfish people.
His gift came with the EXPECTATION of rejection, heart ache, and frustration.
His gift came with the OBLIGATION to continue to give in the face of an enormous amount of rejection.
His gift was so pure, that even the definition of, “pure giving,” doesn’t do what He did justice.
He gave it all. And why? Because it would benefit him in the long run? Yeah, sure, if by benefit you mean, being beaten, mocked and hung by his hands from a tree. Or unless you were thinking it was some how a benefit to Him to spend the rest of eternity pursuing a people that would push His good gifts away, any time the temporal seemed better than the promise.
No, see, the gift of Jesus meant nothing but heart ache for the Father. He had nothing to gain. He only had, to lose. Over, and over and over again. The gift of Jesus meant hitching His sail to a people who could not, and would not ever recognize Him in the way that His gift truly warranted.
But He did it anyway. Why? Love. That’s all. He loved you enough to lay it all down with no expectation of reciprocation. And guess what… He would do it again in a heart beat to secure your place in His kingdom, your freedom in this life.
As you give gifts this season, be reminded that the ultimate gift, the free gift. It came to you in the most surprising context of all, and for reasons that are difficult to comprehend for the human mind.
Remember that He loves you that much. He came for you. He gave it all for you.
Because you were worth it. | 2019-04-18T14:46:26Z | https://jakebrower.me/category/uncategorized/ |
1.1 This User Agreement is between the Client (referred to as “You”) on one side and iCard Services AD, UIN 175415100 , with seat and registered address in Varna, Business Park Varna, B1, Bulgaria, on the other side referred to jointly as “we”, or “us”, acting as a Registered agent of iCard AD, having its seat and registered office at: Bulgaria, Sofia, 76A James Boucher Blvd., PO 1407, UIN: 175325806, authorized and regulated by the Bulgarian National Bank as an Electronic Money Institution under the Electronic Money Directive 2009/110/EC (the “EMD”) with license No. 4703-5081/25.07.2011 Principal Member of Mastercard, VISA and JCB, (hereinafter referred to as “Financial Institution”).
The User Agreement regulates your use of the online LeuPay Wallet. All e-money, payment or other linked services are regulated by separate agreements.
“LeuPay Wallet Platform” or “Platform” is a web-based Platform, operated by us, which end-users may use as a gateway in order to enrol and gain access to their e-money accounts, as well as a mobile app for Android and iOS. The LeuPay Wallet Platform also provides real-time communications services (or “chat”).
The E-money account is a separate product, provided by the entity, described in the Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account, which is a separate legal agreement, concluded via our Platform.
Any issues related to e-money, payment services and instruments, is not a subject of the present Agreement and is described in the respective legal agreement for the product in question.
Not a Framework Contract: For the avoidance of doubt, the present User Agreement does not constitute a "framework contract" for the purpose of the EU Payment Services Directive 2 (EU) 2015/2366 or any implementation of that directive in the European Union or EEA (including, without limitation any national laws implementing the EU PSD).
“LeuPay Wallet User” means a natural or legal person which is an acceptable client the LeuPay Wallet Platform.
"LeuPay Wallet Chat" is part of the Mobile App that allows you to send encrypted instant messages, such as text, images, stickers, document, pictures, video and other supported files by the Platform, to other users registered for the Platform.
(ii) Аgreeing with the Mobile App License Agreement and this User Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Platform, as well as agreeing with the Legal agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account and other legal documents if applicable.
1.4. The Agreement will be effective from the date of its acceptance by you ("Effective Date"). By clicking Accept or Agree where this option is made available to you by us via the Website for the Platform or Mobile Application for the Platform and which you hereby adopt as your electronic signature you consent and agree to the terms and conditions of the present Legal Agreement and therefore the electronic document of the Agreement is deemed as duly signed by you.
1.5. A link of the Agreement will be provided to you in the Website or Mobile App from where you may download the Agreement in printable form during or immediately after the sign-up process. A copy of the Agreement, as amended from time to time, is available to you in the Mobile App and also on Website for the Platform www.leupaywallet.eu (“Website”). You may request to be provided with a copy of the Agreement, and a link to the Agreement will be sent to your registered mobile number for the service.
1.6 The Agreement and all communication between you and us will be in English language. Where we have provided you with a translation of the English-language version of the Agreement or communication in other languages, this translation is only for your convenience and you explicitly agree that the English-language version of the Agreement and communication will govern the relationship with us. If there is any contradiction between the English-language version and a translation, the English-language version takes precedence.
1.7 You declare that you are registering for the Platform on you own behalf only and that you are not acting on behalf or on account of third party.
2.1. To be eligible to use any functionalities of the LeuPay Wallet Platform, you must (i) be at least 18 years old (please see your Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account for dependents under 18 years old); and (ii) be resident of the countries, listed in the Website or Mobile app; and (iii) you must be eligible to access the LeuPay Wallet E-money and other payment services, as described in the Agreement for LeuPay Wallet account and LeuPay Wallet Card.
2.2. Upon registration for the Platform and during this Agreement, you must provide current, complete and accurate information by personalizing your Online account, as requested by us and maintain that information as current and accurate during use of the Platform.
3.1 You are able to buy specially designed Pay Stickers via LeuPay Wallet App and use them as a customized design of your payment order to send money to other users registered for the Service. The price and the number of the specially designed Pay Stickers is specified in the LeuPay Wallet App and you have to pay the price with the cash in the LeuPay Wallet account. You are not entitled to a return or a refund of the price in case you do not use the purchased Pay Stickers or for other reasons. Once you use all numbers of specially designed Pay Stickers ques from one set, you are no longer able to use this set and you are able to either use the standard design Pay Stickers or buy a new set of specially designed Pay Stickers.
3.2 The LeuPay Wallet Mobile app allows you to submit content in various formats, such as text messages, voice messages, photos, documents, PDF, location data and other files (collectively referred to as "Submissions"). You agree that the "last seen" status and LeuPay Wallet Profile photo (collectively referred to as Public Submissions) will be visible to other users of the Service who have your mobile phone number in their mobile phone and which you have not expressly blocked. For clarity, Submissions will only be viewable by those users to whom you have directly addressed these Chat Submissions whereas Public Status may be globally viewed by all users that have your mobile phone number on their smartphones and are registered for LeuPay Wallet Service, unless these user are blocked by you. We do not guarantee any confidentiality with respect to Public Submissions.
3.3 If you are under the age of consent in your country to form a binding agreement, you should only use LeuPay Wallet Chat and other non-payment services if you are either an emancipated minor, or have the legal consent of your parent or guardian for your use of our Service. You should use these services only if you are fully able to understand and enter into and comply with these Terms. LeuPay Wallet Chat and other non-payment services are not intended for children under 13: if you are under 13, please wait until you turn 13 to use them. Children between 13 and 17 years included may only be eligible to use independently the LeuPay Wallet Chat and other non-payment services, subject to any restrictions imposed by the applicable law.
3.4. You acknowledge and accept that any Submissions are only available from your smart phone from which they are sent and are not available in a cloud, virtual storage or similar type of Service. You shall be solely and fully responsible for any type of Submissions generated via LeuPay Wallet Chat and the consequences of posting or publishing them. However, by submitting the Submissions to LeuPay Wallet Mobile App, you hereby grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sub-licensable and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the Submissions in connection with the Platform.
3.5 We also reserve the right to decide any of the content communicated via LeuPay Wallet Chat is compliant with the terms stipulated in the Agreement and especially with your permissible actions or is in violation with any copyrights or any kind of intellectual property rights. We may remove such content and/or terminate your access for uploading such material in violation of the Agreement at any time, without prior notice and at its sole discretion.
3.6 The Platform allows you to encrypt the content of the submissions sent to other users, registered for the Service. We shall not be able to learn the submitted content nor shall be anyone else without direct access to your mobile smart phone. We do not store your secret chats on its servers. We also do not keep any logs for messages in secret chats, so after a short period of time we no longer know who or when you have messaged via secret chats. You agree that encrypted messages may be accessed only from the device they were sent to or from.
(viii) attempt to gain unauthorized access to the Service or its related systems or networks. You understand and agree that Adult content must be identified as such.
3.8 You understand that when using the Platform, you will be exposed to Submissions from a variety of sources, and that we are not responsible for the accuracy, usefulness, safety, or intellectual property rights of or relating to such Submissions. You further agree and acknowledge that you may be exposed to Submissions that are inaccurate, offensive, indecent, or objectionable, and you agrees to waive, and hereby does waive, any legal or equitable rights or remedies you have or may have against us with respect thereto, and agree to indemnify and hold us harmless to the fullest extent allowed by law regarding all matters related to your use of the LeuPay Wallet Chat.
3.9. You acknowledge and agree that the provision of any Goods and Platforms performed via LeuPay Wallet, including but not limited to top-up of prepaid or similar services, are transactions between the respective service/goods provider and you and not with us. We are not liable for the performance of obligation of such providers and you should address your claims to them.
3.10. You hereby confirm your understanding that our Platform solely provides you online access to the LeuPay Wallet e-money and payment services, with the exception of some linked activities such as chat services or customized stickers. We are not liable for the provision of the e-money and payment services. In case of any dispute you should address your claims to the company, providing these services to you.
5.1. The use of the e-money and payment services, such as funding of account receipt of money, payments with cards, credit transfer, direct debit, currency exchange or others, are regulated in the respective Legal Agreements for LeuPay Wallet Account and Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Card and other legal documents (if applicable), which are concluded with iCard AD, a separate entity – licensed E-money institution under the laws of the Republic of Bulgaria.
(j) Use of the Platform for any sale of purchase of goods and/or services, which are not acceptable to us as determined our website for the Platform or as instructed in writing by us.
6.4 We shall be entitled to notify you at any time for the termination of your use ofthe Platform via the Online account or through the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App, in case you have become a non-acceptable client for us. The decision for the refusal is strictly in our discretion and we shall not be liable for whatsoever compensations.
6.5 You agree that you will not engage in any activity that interferes with or disrupts the Platform (or the servers and networks which are connected to the Platform, or impact or attempt to impact the availability of the Platform, with a denial of service (DOS) or distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.
6.6 You agree that you will not reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, trade or resell the Platform for any purpose.
6.7 You agree that you re fully responsible for (and that we have no responsibility to you or to any third party for) any breach of your obligations under the Agreement and for the consequences (including any loss or damage which we may suffer) of any such breach.
6.8 The LeuPay Wallet Mobile Application for smart devices is available for downloading only for certain Smart devices as described in the Agreement and we are not liable for lack of availability of the Platform on mobile or smart devices, or inability to download or use the Platforms via particular smart device, or lack of Platform or part of the Platform, because of lack of Internet or because of mobile operator services (such as SMS or other) or hardware specifics or problems.
6.9 Non-satisfaction of the conditions in this Agreement may result in immediate suspension of the the Platform, blocking of the funds in your Account, our right to withhold funds in your Account for satisfaction of damages incurred by us, because of your breach, claim by us against you, initiation of procedures before competent regulatory bodies or Card Organizations, and also termination of this Agreement without prior notice to Client.
7.1 You acknowledge and agree that we may stop providing the Platform to you, as provided in the Agreement. You may stop using the Platform at any time, without need to inform us. The Agreement will continue to apply until terminated either by you or by us, as set out below.
7.3. In case you wish to terminate the present Agreement, the company which provides the e-money and payment services will have to terminate the respective legal relationships with you as well. You will be given the option to redeem your e-money balance in accordance with the terms set out in the Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account.
You will be instructed to destroy or return the LeuPay Wallet Card in accordance with the Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Card, in case it’s applicable.
7.4. In case of any risk of Damages for us, resulting from claims, fees, fines, penalties, your non-compliance with regulations and other similar liabilities arising from your use of the Platform, you hereby agree that we may instruct the entity, which services your e-money account to hold your funds for up to 180 Days even after Termination of Agreement or shorter or longer period, as required by the law, including laws in favor of the consumer. You will remain liable for all obligations arising under this Agreement even after Termination of Agreement and/or closing of Account.
(b) We are required to do so by law or Regulations (for example, where the provision of the Platform to you becomes non-compliant with the Regulations).
7.6 Unless a shorter period is provided in this Agreement, as permitted by law, we may, at any time, terminate the Agreement by giving you 5-days' notice.
7.7 When this Agreement comes to an end, all of the legal rights, obligations and liabilities that you and we have benefited from, or which have accrued over time whilst the Agreement has been in force, or which are expressed to continue indefinitely, will be unaffected by this cessation, and the provisions of clause 19.5 will continue to apply to such rights, obligations and liabilities indefinitely.
7.8.1 Death of a natural person. We will assume that the relationship between us persists until we are notified in writing about your death. We must be notified by who is legally vested with the rights and obligations to act on behalf of your affairs and will take instructions from him/her/them. Such person may be the heir, legatee, administrator, executor or otherwise. We shall be entitled to receive to its satisfaction such evidence, at your cost, as may be required by us to establish the proper entitlement and authority of the person claiming to be in charge of acting on behalf of your affairs and we shall not be bound to act upon such instructions until such time as we are satisfied of such authority.
7.8.2 Legal Entities: In the event that you are placed into liquidation, bankruptcy or administration or any other analogous process wherein a liquidator, curator or trustee or similar officer is appointed and in whom legal authority and representation is vested, to the exclusion of the persons you may have nominated, we shall be entitled to receive to our satisfaction such evidence, at your cost, as we may require to establish the proper entitlement and authority of the person claiming power to give us instructions and we shall not be bound to act upon such instructions until such time as we are satisfied of such authority. In case where the legal entity or organization is dissolved, the succssessor of the assets (money) in the Account has to provide us with additional information for the due identificaton and verification of the persons, entitled to be provided with access to our service of providing access to the LeuPay Wallet Platform.
(c) Any information obtained by you as a result of use of the Platform will be accurate or reliable.
8.2 No conditions, warranties or other terms (including any implied terms as to satisfactory quality, fitness for purpose or conformance with description) apply to the Platform, except to the extent that they are expressly set out in the Agreement.
8.3 Nothing in the Agreement will affect those mandatory statutory rights to which you are entitled as a consumer and that you cannot contractually agree to alter or waive.
9.1 Nothing in the Agreement will exclude or limit our liability for losses which may not be lawfully excluded or limited by this Agreement or by applicable law.
9.3 We do not assume any responsibility for the information provided by you or other persons to any third parties upon which we cannot influence or control in any way. You acknowledge and agree that we are not liable for any damages or claims resulting from your use or visit on third parties’ websites.
10.1 You agree that we may make changes to the Agreement from time to time. We shall give you 5-days' notice of changes in the Agreement, unless a longer period is necessitated by a Regulatory change, or is allowed by law, by notification-mail sent to your e-mail registered for LeuPay Wallet Platform before their proposed date of entry into force.
10.2 You understand and agree that you will be deemed to have accepted the changes unless you notify us to the contrary by notice, as provided herein under, prior to the date on which the changes are to come into effect, in which case the Agreement will terminate without charge for termination immediately before the effective date of the changes.
10.4 We may introduce innovations, improvements, developments, new functionalities, upgrade Accounts or amend the names of Accounts or products unilaterally and without your consent, for which we shall inform you via e-mail or via the Website for the Platform.
11.1 All information will be made available or provided to you in an easily accessible manner, in easily understandable language, in a clear and comprehensible form and in English and other languages supported by us.
11.2 You agree that we may send notices and other communications to you via your Online account for the Platform or via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App, or via e-mail or other reasonable means to any matter relating to your use of the Platform, including the Agreement (and revisions or amendments to the Agreement), notices or disclosures regarding the Platform.
(ii) Notification by you that you do not agree to the amendment of the Agreement and wish to terminate the Agreement prior to entry into force of the amendments has to be sent from you via your registered e-mail for the Platform.
(iii) Notification by you that you complain about certain services have to be sent via your registered e-mail for the Platform.
12.2 You agree that if we do not exercise or enforce any legal right or remedy which is contained in the Agreement (or which we have the benefit of under any applicable law), this will not constitute a waiver of ours rights and that those rights or remedies will still be available to us.
12.3 If any court of law having the jurisdiction to decide on a matter relating to the Agreement rules that any provision of the Agreement is invalid in respect to you, in your capacity of a Consumer, then that provision will be deemed void and will be removed from the content of the Agreement with you without affecting the rest of the Agreement. The remaining provisions of the Agreement will continue to be valid and enforceable.
12.4 You may not assign your rights under the Agreement or otherwise sub-contract or transfer any of your rights or obligations under the Agreement without our prior written consent.
12.5 We may transfer our rights and obligations under the Agreement to a third party, giving to you at least two-month notice previous the date of the transfer per e-mail or via LeuPay Wallet Mobile App unless such a transfer is required due to regulatory reasons. In case you disagree with such transfer we shall provide you the possibility to terminate the Agreement free of taxes, penalties or other.
For Complaints related to e-money and payment services: See your Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account.
12.7 "LeuPay Wallet", "LeuPay Wallet Card", "LeuPay Wallet Account" and all related URLs, logos, marks or designs, scripts, graphics, interactive features and similar, software, interfaces, standard or special design of Pay Stickers or visualizations or other related to the Platform, including logos and marks of Card Organizations are protected by copyrights, trademark registrations or Patents or other of our intellectual property rights. You may not use, copy, imitate, modify, alter or amend, sell, distribute or provide them without our prior written explicit consent to do so in a separate Agreement.
12.8 This User Agreement and the relationship between us shall be governed by the Republic of Bulgaria, subject to your local mandatory rights. For complaints that cannot be resolved otherwise, you submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the Bulgarian courts in Sofia arising out of or relating to this User Agreement or the provision of our Platforms. In simple terms, “nonexclusive jurisdiction of the Bulgarian courts” means that if you were able to bring a claim arising from this User Agreement against us in Court, the competent court in Sofia, Bulgaria, but in case you are a consumer you may also elect to bring a claim in the court of the country as per your permanent residence.
1.1 This Agreement is concluded between the Client (referred to as “You”) on one side and iCard AD, having its seat and registered office at: Bulgaria, Sofia, 76A James Boucher Blvd., PO 1407, UIN: 175325806, authorized and regulated by the Bulgarian National Bank as an Electronic Money Institution under the Electronic Money Directive 2009/110/EC (the “EMD”) with license No. 4703-5081/25.07.2011 Principal Member of Mastercard, VISA and JCB, (hereinafter referred to as “us”, “we”, “our”, “iCard” or “Financial Institution”), entitled to provide e-money, payment services and card services under EU Payment Services Directive and EU E-money Institutions Directive.
“LeuPay Wallet Service” is a FinTech online payment service for e-money, provided by iCard, accessible through the LeuPay Wallet Platform, which is supported by iCard Services AD.
The present agreement regulates the part of the LeuPay Wallet Service, which constitutes of Е-money issuing and distribution, and any other payment services related to said e-money services. These services are provided by a licensed Institution – iCard AD. To use the LeuPay Wallet Account you have to subscribe and use the LeuPay Wallet Platform via the Mobile app.
"LeuPay Wallet Account" or “Е-money Account” or “Account” means an account for electronic money, provided by us. LeuPay Wallet Account can solely be Personal - for your personal needs. Your use of LeuPay Wallet is regulated by the terms of the present Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account.
(i) Downloading the Mobile App for the Service, published by iCard Services AD., and agreeing with the Mobile App License Agreement and the User Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Service.
(ii) Agreeing with the Legal agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account and the other legal documents if applicable.
1.4 The Agreement will be effective from the date of its acceptance by you ("Effective Date"). By clicking “Accept” or “Agree” where this option is made available to you by us via the Website for the Service and which you hereby adopt as your electronic signature you consent and agree to the terms and conditions of the present Legal Agreement and therefore the electronic document of the Agreement is deemed as duly signed by you.
1.5 A link of the Agreement will be provided to you in the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App from where you may download the Agreement in printable form during or immediately after the sign-up process. A copy of the Agreement, as amended from time to time, is available to you on Website of the Service You may request to be provided with a copy of the Agreement, and a link to the Agreement will be sent to your registered mobile number for the Service.
1.7 You declare that you are registering for the Service on you own behalf only and that you are not acting on behalf or on account of third party.
1.8 14-days cancellation period for Consumers: If you act in your capacity of Consumer, for 14 days after agreeing with the Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account you have the right to cancel your contract with us by closing your Account(s). We will give you all your available money back to a bank account stated by you or via cash withdrawal with LeuPay Wallet Card (if you have such) after completion of card activation. You will not have to pay any charges for exercising this right but you will have to pay for any transactions relating to the time that your Account was open. You can tell us you want to close your Account(s) via your Online account or by calling us at our Contact Center. If you do not close your account in the 14-day period, you can still close your Account in accordance with the Section 14 of this Agreement.
2.1 To be eligible for the payment and e-money Services, you must (i) be at least 18 years old (unless you are a Dependent, as described below); and (ii) be resident of the countries, listed on the Website; and (iii) you or any user of additional card to your Account must not be present on any black list or sanctions lists, related to AML/FT purposes, officially published and notified by Regulators or black lists of card fraudsters or similar.
2.2 Identification and verification: We are legally obliged to identify and verify your identity in compliance with the applicable AML/FT laws, our Internal AML/FT rules and procedures and the applicable rules of the Card Organizations.
(i) For that purpose, we require identification and registration of your data on LeuPay Wallet Platform (via the Website for the Service), such as, but not exhaustively, names, address, date of birth, citizenship, TIN, registered mobile number and other.
(iii) You agree that the video call is only a part of the verification and that your identity will be verified by us via independent sources, such as documents for proof of address, other documents, PEP registers, Dow Jones or similar databases, registers of Card Organizations or other independent sources. You agree with such checks and will provide all assistance requested by us in carrying out such checks. You agree that we shall have full discretion in determining whether you are verified and continue to be in compliance with the anti-money-laundering/FT requirements. We are entitled to decline, stop or terminate Service temporarily or in a permanent way in case of failure to complete the identification and verification process successfully in reasonable time or due to any other risk, security or regulatory reasons, for which we shall not be liable.
(iv) You understand and agree that the payment services, including the Account and the Card/s, shall not be activated and available until successful completion of the identification and verification procedures under our Internal AML/FT rules and procedures. We reserve our right to ask for any additional documents, personal details, originals or notarized copies of ID documents or other documents at any time.
2.3 At our discretion you may be entitled to use only part of the Service, such as LeuPay Wallet Card or Additional card, prior to completion of the full identification and verification procedure. In this case special limits shall be applied for the Service whereas these limits are defined explicitly in the section regarding “Limits” which is available in your Online account. You agree that the limits specified there are based on statutory requirements and may be subject to immediate change in case the regulatory requirements are amended accordingly for which you will be notified.
2.4 In case you are successfully verified by us, your Account shall be automatically activated with the standard limits. Nevertheless, we may require at any time additional information as a condition of the continued use of the Service by you. You agree to provide such information without undue delay, as we may require in this regard. The limits on your Account/Card are set out in the section regarding “Limits” which is available in the Website for the Service and in your Mobile app.
2.5 For regulatory, risk and security reasons we may impose or change the limits unilaterally and without your consent for which we shall inform you with a notification unless we are not permitted by law to notify you in certain cases. We are entitled at our sole discretion to decide whether to change the limits after a customer request for change of limits and we shall not be liable in case of decline of request.
2.6 Upon registration for the Service and during this Agreement, you must provide current, complete and accurate information by personalizing your Online account, as requested by us and maintain that information as current and accurate during use of the Service. In case of any changes in information you provided, you agree to update the information in the online Account without delay.
2.7 Set-off. You agree that LeuPay Wallet Service may set-off any of the amounts held in your e-money accounts or currency balances held or controlled by you with any fees, charges or other amounts you owe to us or our Affiliates. In simple terms, our right to set-off means that we may deduct such fees, charges or other amounts due by you to us or our Affiliates. If such set-off includes a currency conversion we will convert the amount that you owe us according to our currency exchange rate for the date of the operation.
2.8 Users under 18 years of age (“Dependents”): Users under 18 years of age are not eligible to use independently the payment services under this Agreement and have their own independent e-money account, nor to pass the video chat identification. If such users wish to use the payment services they have to ask at least 1 of their parent or guardian (“Parent/Guardian”) to download the mobile app, register for the Service, conclude the Legal Agreement, undergo successfully the video chat identification and add the user under 18 years old as a “Dependent” in their own account. To add as a “Dependent” the main client will have to enter the names, birth date and mobile phone of the Dependent. Dependent users are not considered as Clients for the payment or e-money services and do not have a separate claim on the e-money balance in the Dependent account. However, they shall be entitled to contact the Call Center or the Chat in case of lost or stolen additional card, where they will be asked to state their name, birth date and registered mobile number for security reasons. We reserve our right to ask the Parent/Guardian for any document which may prove his/her relation to the Dependent.
2.8.1 Once successfully added as “Dependent” such users under 18 years of age will be able to use the service only as sub-account to the main account of the Parent/Guardian and/or additional cards, linked to the Parent/Guardian account of the main user with limits set by the Parent/Guardian and only for as long as the main account of the Parent/Guardian is valid, not blocked and/or not terminated. Any claim for chargeback or unauthorized transaction with additional card/wallet has to be made by the Parent/Guardian.
2.8.2 Upon request of the Parent/Guardian the Dependent may be issued or have limited or terminated additional cards embossed or not with the name of the Dependent. Such Dependent users will also be able to use the Fund, Send and Request money functionalities with strict limitations, set via the Parent/Guardian account, and their cards will be limited for certain MCC according to the Card Organizations Rules. The information on all transactions made by such Dependent Users will be sent via the Chat to the Parent/Guardian account.
2.8.3 Once such user reaches the age of 18 years, such user may conclude a Legal Agreement for independent e-money account/card via the mobile app and upon successful identification and verification of the person the account will be open with the standard functionalities and limits. Any cards, issued prior to that moment, may continue to be used with the new independent account. The transactional history of the Dependent prior to the age of 18 shall be also available in the new independent account.
2.8.4 Disclosure to my Dependents: This section only applies to Parents/Guardians of dependents with sub-accounts and/or additional card(s): I, the Parent/Guardian, agree that you can disclose to my Dependent who has a sub-account and/or additional card (s) account with you that I no longer have a and account with you.
You may purchase or receive e-money in the following ways, as allowed by the Service.
3.1.1 You may decide to register a valid card (stored card), of which you’re an authorized holder, which will be used to fund the purchase of e-money for the Service. Purchase of e-money via stored card may be for amount defined by you or for the amount determined by us, necessary for crediting of your Account, in order to complete a payment transaction or charge you as per this Agreement. By adding a stored card you consent to use the stored card for funding transactions, that the funding transactions in compliance with this Agreement can no longer be revoked and that we may check if the stored card is in good standing with the issuing institution or Member, including, but not limited via procedure for verification of a stored card or in other ways. The limits for Funding via stored card are set out in the Online account. You may change the limits, as allowed by the Service, by completing successfully the procedure for verification of stored card, available in your Online account.
c) Upon your explicit request and our consent of or in other cases of reversal of payment operation or refund of sums, to credit, if possible, to your stored card such amounts as may be necessary to effect any Reversal of a funding or payment transaction or refunds of amounts, through the Service.
3.1.3 If you choose to register multiple stored cards, you must select the priority order, to be followed by us for funding transactions. You have to select the order for debiting of your Account from available Account Balance or stored card. You may enable via the Servicee, and afterwards - disable, the functionality for automatic funding of your Account from the stored card with the purpose for payment on physical POS or virtual POS (in Internet) in which case there will be no funding fee for such funding operation. In order to enable this option, we may have requirements for verification of stored card or others, as requested by us. If you activate this option, you (1) cannot dispute or make chargeback of the funding operation and (2) agree that if the stored card cannot be debited for some reason and you have enough Balance in your Account, then your Balance may be debited for the performance of the payment transaction.
3.2 Funding via bank transfer: You can order a credit transfer from a bank account to your LeuPay Wallet Account for e-money provided by us. Upon receipt of the amount of the transfer by us, we will issue electronic money in the same amount and currency as the amount and currency received by us and in the same business day as the date of receipt of the funds. We are not responsible for and do not control when we are going to receive the funds from your payment services provider and whether your payment services provider or correspondent banks will charge you fees for the transfer and will transfer the full amount to us. You will be notified through information in the Online account in the Balance and transaction history on the amount of issued money and date of credit operation.
3.3 In order to receive the amount in the Account, you must provide the correct number of your Account and/or correct IBAN, as well as other beneficiary account details, as stated in your Online account. The limits for Funding via bank transfer are set out in the Online account.
3.4 You agree that we may impose different limitations on amounts of purchased e-money, or special requirements, or not accept bank transfer from certain banks, upon our sole discretion.
3.5 The credit value date for the Payee's account (your Account) and the amount of the funding transactions shall be available no later than the Business day on which the amount of the funding transaction is credited to the Account, held with us.
3.6 Funding in cash: If and when it is allowed and provided by the Service, you will be able to purchase e-money in cash only in the places where this funding is allowed by us and only for type of Accounts and limits for funding in cash, approved by us. Funding in cash is possible in the offices, stores or points of sale of some of our authorized agents or subcontractors, listed on the Website for the Service. Funding in cash is available in limited places and countries, stated on the Website for the Service (“authorized points for cash-in”). The authorized points for cash-in services may charge you at their discretion a fee for the cash-in service on top of the amount to be funded in cash. We shall issue e-money in the same amount as the amount paid in cash by you, less fee for cash-in (if there is such) and shall make the amount available to you immediately after the receipt of funds, or in case of a Payee, who is not a Consumer – at latest on the next Business day after the receipt of the funds. In some cases, such as co-branded programs with sub-contractors, upon our sole discretion, we may make the amount available to you earlier than the receipt of funds by us. Limits on funding in cash operations may vary depending on place and country and are provided to you on the Website for the Service or on spot.
3.7 Funding transactions with some funding methods may be rejected or limited by us for regulatory reasons (AML/FT), risk and security or in order to avoid conflict between various Services by We or on other grounds, or may be rejected or delayed, for reasons beyond our reasonable control. We do not guarantee the acceptance of any particular funding method, and may make changes or discontinue the acceptance of any particular funding method at any time and without prior notice to you, for which we are not liable.
3.8 You agree that you cannot make a successful Chargeback after a funding transaction, on the ground “goods not delivered or similar”, as the purchased e-money (purchased goods) is issued (delivered) by us upon receipt of funds.
3.9 Budget: You may set a Budget via the Service – a fixed amount of e-money, within the limits of the Service, which is debited from the funding instrument (funding card or other) and is credited as e-money in the wallet, and is available at a certain period of time, such as daily, weekly or monthly. You may use or spend this amount and the other e-money balance. This amount may be subject to a blocking or hold by us, in the same way and on the same grounds, as the e-money. You understand and agree that by authorizing the first funding of the wallet for replenishing the fixed budget amount, you express an authorization for recurring transactions with the funding instrument and in this regard, you are not entitled to a charge-back or reversal for unauthorized transactions. You may edit or suspend the Budget at any time via the Service.
3.10 The Service offers possibility for top-up (loading of money) into vouchers and prepaid mobile numbers (“Top-Up”) from the LeuPay Wallet balance. The Service is using third parties subcontractors, who are acting as top-up resellers for the Mobile Operators, who provide the vouchers or prepaid mobile numbers and we are not providing the vouchers or prepaid mobile numbers. Some Mobile operators or some of their agents may collect a surcharge fee on top of the amount to be loaded in the vouchers or prepaid mobile numbers (“Top-Up Fee”). Such fees may vary depending on the Mobile operator, not on us. In such cases, this fee will be displayed in LeuPay Wallet, prior to the debit operation and the customer may refuse to proceed with a Top-up, if the customer does not agree to the fee. The fee is just collected by us and transferred to the agent of the Mobile operator or its sub-contractor. We are not liable for any compensation for the delivery, timely delivery or quality of the vouchers or prepaid time from the Mobile Operators or their agents or sub-contractors.
3.12 Receipt of money: Your Account may be funded with e-money on receipt of money by you from your other Accounts in our system and services or from other bank accounts. In order to receive money from a Client’s Accounts in our system, you have to provide to the Payer either your registered email for the Service or your registered Mobile phone number for the Service or the number of your Account, available in your Online account. In order to receive money from a bank account (inbound money transfer), you must provide to the Payer the correct number of your Account and/or correct IBAN, as well as other beneficiary Account details, as stated in your Online account.
4.1. Once verified, you may send e-money via the Service to other users, registered for LeuPay Wallet Service. In order to send money via the Service you must use the correct mobile phone number of the user, registered for the Service (recipient). You understand and accept that LeuPay Wallet Service does not allow Sending money to persons that are not registered for the Service.
4.2. You are fully liable for sending correct submissions via the send money functionality of LeuPay Wallet Service. By clicking the button "Send Money" or similar in the Mobile App and after entry of the secret code when requested by the Service, you confirm that you are making confirmed and irrevocable payment order to us to execute the payment order and debit your balance with the amount of the transfer, and all applicable fees (if any). Confirmed order, already received by us, cannot be revoked.
4.3. We shall execute the authorized payment order made by you, provided that the balance of e-money in your account is enough to cover the amount of the transfer and the applicable fees (if any). We may refuse to execute a specific transaction if there is not enough balance of e-money or we reasonably believe that the payment order is made by unauthorized person or transaction is fraudulent, illegal or in breach of the present Agreement or any law or regulation.
4.4. We are obliged process you Send money order to another LeuPay Wallet Client and credit its LeuPay Wallet with the amount of the order within the same day as of the date of placement of correct payment order.
5.1. Where we refuse to execute a payment order, the refusal and, if possible, the reasons for it as well as the procedure for correcting any factual mistakes that led to the refusal shall be notified to you, unless prohibited by other relevant EU or national legislation. We shall provide notification to you via Mobile App at the earliest opportunity. We may charge a fee for providing additional information for such a notification if the refusal is objectively justified.
5.2. You are obliged to notify us immediately and without delay via the Contact numbers of the Call Center on the website www.leupaywallet.com in case of loss, theft, misappropriation or unauthorized use of Identifying Credentials and/or Card/s and to take all preventive and security measures as allowed by the Service or us to limit the risks and damages. If you are not a Consumer you cannot claim that a transaction is not authorized, because of lack of your consent for the specific transaction.
5.3. You agree that we may not be always able to reverse the amount of unauthorized transaction in cases, where the deadlines for chargeback before the Card Organizations have expired or in other cases according to the rules of the respective Card Organization, in which cases we shall not be liable before you for compensation bigger than the one provided in the law.
5.4. When you receive a payment, you are liable to us for the full amount of the payment plus any Fees if the payment is later invalidated for any reason. In addition to any other liability, if there is a Reversal, or if you lose a Chargeback or Claim, you will owe to us an amount equal to the Reversal, Chargeback or Claim and applicable fee as per the Tariff and other charges related to the Reversal, Chargeback or Claim. We may debit your account to recover any amounts and fees, due by you in connection to Reversal, or Chargeback or Claim or Reserve, immediately and without prior notice.
(iv) If payment has been made with e-money via debiting of linked Funding Instrument - the amount subject to reversal or refund is refunded to Funding instrument if possible, or if not possible is refunded in your LeuPay Wallet account in the currency of the transaction.
5.6. In case we have reasonable doubts or we receive information from third parties, such as Card Organizations, other Regulators or card issuers/acquirers for fraud or payments with stolen cards, false cards, or unauthorized payments with cards or other irregularities in connection with your use of the Service, we have the right to withhold or block all amounts in your account and other accounts, which seem to be connected to your account, and to start an investigation without prior notice to you or third parties. You are obliged to cooperate with us and present us all requested information related to the alleged fraud or unauthorized payments. We have to complete our internal investigation within a reasonable period and inform you on the outcome, unless this is not permitted by the law for compliance reasons. You acknowledge and agree that in some cases of violations we may be obliged to report you to registers of Card Organizations or other Regulators and terminate the Service, for which we shall not be liable.
5.7.1 Without prejudice to the above, you agree and acknowledge that the reporting and payment of any applicable taxes arising from use of the Service and which by law are your obligations, shall be your exclusive responsibility and liability. You hereby agree to comply with any and all applicable tax laws.
5.7.2 You acknowledge and agree that the sales of Goods and Services, including but not limited to top-up of prepaid or similar services, are transactions between the Merchant and you and not with us, or any of our Branches, Agents or affiliates. We are not liable for the performance of obligation of Merchants.
5.7.3 We provide to you via the LeuPay Wallet platform information on balance/s, IBAN numbers and other unique account identifiers, information on transactions, history of transactions, status of account, status of other payment instruments, status of your customer verification point of view, notifications sent to you and other important information regarding your e-money account opened under the present Agreement. You agree to any such disclosures of your personal and e-money and payment services data and records to iCard Services AD for the purposes of providing the LeuPay Wallet Service.
5.7.4 You will be able to view transactions free of charge in the transaction history, which is updated regularly, and you agree not to receive paper statements. Upon your request we may, at our discretion, provide you with additional statements, paper or otherwise, of the transactions but in this case we may charge you a reasonable administration fee. We may charge you a fee for other information services, different from the standard information services, provided via the Service or additional services provided by us, as provided in the Tariff.
6.1 We have provided to you personalized security features which comply with the principles of strong customer authentication for using all payment instruments, included in the Service, such as, but not limited to, password, OTP (one-time passcodes) received via SMS or generated via special mobile applications for access to Online account and making a payment order, embossed number of the card, PIN, CVC/CVV or similar code of the card, password for Mobile Application and others, which are necessary tools for preserving the security of your payment instruments. We will make sure that the personalized security features of the payment instruments are not accessible to parties other than you or the entitled to use the payment instrument user and conform to all Regulatory Technical Standards, without prejudice to your obligations.
6.2 You are able to control the security of the payment instruments, by enabling or disabling them for certain transactions, such as Internet transactions, ATM cash withdrawal or other, receipt of SMS or email after each transaction with Card, and imposing limits, which are more stringent than our default spending limits via the Service (Online account, Mobile App or SMS commands via registered mobile number or in other available ways). You agree to use these security control mechanisms available via the Service in order to minimize the risks of unauthorized access to your Account and unauthorized transactions. You must use the functionalities of the Service for disabling cards for Internet transactions and cash withdrawals only with one click or with SMS and enabling such Internet transactions or cash withdrawals only when you wish to make such transactions.
6.3 You agree to use your credentials, such as username and password and other personalized security features for your payment instruments only in accordance with this Agreement and with the law. You must not provide and must not allow disclosure of the personalized security features to a third party even where the Card or payment instrument is PIN based, because even in this case Card or payment instrument can be comprised and result in unauthorized transactions, for which you are fully liable. You must not disclose the credentials for access to a Business account (username and password), because they may be identical with the credentials for access to your personal account and there is a risk of unauthorized transactions. The breach of this obligation is breach of your obligation for protection of personalized security characteristics of payment instrument and you will be fully liable for unauthorized transactions as a result of your breach of this obligation willfully or with gross negligence.
6.4 You acknowledge and agree that all Cards linked to your Account are providing access to the e-money in your Account and you shall be liable for all transactions and charges arising of the use of Cards, associated with your Account.
6.5 If you believe that your Account or other payment instruments have been used in an unauthorized manner or in case of unauthorized transactions, you have to contact us without undue delay. You agree to notify us via the Contact Center or via "Contact us" on our Website for the Service, immediately and without delay in case of loss, theft, misappropriation or unauthorized use of credentials and/or personalized security features and/or payment instruments, including, but not limited to Cards, and to take all preventive and security measures as allowed by the Service, including to disable the compromised payment instruments via the Service, or allow us to do it and limit the risks of unauthorized transactions and damages. You also agree to notify us without undue delay and in the same manner of any other breach of security regarding the Service of which you have knowledge.
6.6 We may suspend the use of the Service in part of wholly, including block the Card, or Account, where we suspect that their security may have been compromised or that unauthorized or fraudulent use has taken place. We will inform you in advance or, if that is not possible, immediately after, of the suspension of the use of the Service, specifying the reasons for the suspension, unless such provision of information would compromise reasonable security measures or be otherwise unlawful. We will provide the Service or replacement credentials or personalized security characteristics to you, as soon as practicable after the reasons for the suspension cease to exist and on condition that you have satisfied all obligations towards us.
6.7 More information on security measures, which you must and are able to take, is provided on the Website for the Service or in the Online account.
h) Use of the Service for any sale of purchase of goods and/or services, which are not acceptable to us as determined on our Website for the Service or instructed in writing by us.
8.4 We shall be entitled to notify you at any time about the cessation of the provision of the Service to you via e-mail. The decision for the refusal is strictly in our discretion and we shall not be liable for whatsoever compensations.
8.5 You authorize us to obtain a credit report and/or to otherwise make credit or other background enquiries from time to time, as we may deem appropriate, to evaluate your registration for or continued use of the Service.
8.6 You agreе not to access (or attempt to access) any of the Service by any means other than through the Online account of the Service and Card that we have provided for the Service, unless you have been specifically allowed to do so in a separate agreement with us. You acknowledge that this restriction will apply to use of the Service by any automated means.
8.7 You agree that you will not engage in any activity that interferes with or disrupts the Service (or the servers and networks which are connected to the Service).
8.8 You agree that you will not reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, trade or resell the Service for any purpose.
8.9 You agree that you are fully responsible for (and that we have no responsibility to you or to any third party for) any breach of your obligations under the Agreement and for the consequences (including any loss or damage which we may suffer) of any such breach.
8.10 You acknowledge and agree that in order to meet all obligations after the anti-money laundering legislation (Prevention of Money Laundering Act and The Prevention of Money Laundering and Funding of Terrorism Regulations) and other documents related to their execution, as well as all European and national legislation in the field, we may establish general practices and limits concerning the use of the Service without prior notice to you, including, without limitation, individual or aggregate transaction limits on the value or turnover of e-money, transaction or other limits on the value, type or number of funding transactions or Payment Transactions during any specified time period(s). We shall notify you for every amendment in the common practices and limitations within reasonable time unless such notification is prohibited by aforementioned anti-money laundering legislation.
8.11 We may refuse to execute any funding or payment transaction, payment order or other use of the Service if we have reasonable grounds to suspect fraud, a breach of the applicable Agreement by you or the Merchant, or a violation of law or regulation of Card Organization or other Organization. Transactions may also be delayed due to our compliance withour obligations under applicable anti-money-laundering legislation, including if we suspect that the transaction involves fraud or illegal or non-acceptable activities. In the event that we refuse to execute a Funding or Payment Transaction or Payment Order, you will be notified, unless it is unlawful for us to do so or would compromise reasonable security measures.
8.12 You acknowledge and agree that if we disable access to E-money account or to any payment instrument by stopping the use of your Identifying Credentials or blocking the Card/s, you may be prevented from accessing the Service, your Account details or any files or other content which are contained in your Account or connected to your e-money or payment instruments.
8.13 We are not liable for declined payment transactions or lack of Service, due to lack of enough Balance in the Account or linked funding instrument/s, use of Card without name of Cardholder or in case of Merchants not accepting payments with such Cards, or offline transactions (Cards are generally not accepted for offline transactions, such as payments on toll roads, or other, however, this does not exclude your liability for offline transactions, if any), lack of Internet, or problems with your hardware or software, or exceeding the limits set by you as allowed by the Service, or the general limits, determined by us, or any other reason beyond our reasonable control.
8.14 Non-satisfaction of the conditions in this Agreement and/or our Acceptance Policy, may result in immediate suspension of your use of the Service, blocking of funds in your Account, our right to withhold funds in your Account for satisfaction of damages incurred by us, because of you rbreach, our claim against you, initiation of procedures before competent regulatory bodies or Card Organizations, and also termination of this Agreement without prior notice to you.
9.1 We will charge you fees to use the Service, as specified in the Tariff. Tariff may be changed by us unilaterally with 2-month notice to you. Updates in Tariff will be indicated on the Website for the Service or via the Online account, and you will be duly notified in accordance to the Agreement. We may charge fee for transfers, if it is stated in the Tariff.
9.2 Currency conversion: If transaction involves a currency conversion, it will be completed at a foreign exchange rate determined by us plus a Currency exchange fee expressed as a certain percentage above the exchange rate and as specified in the Tariff. Foreign exchange rate is adjusted regularly based on market conditions (the wholesale exchange rate at which we obtains foreign currency). The exchange rate may be applied immediately by us. The exchange rate may be updated daily by us and applied immediately by us. It may be viewed in your Mobile App or on https://www.leupaywallet.com/ under Currency Exchange Rates.
9.3 Where a currency conversion is offered by us at the point of sale you will be shown the foreign exchange rate that will be applied to the transaction before authorising the payment transaction on our Website for the Service. By proceeding with authorisation of the payment transaction you are agreeing to the currency conversion on the basis of the foreign exchange rate. Where a currency conversion is offered at the point of sale by the Merchant, not by us, you choose to authorize the payment transaction on the basis of the Merchant's exchange rate and charges, we shall have no liability to you for that currency conversion. Where your payment for e-money is funded by a Debit or Credit Card and involves a currency conversion, by entering into this Agreement you consent to and authorize us to convert the currency in place of your Credit or Debit card issuer.
9.4 In case you are being sent e-money in currency, different from the currency of your account, you agree that we shall automatically make a currency conversion and shall issue e-money in the currency of your LeuPay Wallet account at the foreign exchange rate, applied by us at the date of issuing the e-money.
9.5 You agree and understand that the Institution or Member that issues the stored card or providеs the bank account to you, used for funding tranactions, may charge you a fee and/or currency conversion fee in connection with the debiting or charging of the funding instrument resulting from the funding transaction. You should consult the Terms and Conditions governing your funding instrument for more information about any such fees. We are not liable for taxes, fees or costs imposed by third parties.
9.6. In case where your LeuPay Wallet Account has been blocked by us for compliance or security reasons, or under order by a regulator, and this situation has not been rectified within a period of 2 (two) years from date of blocking, we shall be entitled to charge a Non-compliant fee in the amount of 15 EUR per month from any outstanding Balance or Reserve amount, or collateral amount, until rectification of the non-compliance or depletion of the funds in the Account, in which last case we have the right to terminate the Agreement and close the Account.
10.1 In case you are using the Service as a Consumer, you shall be liable for all losses incurred in respect of unauthorized transactions, as a result of use of lost or stolen payment instrument or from its misappropriation, before it is reported for up to a maximum of 50 EUR unless you were able to detect the loss, theft or misappropriation of the payment instrument before the payment was made or the loss was caused by acts or lack of action of an employee, agent or branch of ours. In case you are not using the Service as a Consumer, you shall be liable without limitation for all losses incurred in respect of unauthorized or incorrect transactions, as a result of use of lost or stolen payment instrument or from its misappropriation or incorrect payment orders. When you do not use LeuPay Wallet Service as a Consumer, you agree that all payment transactions with your LeuPay Wallet Account or Card or other payment instruments will be considered as authorized by you if they are registered in the system of the respective Financial Institution. In case that the unauthorized transaction was made through a third-party payment service provider approved by the payment initiation service, we shall immediately refund the amount involved in said unauthorized transaction no later than by the end on the next working day. If applicable, the status of the debited account shall be restored to the state it would have been had the unauthorized transaction not been made, nothwistanding any rights of recourse to which we may be entitled against the payment service provider. Your liability cap of 50 EUR maximum arising from unauthorized transactions under the terms set out in the above paragraph shall likewise apply in the event of transactions made through a third-party payment service provider.
10.2 However, you shall be fully liable for all losses incurred in respect of unauthorized transactions and/or all damages, notwithstanding the amount of the losses or damages, if you have acted fraudulently or has, with intent or gross negligence, failed to comply with the Agreement or law, including your obligations to preserve the security of your Identifying Credentials, providing access to your Account, e-money or Card or other.
10.3 You shall be entitled to redress losses (excluding fees or interest in case your are not a Consumers) incurred by you in respect of unauthorized or incorrect transactions made after you have informed us for the unauthorized or incorrect transaction and we has been able to block the Account and/or Card or other payment instrument without undue delay in the day when your Account was debited or within 7 (seven) days afterwards, and in case where you have acted as a Consumer, no later than any longer period after the debit date, as provided in applicable legislation in the interest of Consumer. We will, on your request, make efforts to trace the transaction and notify you of the outcome. Where you are entitled to redress, we will refund the amount of the unauthorized transactions, less applicable fees as per Tariff, by crediting your Account.
In the case of an unauthorised payment transaction, which debits your Account, including where the unauthorized transaction was made through a third party authorised payment initiation services provider (PISP), we shall refund the amount of the unauthorised payment transaction immediately, and in any event no later than by the end of the following business day, after being notified of the unauthorized transaction by you or your legal representative (in case of legal entities), except where we have reasonable grounds for suspecting fraud and communicate those grounds to the relevant national authority in writing. Where applicable, we shall restore the debited account to the state in which it would have been had the unauthorised payment transaction not taken place. This shall also ensure that the credit value date for your account shall be no later than the date the amount had been debited. You have to inform us via your registered e-mail in case of unauthorized transaction and request a refund. You have to be fully identified and verified and your account has to be in good standing and not blocked for security or compliance reasons.
10.4. You agree to indemnify, defend and hold us harmless , from and against any losses or negative Balance on Account or Cards, resulting from any and all actions, causes of actions, claims, demands, liabilities, judgments, damages or expenses (collectively, "Claim" or "Claims") which we may at any time during the term of this Agreement or within 5 (five) years after its termination incur, sustain or become subject as a result of any Claim and: (a) connected to your or your employees’, agents’ or sub-contractors’, or 3rd parties’ use of the Service, including, but not limited to Accounts or Cards, breach of any provision, warranty or representation in this Agreement, or regulations of Card Organizations or other Organizations; or (b) arising out of your or your employees’, agents’ or sub-contractors’, or end customers’ or 3rd parties’ use of the Service, including, but not limited to Accounts or Cards, willful acts or omissions, gross negligence, or other similar wrongdoings or claims, or fraud, charge back, including, but not limited to amounts and fees debited or charged by Card Organizations for charge back, initiated by you or 3rd parties, offline transactions, recurring transactions, currency conversions, pre-authorization, manual operations, stand-in process, system malfunction, or other unlawful use of the Card and/or e-money; or (c) arising from your or your employees’, agents’ or sub-contractors’, or end customers’ or 3rd parties’ use of the Service, including, but not limited to Accounts or Cards, failure to comply with any law or regulation including but not limited to AML, data protection laws, Cardholder´s data information and other rules and regulations. You agree that we are authorized to satisfy immediately as they become due any of your obligations by debiting or withdrawing directly funds from your Account, or from any Security provided by you (if Security is provided), or any outstanding sums owed by us to you, including by debiting or charging your Funding instrument. We shall inform you on the ground, amount and value date of such withdrawals, unless it is forbidden by law or regulations for AML or security reasons to make such notice.
10.4.1 In case of outstanding obligations of yours towards us or any of our Affiliates, you consent explicitly and irrevocably and authorize us to debit the amount of your obligations from your account/s with us without prior notice and pay your obligations on your behalf. The information on the debit transaction value and date will be shown in the Client’s online account.
10.5 In case of delay for payment of amounts due to us you shall owe a penalty for delay in the amount of the statutory interest according to the European Central Bank rate for each day of delay from the date of delay until payment of the full amount.
10.6 Right of Retention: Unless otherwise agreed between the parties in writing, according to applicable law we may exercise a right of retention over all your money in your account/s with us or our Affiliates until all outstanding fees, costs, charges, expenses and liabilities owed to us have been paid in full.
10.7 In addition to our right of indemnification, in case where your LeuPay Wallet Account has been blocked by us for compliance or security reasons, or under order by a regulator, due to your breach of this Legal Agreement or use of the Service by you in breach the applicable laws or the Rules of the Card Organizations, we shall be entitled to block your LeuPay Wallet Account and all or part of the Services, without prior notice to you and we shall be entitled to receive as a penalty for each breach by you, equal to 20% of your turnover via LeuPay Wallet Service for a period not exceeding the last 12 (twelve) months prior to the blocking of the account, and per each breach. We reserve our right to withhold amounts and/or seek higher compensation for our actual damages.
10.8 Right of Withhold or Set-off: Unless otherwise agreed between the parties in writing, according to the applicable law we may exercise a right of withhold and/or set-off over all your money in your Account/s with us until all outstanding fees, costs, charges, expenses and liabilities due to us have been paid in full.
10.9 We shall be released of liability in the case that a card is not accepted by a Merchant or another financial institution that has undertaken to sell goods or render services paid for by card or in the event of incidents of a technical or operational nature that affects ATMs. We shall be held harmless from any incidents and liabilities that may arise from transactions conducted between us.
11.1 You acknowledge and agree that we may stop providing the Service to you, as provided in the Agreement. You may stop using the Service at any time, without need to inform us when you stop using the Service. The Agreement will continue to apply until terminated either by you or us, as set out below.
c) Return of Card to us.
11.3. In case of any risk of Damages for us, resulting from reversals, chargebacks, claims, fees, fines, penalties, your non-compliance with AML/FT or other regulations and other similar liabilities arising from your use of the Service, Wwe may hold your funds for up to 180 Days even after Termination of Agreement or shorter or longer period, as required by the law, including laws in favor of the Consumer. You will remain liable for all obligations arising under this Agreement even after Termination of Agreement and/or closing of Account.
b) We are required to do so by law or Regulations of Card Organizations or other Organizations (for example, where the provision of the Service to you becomes non-compliant with the Regulations).
11.5 Unless a shorter period is provided in this Agreement, as permitted by law, we may, at any time, terminate the Agreement by giving you two (2) months' notice.
11.6 When this Agreement comes to an end, all of the legal rights, obligations and liabilities that both parties have benefited from, or which have accrued over time whilst the Agreement has been in force, or which are expressed to continue indefinitely, will be unaffected by this cessation, and the provisions of clause 19.5 will continue to apply to such rights, obligations and liabilities indefinitely.
11.7.1 You are entitled to request personally by sending an e-mail from “Contact Us” on our Website for the Service to redeem (buy back) part or all available Balance of your e-money, less all applicable fees. The request for redemption of e-money has to be signed by a legal representative or a person explicitly authorized by you in relation to the Business Account. Subject to the successful completion of applicable anti-money-laundering, fraud, risk and other checks of every request for redemption by us and subject to the expiry of any reserve/hold/block or collateral under this Agreement or the law, we will redeem the amount of the outstanding e-money, less the applicable fees, such as redemption fee, determined in Tariff or currency conversion fees if applicable and possible bank transfer fees for the bank transfer. We shall initiate transfer of the remaining amount to your personal bank account, which has to be in the same currency as the currency in your account or in one of the currencies, supported by us, as notified by us on our Website for the Service. The e-money is issued by us in our capacity of a E-money Institution and your claim of for the available balance of e-money is towards us.
11.7.2 We are not liable for incorrect transactions based on false or incomplete information. We shall not be liable for delays in the redemption of e-money where the delay is caused by any third party involved in the transfer transaction of redeemed money.
11.7.3 You cannot request and is not entitled to e-money redemption if there is no Balance available in your Account for whatsoever reason or Balance is not enough to cover the fees for redemption.
11.7.4 If the outstanding amount of e-money cannot be redeemed in accordance with this clause, you have six (6) years following termination of the Agreement to request the redemption of the outstanding amount in full and in compliance with this Agreement, after which time any e-money left in your Account becomes our property . For the purposes of this clause, the Agreement terminates when you are no longer able to use your e-money for the purpose of making Funding and/or Payment transactions or use of the Service. Any redemption made, pursuant to this clause, is subject to the successful completion of applicable anti-money-laundering, fraud and other illegal activity checks, and you agree to provide the information requested by us in order for us to complete these checks. Nothing in this clause limits our right to terminate the Agreement, pursuant to the other clauses of this Agreement or the law.
11.8. Death of Individuals: We will assume that the relationship between us persists until we are notified in writing about your death. We must be notified by who is legally vested with the rights and obligations to act on behalf of your affairs and will take instructions from him/her/them. Such person may be the heir, legatee, administrator, executor or otherwise. We shall be entitled to receive to its satisfaction such evidence, at your cost, as may be required by us to establish the proper entitlement and authority of the person claiming to be in charge of acting on behalf of your affairs and the Bank shall not be bound to act upon such instructions until such time as we are satisfied of such authority.
(c) Any information obtained by you as a result of use of the Service will be accurate or reliable.
12.2 No conditions, warranties or other terms (including any implied terms as to satisfactory quality, fitness for purpose or conformance with description) apply to the Service, except to the extent that they are expressly set out in the Agreement.
12.3 Nothing in the Agreement will affect those mandatory statutory rights to which you are entitled as a Consumer and that you cannot contractually agree to alter or waive.
13.1 Nothing in the Agreement will exclude or limit our liability for losses which may not be lawfully excluded or limited by this Agreement or by applicable law.
c) (in case you are not a Consumer) Any compensation for fees or interest paid or levied on you , as a result of non-performance or incorrect performance of a payment transaction.
13.3. We do not assume any responsibility for the information provided by you or other clients via the LeuPay Wallet Chat which has links to content, policies or practices of any third parties websites upon which we cannot influence or control in any way. You acknowledge and agree that we are not liable for any damages or claims resulting from your use or visit on third parties’ websites.
14.1 You agree that we may make changes to the Agreement from time to time. We shall give you two (2) months' notice of changes in the Agreement, unless shorter period is necessitated by a Regulatory change, or is allowed by law, by email sent to your email address and/or by notifying you in the Online account or the Website of the Service before their proposed date of entry into force.
14.2 You understand and agree that you will be deemed to have accepted the changes unless you notifie us to the contrary by notice, as provided hereinunder, prior to the date on which the changes are to come into effect, in which case the Agreement will terminate without charge for termination immediately before the effective date of the changes.
b) The parties' right to vary the terms of this Section, where the variation is not prohibited by law and both parties agree to it.
14.4 We may introduce innovations, improvements, developments, new functionalities, upgrade accounts or amend the names of accounts or products unilaterally and without your consent, for which we shall inform you via LeuPay Wallet App.
15.1 All information will be made available or provided to you in an easily accessible manner, in easily understandable language, in a clear and comprehensible form and in English. For each transaction made through the Service we shall provide to you information about its execution deadline, the fees to which you shall be subject and, if applicable, a breakdown of the fees, provided such information is requested prior to execution. Furthermore, once the fees have been debited from your LeuPay Wallet account, we shall provide you with the following information: (i) a reference number that enables you to identify each payment and, if applicable, information about the beneficiary; (ii) the amount involved in each payment; (iii) the amount of any fees charged and, if applicable, the corresponding breakdown; (iv) the exchange rate to which each payment is subject, if applicable, and (v) the date of debit or receipt of a payment order. You are entitled to request this information to be provided or made accessible regularly, at least once a month, free of charge, provided you are allowed to store this information and reproduce it without changes.
15.2 You agree that we may send notices and other communications to you via LeuPay Wallet App or other reasonable means to any matter relating to your use of the Service, including the Agreement (and revisions or amendments to the Agreement), notices or disclosures regarding the Service and payment authorizations.
(v) Information about a suspension of the Service and about the rejection of transactions with e-money will be made available via the Mobile App.
(ii) Notification of application for Card, purchase of e-money, redemption of e-money upon termination of this Agreement should be sent via the Mobile App.
(iii) Notification by you that you do not agree to the amendment of the Agreement and wish to terminate the Agreement prior to entry into force of the amendments has to be sent from you via the Mobile App.
(iv) Notification by you that you complain about certain services have to be sent via the Mobile app and via your registered mobile number.
16.1 Unless otherwise expressly stated in the Agreement or Tariff, all amounts stated in the Agreement are denominated in EURO (EUR) or Bulgarian lev (BGN).
16.3 You agree that if we do not exercise or enforce any legal right or remedy which is contained in the Agreement (or which we have the benefit of under any applicable law), this will not constitute a waiver of our rights and that those rights or remedies will still be available to us.
16.4 If any court of law having the jurisdiction to decide on a matter relating to the Agreement rules that any provision of the Agreement is invalid, then that provision will be removed from the Agreement without affecting the rest of the Agreement. The remaining provisions of the Agreement will continue to be valid and enforceable.
16.5 You may not assign your rights under the Agreement or otherwise sub-contract or transfer any of your rights or obligations under the Agreement without our prior written consent.
16.6 We may transfer our rights and obligations under the Agreement to third party, which is licensed to issue e-money giving to you at least two-month notice previous the date of the transfer per e-mail unless such a transfer is required due to regulatory reasons. In case of such transfer and if you disagree with it we shall provide you the possibility to terminate the Agreement free of taxes, penalties or other.
16.8 Both Parties agree that the authentic and/or correct execution of transactions and operations shall be proven with print-outs or statements printed or generated from ur IT systems, such as your online account, our Website of for the Service, our Card System of or the Member’s, our Register of E-money of or other software systems or platforms used by us in the capacity of regulated Financial institution or its sub-contractors, licensed to use our software or platforms.
16.9 “LeuPay Wallet”, “LeuPay Wallet Card”, LeuPay Wallet, www.leupaywallet.com and all related URLs, logos, marks or designs, software, interfaces or other related to the Services, including logos and marks of Card Organizations are protected by copyright, trademark registration or Patent or our other intellectual property rights or third party Licensor’s. You may not use, copy, imitate, modify, alter or amend, sell, distribute or provide them without our prior written explicit consent to do .
16.10 The Agreement and our relationship under the Agreement will be governed in all cases by Bulgarian law. For complaints arising out of or relating to this Agreement or the provision of our Service that cannot be resolved otherwise, you submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the competent Court in Sofia, Bulgaria. In simple terms, “nonexclusive jurisdiction of the competent Court in Sofia, Bulgaria” means that if you were able to bring a claim arising from this Agreement against us in Court, an acceptable Court would be a Court located Sofia, Bulgaria, but in case you are using the Service as a Consumer you may also elect to bring a claim in the Court of the country as per your permanent residence.
“Card” means “LeuPay Wallet Card”, issued as part of the Service, collectively called "Card" means a payment instrument, issued by the Member, with the logos of and one of the Card Organizations, providing possibility for the Cardholder to submit payment orders for payment on POS and in Internet, or ATM transactions, such as cash withdrawal or Balance check. The Card is linked to your account for e-money. Card is always personalized with personalized security characteristics, such as PAN, expiry date, CHIP & PIN based, CVV or CVC or similar characteristics, and is with or without Cardholder names embossed.
“Additional card” means a card, which is linked to your account for e-money, that may be without your names, or with your names or with the names of members of your family or close associates. Cardholders of additional cards, different from you, do not have account for e-money and use your electronic money.
"Card Organizations" means MasterCard International (“MasterCard”), VISA Europe (VISA), JCB Europe (“JCB”), UnionPay or any other card association or organization applicable hereunder, including any parent, affiliate, subsidiary, or successor, of any of them.
“Currencies, supported by us” means various currencies, supported by us for the Service, in which we issue electronic money, notified on our Website for the Service.
"Electronic Money" or “e-money” means monetary value issued by us on receipt of funds, registered in electronic form in our Register of e-money in our IT System and indicated as a Balance, which represents your claim towards us for redemption and is accepted as means of payment by persons other than us.
"Funding via bank transfer" means the transaction by which you will order a credit transfer from your bank account to your account and upon receipt of the amount of the transfer by us, we will issue electronic money in the same amount as received by us and in the same business day.
"LeuPay Wallet Chat" is part of the Mobile App that allows you to send encrypted instant messages, such as text, images, stickers, document, pictures, video and other supported files by the Service, to other users registered for the Service. LeuPay Wallet Chat is supported by iCard Services AD.
"Service" means issuing of electronic money from us upon receipt of funds from you, providing account for electronic money with Balances in multiple currencies, unique identifier of the account for electronic money and/or IBAN as unique identifier for your different Balances, issuing and acquiring of prepaid cards with the logo of MasterCard, VISA, JCB and other Card Organizations, money transfers within our system and SEPA and International money transfers and all payment services and related products available through the Website(s) for the Service, such as www.LeuPay Wallet.eu and all related URLs.
"Verification of mobile phone number" is the procedure we follow that verifies You Mobile phone number for the Service by sending via SMS a confirmation to your mobile phone number assigned to the device on which you have installed the Mobile App which confirmation must be entered in the Mobile App in order to complete the verification.
“Financial Institution” or “We” means iCARD AD, having its seat and registered office at: Bulgaria, Sofia, 76A James Boucher Blvd., PO 1407, UIN: 175325806, authorized and regulated by the Bulgarian National Bank as an Electronic Money Institution under the Electronic Money Directive 2009/110/EC (the “EMD”) with license No. 4703-5081/25.07.2011 Principal Member of MasterCard, VISA and JCB.
The present agreement regulates the part of the LeuPay Wallet Service, which constitutes of Card/s issuing and processing, and any other payment services with Cards with the logo of the Card Organizations. These services are provided by a licensed Institution, which is a Member to the Card Organizations – iCard AD. To use the LeuPay Wallet Card/s you have to subscribe and use the LeuPay Wallet Platform via the Mobile app.
This Agreement represents an inseparable part of the Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account, concluded via LeuPay Wallet Platform.
For the purposes of the present Agreement, all consumer-related protections shall apply to Clients which are micro-enterprises and are protected as Consumers under the payment services legislation of their domicile.
"LeuPay Wallet Card" or "Card" is a payment instrument, provided by us with the logo of the Card Organizations used for payments on POS or Internet or cash withdrawals on ATMs. The LeuPay Wallet Card is a plastic card, CHIP & PIN based, embossed with names of the cardholder. The LeuPay Wallet Card provides access to the funds in the LeuPay Wallet Account to which it is linked.
“Member” means the company, which is a principal member of the Card Organizations and is providing card issuing services. The Member is iCard AD defined as a party to this Agreement.
1.3 The present Agreement regulates the issuing, use and execution of payments with LeuPay Wallet Card.
(i) The plastic payment card for POS and Internet purchases and ATM or POS cash withdrawals is not issued automatically and must be ordered by you via the Online account on the Website for the Service or via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App for which we may charge issuing fee. The Card is issued and linked to your LeuPay Wallet Account as described in this Agreement. In case, where allowed by the LeuPay Wallet Service you may purchase or otherwise obtain an inactive LeuPay Wallet Card by an authorized Agent or Distributor of the LeuPay Wallet Service or directly from the Member, where the Card will be inactive and not loaded with funds. You agree that to activate such Card, you have to enroll for the LeuPay Wallet Service and agree with all Legal Agreements and documents and requirements for identification and verification applicable to your use of the Service.
(ii) Your use of the Card/s is subject to opening and maintaining of at least one valid LeuPay Wallet Account.
(v) Perform the procedure for Card activation as indicated by us on the cover of the Card, or the Online account, or in the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App or on the Website of the Service. In some cases, we may allow limited use of the Card prior to completion of the client verification procedure with regulatory limits, such as 150 EUR or other in compliance with the law. The limits are specified below in this Agreement and may be changed due to regulatory requirements or at our discretion in case of higher risk.
(vi) Successfully pass the identification and verification procedure as per your Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account, to which Account the Card will be linked.
1.6 By clicking “Accept” or “Agree” where this option is made available to you by us on the Website for the Service and which you hereby adopt as your electronic signature you consent and agree to the terms and conditions of the present Agreement and therefore the electronic document of the Agreement is deemed as duly signed by you.
1.7 A link of the Agreement will be provided to you in the Mobile App from where you may download the Agreement in printable form during or immediately after the sign-up process. A copy of the Agreement, as amended from time to time, is available to you in the Website for the Service. You may request to be provided with a copy of the Agreement, and a link to the Agreement will be sent to your registered mobile number for the Service.
1.8 The Agreement and all communication between you and us will be in English language. Where we have provided you with a translation of the English-language version of the Agreement or communication in other languages, this translation is only for your convenience and you explicitly agree that the English-language version of the Agreement and communication will govern the relationship with us. If there is any contradiction between the English-language version and a translation, the English-language version takes precedence.
1.9 You declare that you are concluding the present Agreement you own behalf only and that you are not acting on behalf or on account of third party with respect to the use of the Card.
d) by providing the card data (number, validity, CVC2) to the provider of goods or services and authorizing him to use it for payment of the respective service by fax, telephone or other communication device.
2.2 Card, which has been personalized with your names in your capacity of a cardholder, must be used only by you. Card, which has not been personalized with your names in your capacity of cardholder (if offered by the Service), may be used by you or third parties, to whom you provide or make available the Card for which you shall be fully responsible.
2.3 The spending limits with Cards or via Contactless Payments are set out the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App. To minimize the risk from losses and/or unauthorized transactions, you may set even more strict spending limits via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App and manage the security characteristics of the payment instruments, as allowed by the Service, via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App. Requests for blocking and unblocking of Cards may be made only by you in your capacity of main cardholder.
2.4 You understand and agree that in some cases when you perform a cash withdrawal transaction with your Card at ATM or POS terminal the Service provider supporting the terminal may charge you a fee for the transaction. You understand and acknowledge that we may not control the amount of such fees, prevent their application or affect them in any way. We are not liable for the fees determined by other service providers.
3.1 We have provided to you Personalized Security Features which comply with the principles of strong customer authentication for using all payment instruments, included in the Service, such as, but not limited to secret code for access to the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App, secret code for confirmation of payment orders, embossed number of the card, PIN, CVC/CVV or similar code of the card/s and others, which are necessary tools for preserving the security of your payment instruments. We will make sure that the Personalized Security Features of the payment instruments are not accessible to parties other than you or any user authorized by you to use the payment instrument and conform to all Regulatory Technical Standards, without prejudice to your obligations.
3.2 You are able to control the security of the payment instruments, by enabling or disabling them for certain transactions, such as Internet transactions, ATM cash withdrawal or other, receipt of SMS after each transaction with Card, and imposing limits, which are more stringent than our default spending limits via the Service (LeuPay Wallet Mobile App or SMS commands). You agree to use these security control mechanisms available in order to minimize the risks of unauthorized access to your Account and unauthorized transactions. You must use the functionalities for disabling cards for Internet transactions and cash withdrawals only with one click and enabling such Internet transactions or cash withdrawals only when you wish to make such transactions.
3.3 You agree to use Personalized Security Features for your payment instruments only in accordance with this Agreement and with the law. You must not provide and must not allow disclosure of the Personalized Security Features to a third party even where the Card or payment instrument is PIN based, because even in this case Card or payment instrument can be comprised and result in unauthorized transactions, for which you are fully liable. The breach of this obligation is breach of your obligation for protection of Personalized Security Features of payment instrument and you will be fully liable for unauthorized transactions as a result of your breach of this obligation willfully or with gross negligence.
3.4 When you do not act as a consumer you agree that when a transaction is executed with your LeuPay Wallet Card the use of your LeuPay Wallet Card recorded in our system by us as appropriate means that the transaction is authorized by you. The appropriate use includes without limitation any transaction in which the chip or the magnetic stripe of your LeuPay Wallet Card is read by any ATM or POS device, or a self-service machine, and/or your valid PIN is entered, and/or the data of your LeuPay Wallet Card, such as the 16-digits number, validity date or CVC2 code is entered in the Internet. In case where the transaction is executed by a third party the use of your LeuPay Wallet Card recorded in our system as appropriate means you have breached your obligation for protection of your security features with gross negligence or you have acted with fraud, or you have willfully shared your Personalized Security Features with a third party.
3.5 If you believe that your Card(s) or other payment instruments have been used in an unauthorized manner or in case of unauthorized transactions, you have to contact us without undue delay. You agree to notify us via the Contact Center, immediately and without delay in case of loss, theft, misappropriation or unauthorized use of Personalized Security Features and/or Identification Credentials and/or payment instruments, including, but not limited to Cards, and to take all preventive and security measures as allowed by the Service, including to disable the compromised payment instruments via the Service, or allow us to do it and limit the risks of unauthorized transactions and damages. You also agree to notify us without undue delay and in the same manner of any other breach of security regarding the Service of which you have knowledge.
3.6 We may suspend the use of the Card in part of wholly, including block the Card/s or the Contactless Payments, where we suspect that their security may have been compromised or that unauthorized or fraudulent use has taken place. We will inform you in advance or, if that is not possible, immediately after, of the suspension of the use of the Card, specifying the reasons for the suspension, unless such provision of information would compromise reasonable security measures or be otherwise unlawful. We will unblock the use of the Card or replace your Personalized Security Features, as soon as practicable after the reasons for the suspension cease to exist and on condition that you have performed all obligations towards us.
5.1 We will charge you fees to use the Service, as specified in the Tariff. Tariff may be changed by us unilaterally with 2-month notice sent to you. Updates in Tariff will be indicated via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App, and you will be duly notified in accordance to the Agreement. We may charge fee for transfers, if it is stated in the Tariff.
5.2 Currency conversion: If transaction involves a currency conversion, it will be completed at a foreign exchange rate determined by us plus a Currency exchange fee expressed as a certain percentage above the exchange rate and as specified in the Tariff. Foreign exchange rate is adjusted regularly based on market conditions (the wholesale exchange rate at which we obtain foreign currency). The exchange rate may be applied immediately and could be viewed by you in your LeuPay Wallet Mobile app.
5.3 Where a currency conversion is offered by us at the point of sale you will be shown in your Mobile App the foreign exchange rate that will be applied to the transaction before authorizing the payment transaction. By proceeding with authorization of the payment transaction you are agreeing to the currency conversion on the basis of the foreign exchange rate. Where a currency conversion is offered at the point of sale by the Merchant, not by us, you choose to authorize the payment transaction on the basis of the Merchant's exchange rate and charges, we have no liability to you for that currency conversion. Where your payment for e-money is funded by a Debit or Credit Card and involves a currency conversion, by entering into this Agreement you agree and authorize us to convert the currency in place of your Credit or Debit card issuer.
6.1 When you act as a consumer you shall be liable for all losses incurred in respect of unauthorized transactions, as a result of use of lost or stolen payment instrument or from its misappropriation, before it is reported, up to a maximum of 50 EUR unless you were able to detect the loss, theft or misappropriation of the payment instrument before the payment was made or the loss was caused by acts or lack of action of an employee, agent or branch of ours. When you do not act as a consumer and you use your LeuPay Wallet Card, you shall be liable without limitation for all losses incurred in respect of any unauthorized or incorrect transactions executed with your Card, as a result of lost or stolen payment instrument or from its misappropriation or incorrect payment orders. In case that the unauthorized transaction was made through a third-party payment service provider approved by the payment initiation service, we shall immediately refund the amount involved in said unauthorized transaction no later than by the end on the next working day. If applicable, the status of the debited account shall be restored to the state it would have been had the unauthorized transaction not been made, nothwistanding any rights of recourse to which we may be entitled against the payment service provider. Your liability cap of 50 EUR maximum arising from unauthorized transactions under the terms set out in the above paragraph shall likewise apply in the event of transactions made through a third-party payment service provider.
6.2 Notwithstanding the provision above, you shall be fully liable for all losses incurred in respect of unauthorized transactions and/or all damages, notwithstanding the amount of the losses or damages, if you have acted fraudulently or have, with intent or gross negligence, failed to comply with the Agreement or law, including your obligations to preserve the security of your Identifying Credentials, providing access to your E-money account, or Card or other. When you do not act as a consumer and you use your LeuPay Wallet Card you agree that it is for you to prove that the payment transaction was unauthorized or incorrectly executed.
6.3 You shall be entitled to redress losses (excluding fees or interest in case of when you are not a consumer) incurred by you in respect of unauthorized or incorrect transactions made after you have informed us for the unauthorized or incorrect transaction and we have been able to block the Card or other payment instrument without undue delay in the day when your Account was debited or within 7 (seven) days afterwards, and in case where you act as consumer, no later than any longer period after the debit date, as provided in applicable legislation in the interest of consumer. We will, on your request, make efforts to trace the transaction and notify you of the outcome. Where you are entitled to a redress, we will refund the amount of the unauthorized transactions, less applicable fees as per Tariff, by crediting your Account.
6.4 You agree that we are entitled to satisfy immediately as they become due any of your obligations by debiting or withdrawing directly funds from your LeuPay Wallet account under Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account, or from Security provided by you (if Security is provided), or any outstanding sums owed by us to you, including by debiting or charging your Funding instrument.
6.5 We shall be released of liability in the case that a card is not accepted by a Retailer or Bank that has undertaken to sell goods or render services paid for by card or in the event of incidents of a technical or operational nature that affects ATMs. We shall be held harmless from any incidents and liabilities that may arise from transactions conducted between us. You shall not bear any financial consequences for the use of the card subsequent to it being reported as lost or stolen, except in the case of fraudulent acts.
7.1 You acknowledge and agree that we may stop providing the Services to you, as provided in the Agreement and the Legal Agreement for LeuPay Wallet Account. You may stop using these services at any time, without need to inform us. The Agreement will continue to apply until terminated either by you or by us, as set out below.
b) Return of your Card to us.
7.3 In case of any risk of Damages for us, resulting from reversals, chargebacks, claims, fees, fines, penalties, your non-compliance with AML/FT or other regulations and other similar liabilities arising from your use of the Service, we may stop providing the Services and/or hold your funds for up to 180 Days even after Termination of Agreement or shorter or longer period, as required by the law, including laws in favor of the consumer. You will remain liable for all obligations arising under this Agreement even after Termination of Agreement and/or closing of Account.
c) We block the LeuPay Wallet E-money account, to which the Cards are linked, or otherwise decide to terminate the LeuPay Wallet Account Agreement with you for any reasons. In such case we shall not be liable for terminating this Agreement with you.
7.5 Unless a shorter period is provided in this Agreement, as permitted by law, we may, at any time, terminate the Agreement by giving you two (2) months' notice.
7.6 When this Agreement comes to an end, all of the legal rights, obligations and liabilities that you and we have benefited from, or which have accrued over time whilst the Agreement has been in force, or which are expressed to continue indefinitely, will be unaffected by this cessation.
c) Any information obtained by you as a result of use of the Service will be accurate or reliable.
8.2 No conditions, warranties or other terms (including any implied terms as to satisfactory quality, fitness for purpose or conformance with description) apply to the Service, except to the extent that they are expressly set out in the Agreement.
c) Any compensation for fees or interest paid or levied on you who are not consumers, as a result of non-performance or incorrect performance of a payment transaction.
10.1 All information will be made available or provided to you in an easily accessible manner, in easily understandable language, in a clear and comprehensible form and in English language, unless we support another language for the Service. For each transaction made through the Service we shall provide to you information about its execution deadline, the fees to which you shall be subject and, if applicable, a breakdown of the fees, provided such information is requested prior to execution. Furthermore, once the fees have been debited from your LeuPay Wallet account, we shall provide you with the following information: (i) a reference number that enables you to identify each payment and, if applicable, information about the beneficiary; (ii) the amount involved in each payment; (iii) the amount of any fees charged and, if applicable, the corresponding breakdown; and (iv) the date of debit or receipt of a payment order. You are entitled to request this information to be provided or made accessible regularly, at least once a month, free of charge, provided you are allowed to store this information and reproduce it without changes.
10.2 You agree that we may send notices and other communications to you via emails, via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App (if applicable) or other reasonable means to any matter relating to your use of LeuPay Wallet Card, including the Agreement (and revisions or amendments to it), notices or disclosures regarding the Card and payment authorizations.
(v) Information about a suspension of the use of the Card and about the rejection of transactions with e-money will be made available to your email registered for the Service or on the Online account, or via the Mobile App.
(ii) Notification of application for Card should be sent via or via email the Online account or via LeuPay Wallet Mobile App.
(iii) Notification by you that you do not agree to the amendment of the Agreement and wish to terminate the Agreement prior to entry into force of the amendments has to be sent from you from your registered email for the Service, from your Online account or via the LeuPay Wallet Mobile App.
(iv) Notifications by you that you complain about certain services have to be sent via from your registered email for the Service, the Mobile app and via your registered mobile number.
(iv) Customers claims for refunds of unauthorized transactions have to be sent to us with clear explanation of the claim, reasons why do you believe that the transaction is unauthorized and a request for refund, via e-mail from your registered e-mail for the Service to the e-mail, published on the website for the Service: support@LeuPay Wallet.eu. We reserve our right not to honour requests for refunds of unauthorized transactions made via the chat channel of communication.
10.6 To help us continually improve our Services and in the interests of security we may monitor and/or record your telephone calls with us.
11.1 Unless otherwise expressly stated in the Agreement or Tariff, all amounts stated in the Agreement are denominated in EURO (EUR) or in Bulgarian lev (BGN).
11.3 You agree that if we do not exercise or enforce any legal right or remedy which is contained in the Agreement (or which we have the benefit of under any applicable law), this will not constitute a waiver of ours rights and that those rights or remedies will still be available to us.
11.4 If any court of law having the jurisdiction to decide on a matter relating to the Agreement rules that any provision of the Agreement is invalid in respect to you, in your capacity of a consumer, then that provision will be deemed void and will be removed from the content of the Agreement with you without affecting the rest of the Agreement. The remaining provisions of the Agreement will continue to be valid and enforceable.
11.5 You may not assign your rights under the Agreement or otherwise sub-contract or transfer any of your rights or obligations under the Agreement without our prior written consent.
11.6 We may transfer our rights and obligations under the Agreement to third party, which is a licensed Member giving to you at least two-month notice previous the date of the transfer per e-mail unless such a transfer is required due to regulatory reasons. In case you disagree with such transfer we shall provide you the possibility to terminate the Agreement free of taxes, penalties or other.
11.8 Both Parties agree that the authentic and/or correct execution of transactions and operations shall be proven with print-outs or statements printed or generated from our IT systems, such as your Online account for the Service for the LeuPay Wallet Service, our Card System, our Register of E-money or other software systems or multims used by us in our capacity of regulated E-Money Institution or our Agents or sub-contractors, in the capacity of our authorized Agents or sub-contractors, licensed to use our software or platforms.
11.9 "LeuPay Wallet", "LeuPay Wallet Card", and all related URLs, logos, marks or designs, scripts, graphics, interactive features and similar, software, interfaces, standard or special design of Pay Stickers or visualizations or other related to the Service, including logos and marks of Card Organizations are protected by our copyrights, trademark registrations or Patents or other of our intellectual property rights or of third party Licensor. You may not use, copy, imitate, modify, alter or amend, sell, distribute or provide them without our prior written explicit consent to do so in a separate Agreement.
11.10 The Agreement and relationship between you and us arising under this Agreement will be governed by Bulgarian law. When you are using the LeuPay Wallet Service not as a consumer, the Parties agree to submit to the jurisdiction of the competent court in the City of Sofia, Bulgaria to resolve any dispute arising between them. Nevertheless, the Client agrees that we will still be allowed, upon our discretion, to bring a claim or apply for injunctive remedies (or an equivalent type of urgent legal relief) in any court or jurisdiction. | 2019-04-26T00:20:17Z | https://leupaywallet.com/en/terms-conditions |
A distance camera includes at least one photo element, a trigger generator activating the photo element during a temporal integration gate, a light source illuminating an object with light pulses having a predetermined temporal intensity profile with a duration T.sub.p, and an intensity sensor determining the intensity I.sub.p of the light pulses arriving on the photo element. The integration gate has a predetermined delay to the light pulse emission start point in order to capture the light pulses back reflected from the object. The photo element outputs a signal value U at an integration end point in time T.sub.1e and in accordance with an intensity I.sub.p and a duration of the light pulse arriving on the photo element during its activation.
4259592 March 1981 Fruengel et al.
6778219 August 2004 Seo et al.
6919549 July 2005 Bamji et al.
English translation of Office Action in corresponding Chinese Application No. 2013800576522. cited by applicant .
International Search Report in counterpart International Application No. PCT/EP2013/072819, dated Jan. 31, 2014. cited by applicant .
Office Action in corresponding Japanese Patent Application No. 2015-540129, dated Apr. 24, 2017, with English translation. cited by applicant.
This application is a Continuation of International Application No. PCT/EP2013/072819, filed on Oct. 31, 2013, which claims benefit under 35 U.S.C. .sctn. 119(e) to U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/722,465, filed Nov. 5, 2012, and which claims priority under 35 U.S.C. .sctn. 119(a) to German Patent Application No. 10 2012 110 538.3, also filed on Nov. 5, 2012. The disclosures of all three related applications are considered part of and are incorporated by reference into the disclosure of the present application in their respective entireties.
1. A distance camera for determining a distance value (R.sub.abs) between an object and the distance camera within a predetermined distance range, comprising: at least one photo element, a trigger generator for activating the photo element during a temporal integration gate, a light source for illuminating the object with light pulses having a predetermined temporal intensity profile with a duration (T.sub.p), and an intensity sensor for determining an intensity (I.sub.p) of the light pulses arriving on the photo element, wherein the integration gate has a predetermined delay to the light pulse emission start point in time in order to capture the light pulses back reflected from the object such that either a first point in time when the light pulse arrives on the photo element (T.sub.o) or T.sub.o+T.sub.p is between an integration start point in time (T.sub.1b) of the integration gate and an integration end point in time (T.sub.1e) of the integration gate, wherein the photo element is adapted to output a signal value (U) at the integration end point in time T.sub.1e with the signal value U depending on the intensity I.sub.p and the duration of the light pulse arriving on the photo element during the time the photo element is activated, wherein the camera further comprises: a memory unit for storing predetermined parameters of an explicit light-pulse-intensity-dependent correction value function .DELTA.=f(I.sub.p) for the photo element, and an evaluation unit for determining a raw distance value (R.sub.raw) from the signal value U and the light-pulse-intensity I.sub.p and adding the raw distance value R.sub.raw and a correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) taken the from light-pulse-intensity-dependent correction value function .DELTA.=f(I.sub.p) for obtaining the distance value R.sub.abs.
2. The distance camera according to claim 1, wherein the memory unit is a non volatile memory.
3. The distance camera according to claim 1, wherein the photo element comprises a condenser and a photo diode accessible from outside the camera such that the light pulse back reflected from the object is captured by the photo diode and electrically connected to the condenser such that, when the light pulse back reflected from the object is captured by the photo diode, the condenser is discharged.
4. The distance camera according to claim 1, wherein the trigger generator comprises a first electrical switch for activating the photo element and a second electrical switch for deactivating the photo element and outputting the signal value U.
5. The distance camera according to claim 1, further comprising a plurality of additional photo elements and a plurality of additional memory units associated respectively with the additional photo elements, wherein a number of the photo elements and the memory units is at least 3*10.sup.5.
6. The distance camera according to claim 5, wherein the number of the photo elements and the memory units is at least 10.sup.6.
7. The distance camera according to claim 1, wherein the predetermined temporal intensity profile of the light pulse is rectangular, trapezoidal, saw tooth shaped, triangular, a Voigt profile or a Gaussian.
8. The distance camera according to claim 1, wherein the temporal intensity profile of the light pulse is predetermined by a measurement.
9. A method for determining a distance value (R.sub.abs) between an object and a distance camera according to claim 1, comprising: a) arranging a target object within the predetermined distance range with a predetermined distance (R.sub.abs,cal) to the distance camera; b) obtaining a plurality of sampling points (R.sub.raw,cal, I.sub.p,cal) by: illuminating the target object with variable and determined intensities (I.sub.p,cal) of the light pulses arriving on the photo element, and determining respective raw distance values R.sub.raw,cal from respective signal values (U.sub.cal) and the variable and determined intensities I.sub.p,cal; c) calculating the parameters of the explicit light-pulse-intensity-dependent correction value function .DELTA.=R.sub.raw,cal-R.sub.abs,cal=f(I.sub.p,cal) as an interpolation of the sampling points R.sub.raw,cal, I.sub.p,cal, and storing the parameters for the photo element in the memory unit; d) arranging the object within the predetermined distance range; e) illuminating the object with the light pulses, and determining the raw distance value R.sub.raw from the signal value U and the corresponding intensity I.sub.p determined by the intensity sensor; f) calculating the correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) for the raw distance value R.sub.raw in dependence on the intensity I.sub.p with the parameters stored in the memory unit; and g) calculating the distance value R.sub.abs in accordance with R.sub.abs=R.sub.raw-.DELTA.(I.sub.p).
10. The method according to claim 9, further comprising repeating the limitations (d) through (g) for determining multiple distance values R.sub.abs.
11. The method according to claim 9, wherein the explicit correction value function .DELTA. is a monotonic function.
12. The method according to claim 11, wherein the monotonic function is a polygonal line or a polynomial or a spline.
13. The method according to claim 9, wherein the number of parameters is four.
14. The method according to claim 9, wherein the number of sampling points is four.
15. The method according to claim 9, wherein the intensity sensor is the photo element and the determined intensities I.sub.p,cal and/or the intensity I.sub.p are determined by measuring the signal value U.sub.cal and/or U, respectively, with the photo element within a second integration gate with a further integration start point in time (T.sub.2b) earlier than or equal to T.sub.o and a second integration end point in time (T.sub.2e) later than or equal to T.sub.o+T.sub.p.
The invention relates to a device and a method for determining distance values and distance images.
Distance values can be measured between a measuring device and an object without a physical contact between the device and the object by optical methods. In these methods, the object is illuminated by the device and the light back reflected from the object is then captured by a light detector of the device.
Distance values can for example be determined by periodically modulating the light intensity which is emitted from the device and by measuring the phase difference between the emitted light and the back reflected light arriving on the detector. However, due to the periodicity of the light intensity this method results in an ambiguous distance measurement. Unambiguous distance values can be determined by measuring the time of flight between the emission of light and the arrival of the back reflected light on the detector.
For a time of flight measurement with a precision of the distance value in the order of centimeters fast electronics acting and responding in the picosecond range are required. The distance value measured by the device can therefore depend on manufacturing tolerances of the detector. If an image sensor with multiple picture elements is used for the detector, different picture elements can measure different distance values due to the manufacturing tolerances of the picture elements.
It is an object of the invention to provide a device and a method for measuring distance values with a high precision.
A distance camera according to the invention for determining a distance value R.sub.abs between an object and the distance camera within a predetermined distance range comprises at least one photo element, a trigger generator for activating the photo element during a temporal integration gate, a light source for illuminating the object with light pulses having a predetermined temporal intensity profile with a duration T.sub.p, and an intensity sensor for determining the intensity I.sub.p of the light pulses arriving on the photo element, wherein the integration gate has a predetermined delay to the light pulse emission start point in time in order to capture the light pulses back reflected from the object such that either T.sub.o or T.sub.o+T.sub.p is between an integration start point in time T.sub.1b of the integration gate and an integration end point in time T.sub.1e of the integration gate, with T.sub.o being the first point in time when the light pulse arrives on the photo element, wherein the photo element is adapted to output a signal value U at the integration end point in time T.sub.1e with the signal value U depending on the intensity I.sub.p and the duration of the light pulse arriving on the photo element during its activation, wherein the camera comprises a memory unit for storing predetermined parameters of an explicit correction value function .DELTA.=f(I.sub.p) for the photo element, and an evaluation unit for determining a raw distance value R.sub.raw from the signal value U and the intensity I.sub.p and adding the raw distance value R.sub.raw and the correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) for obtaining the distance value R.sub.abs.
The method according to the invention for determining the distance value R.sub.abs between the object and the distance camera comprises the steps: a) arranging a target object within the predetermined distance range with a predetermined distance R.sub.abs,cal to the distance camera; b) obtaining a plurality of sampling points R.sub.raw,cal, I.sub.p,cal by:--illuminating the target object with the light source with variable and determined intensities I.sub.p,cal of the light pulses arriving on the photo element, and determining the respective raw distance values R.sub.raw,cal from the respective signal values U.sub.cal and the corresponding intensities I.sub.p,cal; c) calculating the parameters of the explicit correction value function .DELTA.=R.sub.raw,cal R.sub.abs,cal=f(I.sub.p,cal) being an interpolation of the sampling points R.sub.raw,cal, and storing the parameters for the photo element in the memory unit; d) arranging the object within the predetermined distance range; e) illuminating the object with the light source with the light pulse, and determining the raw distance value R.sub.raw from the signal value U and the corresponding intensity I.sub.p determined using the intensity sensor; f) calculating the correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) for the raw distance value R.sub.raw in dependence on the intensity I.sub.p using the parameters stored in the memory unit; g) calculating the distance value by R.sub.abs=R.sub.raw,cal .DELTA.(I.sub.p).
With the distance camera according to the invention and the method according to the invention the distance values R.sub.abs can advantageously be determined with a high precision. Distance images can be taken by either scanning the single photo element over the object and determining the single distance value R.sub.abs with the respective light pulse or by providing the camera with multiple photo elements and by determining the multiple distance values R.sub.abs with the single light pulse. In case the multiple photo elements are provided smooth distance images can advantageously be taken even if there are variations in individual photo elements present due to manufacturing tolerances since a respective correction value function .DELTA. is provided for each photo element. Since the interpolation of the sampling points leads to a parameterisation of the correction value function .DELTA., this function is fully described by its parameters. Therefore, only these parameters need to be stored in the memory unit and the number of accesses to the memory unit is low compared to, for example, storing a high number of sampling points necessary for obtaining a distance measurement with a similar high precision. Due to the fact that the number of accesses to the memory unit according to the invention is low, the correction of the distance values R.sub.raw is fast so that even the high precision in a centimeter range can be obtained with a high repetition rate.
Furthermore, all distance values can be corrected by using the parameterised correction value function .DELTA. and it is not necessary to store correction values .DELTA.(I.sub.p) for a large number of every conceivable intensitiy I.sub.p.
It is preferred that the memory unit is a non volatile memory. Therefore, a dynamic access to the parameters during the correction of the raw distance values R.sub.raw is advantageously provided. Also, it is advantageously assured that an update of the correction value function .DELTA. can optionally only be provided by the manufacturer of the distance camera by a delivery of the memory unit.
The photo element comprises preferably a condenser and a photo diode accessible from the outside such that the light pulse back reflected from the object is captured by the photo diode and is electrically connected to the condenser such that, when the light pulse back reflected from the object is captured by the photo diode, the condenser is discharged. The signal value U being output at the integration end point in time T.sub.1e is therefore preferably the voltage of the condenser at the integration end point in time T.sub.1e. The voltage is a measure for the energy of the light pulse arriving at the photo diode within the integration gate. It is preferred that the trigger generator comprises a first electrical switch for activating the photo element and a second electrical switch for deactivating the photo element and outputting the signal value U. The first and/or the second electrical switches are preferably transistors, in particular of identical type. By correcting the raw distance value R.sub.raw with the correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) it is advantageously achieved that the specific inertia of each individual photo element, in particular the inertia of the photo diode, the condenser and both switches, is corrected.
It is preferred that the distance camera comprises a plurality of photo elements and for every photo element the respective memory unit, wherein the number of the photo elements and the memory units is at least 3*10.sup.5, in particular at least 10.sup.6. Since each correction value function .DELTA. is parameterized and its parameters are stored in the respective memory unit, it is advantageously achieved that the distance values R.sub.abs for this high number of photo elements can be determined at a high repetition rate such as 50 Hz.
It is preferred that the predetermined temporal intensity profile of the light pulse is substantially rectangular, trapezoidal, saw tooth shaped, triangular, a Lorentz profile, a Voigt profile or a Gaussian. Further, the temporal intensity profile of the light pulse is preferably predetermined by a measurement. The measurement can for example be carried out by the use of a photo multiplier or a fast photo diode. In case the predetermined temporal intensity profile of the light pulse is not rectangular, the intensity I.sub.p is defined, for example, as maximum intensity of the temporal intensity profile. Other definitions like half maximum of the intensity of the temporal intensity profile are also conceivable. With the predetermined temporal intensity profile, and the determined signal value U and intensity I.sub.p, it is possible to determine the distance R.sub.raw.
Multiple distance values R.sub.abs are preferably determined by repeating steps d) to g). Therefore only a single correction value function .DELTA. has to be determined for the determination of the multiple distance values R.sub.abs.
It is preferred that the explicit correction value function .DELTA. is a monotonic function, in particular a polygonal line or a polynomial or a spline. The number of parameters is preferably four. The number of sampling points is preferably four. It has been found that the high precision of the determination of the distance value R.sub.abs can advantageously be achieved with this low number of parameters and/or sampling points which results in a high feasible repetition rate.
It is preferred that the intensity sensor is the photo element and the intensity I.sub.p,cal and/or the intensity I.sub.p are determined by measuring the signal value U.sub.ral and/or U, respectively, the photo element within a second integration gate with an integration start point in time T.sub.2b earlier than or equal to T.sub.o and an integration end point in time T.sub.2e later than or equal to T.sub.o+T.sub.p. Therefore, no extra intensity measuring apparatus needs to be provided for the intensity determination.
In the following the invention is explained on the basis of schematic drawings.
FIGS. 5 to 7 show temporal profile diagrams with light pulses and different integration gates.
As it can be seen in FIGS. 1 to 4 a distance camera according to the invention for determining a distance value R.sub.abs between an object and the distance camera within a predetermined distance range comprises a light source for illuminating the object with light pulses having a substantially rectangular temporal intensity profile with a duration T.sub.p. Conceivable are also other temporal profiles. The light source is preferably a light emitting diode or a laser preferably emitting the light pulses with the duration T.sub.p in the nanosecond range. The predetermined distance range is the range in which the distance camera can determine distance values, for example from 0.5 m to 10 m. The distance camera further comprises at least one photo element 9 and a trigger generator for activating the photo element 9 during a temporal integration gate 30, 31 and preferably for controlling the emission of the light pulses with the light source. The trigger generator comprises a first electrical switch 15 for activating the photo element 9 and a second electrical switch 16 for deactivating the photo element 9.
FIG. 3 shows that the photo element 9 comprises a condenser 13 and a photo diode 14 accessible from the outside such that the light pulses back reflected from the object are captured by the photo diode 14. The photo diode 14 is electrically connected to the condenser 13 in a parallel circuit such that, when the light pulses back reflected from the object are captured by the photo diode 14, the condenser 13 is discharged. FIG. 4 shows a diagram where the corresponding condenser voltage 18 is plotted versus time 19. The condenser voltage 18 is held at a voltage V.sub.DD 22 by a power supply 11 and a corresponding electrical grounding 12 as long as the first electrical switch 15 is closed. At the integration start point in time T.sub.1b 20 of the integration gate 30, 31 the trigger generator opens its first electrical switch 15 and after a time delay 23 the condenser voltage 18 begins to drop which results in a voltage decay 24. The time delay 23 can vary between different photo elements 9 due to manufacturing tolerances and can depend on the intensity I.sub.p of the light pulse arriving on the photo element 9. At the integration end point in time T.sub.1e 21 of the integration gate 30, 31 the trigger generator closes its second electrical switch 16, whereby a signal value U 25 being the condenser voltage 18 at T.sub.1e 21 is output by action of a voltage buffer 17 of the photo element 9. The signal value U 25 is a measure of the energy of the light arriving on the photo element 9 during its activation, wherein the signal value U 25 is approximately inversely proportional to the energy. After closing and opening the first 15 and second 16 electrical switch, respectively, the photo element 9 is reset and another measurement can be taken.
The distance camera further comprises an intensity sensor for determining the intensity I.sub.p of the light pulses arriving on the photo element 9 and an evaluation unit for determining a raw distance value R.sub.raw from the signal value U 25 and the intensity I.sub.p 6. The evaluation unit is further adapted to add a correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) 7 taken from a correction value function .DELTA.=f(I.sub.p) 5 to the raw distance value R.sub.raw so as to obtain a distance value R.sub.abs. Each photo element 9 comprises a memory unit, wherein the parameters 10 of the correction value function .DELTA. 5 for each photo element 9 are stored in the corresponding memory unit. Each memory unit is corresponding to its photo element 9, wherein each memory unit can be located on a chip of the photo element 9 or externally to the chip. All memory units form a memory of the distance camera. FIG. 2 shows an array 8 of the photo elements 9, wherein the number of the photo elements 9 and the memory units is at least 3*10.sup.5, in particular at least 10.sup.6.
FIG. 1 shows an exemplary correction value function .DELTA. 5 in a diagram, in which raw distance values R.sub.raw,cal 1 are plotted versus intensity I.sub.p,cal 2. The correction value function .DELTA. 5 is based on four sampling points 4 R.sub.raw,cal, I.sub.p,cal, wherein the four sampling points 4 R.sub.raw,cal are obtained under known laboratory conditions. For obtaining the sampling points 4 a target object is arranged within the predetermined distance range with a predetermined distance R.sub.abs,ca1 3 to the distance camera. It has been found that by choosing the predetermined distance R.sub.abs,cal to be 2 m and the predetermined distance range to extend from 0.5 m to 10 m results in a particularly high precision for the distance values R.sub.abs.
The target object is then illuminated by the light source with variable and predetermined intensities I.sub.p,cal 2 of the light pulses arriving on the photo element 9, and the respective raw distance values R.sub.raw,cal 1 are determined from the respective signal values U.sub.cal and the corresponding intensities I.sub.p,cal 2. The intensities I.sub.p,cal 2 are preferably chosen such that most of the dynamic range of the photo element 9 is covered. The intensity I.sub.p,cal 2 can, for example, be varied by inserting grey filters or an optical attenuator comprising a polarisation filter and a lambda half plate in the path of the light pulse. Each pair of a raw distance value R.sub.raw,cal 1 and an intensity I.sub.p,cal 2 forms the respective sampling point 4.
In order to predetermine the intensities I.sub.p,cal 2 of the light pulses arriving on the photo element 9 it is conceivable to adjust the emission intensity of the light source by taking into consideration the reflectance of the target object and the transmission of atmosphere under the laboratory conditions. The emission intensity of the light source is adjusted such that the intensities I.sub.p,cal 2 of the light pulses arriving on the photo element 9 correspond to the predetermined intensities I.sub.p,cal 2.
The parameters 10 of the explicit correction value function .DELTA.=R.sub.raw,cal R.sub.abs,cal=f(I.sub.p,cal) 5 are an interpolation of the sampling points 4 R.sub.raw,cal, I.sub.p,cal and are calculated and stored for the photo element 9 in its corresponding memory unit. The interpolation can also comprise sections that are extrapolated from the sampling points 4 R.sub.raw,cal, I.sub.p,cal. In FIG. 1 the correction value function .DELTA. 5 is a third order polynomial in the form of .DELTA.=A.sub.1+A.sub.2I.sub.p,cal+.DELTA..sub.3I.sub.p,cal.sup.2+A.sub.4- I.sub.p,cal.sup.3 with the parameters A.sub.1, A.sub.2, A.sub.3, A.sub.4 being the parameters of this correction value function .DELTA. 5 for the first photo element 9 in FIG. 2. The parameters A.sub.1, A.sub.2, A.sub.3, A.sub.4 for the first photo element 9 are stored in its respective memory unit. The parameters B.sub.1, B.sub.2, B.sub.3, B.sub.4 for the second photo element 9 are stored in its memory unit, whereas the parameters X.sub.1, X.sub.2, X.sub.3, X.sub.4 are stored in the memory unit of the last photo element 9. However, also polynomials with other orders or other functions, such as exponentials or a polygonal line with the individual lines connecting adjacent sampling points 4 can be employed.
For determining the distance value R.sub.abs the object is arranged within the predetermined distance range, illuminated by the light source with the light pulse, and the raw distance value R.sub.raw is determined from the signal value U 25 and the corresponding intensity I.sub.p 6 determined using the intensity sensor. The correction value .DELTA.(I.sub.p) 7 for the raw distance value R.sub.raw is then determined in dependence on the intensity I.sub.p 6 using the parameters 10 stored in the respective memory unit and the distance value is afterwards calculated by R.sub.abs=R.sub.raw,cal-.DELTA.(I.sub.p) for each photo element 9.
FIGS. 5 to 7 show three trigger schemes, wherein the intensity 26 of the emitted light pulse 28 and of the light pulse 29 arriving on the photo element 9 is plotted versus time 27. Also shown are different integration gates 30, 31 with a predetermined delay to the light pulse emission start point in time. The temporal profiles of the light pulses and integration gates 30, 31 are rectangular. Conceivable are also other temporal profiles for the light pulses. For all conceivable temporal intensity profile shapes, the emission of the light pulse 28 starts at time zero and ends at T.sub.p. The light pulse 29 is then back reflected from the object and arrives on the photo element 9 with the intensity I.sub.p, which is lower than the intensity of the emitted light pulse 28. The light pulse 29 arrives on the photo element 9 from T.sub.o to T.sub.o+T.sub.p. In FIG. 5 the integration gate 30 is chosen such that T.sub.o+T.sub.p is between the integration start point in time T.sub.1b 20 and the integration end point in time T.sub.1e, whereas T.sub.o is outside of the integration gate. In contrast thereto, in FIG. 6 T.sub.o is between the integration start point in time T.sub.1b 20 and the integration end point in time T.sub.1e, whereas T.sub.o+T.sub.p is outside of the integration gate. The grey marked areas in the diagrams correspond to the signal value U being a measure for the energy of the light pulse 29 arriving on the photo element 9 within the integration gates 30, 31.
The intensity I.sub.p,cal and/or the intensity I.sub.p are determined by measuring the signal value U.sub.cal and/or U, respectively, using the photo element within a second integration gate 31, as shown in FIG. 7, with an integration start point in time T.sub.2b earlier than or equal to T.sub.o and an integration end point in time T.sub.2e later than or equal to T.sub.o+T.sub.p. With the signal values U.sub.cal and/or U, which correspond to the total energy of the light pulse 29 arriving on the photo element 9 and the known duration T.sub.p of the light pulse 29, it is possible to calculate the intensity I.sub.p.
The intensity I.sub.p and/or I.sub.p,cal can be determined simultaneously with a single light pulse by using two photo elements 9, the first photo element with the first integration gate 30 and the second photo element with the second integration gate 31. The first integration gate 30 is chosen such that either T.sub.o or T.sub.o+T.sub.p is between the first integration start point in time T.sub.1b of the first integration gate 30 and the first integration end point in time T.sub.1e of the integration gate 30. The second integration gate 31 is chosen such that the second integration start point in time T.sub.2b is earlier than or equal to T.sub.o and the second integration end point in time T.sub.2e is later than or equal to T.sub.o+T.sub.p. The first and the second photo elements can for example be arranged adjacent to each other or the light pulse 29 can be split with a beam splitter and each split light pulse can be directed to the first and second photo elements, respectively. The intensity I.sub.p and/or I.sub.p,cal can also be determined consecutively with a single photo element 9 and two light pulses 29.
With the integration gate 30 according to FIG. 5, T.sub.o can be calculated by T.sub.o=E/I.sub.p+T.sub.1b-T.sub.p and with the integration gate 30 according to FIG. 6 by T.sub.o=T.sub.1e-E/I.sub.p with E being the energy of light pulse 29 arriving on the photo element 9 and being preferably reciprocal to the signal value U 25. R.sub.raw can then be determined via R.sub.raw=0.5*c*T.sub.o, with c being the speed of light. It should be noted that it is possible to either correct R.sub.raw or T.sub.o with .DELTA.(I.sub.p). It should be noted also that a change of the light source of the camera or a change in T.sub.1b and T.sub.1e required by a change in the predetermined distance range usually requires a new calibration function .DELTA.. | 2019-04-26T02:14:44Z | http://patents.com/us-9897691.html |
World attention is right now focused on the Gulf Coast of the United States, where one of the worst industrial disasters of all time is slowing playing itself out. The Deepwater Horizon oil platform explosion and sinking killed 11 workers, but it is the massive environmental disaster caused by the leaking of hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico that is making it probably the worst industrial environmental disaster in US history.
Industrial disasters are a unique post-industrial age creation of man. Industrial disasters have killed untold thousands of people since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Many were avoidable, and needless disasters caused by callous disregard for human safety in an unending quest for money. Others were unforeseen and accidental.
This list focuses on American industrial disasters since the post World War II era. But as we will see, recent industrial disasters such as the 2007 I-35 West Mississippi bridge collapse (13 killed, 145 injured), the 2006 Sago mine disaster (12 killed), 2010 Upper Big Branch mine explosion (29 killed), 2007 Crandall Canyon mine cave in (9 killed), 2008 Kingston Fossil Plant collapse (a huge environmental disaster caused by the largest coal slurry fly ash release in US history), 2008 New York City crane collapse (7 killed) and now the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil platform explosion ( 11 killed) are nothing new. Similar disasters have played themselves out, here in the USA, over the last 65 years and, like the Deepwater Horizon disaster, there appears to be no end in sight to the death and destruction caused by these catastrophes. Let’s take a look back at ten of the worst industrial disasters since 1945.
This Silver Bridge was a suspension bridge built in 1928 and named for the color of its aluminum paint. The bridge connected Point Pleasant, West Virginia and Kanauga, Ohio, over the Ohio River. On December 15, 1967, the Silver Bridge collapsed while it was full of rush-hour traffic, resulting in the deaths of 46 people. Two of the victims were never found. Investigation of the wreckage pointed to the cause of the collapse being the failure of a single eye bar in a suspension chain, due to a small defect 0.1 inch (2.5 mm) deep. Analysis showed that the bridge was carrying much heavier loads than it had originally been designed for and had been poorly maintained. The collapsed bridge was replaced by the Silver Memorial Bridge, which was completed in 1969.
In March 25, 1947, the Centralia No. 5 coal mine exploded near the town of Centralia, Illinois, killing 111 people. The explosion was caused when an under burdened explosive detonation ignited coal dust. At the time of the explosion, 142 men were in the mine; 111 miners were killed by burns and other injuries. Only 31 miners escaped. Following the disaster, John L. Lewis, president of the United Mine Workers, called a two-week national memorial work stoppage on 400,000 soft-coal miners. Lewis also blamed the then Secretary of the Interior, Julius Krug, for the men’s deaths because he felt the Department of the Interior was not adequately enforcing new and stricter mine safety rules which had been enacted only a year earlier. Lewis called for Krug’s resignation, but President Harry Truman, who regarded the mourning strike as a sham, rejected this demand.
The disaster did force Congress to address mine safety. In August 1947, Congress passed a joint resolution calling on the Bureau of Mines to inspect coalmines and to report to state regulatory agencies any violations of the federal code. American folksinger Woody Guthrie wrote and recorded a song about the Centralia mine disaster entitled The Dying Miner.
The following year, 1948, a different type of industrial disaster struck the United States, this one invisible, but no less deadly than the explosion in Centralia in1947. The Donora Smog was an historic air inversion pall of smog that killed 20 and sickened 7,000 people in Donora, Pennsylvania, a mill town on the Monongahela River, 24 miles southeast of Pittsburgh.
The smog first rolled into Donora on October 27, 1948. By the following day it was causing coughing and other signs of respiratory distress for many residents. Many of the illnesses and deaths were initially attributed to asthma. The smog continued until it rained on October 31, by which time 20 residents of Donora had died and approximately a third to one half of the town’s population of 14,000 residents had been sickened. Even ten years after the incident, mortality rates in Donora were significantly higher than those in other communities nearby.
Sulfur dioxide emissions from U.S. Steel’s Donora Zinc Works and its American Steel & Wire plant were frequent occurrences in Donora. What made the 1948 event more severe was a temperature inversion, in which a mass of warm, stagnant air was trapped in the valley, the pollutants in the air mixing with fog to form a thick, yellowish, acrid smog that hung over Donora for five days. The sulfuric acid, nitrogen dioxide, fluorine and other poisonous gases that usually dispersed into the atmosphere were caught in the inversion and accumulated until the rain ended the weather pattern.
It was not until Sunday morning the 31st of October that a meeting occurred between the operators of the plants, and the town officials. The plants were shut down until the rain came, whereupon the plants resumed normal operation. A study released in December 1948 showed that thousands more Donora residents could have been killed if the smog had lasted any longer than it had.
U.S. Steel never acknowledged responsibility for the incident, calling it “an act of God”. The Donora Smog is often credited for helping to trigger the clean-air movement in the United States, whose crowning achievement was the Clean Air Act of 1970, which required the United States Environmental Protection Agency to develop and enforce regulations to protect the general public from exposure to hazardous airborne contaminants.
The Buffalo Creek Flood was a disaster that occurred on February 26, 1972, when the Pittston Coal Company’s coal slurry impoundment dam #3, located on a hillside in Logan County, West Virginia burst four days after having been declared ‘satisfactory’ by a federal mine inspector.
Dam #3, constructed of coarse mining refuse dumped into the Middle Fork of Buffalo Creek starting in 1968, failed first, following heavy rains. The water from Dam #3 then overwhelmed Dams #2 and #1. Dam #3 had been built on top of coal slurry sediment that had collected behind dams # 1 and #2, instead of on solid bedrock. Dam #3 was approximately 260 feet above the town of Saunders when it failed.
The Willow Island disaster was the collapse of a cooling tower under construction at a power station at Willow Island, West Virginia, on Thursday April 27th 1978. Falling concrete caused the scaffolding to collapse. 51 construction workers were killed. It is thought to be the largest construction accident in American history. The disaster occurred when the Allegheny Power System was building a new power plant with two giant natural draft cooling towers. The usual method of scaffold construction for building large cooling towers has the base of the scaffold built on the ground, with the top being built higher to keep up with the height of the tower.
This scaffolding was different. It was bolted to the structure as it was being built. A layer of concrete was poured, then after the concrete forms were removed the scaffolding was raised and bolted onto the new section. On April 27th 1978 tower number 2 had reached a height of 166 feet Just after 10 AM, as the third lift of concrete was being raised, the cable hoisting that bucket of concrete went slack. The crane that was pulling it up fell toward the inside of the tower. The previous day’s concrete, Lift 28, started to collapse. Concrete began to unwrap from the top of the tower, first peeling counter-clockwise, then in both directions. A jumble of concrete, wooden forms and metal scaffolding fell into the hollow center of the tower. Fifty-one construction workers were on the scaffold at the time. All fell to their deaths.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) investigation showed that, like most disasters, it was a series of errors, short cuts and accidents that triggered the event. Scaffold was attached to concrete that hadn’t had time to sufficiently cure. Bolts were missing and the existing bolts were of insufficient grade. There was only one access ladder, restricting ability to escape. An elaborate concrete hoisting system was modified without proper engineering review. And as is almost always seems to be the case, contractors were rushing to speed construction.
The second major construction project industrial disaster to make this list occurred nine years later. The L’Ambiance Plaza was a 16-story residential project under construction in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Its partially erect frame completely collapsed on April 23, 1987, killing 28 construction workers. Failure was possibly due to high stresses placed on the floor slabs by the lift slab technique. There was a school of thought that this accident highlighted the deficiencies of lift slab construction. This accident prompted a major nationwide federal investigation into this construction technique, as well as a temporary moratorium of its use in Connecticut. L’Ambiance Plaza was planned to be a sixteen-story building with thirteen apartment levels topping three parking levels. It consisted of two offset rectangular towers, 63 ft by 112 ft each, connected by an elevator.
At the time of collapse, the building was a little more than halfway completed. In the west tower, the ninth, tenth, and eleventh floor slab package was parked in stage IV directly under the twelfth floor and roof package. The shear walls were about five levels below the lifted slabs. The workmen were tack welding wedges under the ninth, tenth, and eleventh floor package to temporarily hold them into position when they heard a loud metallic sound followed by rumbling. An ironworker who was installing wedges at the time, looked up to see the slab over him “cracking like ice breaking.” Suddenly, the slab fell on to the slab below it, which was unable to support this added weight and in turn fell.
The entire structure collapsed, first the west tower and then the east tower, in 5 seconds, only 2.5 seconds longer than it would have taken an object to free fall from that height. Two days of frantic rescue operations revealed that 28 construction workers died in the collapse, making it the worst lift-slab construction accident.
The explosion at the Imperial Sugar refinery was an industrial disaster that occurred on February 7, 2008 in Port Wentworth, Georgia. Thirteen people were killed and 42 injured when a dust explosion occurred at a sugar refinery owned by Imperial Sugar. Dust explosions had been an issue of concern amongst United States authorities since three fatal accidents in 2003, with efforts made to improve safety and reduce the risk of recurrence. However, a safety board had criticized this as inadequate.
The sugar refinery was a four-story structure on the bank of the Savannah River and was the second largest in the US. Workers described the factory as antiquated, with much of the machinery dating back more than 28 years, but say the site was kept in operation because it had good access to rail and shipping links for transport. At one time the facility refined 9% of the nation’s sugar requirements. The explosion occurred at 7:00 p.m. local time in what was initially believed to be a room where sugar was bagged by workers. There were 112 employees on-site at the time. Most of the victims were seriously burned, with ages ranging from 18 to 50.
By February 14, 2008, the worst of the fire had been extinguished but the 100-foot sugar storage silos remained alight despite attempts to put the fire out. The smoldering, molten sugar in the silos was unlike anything most fire fighters had ever experienced. It is believed that the factory’s outdated construction materials and methods contributed to the severity of the blaze. The ceiling was of wooden tongue and groove design, and creosote used throughout was known as “fat lighter” because of the fire risk it posed. As a result of the disaster new safety legislation has been proposed, while the local economy has slumped because the factory remains offline, although Imperial intends to rebuild.
On March 23, 2005, a fire and explosion occurred at BP’s Texas City Refinery in Texas City, Texas, killing 15 workers and injuring more than 170 others. BP was charged with violating federal environment crime laws and has been subject to lawsuits from the victim’s families. Later, an $87 million fine was imposed by the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which claimed that BP had failed to implement safety improvements following the disaster.
The Texas City Refinery is the second-largest oil refinery in the state and the third largest in the United States. The explosion occurred in a unit where light and heavy gasoline components were being separated, and octane was being added. Due to operator error, gasoline was forced in to a pressure release system called a blow down drum. The pressure was too much and overwhelmed it, resulting in liquids spilling out and accumulating on the ground, which created a highly flammable and combustible vapor cloud. The hydrocarbon vapor cloud was then ignited by a nearby contractor’s pickup truck. The report identified numerous failings in equipment, risk management, staff management, working culture at the site, maintenance and inspection and general health and safety assessments.
An independent panel to investigate the safety culture and management systems at BP North America was set up and led by former US Secretary of State, James Baker III. The Baker panel report was released on January 16, 2007. The principal finding was that BP management had not distinguished between “occupational safety” (i.e. slips-trips-and-falls, driving safety, etc.) vs. “process safety” (i.e. design for safety, hazard analysis, material verification, equipment maintenance, process upset reporting, etc.). BP confused improving trends in occupational safety statistics for a general improvement in all types of safety. BP also decided against replacing the antiquated blow down system with a more modern (and expensive) system that would not have allowed the excess gasoline to flow out and onto the ground and would have prevented the explosion.
The BP refinery explosion was hardly the worst industrial disaster to strike this town or state. The year 1947 was a very bad year for industrial disasters. Only three weeks after the Centralia Mining Disaster, on April 16, 1947, a fire started on board the French-registered vessel SS Grandcamp in the Port of Texas City, Texas. The fire detonated approximately 2,300 tons of ammonium nitrate and the resulting chain reaction of fires and explosions killed at least 581 people.
The SS High Flyer was another ship in the harbor at the time, about 600 feet away from the SS Grandcamp. The High Flyer contained an additional 961 tons of ammonium nitrate and 1,800 tons of sulfur. The ammonium nitrate in the two ships and in the adjacent warehouse was fertilizer on its way to farmers in Europe. Around 08:10, smoke was spotted in the cargo hold of the Grandcamp. Attempts to control the fire failed.
Shortly before 9:00 AM, the Captain ordered his men to steam the hold, a firefighting method where steam is piped in to put out fires in the hope of preserving the cargo. Meanwhile, the fire had attracted a crowd of spectators along the shoreline, who believed they were a safe distance away. Spectators noted that the water around the ship was already boiling from the heat, an indication of runaway chemical reactions. The cargo hold and deck began to bulge as the forces increased inside.
At 09:12, the ammonium nitrate inside the vessel detonated. The tremendous blast sent a 15-foot wave that was detectable over nearly 100 miles of the Texas shoreline. The Grandcamp explosion destroyed the Monsanto Chemical Company plant and resulted in ignition of refineries and chemical tanks on the waterfront. The force of the explosion was so great that sightseeing airplanes flying nearby had their wings shorn off. People felt the shock 250 miles away in Louisiana. The entire volunteer fire department of Texas City was killed in the initial explosion.
But the disaster was not over. The first explosion ignited ammonium nitrate cargo in the High Flyer. The crews attempted to save the ship and failing that, tried to move it out of the harbor but about fifteen hours after the explosions aboard the Grandcamp, the High Flyer blew up killing at least two more people and increasing the damage to the port and other ships.
The Texas City Disaster is generally considered the worst industrial accident in American history. Witnesses compared the scene to the devastation at Nagasaki. The official death toll was 581. Of the dead 63 were never identified. A remaining 113 people were classified as missing, for no identifiable parts were ever found. There is some speculation that there may have been hundreds more killed but uncounted, including visiting seamen, non-census laborers and their families, and an untold number of travelers.
Vermiculite, an ore found in the area of Libby Montana in 1881, had been mined since 1919 and sold under the brand name Zonolite. Vermiculite is a mineral that was used mostly as an insulator in homes and is also an additive in potting soil (the bright sparkly stuff you see mixed in with the brown and black soil). The problem was, the vermiculite was contaminated with asbestos and this had been widely known by the company for many years, even prior to W. R. Grace and Company’s purchase of the Zonolite mine in 1963.
In 1999, the Seattle Post-Intellingencer published a series of articles documenting extensive deaths and illness from the asbestos contaminated vermiculite at the mine. These deaths and illnesses from asbestos exposure were not simply workers but also people living in the town of Libby, people who had never worked a day at the plant. This was very unusual as most victims of asbestos exposure actually work with the material in plants, mines, or ships, and perhaps bring the asbestos dust home to their family members on their clothing. But in Libby, people were becoming ill and dying of asbestosis and mesothelioma (diseases caused only by asbestos exposure) who never stepped foot inside the mine or plant, and had no relative who ever worked there. Finding cases of asbestosis (which requires repeated, long term exposures to asbestos over many years) in people with no known industrial exposure was unheard of, until the asbestos-contaminated vermiculite disaster in Libby Montana came to light.
As it turns out, the mine owners knew that the vermiculite ore that came out of the Libby mine was contaminated with a form of asbestos called tremolite – an especially deadly form of asbestos. They also knew there was no way they could remove the asbestos contamination from the vermiculite ore they were mining and processing in Libby, and shipping out by rail car to scores of other processing plants and manufacturers who used the vermiculite as a raw material in their products. Even knowing the deadly effects of the asbestos in their vermiculite, WR Grace continued to exposure their workers, the people in the town of Libby, and the employees of other manufacturers who used the vermiculite.
It is unknown how many have died of asbestos-related disease. One study comparing the Montana and US mortality rates against those in Libby from 1979-1998 found there was a 20-40% increase in malignant and non-malignant respiratory death for the Libby inhabitants. No one can say how many were killed by asbestos exposure from the vermiculite shipped out of Libby to other parts of the country.
The EPA estimates more than 274 area deaths were caused by asbestos-related diseases. A full 17% of Libby residents who were tested were found to have pleural abnormalities, which may be related to exposure to asbestos. In February 2005 the Federal Government began a criminal conspiracy prosecution of WR Grace and of seven current and former Grace employees. The government alleged that Grace conspired to hide from employees and the town residents the asbestos dangers and that it knowingly released asbestos into the environment. On May 8, 2009, a jury found W.R. Grace & Co. and the accused employees not guilty on all counts, ending what was called the biggest environmental-crime prosecution in U.S. history.
Though not a single event like the others, this was a mammoth industrial scale disaster played out one nuclear detonation at a time, over a twelve-year period. The full human impact of the approximately 200 above ground nuclear weapons tests conducted in the western USA, at the Nevada Proving Grounds, may never be known. What is known is that the detonation of nuclear weapons, in the atmosphere, accounted for a total yield of 153.8 megatons of TNT explosive and large amounts of radioactive fall out over a huge portion of the United States (and the world).
Between 16 July 1945 and 23 September 1992, the United States maintained a program of vigorous nuclear testing. Until November 1962, the vast majority of the U.S. tests were atmospheric (that is, above-ground). After the acceptance of the Partial Test Ban Treaty all testing was regulated underground, in order to prevent the dispersion of nuclear fallout. The U.S. program of atmospheric nuclear testing exposed a huge portion of the US population to the hazards of fallout. Estimating exact numbers, and the exact consequences, of people exposed has been medically very difficult.
In a report by the National Cancer Institute, released in 1997, it was determined that ninety atmospheric tests at the Nevada Test Site (NTS) deposited high levels of radioactive iodine-131 across a large portion of the contiguous United States, especially in the years 1952, 1953, 1955, and 1957—doses large enough, they determined, to produce 10,000 to 75,000 cases of thyroid cancer.
Radioactive fallout from Cold War nuclear weapons tests across the globe probably caused at least 15,000 cancer deaths in U.S. residents born after 1951, according to data from an unreleased federal study. Certainly a large percentage of the radioactive fall out that Americans were exposed to came from US above ground nuclear weapons testing.
The study, coupled with findings from previous government investigations, suggests that 20,000 non-fatal cancers — and possibly many more — also can be tied to fallout from aboveground weapons tests. The study shows that fallout from scores of U.S. trials at the Nevada Test Site spread substantial amounts of radioactivity across broad swaths of the country. When fallout from all tests, domestic and foreign, is taken together, no U.S. resident born after 1951 escaped exposure. | 2019-04-22T02:20:40Z | http://listverse.com/2010/06/01/top-10-recent-american-industrial-disasters/?utm_source=more&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=direct |
Gym 5 (Soul Badge) | Silph Co.
Silph Co. is the centrepiece of Saffron City–a sprawling eleven storey building that’s home to the Kanto region’s largest technological enterprise. However its fame caught the attention of Team Rocket, who have taken over their entire headquarters.
As you enter, a fearful receptionist will call you over. Then your rival will follow, along with another familiar face. In order to test your resolve, you’ll have to prove your skills to the previous Kanto region Champion.
Blue is a massive step up from most trainers you’ve fought so far. Fortunately he only brought two Pokémon this time.
His first, Exeggutor, is an evolved Exeggcute. It’s weak to Fire, Flying, Ice, Poison, Ghost and Dark, and takes quadruple damage from Bug. For attacks, it can use STAB-boosted Power Whip and Psychic, plus Light Screen to temporarily halve special damage.
Charizard is a fully evolved Charmander that has gained the Flying-type. It’s now weak to Water and Electric, and is doubly weak to Rock. It can attack with STAB-boosted Heat Wave and Air Slash, plus Slash as a last resort. Rock-types clearly have the upper hand here.
Having proved your worth, you’re free to begin your rescue operation. First, go towards the southern side of the central fountain. There, you can pick up an X Sp. Atk off the floor. Then head towards the north-east corner. To the right, there are stairs upstairs, while to the left is a lift. Ride the lift to 5F.
When you emerge, there’s a Juggler to your right. Ignore him for now. Instead, go left and past the teleporter pad on the floor. You should bump into Archer and a Rocket Grunt. Before they gang up on you, your rival will come in to lend a hand.
This is a rare Multi Battle, which is a 2 vs 2 battle. Accompanying you is your rival, who uses his Cubone, Pidgeot, Gloom and partner.
Archer leads with an Electrode that can attack with a fairly strong Thunderbolt. It may also use Self-Destruct to blow itself up and damage both your and your rival’s Pokémon. When it does this, the Rocket Grunt’s Weezing may use Protect. Try to focus on Electrode first.
Next up, Archer has his Weezing from earlier. In addition to Sludge Bomb, it can use Flamethrower to hurt Steel-types and Dark Pulse to punish Psychic-types. As such, Ground-types are recommended, but Psychic-types should be OK if they have high health.
Finally, Archer’s Golbat has Air Slash for STAB-boosted damage and to potentially cause flinch. Plus Crunch to hurt Psychic-types. This time, Electric, Ice and Rock-types are the way to go. If your Psychic-type hasn’t taken serious damage, it can probably continue the good fight.
Meanwhile the Rocket Grunt assisting Archer has a Muk to start with. This evolved Grimer plays a pure support role, using Toxic to inflict severe poison and Screech to greatly lower Defence. It can use Minimize to greatly raise evade and Protect to stall. If you have it, Body Slam counters Minimize.
Afterwards, the Rock Grunt will send out Raticate. This one focuses on priority moves to outspeed your Pokémon. Of note, be wary of Sucker Punch as that can cause decent damage to Psychic-types.
Upon showing your combined strength to Archer and his minion, the pair will dash off into the distance. But not before dropping their valuable Card Key. This key item can be used to automatically unlock the shutter doors found all over Silph Co. So it’s a very good idea to obtain it as early as possible.
From here, you have two options available to you. You can either proceed straight to the chairman’s room to oust the leader of Team Rocket. Or you can take your time to explore Silph Co., obtaining useful items and earning valuable experience from the Rocket thugs all over the place. If you want to skip ahead, keep scrolling until you reach the end of 3F.
Otherwise, we’ll be exloring every nook and cranny of Silph Co.! By the way, you may notice there are lots of teleporter pads in the building. These will transport you to a specific teleporter pad located elsewhere. However, except for one or two exceptions, there is no need to use them. In fact, we will avoid them altogether, unless necessary.
That said, we will tell you where each teleporter pad leads, in case you’re curious or want to use them as shortcuts. To start with, we highly recommend returning to the lift and riding it to 2F. Then you can proceed to navigate the building one floor at a time, thus greatly reducing the amount of potential confusion.
Starting from the lift entrance on 2F, to the left, there’s a teleporter that leads to the south-west corner of 8F. For now, ignore it and head right from the lift. Below, there’s a doorway leading to a lounge of sorts. But blocking the way is a Team Rocket Grunt who won’t budge without a fight.
After battling Blue and Archer, this Grunt should be a walk in the park. Still, be wary of Super Fang, which halves your current HP, and Sucker Punch, which goes first if you’re attacking.
If you wish to avoid all unnecessary battles, you’ll have to leave this floor for now. Otherwise, after beating the Grunt, proceed into the lounge. Along the top, there’s a Grunt watching TV, but he will battle you if you get in his way.
Not very creative, this Grunt. All of his Koffing pack Self-Destruct as a last resort and Toxic to inflict deadly poison. If you use super-effective Ground or Psychic moves, you should be fine. Alternatively, Steel-types will take no damage from its Poison-type moves and can easily survive a Self-Destruct.
Near the bottom-left corner of the lounge, there’s a drinking fountain that you can search for a hidden Fresh Water. Towards the bottom-right is an office room. Standing below a printer is a rogue Scientist. You can either fight him or turn back for now.
A fairly rare Pokémon found in the Power Plant. Because it’s pure Electric, Ground-types are recommended. You don’t have to be a Scientist to figure that out!
Past the Scientist, there’s an X Attack below one of the computer desks. Also in this room, there’s a teleporter that will take you towards the north side of 8F. Head back into the lounge and proceed left, while keeping near the top. At the end is a Super Potion on the floor and two shutter doors–one above and one below.
Use the Card Key to open the top door first. Speak to the lady in the corner to receive TM42 Self-Destruct. It should be pretty obvious what this does. We don’t recommend using it unless you’re going to lose your Pokémon no matter what you do. In the same reason, there’s a teleporter to the north-east corner of 3F. You can actually use this once you’ve finished here.
Before leaving this floor though, open the bottom shutter door. Here, there’s a Scientist looking around agitatedly. Next to him is a teleporter to the north-east corner of 6F.
This evolved Koffing can use Sludge Bomb for STAB-boosted damage and Shadow Ball to hurt Psychic-types. Ground-types are ideal, while Psychic-types can handle a Shadow Ball or two at full health.
Afterwards, head to 3F via the staircase, lift or the transporter in the north-west room.
Regardless of where you came from, you’ll start near the north-east corner. As a reminder, the transporter to the right will take you back to 2F. If you wanted to avoid all battles, you can use this now to reach the main part of 2F without any fights.
Meanwhile, to the far left is a transporter that leads to the 5F, near the lift. In fact, it’s the one near where you battled Archer. To proceed, head down the corridor in-between the lift and staircase. To the left is a shutter door, while to the right is an open doorway. Go right. In this room, there’s an X Sp. Def in the bottom-right corner.
Also, there’s a teleporter that will transport you to the south-east corner of this room. You can use it avoid a Grunt who’s standing below the two central doorways. Otherwise, go down and fight him.
You must have battled a bunch of these while climbing the Pokémon Tower. As usual, it’s weak to Ground, Psychic, Ghost and Dark. Try to priortise Ground and Dark-types.
Along the bottom-most corridor, if you keep going to the south-west corner, there’s a teleporter here as well. This one will zap you to the south-west corner of 5F. If you want, you can use it now to quickly access a storage room with some handy items, but we’ll officially head there later. Return to the central corridor and open the shutter door on the left.
Inside, there’s a Scientist near the right and a Grunt who’s busy near the left. To the north-east of the Scientist is a Max Lure.
Jose’s Grimer only has Poison-type moves, so you can wall it with Steel-types, or stick to your advantageous Ground or Psychic-types. Magmar is a rare Pokémon found in Cinnabar Island. Because it’s a pure Fire-type, its weaknesses are easy to suss out.
Meanwhile, the teleporter in this room is very special, as it’s the only way to reach the chairman’s room. It will transport you to an isolated room in the north-west corner of 7F. When you go there, your rival will catch up, but so will Archer. Fortunately, your rival will distract Archer, so you can use the transporter below to reach the north-west corner of 11F.
If you’re heading straight to 11F now, skip ahead to the very end of this section.
Still on 3F, keep going left and open the next shutter door. Beyond, there’s a transporter that connects to the north-west corner of 9F. If your Pokémon need a rest, go there now. You’ll have to fight or avoid a Grunt, then you’ll reach an infirmary where you can heal your Pokémon.
Assuming you still want to explore, head over to 4F via the stairs or the lift.
Go right and enter the large office room below. Halfway down, there’s a Grunt scouting for intruders. That means you.
Ground-types are the way to go here. If you want to be cautious, Ghost-types are worth a shot since both of his Pokémon have Self-Destruct. Plus neither have moves that threaten Ghost/Poison-types.
Towards the far bottom-right corner, you can find a Dire Hit below a computer desk. Afterwards, exit the office room and follow the corridor that goes down the centre of this floor. Upon turning the corner, watch out for a Grunt standing in the middle of the hallway. He’ll swap between looking left, right and down (in any order).
A pair of pitiful unevolved Pokémon. Even worse, the Rattata only uses Quick Attack, while the Grimer is a bit better equipped, with Sludge Bomb and Toxic.
To the right of the Grunt, there’s an open doorway. Go there first. Nearby, there’s a teleporter to a room towards the east of 10F. Also, there’s a drinking fountain that you can search for more Fresh Water. Always remember to keep hydrated, especially when in the middle of a mission!
Continue up and unlock the shutter door that’s ahead. In this next room, there’s a Scientist and two teleporters. The bottom-left one also goes to the south-east corner of 10F. Meanwhile the top-right teleporter goes to the north-west corner of 6F. Both are kind of useless.
What a load of balls. The first Voltorb can use Light Screen, while halves special damage, if it gets a chance to survive that is. Otherwise all three Pokémon pack Thunderbolt. If there was any doubt, this is the perfect job for a Ground-type.
Past the Grunt in the hallway, there’s a teleporter at the far end that goes to a room in the south-east corner of 10F. Still on the same floor, open the shutter door directly above. Through here is a storage room with a plethora of items, free for the taking: a Full Heal, Star Piece and Escape Rope near the south, and 5 Great Balls and a Revive up north.
Moving on, head to 5F using any routes that you’re familiar with. We humbly recommend the stairs or the lift. Just note that there’s a Juggler standing in-between the lift on the left and the stairs on the right. So if your mission is to avoid all battles, you’ll need to take both the stairs and the lift to safely explore the whole floor.
Anyway, we’ll go right from the stairs to start with. Near the north-east corner, there’s a teleporter to the south-east corner of 7F. You can go there to quickly grab an item or two, but we’ll head there later anyway. Also, there’s a Grunt to the south-east of the teleporter. Feel free to say "hello".
An easy Pokémon followed by a slightly harder one. Zubat has Toxic, so you’ll want to finish it fast or wall it with Steel-types. Meanwile Arbok has Glare to cause Paralyse and Bite to chip away at Psychic-types.
Next, go through the nearby doorway to reach a large conference room. Here, head over to the west to locate a shutter door. There’s also a Rocket Grunt in the corner, but they’re too embarrassed to battle. Past the shutter door, you can claim a Guard Spec. Exit the conference room and turn left. You can battle the Juggler or you can go downstairs and ride the lift back up.
This Juggler seems to like his supernatural Pokémon. Hypno, perhaps unsurprisingly, has Hypnosis to try and cause Sleep. Bug and Dark-types are recommended; otherwise, hit it hard with neutral physical attackers.
Next up can be Haunter. This naughty ghost can use Sucker Punch to go first if you’re using an attack move. It also has Dream Eater to steal HP from sleeping Pokémon. Avoid using Rest and you shouldn’t have nightmares.
Finally, Kadabra has Reflect to halve physical damage and Night Shade to get around Dark-types. As with Hypno, Bug and Dark-types are the best choices. But it’s not particularly durable, even with Reflect up.
To the left of the Juggler is the place where you should have battled Archer. Otherwise, you’ll have to battle him now. If that’s the case, refer to the beginning of this section. Here, there’s a teleporter in the middle of nowhere that leads to the north-west corner of 3F. Continue past it. Nearby, open the shutter door on the left.
Inside the north-west room, there’s a Scientist standing in the middle of two tables. He’ll be looking around for suspicious people, but you can easily avoid his gaze. Be sure to retrieve the Max Ether below the left table.
This Muk is quite interesting. It has Minimize to boost its evasion and Ice, Thunder and Fire Punch to target common weaknesses. Ground-types will need to be somewhat cautious of Ice Punch and Steel-types can take damage from Fire Punch. Most Psychic-typeswon’t need to worry at all.
Leave the room and proceed south. Soon, there will be a Grunt standing guard. If you wish to avoid him, return to 3F and use the teleporter in the south-west corner. You’ll emerge in the room to his south-west. Otherwise, fight your way through.
Quickly dispose of the Ekans with super-effective Ground or Psychic-types or it make use Glare. Once again, Hypno is ideally tackled with Dark-types or Bug-types that aren’t also Poison. But you can brute force it with strong physical attackers.
Past the Grunt, use the Card Key to unlock the shutter door to the left. Inside, there’s a storage room with 5 Poké Balls and TM54: Flash Cannon. Or if you came from 3F, grab the items and open the shutter door from inside to get back to the main hallway. In any case, proceed east along the southern-most part of this floor.
For reference, the teleporter below the Grunt leads to a room near the south side of 9F. You can skip ahead and grab some items, but as usual, we’ll be going there the normal way. At the next corner, follow the narrow path north. Grab the Nugget and then leave this floor towards 6F. Preferably via the stairs or lift, but it’s up to you.
As you arrive at 6F, head through the doorway directly below the left staircase. You’ll step foot in another conference room. Check the top-left corner for an X Sp. Atk. Exit the conference room via the north doorway. Then head right towards the north-east corner. Here, there’s a teleporter that goes to the south-west corner of 2F.
Continue south from this teleporter to find a PP Up lying on the floor. If you keep following the hallway clock-wise, you’ll have to fight a Grunt outside a doorway. To avoid him, simply go back around to the north side of this floor and then head south-west through the conference room, towards the south doorway.
It’s the usual suspects. Raticate primarily uses Quick Attack for a surprise attack or Crunch to hurt Ghosts. Similarly, Golbat also has Crunch to hurt Psychic-types. Besides that, there’s nothing substantial about these creatures.
Moving on, continue west from the Grunt below the doorway. Over here, open the shutter door on the left so you can enter the storage room with a Hyper Potion and Max Repel. Exit the storage room and head north. Before you reach the Scientist, there’s a Super Potion hiding above a potted plant on the right.
A Magmar sandwiched by two Magnemite. The Magnemite are fairly straightforward, preferring to stick to STAB-boosted attacks. Hit them with Ground-types for a blindingly fast win, or Fire or Fighting for an almost as fast win. Magmar has a pretty strong Flamethrower, but that’s about it.
Past the Scientist, go over to the room in the north-west corner. Here, there’s a teleporter to a room near the north side of 4F. There’s little reason to go there though. Before leaving this room, search the drinking fountain for a free Fresh Water. Ah, that’s the stuff!
To the right is another Grunt you have to battle. Or you can opt to go back through the conference room.
Two Normal-types, so a good time to bring out any Fighting-types. Meowth has Fake Out, which causes a flinch on the first turn. Plus it has Feint, which has increased priority. You can avoid both with Ghost-types. Raticate has Super Fang to halve HP and Sucker Punch to surprise attackers.
You should be done with 6F by now. Go up the stairs to 7F, unless you have a better way of getting there, of course.
Towards the north-east corner, open the shutter door below. You’ll come to a small lounge where a Grunt appears to be interrogating a Silph Co. employee. You can avoid her by using the north-eastern teleporter on 5F and going north.
Another trainer with terrible imagination when it comes to team building. Still, try not to be careless as the first two Voltorb have Self-Destruct and only Self-Destruct. As such, you can lead with a Ghost-type. Meanwhile the final Voltorb actually has moves that won’t kill it.
Past the Grunt, pick up the TM34 Dragon Pulse below the table. Nearby, there’s another shutter door to unlock. In the next room, grab the 3 Smart Candies below the coffee table. There’s also a teleporter to the north-east corner of 5F. Or maybe you came via this transporter to sneak past the Grunt.
Go back towards the stairs along the top and head left this time. Opposite the lift, there’s a hallway going down. Follow it to the south-west corner. Here, there’s a Scientist watching over a PP Up below a painting at the far end. Wait, is that a painting of a pagoda from the Johto region?
Koffing has Dark Pulse to annoy Psychic-types, but a strong Psychic-type can probably one-shot it. Magneton is an evolved Magnemite with the same weaknesses: Ground, Fire and Fighting. This one doesn’t have Electric-type moves, but can use Tri Attack to potentially inflict a status condition.
From here, return to the lift. If you don’t want to battle anyone, leave for the next floor. Otherwise, head left and battle the Grunt standing near the reception counter.
This Grunt has the full Zubat line, at least until a new discovery is made in the Johto region. His Zubat has Toxic, so beware of that. Meanwhile his Golbat has Confuse Ray, which is less scary, but potentially more annoying. Hit 'em with Electric, Ice, Rock or Psychic-types as usual.
Once the Grunt’s been dealt with, open the shutter door towards the left. Through here is another small lounge.
Speak to the man in the top-right corner to receive a Lapras. If you don’t have a decent Water-type, you could consider using it. But since it’s Ice, it does suffer from multiple weaknesses.
Next, grab the Rare Candy near the bottom-left corner. That’s everything you can do here. For reference, the room in the far north-west corner is only accessible via the teleporter near the middle of 3F. For now, go upstairs to 8F.
This time, we recommend the lift, as it’ll take you past a Grunt. Or you can battle your way past her.
Let your Ground or Psychic-types wreak havoc here. Her Grimer knows Minimize, which can be a nuisance since it makes your attacks liable to miss. But 100% accuracy moves like Swift can bypass it–and, funnily enough, Body Slam too. Meanwhile, Koffing has Toxic and Self-Destruct to be mindful of.
Head south from the Grunt’s left (our perspective). At the end of the corridor, you can go left or right. If you head right, there’s a lounge area. Here, check out the top-right corner to find an X Attack above a potted plant. Next, go left along the bottom-most hallway. Head up through the first doorway above.
However, just past the doorway, there’s a Grunt in the bottom-right corner who will try to ambush you. Unfortunately, there’s no way to enter this area without fighting at least one trainer. You can skip this Grunt by using the south-east teleporter on 2F, but that requires fighting a Scientist. Basically, pick your poison. Or we suppose you could just leave for now.
A devious Gastly to content with first. This one can use Will-O-Wisp and Toxic to inflict an annoying status condition. So try and get rid of it ASAP. Persian is an evolved Meowth, but this one isn’t anything special. It does have Feint, which has boosted priority.
Above the Grunt is a teleporter that leads to the room on the left, which can be accessed by opening the nearby shutter door. This does allow you to enter the room without the Card Key, but why’d you want to do that? Further north is a teleporter to the south-east corner of 2F. Which isn’t terribly exciting.
Head to the room on the left, via the shutter door or the nearby teleporter. Inside, there’s a Scientist guarding a Revive in the far corner.
Parker’s Electrode can use Reflect to weaken physical attacks. Besides that, it has Sonic Boom as its only move, which deals 20 damage at a pop. Porygon can only use Hyper Beam. This is a pretty powerful move, but the user will need to recharge on the next turn. A Ghost-type can laugh in its polygonal face.
Your next destination should be 9F. Perhaps you’ve already visited a part of it earlier.
Anyway, from the stairs, if you need to rest your Pokémon quickly, go along the central hallway towards the left. You will need to fight a Grunt along the way. If you’re shy, you can instead go to 3F and use the teleporter in the middle row towards the west.
This Persian has Fake Out to cause a flinch on turn 1. It also has Feint, which has increased priority, and Hypnosis to try and cause Sleep. Not only that but it has Play Rough to hurt Fighting-types. Still, it’s only one Pokémon, so you ought to be able to work around it.
Use the Card Key to open the shutter door below. You’ll arrive at the infirmary, where a Pokémon Centre nurse will heal your Pokémon. Earlier, we did point out that you can come here early if your Pokémon need healing. Also, check the bottom-left corner for a handy Revive and search between the top-right beds for a hidden Elixir.
To the left of the nurse is another shutter door. Past here, there’s a Grunt guarding the north-west corner. You can sneak past him when he’s turning the other way. To his right is a teleporter to 3F, near the west side. As a reminder, that’ll also lead you near the teleporter that goes to the chairman’s office.
Bring out your Ground-types if you have any! This Koffing is fairly predictable, but it does have Toxic and Self-Destruct. Next up, Haunter can use Will-O-Wisp and also has Toxic. Plus it can use Sucker Punch to try and get an attack in before you can.
Go back towards the stairs and go down, then unlock the nearby shutter door. Strangely, there’s nothing in this room, so continue south and open the next shutter door. Here, you can retrieve 3 Poké Balls and 3 Great Balls towards the left side. There’s also a teleporter to 5F, near the south-west. Plus a dodgy-looking Scientist.
Ed actually has a somewhat competent team, except all of his Pokémon are weak to Ground-types. His Weezing has Toxic and can use Psybeam to try and hurt other Poison-types. Meanwhile, his Electric-types are pretty standard stuff.
Past Ed, grab the 3 Ultra Balls to the right. Or if you prefer, you can go back up and then head down the eastern-most hallway to go around Ed. Whichever way works. Once you’re all done here, proceed to 10F via the stairs or lift. Alright, we’re finally getting to the double digit floors!
10F is small compared to the rest of the floors here. If you came from the stairs, there’s a doorway just below. Inside the room, battle or sneak past the Scientist.
Travis must be proud of having the full Grimer line. What if we told him about the Alolan forms, huh? Anyway, his Grimer has Fire Punch to hurt Steel-types, while his Muk has Ice Punch to hurt Ground-types. But honestly, if your Pokémon are healthy, they should outlast these slimes.
To Travis’s right is a teleporter that goes to a room near the middle of 4F. Below is a shutter door, which you may want to unlock. In the next room, there are two teleporters. The one towards the top-left also leads to 4F, but nearer the north. Meanwhile the one near towards the bottom-right leads to the south-west corner of 4F.
Go back towards the stairs and turn left towards the lift. Nearby, pick up the Full Heal above the table and comfy chairs. Mmm, it’d be nice to just lie back on them… but we’ve got a building to save! Go south through the next doorway. Over here is the final storage room and it’s being protected by a stubborn guard.
This Grunt’s Voltorb only knows Self-Destruct. You can either send out a Ghost-type or one that resists Normal-type moves. Or use Protect. Or just finish it quick with a strong Ground-type. Raticate has Crunch to hit Ghosts and Sucker Punch to attack early.
After defeating the Grunt, go and grab the items in the storage room. You can look forward to a Max Revive, Rare Candy and TM37 Flamethrower. Don’t worry about being reprimanded; nobody else is going to use these items–and if you can save Silph Co. using them, you’ll be forgiven.
Finally, go up to 11F via the stairs or lift.
To the right is the final Rocket Grunt in this building. You’ll need to beat him to get past, probably.
This Drowzee can use Meditate to boost its Attack and Headbutt to take advantage of the Attack boost. Even then, it’s still a weakling. So put it out of its misery with a good Bug, Psychic or Ghost-type or anything well-trained that’s neutral.
Meanwhile, his Zubat has Toxic to inflict some serious Poison and his Golbat has Confuse Ray to try and make your Pokémon injure themselves. Focus on using super-effective Electric, Rock, Ice or Psychic-types and you’ll easily come on top.
Past the Grunt, keep going south to find a Max Elixir waiting at the far end. You’ve explored pretty much all of Silph Co. now. To proceed, go back to 3F and use the teleporter near the middle, in the room where the Rocket Grunt and Scientist are. If you want, you can also return to 9F to visit the infirmary and heal your Pokémon.
After stepping through the middle teleporter on 3F, go down and step on the next one. This will take you to the north-west corner of 11F. Make sure your are fully prepared. As you go halfway down the corridor, the last line of defence will arrive to try and halt you. "Try" being the keyword here.
This makes battle number 4 with the Team Rocket clowns. Sadly, they didn’t bring along any new Pokémon, so it’s just the usual Poison-type pair. Jessie’s Arbok now has Rock Slide to damage Ice, Bug and Flying-types. But you’d have little reason to use those.
Arbok still has Glare, making it the biggest nuisance. So try to defeat it first, ideally with your Ground or Psychic-types. Meanwhile, James’s Weezing has learned Thunderbolt and Flamethrower–the latter can potentially annoy Steel-types.
Once Team Rocket has blasted off, for perhaps the last time, you can enter the chairman’s office via the shutter door. Remember to heal your Pokémon if you need to. As soon as you enter, you’ll come face to face with Giovanni once again.
Giovanni is basically on par with a Gym Leader, so keep your guard up at all times.
His Persian can use Fake Out for a guaranteed flinch on Turn 1. You can avoid it with Protect or by leading with a Ghost-type. It can also use Feint, which has increased priority, Slash to try and score a critical hit, and Play Rough to hurt Fighting-types. Use Fighting-types if you’re confident; otherwise go with Ghost, Rock or Steel.
Next up is Rhyhorn, which is a lot easier, but should not be underestimated still. In addition to a pair of STAB-boosted moves, it can use Megahorn to hurt Grass-types. But if they’re also Poison-type like most are, it’ll simply do neutral damage. Grass and Water-types are ideal, as their moves do four times damage. Ground and Fighting are also worth a shot.
Finally, Giovanni’s crown jewel is his Nidoqueen, a fully evolved female Nidoran. In this form, it has gained the Ground-type, making it weak to Water, Ice, Ground and Psychic. Strangely, it can only use Body Slam and Crunch–the latter to punish Psychics. But if your Psychic-type still has high health, it can probably stand its ground.
Defeat Giovanni and he’ll abandon his invasion plan. As thanks, the Silph Co. chairman will give you a one-of-a-kind Master Ball. We say "one-of-a-kind", but it’s actually possible to get more. Afterwards, Team Rocket will leave Saffron City, so you can challenge the Gym. You can also freely explore Silph Co., which is great if you want to pick up items in peace.
By the way, the Saffron Gym is known to be among the toughest, so we recommend heading over to Fuchsia City first. You can get there by traveling south from Lavendar Town or west from Celadon City. The first route is a bit longer, but that just means you can earn more rewards and experience. If possible, we suggest going through both routes.
Before leaving Saffron City, go back to the Pokémon Centre near the south-west. Besides healing your team, speak to the man with the Porygon just outside.
He’ll give you a Porygon for getting rid of Team Rocket. This man-made Pokémon can use Conversion to change its Type.
Also, chat to the policewoman to the north-east, near the Gym. She’ll lend you her Police Set so you can play dress up.
ReadingGym 5 (Soul Badge) | Silph Co. | 2019-04-23T16:49:23Z | https://www.gamerguides.com/pokemon-lets-go/walkthrough/gym-5-soul-badge/silph-co |
WHAT TYPE OF SOLAR LIGHT ARE YOU LOOKING FOR?
How We Picked Best Lights?
Finding the best solar flood light wasn’t an easy task. To get to this flood light we went through more than 50 different models, starting from cheap solar wall lights to expensive dusk to dawn flood lights, each one a little different from another.
There are few key components that make up a great solar flood light – illumination intensity and brightness, efficiency and quality of solar panel, battery type and capacity, durability and weatherproofness of all parts of solar flood light, sensors included with the fixture and of course the price of the flood light. And not only the components are important but also how wide the range of applications is, meaning if the light can be installed both horizontally and vertically, does it come with adjustable mounts and ground stakes, how long is the cable that connects solar panel to the flood light and other similar factors.
And last but not least, we also judged the manufacturer of the fixture – how well known it is, how many other products it has, for how long it has been around, how fast it responds to different user inquiries, how well they solve problems, how long warranty period they provide for their products, how willing they are to replace defective lights, and what is very important for solar lights (mostly considering rechargeable batteries) – how easy it will be to get replacements in the future.
And considering all the previously mentioned aspects, we found one solar flood light that nails most of these previously mentioned points – Guardian 580X Solar Flood Light.
This solar flood light features 84 amazingly bright LED diodes, high quality industrial grade aluminium solar panel, 2500 mAh lithium-ion battery providing up to 12 hours of illumination and a PIR motion sensor, all sealed in a fully waterproof cast iron and tempered glass casing. Excellent specs for an amazing price.
There are a lot of solar flood lights now out there on the market, and they vary widely in terms of their quality. Sorting the wheat from the chaff, and finding the pick of the solar flood light bunch, is not an easy task – fortunately for you, though, we have already done most of the hard work, and come up with what in our view is the best solar flood light currently going around. And the winner is … the Guardian 580X. This device comes with 84 LED bulbs that together produce a grand total of 730 lumens of light. It is solar powered, with a 16 feet cable connecting the solar panel to the flood light; and comes with three lighting modes, plus its own PIR motion sensor (a 9-foot cable connects the motion sensor to your solar panel). It has a full aluminum body, and is IP65 certified, which means it is suitable for use outdoors in all weather conditions.
When it comes to the factors that make up a great solar flood light – brightness and lighting intensity, energy efficiency and quality of the solar panel, capacity of the battery, durability and ability to withstand all weather conditions, inclusion of additional features like motion sensors and dimmers, ground stakes and other mounting equipment, and of course the affordability of the light itself – this solar flood light beats most of the competition hands down. And not only does this product tick all of these boxes, it also comes from a quality manufacturer who have an established reputation in this market, and who provide excellent service and protection to their customers – whether in the form of generous warranties and product guarantees, responsiveness to complaints, and ease of obtaining replacement parts (like batteries). So without further ado, let’s take a look at the Guardian 580X.
To begin with, let’s take a look at the range of places you can use this light. Both the light itself, and the solar panel, can be mounted on any solid surface – wall or floor – using the mounts included in the box. This means you can use the light as a security light (by placing on the wall), or as a landscape light (if you position it on the ground). Another benefit is that the mounts are made out of 100 percent metal (not plastic, like a lot of products in this line), giving you enhanced durability. In addition, there are 16 feet of cable connected the solar panel to the light – which gives you plenty of options as to where you place your light, though because this is a solar-powered light, you are still basically limited to those areas that receive plenty of direct sunlight during the daylight hours. Also, the mounts for the solar panel are non-adjustable, and you can’t alter the angle – which makes things difficult if you are not installing the panels on a flat, horizontal surface.
When it comes to durability, this light is built from the sturdiest cast iron and tempered glass. All other fittings are made from stainless steel which is strong, and non-corrosive. The light’s frame is die-cast, waterproof and has received an IP65 weatherproof rating – which means it can be used outside the entire year round, whatever the weather conditions. The solar panel, meanwhile, is built from lightweight yet tough aluminum and tempered glass, and is also IP65 weatherproof rated; the motion sensor device is built from ABS (weatherproof) plastic. When you look at the IP65 rating, and the quality of the materials used in its construction, this is, without doubt, one of the most durable solar flood lights out there – it will stand up to whatever elements nature throws at it.
PIR motion sensor mode, off to full brightness: upon motion being detected, the light puts out 730 lumens worth of light for up to a minute; otherwise, the light is off, no light is emitted at all.
All in all, these are some very bright flood lights, they will easily illuminate an area of up to 50 square feet. With several of these lights, you will be able to illuminate your entire backyard! The color temperature of this light is 7000 Kelvins – ie warm, white colored light.
The Guardian 580X comes with a 2-watt polycrystalline material solar panel that is very efficient at converting sunlight into power – though admittedly not as powerful as some other (for example, 10-watt) panels out there on the market. There is also built into the solar panel a cutting-edge LED driver that ensures a steady output of power from the panel, thus preventing the battery from being overcharged and having its lifespan reduced. The panel has a sturdy aluminum frame that will, like the light fixture itself, stand up under all weather conditions; and is connected to the light by a 16 feet long waterproof cable; meanwhile, there is a 3-foot long waterproof cable between the solar panel and the motion sensor. The solar panel can be mounted just about anywhere, all it requires is access to direct sunlight, and it will automatically convert solar energy into power that can be utilized by your lights when it gets dark.
It does this by charging the 2500 mAh Lithium-ion rechargeable battery included with the light. While the battery does not have the highest capacity compared to some other models out there, thanks to the motion sensor feature of this floodlight, it will have no problem illuminating your yard through the entirety of the night-time period – making this a truly dawn-to-dusk light. The battery is installed inside the light fixture, so it will power your lights even when the solar panel is not connected as well.
As goes without saying, though – and the same is true of any solar powered light – the amount and length of lighting coverage you get from this light depends largely on the amount of sunlight available to the panel during the day – which will differ depending on the latitude, and the time of year. Where the amount of sunlight available is only fair or average, you will get 8-10 hours of lighting at best from this light; on the other hand, in peak lighting conditions within favorable climates, you can expect a fully charged battery to deliver up to 12 hours lighting coverage with this light.
One other very important point to take into consideration with solar lights is the ease of replacing the batteries, which have a lifespan of only about 2 to 3 years. Fortunately, Solar Light Mart do sell replacement batteries for their lights, so you shouldn’t have any trouble obtaining one when the time comes.
As we have seen, included with this light is a passive infra-red (PIR) motion sensor that detects movement with a range of 10-12 meters of your light, and spanning an angle of 180 degrees. Whenever motion is detected, your light is triggered to either turn on – or become brighter; instead of being forced to have your light on at full intensity the whole night long, the motion sensor feature allows you to keep the light off – or on in dim mode – until someone comes into the area. This enables you to save light – and power – for when it is really needed, which is especially useful if you live in climates with high cloud cover and not a lot of sunlight during the daylight hours. There are three different working modes included with this light – as was explored above.
In addition, this light has built into the solar panel a photocell sensor. As soon as the ambient lighting in the area drops below a certain level, the photosensor triggers the lights to turn on. In the same manner, once it starts getting brighter outside as morning arrives, the light switches off. There is also an on/off push button switch included with the Guardian 580X for good measure. Turn the light off on those nights you are sure you will not need it; or when you go away on vacation.
Solar Light Mart is the manufacturer of this light. These guys are a relative newcomer to the solar flood light game, with only a handful of solar flood light products already out there on the market. However, despite their lack of reputation, all of their products offer full warranties and product satisfaction guarantees. In addition, they are, according to consumer reviews, very responsive to customer complaints and queries. They also claim to offer replacement parts for their products – including batteries that have reached the end of their lifespan. That’s yet another reason to choose the Guardian 580X!
For the most part, the Guardian 580X is a quality solar flood light that ticks all the right boxes. Yet it still has a few shortcomings, as is to be expected. To start with, the cables connecting the light to the solar panel, and the solar panel to the motion sensor, might be a little short for some people’s liking. Also, it would be better if the motion sensor were connected to the light itself, rather than the solar panel. Another slight drawback of this light is that you can’t adjust how long the light remains on once motion has been detected – it is fixed at one minute’s illumination time, which may be suitable for some purposes, but probably not for all. The solar panel mount is not adjustable and is fixed at an angle of 45 degrees, so if you want to install it somewhere other than on a flat, horizontal surface, you may have to install additional mounting equipment.
A few other areas where this light could improve are the lack of remote control – you have to change the working mode of the light manually each and every time; the lack of alternative options when it comes to brightness – there are only two brightness modes (full brightness at 730 lumens, and 55 lumens in dime mode); and capacity of the battery and power of the solar panel, which are not as impressive as some other comparable products out there on the market. Finally, the manufacturer, Solar Light Mart, is not all that well known, so it’s not possible to determine the quality of this product from the previous track record of the company alone.
Despite these minor shortcomings, the Guardian 580X is overall a quality solar flood light and gets our vote as the best light of this sort out there on the market at current. It’s easy to install, built with high quality, weatherproof materials, has excellent light output, and comes with its own motion sensor that enables you to save power and extend the lifespan of your light – this is one solar flood light that ticks all the right boxes. It’s backed by a one year manufacturer’s warranty as well – which is a testament, really, to the quality of this product and the faith the manufacturers have in it.
How we picked the best solar flood lights?
Solar flood light market has recently been swarmed with lots of good (and not so good) fixtures starting from small wall lights to powerful dusk-to-dawn flood lights and choosing the best one can be a very challenging and time-consuming task. So to make it easier for you, we have taken this job and picked the best out of best solar flood lights that will fit everyone’s needs.
1. Categorized solar lights for easier comparison.
And at the end, we chose the single best solar flood light that we felt was the most universal one, had the best specs for the price and that we could recommend for everyone looking for a solar flood light.
Components used and the overall quality of the fixture – First we looked at what components are used in the fixture and what is the overall quality of the product. The main factor that indicates whether it is a good fixture or not is the type of components used in the unit. For example, does it have a polycrystalline solar panel or some other type, does it have a lithium-ion battery or older Ni-Cd battery, is casing made out of durable aluminum or weaker plastic, does it produce lighting using LED diodes or other types of bulbs, etc.. Of course, using newer and more expensive components doesn’t automatically make one light better than other, so we didn’t base our decision just by the components of the fixture alone, but also looked at the overall quality of the light, how well it’s built, how long the light is expected to last and other factors.
Features and specs – Each solar flood light type have its own unique features and specs that are important exactly to that light type. For example, security lights must have an adjustable motion sensor that can pick up motion in a longer range, dusk-to-dawn flood lights must have large batteries and solar panels that output enough wattage to charge these batteries fast, landscape flood lights need to have ground stakes to be placed in the ground etc.
Price and value for money – It isn’t difficult to produce a powerful flood light, with large battery, high wattage solar panel and durable metal housing, but it is very hard to combine it all together in a well-priced fixture. Often we saw very high-quality solar flood lights with inadequately high price or the opposite, those solar lights that come at a bargain price contain some underpowered or cheap parts. So when choosing the best solar flood lights we did pay a lot of attention to the price and value ratio, picking those flood lights that offered the best value for money.
User ratings – Price, components, and specs don’t tell you the whole story about a product, so we also paid a lot of attention to the ratings and reviews from other users, considering each good and bad review we could find about the product from its owners.
Manufacturer reputation – Although not as important as other factors, the reputation and reliability of the manufacturer did play a role when we couldn’t choose between two flood lights with very similar specs. We preferred well-known manufacturers that had been around for a while and offered great customer service, provided warranty for their products and actually replaced any faulty items clients complained about, and that also offer replacement parts if anything needs to be replaced for the flood light in the future.
Own testing experience – With multiple years of experience in running solar lighting websites and blogs, we brought in all our experience and knowledge to make this article as professional as we could, at the same time making all the important information simple and understandable for beginners to solar lighting.
3. Compared five of the best solar flood lights in each category to find the winners.
We took 5 best solar lights in each category (selected based on the criteria in the previous point) and compared them side by side making our final TOP3 list for each category. Then we made an extensive review of all three lights, listing both positive and negative aspects of them, to provide as much information as possible and make your decision of which solar light to purchase much easier.
When to choose security lights?
To illuminate an area at night for walking – People mostly choose to install solar security lights for practical reasons – to illuminate front doors, walkway, driveway or another path that leads to the house. Security lights are ideal for these kinds of situations because motion sensor turns the light on only when motion has been detected thus saving battery life in the remaining time.
To deter burglars – When an unwanted person is wandering around your backyard in the dark, a sudden splash of light from your motion activated security light will not only surprise them but also unveil them to everyone nearby, therefore increasing the chance that they will immediately leave your property.
To deter animals – Solar security lights are also great for deterring animals away from your yard. Most motion sensors can be adjusted to pick motion even from smaller animals like raccoons.
Provide lighting for security cameras – Solar security lights can also be used together with security cameras illuminating the area that needs to be captured immediately when someone walks into that area.
Provide illumination indoors – Solar security lights not only are useful outdoors but also can provide illumination indoors in areas such as staircases. Most solar security flood lights come with a separate solar panel that attaches to the flood light with a cable, so you can install the solar panel outdoors to pick up solar energy, while the fixture itself is installed and provides illumination indoors.
The key factors of a solar security light that you need to pay most attention to are brightness and motion sensor. Make sure the solar flood light is bright enough to be able to fully illuminate the intended area and also that motion sensor has got a long detection range. As a bonus, look for solar security lights with an adjustable motion sensor that allows controlling illumination time, lux range and sensitivity or detection distance and range.
High quality security light with 48 LED diodes, an effective amorphous solar panel and a 1500mAh capacity lithium-ion battery.
Powerful and bright solar security flood light with amazing 150 LED diodes producing 1000 lumens and featuring a triple head design for better light coverage.
Durable plastic housing with IP55 rating, built-in PIR motion sensor and high capacity 4500mAh battery makes this a top quality security light.
Choosing the best solar security light wasn’t an easy task, because the range of motion activated solar lights has grown rapidly in the previous years. Comparing the most important aspects of security lights – brightness, light direction and coverage, motion sensor detection range and adjustment possibilities, our choice came down to 150 LED Triple Head Motion Activated Light by SunForce.
What really pulled the trigger for this solar flood light was the power and brightness provided by amazing 150 LED diodes and triple head feature (each head has got 50 LED diodes) that allows adjusting the illumination in any direction needed. Often there is a need to illuminate not only one spot, such as front doors, but multiple spots at a single time, especially if it is for security purposes, and to do that, usually you would need to purchase and install multiple lights separately. This SunForce solar security light basically combines 3 flood lights in one reasonably priced fixture to offer an excellent lighting coverage in all directions. In our book, this is an exceptional deal!
Not only us, but many reviewers on Amazon (the light has got one of the best ratings for any solar flood light) also praised the brightness of this flood light. In total it can output 1000 lumens of light, which is very respectable for a solar light at this price and will easily light up an area to uncover unwanted persons walking by your property.
The solar powered flood light is equipped with a PIR motion detector that can pick up motion in 180-degree range, in up to 30 feet distance. You can expect similar results with the majority of motion activated flood lights. There is an option to adjust the sensitivity (detection range) and detection time of the motion sensor for different situations.
To collect solar energy, the SunForce solar light uses an amorphous solar panel. We would prefer a more efficient polycrystalline solar panel for a light that can produce 1000 lumens of light, but amorphous panel used on this fixture isn’t bad by any means and will do its job of charging lights batteries.
While we’re at it, SunForce has chosen to use three AA-size Ni-MH rechargeable batteries instead of Lithium-ion for the fixture. Similar to the solar panel, this seems a bit weird decision for such a powerful lamp to not use the more superior lithium-ion battery, but Ni-MH is definitely not the worse choice either. While it has lower specific energy than lithium-ion batteries, it is also cheaper and you can easily buy a replacement when the batteries run out. The light is going to be good for short periods of illumination (what motion activated lights are made for), but definitely won’t be able to provide continuous illumination from dusk to dawn.
The fixture itself has got a durable, weather resistant plastic housing. Although the manufacturer hasn’t indicated anywhere the IP rating of the light, based on our experience with similar fixtures, we can guess that it is either IP44 or IP45 flood light. The light should run outdoors without any problems all year round. The cable length from solar panel to fixture is 15 feet and the flood light comes with wall mounting hardware.
If you are still in doubt whether to get this flood light and want the last bit of convincing, we can recommend the manufacturer of the fixture – SunForce to be a well known and respectable brand in solar flood lighting. Also, the solar flood light comes with a 1-year warranty.
All in all, this is really a great solar security flood light without practically any major drawbacks. As previously mentioned, we would like to see a little bit different choices for few lamp components, such as polycrystalline solar panel instead of amorphous and lithium-ion battery instead of Ni-MH, but these aren’t really drawback, because they help to keep the price of the fixture so low and overall the light works very well.
The only real drawback we could find is that the fixture is not equipped with a dusk to dawn sensor, but instead, you have to manually turn on the “always on” setting for continuous illumination. This, however, will drain the small battery in just a few hours so you won’t get a full night illumination from this flood light.
What are the qualities you look for in a good solar security light for your entryway, garage, yard, patio or other external parts of your property? Ideally, it will be bright, weatherproof, and with a powerful and effective motion sensor built into the light. And as a solar powered light, the solar panel should be able to collect sunlight and efficiently charge the battery so that it is ready to go supplying light to your property at night. Well, the SOLLA Security Light satisfies all of these requirements, thus making it one of the best solar security lights out there today. Read on to find out more.
This adjustable head flood light is equipped with a high tech LED lamp that emits a super-bright 950 lumens of light. You can either set the light to Auto (motion sensing) mode, in which it emits 950 lumens of bright, white light only when motion is detected (it is off the rest of the time) or constant ON mode, in which it emits 950 lumens constantly throughout the night.
The light head is rotatable as well, which enables you to achieve more focused, targeted lighting.
If you choose to avail yourself of the AUTO mode in this light, then the motion sensor has a range of 49 feet spanning an angle of 180 degrees. And when motion is detected by the passive infrared (PIR) sensor, the light stays on for one minute before turning off again.
This light is solar powered, and the panel is an amorphous solar panel, which means it charges in all conditions and does not require access to direct sunlight. It has a capacity of 8 watts which will enable it to charge the battery quickly and efficiently.
One lithium-ion battery is included with this light, it charges quickly and has excellent storage capacity so that it will be ready to go supplying light to your property of a night time. Fully charged, it will provide up to 10 hours lighting coverage – whether in auto or on mode.
The light fixture and solar panel are housed in IP65 weatherproof, plastic material that will endure all weather conditions, whether rain, snow, wind or scorching summer sun – this truly is a light ‘for all seasons’. It has a lifespan of 50,000 hours.
This light is backed by a one year manufacturer’s warranty. There is also a 60 days money back guarantee, so should you be in any way dissatisfied with your purchase within this time frame, you can return to the manufacturer and get a full refund, no questions asked.
There are 9 feet of cable connecting the light to the solar panel, which gives you plenty of options as to where you position your light. You get the wall and horizontal mounting brackets for both the light fixture and the solar panel as well.
As with other lights reviewed here, this light would benefit from a remote control option to change the settings from afar. It would also make for a better light if there were more lighting modes and if you could adjust the brightness – for example, if you were able to have the light constantly on in dim mode, which converts to full brightness when motion is detected. Also, you are not able to adjust the length of time the light stays on for after motion is detected – which would enable you to save power when it is needed. These – albeit minor – disadvantages, prevent the SOLLA security light from taking the prize as the number one solar security light going around today.
For a quality solar security light, this offering from OPERNEE has few rivals. Super bright, adjustable, solar powered and eco-friendly, and comes with its very own motion sensor, the OPERNEE Dual Head comes with everything you could ask for in a light of this sort. Read on to find out more.
There are 6, dual head, LED lights included with this product, each light comes equipped with a lamp on either side, and each emits 50 lumens of light. This gives you a grand total of 12 LED pieces, and 600 lumens of bright – excellent lighting coverage that will allow you to illuminate your yard, patio, deck, garden and more. And because lamps are installed on each side, you get an illumination angle of 360 degrees with each one of these lights. The color temperature of these lights is 6500-700 Kelvins.
This light comes with its own built-in passive infra-red (PIR) motion sensor, that can detect movement up to 26 feet away, ranging an angle of 120 degrees – when this occurs it will automatically turn the light up to bright mode (600 lumens) for a full minute after motion is detected, before returning it to OFF mode.
There is also a photosensor built into these lights, so that they automatically turn on at dusk, off at dawn. The motion sensor is not active during the day.
No external power source is required with these lights, this is green energy at it’s finest! The 3 watts, 6 inches by 6 inches solar panel is made from the highest quality polysilicon material that will efficiently convert sunlight into electricity that you can utilize as light in your yard. All it requires is exposure to direct sunlight during the day.
The solar panel charges a 4500 mAh lithium-ion battery, courtesy of the solar panel it will be fully charged in 4.5 hours given optimal sunlight conditions and will deliver 9-11 hours continuous lighting for your yard.
The light is constructed from IP55 weatherproof, ABS plastic that will stand up under all conditions. It’s backed by a one year manufacturer’s warranty. There are 16 feet of cable connecting the solar panel to the light. And screws are included for mounting the light fixture and solar panel on your surface of choice.
This light only has one lighting mode – off to full brightness motion sensor mode. This is appropriate for a security light intend to scare away intruders, however, this light would be a lot more versatile if it had dimming option or a dim light to full brightness motion sensor mode. You also can’t adjust the length of time the light stays on for after motion is detected. For these reasons, we can’t give the No. 1 ranking to the OPERNEE Dual Head solar security light. It’s still a great light though!
ELEDing EE814WDC solar security light delivers dusk-to-dawn motion sensor, solar powered/ eco-friendly lighting that is suitable for all weather conditions. IPM programming automatically adjusts the light emitted to suit the external weather conditions – saving you power for when it’s needed most. Despite these advantages, it is not nearly as bright as comparable lights in this market – only equivalent to a 60-watt Halogen lamp – and the range of the motion sensor is quite limited as well.
MAXSA Innovations 44449-L – great flood light with 100 bright LEDs with over 500 lumens of brightness, large 4400 mAh Lithium-ion battery and adjustable PIR sensor with 40 feet detection range. However, the price is a bit higher than for other, similarly equipped security lights we chose for this list.
When to choose dusk to dawn lights?
Out of all types of solar flood lights, dusk to dawn lights must meet the most strict criteria to be considered a successful light, because these type of lights are used outdoor practically all year round and need to provide continuous illumination from sunset to sunrise. The application range of these lights is very broad, they can be as good security lights as landscape lights.
Dusk to dawn flood lights are the most versatile outdoor lighting options, but all that comes at a much greater price. To be able to power bright outdoor flood lights, the lighting fixture needs to have a decent sized battery and to charge that battery there must be an efficient solar panel (monocrystalline or polycrystalline) that outputs enough wattage to be able to recharge the battery during the daytime. And not only that but also the casing of the flood light must be durable enough, to protect all these components from any (solid or water) damage. And in a result, solar dusk to dawn flood light that consists of all these powerful, high-end components will cost you from $100 even up to $1000.
So the key components you need to watch in a dusk to dawn solar flood light are battery type and capacity, durability and IP rating of whole fixture (including solar panel and sensors), solar panel type and wattage, and brightness.
Probabaly the best equipped dusk-to-dawn flood light on the market also feautring an adjustable motion sensor and a remote control.
This dusk-to-dawn light has it all - 1200 lumens of light and intelligent power management software with everything safely sealed in a heavy-duty IP65 polycarbonate casing.
One of the best dusk to dawn lights which has 44 LED diodes producing up to 1000 lumens. And It will provide up to 10 hours of worktime with its high capacity 8000mAh lithium-ion battery.
When it comes to dusk to dawn solar lights, few devices compare with the leading 1200 lumens solar flood light. The ELEDing 1200 lm solar light features ultra-bright LED 3rd generation illuminators, IP65 weatherproof design, and cutting-edge SMART light saving technology that enables you to save power and achieve true ‘dusk to dawn’ outdoor lighting. Read on as we explore just what makes this the number one rated dusk to dawn solar flood light on the market today.
This light comes with two LED 3rd generation illuminators that together produce a maximum light output of 1200 lumens of white, daylight color temperature light (7000 Kelvins) that delivers enhanced full-color-image vision – and far outperforms your traditional 120 watts incandescent bulb in terms of both brightness and light quality. The LED illuminators have adjustable heads which enable you to either combine or separate their beams, achieving more precise, targeted illumination. Choose SMART mode (the default setting of these lights), and it will provide all-night, dusk to dawn illumination, functioning in dim mode until motion is detected, after which the light automatically switches to maximum brightness.
But that’s not all. With the innovative Intelligent Power Management (IPM) software built into this light, the brightness level of the light emitted by these lamps automatically varies in accordance with the external weather conditions. You can also manually dim the lights using the dials situated on the light body.
As we have seen, this light is also a motion sensor light. Under SMART mode, the default setting, it automatically switches from dim light mode to maximum brightness when motion is detected. Alternatively, you can choose the SMART AUTO setting on your light, and it will operate as a conventional motion sensing security light – ie lighting up to maximum brightness when motion is detected; the rest of the time the light is off. On either setting, the motion sensor has a range of 30-40 feet, spanning an angle of 180 degrees, and triggers the light to stay on for a minute after a motion is detected.
In order for this light to be a true dawn to dusk floodlight, it needs to have a photo-sensor built into it as well, and the leading 1200 lumens certainly does. Switch your light to ‘on’, and when ambient lighting levels in the surrounding environment drop to a certain level, the light will automatically light up; similarly, when ambient lighting levels start to increase as morning approaches, the light will automatically switch off. The IPM power saving software built into this light also alters the lighting output of this light to compensate for external weather conditions.
This is solar powered lighting, which means no external power source is required; all you need to do is place the solar panel in an area that receives plenty of sunlight during the day, and the attached battery will automatically charge your lights so that come nightfall they are ready to go illuminating your yard. The 8 watts solar panel that accompanies this light is built from tempered glass and high-quality polycrystalline material, it also comes with its own (adjustable) mounts and 10 feet worth of cable for connecting to the light fixture itself – which gives you plenty of options as to where you position your lights. With 8 watts charging capacity, you can be sure it will charge the battery quickly and efficiently as well.
A rechargeable 28 watts Lithium-Poly AA battery is built into this light so that the power accumulated by the solar panel during the day can be saved and stored for when it is needed after dark. The battery has a long lifespan, so that it can be recharged by the solar panel many times over, and has an excellent capacity compared to comparable batteries out there on the market. Given a full day’s exposure to sunlight, the battery will deliver up to 10 hours continuous lighting to your yard – whether you choose full brightness or dimmed mode.
All components included with this light are housed in durable, well-built components. The light fixture and solar panel are housed in heavy-duty polycarbonate material that is IP65 rated – meaning it is completely weatherproof and will stand up under all climatic conditions. The solar panel also is designed with tempered glass that is very durable. Sturdy, all-metal, wall and ground mounting stakes are included with this light as well.
It’s backed by a one-year limited manufacturer’s warranty. And wall and mounting stakes, and full installation instructions are included with this light, free of charge.
Whilst the LEDing 1200 lumens is a really fantastic little solar flood light, it is still far from perfect. It could benefit from the inclusion of a remote control that enables you to change the settings from afar instead of manually. Also the mounting brackets and solar panel head are not adjustable, so you can’t alter their angle relative to the sky as the position of the sun changes through the year. You will need to purchase additional equipment to do this. Finally, you can’t change the amount of time the light stays on for after motion is detected – which would come in handy on those occasions where you want to save power. Compared to the many advantages of this light, though, these are minor shortcomings.
A great contender for the best dusk-to-dawn flood light title is the SGG-F156-2R solar flood light by Solar Goes Green. This is a fully equipped dusk to dawn fixture that in addition to two polycrystalline solar panels and 180 bright LED diodes also features an adjustable motion sensor and a remote control, all things to make this the best dusk-to-dawn solar flood light on the market.
So why didn’t it make the first spot on our list? Simply, all these great features come at a much higher price, which we think might be out of budget for most homeowners that are the target audience for this article. But because this is one of the best solar flood lights on the market, we must look at it in more details.
Solar Goes Green SGG-F156-2R has got 156 LED diodes that produce total 780 lumens of bright white light, which may not seem that much, but actually the flood light is very powerful and will lit practically anything, from your backyard to a parking lot, commercial signs and anything else.
To make this an ideal outdoor light, the fixture and solar panel have got rugged aluminum bodies, the design of the fixture (except the motion sensor) is totally weather-proof, allowing to use the flood light outdoors all year round. Unfortunately, Solar Goes Green haven’t listed the IP rating of the flood light, but it should be at least IP65 rated fixture. The length of two cables – one from flood light to solar panel and other from the flood light to motion sensor is 15 feet, allowing a wide range of installation choices. There are also 4 ground stakes included in the packaging, so you can choose to install the light on a wall or other vertical surface or in the ground and use it as a landscape light.
Similarly to MicroSolar 180 LED fixture, this flood light also has got two 10W polycrystalline solar panels (20W in total) which, as we previously mentioned, is an excellent choice for dusk-to-dawn flood light. The polycrystalline solar panels charges a 7000 mAh large lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) battery, which is able to power the light for about 10 hours with a full charge. The fixture requires about 8-10 hours of sunshine to fully charge its batteries. You can also purchase a flag pole mount separately for this fixture.
What makes this dusk to dawn flood light to stand out among the rest is the ability to connect a fully adjustable motion sensor. The sensor has got a 40 feet detection range and you can adjust the sensitivity, lux detection settings and lighting time from 10 seconds to 5 minutes. And because this is a dusk-to-dawn flood light, it is obviously equipped with a photosensor, so you can choose whether the light will work as a normal dusk to dawn flood light, automatically turning on at dusk and off at dawn, or as a motion activated flood light.
Another great feature of this solar flood light that you won’t find in practically any other lighting is a remote control which allows you to operate the flood light from a distance. This is especially useful if you have installed the fixture high above the ground and don’t want to climb up the ladder each time you need to change illumination settings of the fixture.
First of all, although this is one of the most feature-packed solar flood lights on the market, we felt that the price of it is just a bit too high looking at the prices of few competitor dusk to dawn flood lights. And second, considering the build quality and materials used to make the flood light and solar panel, we didn’t understand why motion sensor was made out of plastic and was not fully water proof (while it would stand most weather conditions, some heavier downpour could damage the sensor).
This solar powered, motion sensor flood light from RuggedGrade is one of the best dusk to dawn solar flood lights out there on the market today.
The RuggedGrade 1000lm flood light utilizes cutting edge, 10 watt LEDs that together deliver 1000 lumens of super bright, white light (5000 Kelvins color temperature) in full brightness mode. That’s more than enough to illuminate your balcony, deck, garden, landscaping – or any other features in your yard!
The PIR motion sensor included with this light has a range of 5 meters. After detecting any movement, it automatically increases the output of your flood light from 10 percent capacity, dimming mode, to full brightness. It remains bright for 30 seconds before returning to dim mode.
This light also has an in-built photosensor so that it automatically turns on at dusk, off at dawn. The motion sensor is not active during the day.
The polycrystalline, 5 watts solar panel is what powers your lights, it collects sunlight during the day and efficiently converts it into electricity that you can utilize in your yard as light after dark. You can directly mount it onto your wall of choice, or other horizontal surfaces. You can adjust the angle as required to maximize sunlight exposure.
The premium super sized 8000 mAh lithium-ion battery built into this light charges quickly and has an exceptional capacity. It can deliver up to 10 hours continuous lighting to your property of a night-time when fully charged. It’s also much longer lasting than your average battery and will run for many years before replacement is required.
The light and solar panel are built from sturdy, high-quality aluminum and plastic materials, with tempered, shock-resistant glass. They have an IP65 weatherproof rating, which ensures they will stand up under all conditions, and throughout the year.
It’s backed by a full one year manufacturer’s warranty. And there are 16 feet of cable included for connecting the light fixture to the solar panel. And screws and mounting stakes are included to install your light and panel.
It would be good if you could dispense with the motion sensor as required, and use your light simply as a normal flood light at a medium or full brightness. That would certainly enhance its versatility! It would also be to this light’s advantage if it came with its own remote control for changing the settings from afar. These are minor quibbles, however – the RuggedGrade solar motion sensor light is still a high-quality offering. Well and truly recommended!
The SunBonar 800 lumens dusk to dawn solar flood light delivers super bright (800-1000 lumens), long-lasting (8-10 hours) solar powered lighting for your yard. With an IP66 weatherproof rating, it will deliver year around coverage as well. However, it lacks any kind of dimming option – and there is no motion sensor feature either – which limit it’s versatility somewhat.
While ALPHA 1200X dusk to dawn solar flood light comes with 180 LED pieces and three brightness settings (150, 500, 1500 lumens), making it suitable for just about any lighting purpose you might have in mind for your yard. With 16 feet of cable connecting your light to the solar panel that powers it, you can place it just about anywhere as well. However, it lacks a motion sensor feature, and it has a rather flimsy, lightweight design.
When to choose landscape flood lights?
Landscape flood lights are used to illuminate different objects whether it is a commercial sing next to a road or some interesting object in your backyard such as a fountain or an old tree. Landscape lights are mostly used for aesthetic purposes, to showcase something or make something stand out in the night rather than for security reasons as other types of solar flood lights. And often they work similar to dusk-to-dawn lights providing continuous illumination during the night.
Because of this, the key features to look for when purchasing solar landscape lights are durability (casing material and IP rating), battery capacity, solar panel type and wattage, and mounting hardware supplied, because mostly landscape flood lights are placed in the ground so the light should include ground stakes for solar panel, flood light or both.
Why landscape flood light instead of landscape spot light?
Often solar landscape spot lights are the more popular option than solar landscape flood lights, so in which case should you install flood lights instead of spot lights? We recommend installing flood lights when you need to illuminate a larger (wider) object or area. Flood lights are designed to produce a wider beam of light, which can illuminate a larger area, while spot lights have a more concentrated beam which is great if you need to illuminate a smaller object but with more intense light. Also, landscape flood lights tend to be brighter and most can illuminate from dusk to dawn, so if you need a powerful light, that covers a larger area and can provide illumination throughout the whole night, get a solar landscape light.
Thanks to the 2-watt polycrystalline solar panel and 2000 mAh rechargeable battery this 120 lumen fixture can run for up to 10 hours.
Thanks to the 3W polycrystalline solar panel and 4000 mAh lithium-ion battery this 180 lumens bright fixture can run for up to 10 hours.
Powerful 6-watt polycrystalline solar panel and a 4400mAh mAh battery allows this solar landscape light to illuminate your space for up to 12 hours straight.
If you need a good quality solar landscape light that has enough power for most uses, you may want to consider this – MicroSolar FL2 solar flood light.
The flood light has got 64 LED diodes that produce total 180 lumens of light, enough to illuminate not only some landscape objects but also a smaller parking lot, driveway, a walkway and similar areas. The flood light can be mounted to a wall or other vertical surface or placed in the ground with three ground stakes (one for light and two for solar panel) and used as a solar landscape lighting.
Because this is a more powerful light, it also requires a more powerful solar panel. FL2 solar flood light is powered by a 3W polycrystalline solar panel that charges a 4000 mAh lithium-ion battery. In most areas, during the summer months, the light will run about 8-10 hours with a full charge or about 6 hours if its cloudy throughout the day.
As expected from lights manufactured by MicroSolar, the fixture is equipped with the most up-to-date, efficient and long lasting components such as LED diodes, polycrystalline solar panel, and lithium-ion batteries.
The housing of the flood light has got an IP65 rating so you can use it outdoors all year round. There is a 16.4 feet long cable connecting solar panel with the flood light fixture and you can also get an additional 16.4 feet extension cable (as with other MicroSolar lights).
There is no motion sensor on the MicroSolar FL2, but there is a photocell in the solar panel, as you would expect from a solar landscape flood light, so the light will automatically turn on and illuminate during the night and then turn off when the sun reaches the solar panel again in the morning. This light has got an on/off switch behind the solar panel, so you can actually control when the light illuminates and can turn it off at night if you don’t need light.
The manufacturer MicroSolar provides a 1-year warranty for this flood light.
First of all, this is not the cheapest light considering its light output is just around 180 lumens. While it’s perfectly fine for most applications, some may find the light to be just a bit too dim to properly illuminate an object.
And second, attaching the metal mounting bracket to the back of the solar panel is a bit complex, because you need to hold the nut to tighten the screw, but there is a very small place to access it, so some extra tools may be needed to do the job.
Would you like to show off your garden and landscaping after dark, and in a manner that saves money and is good for the environment? Then the Findyouled 60 LEDs solar flood light may be the product for you. Super bright, adjustable and 100 percent weatherproof – this is one of the best solar flood lights going around today. You can use it to illuminate your trees, garden, pathways, patios, decks, signage – or any other feature of your yard that you deem to need lighting. Read on to find out more.
The Findyouled flood light comes with 60 powerful LED bulbs that together emit a maximum light output of 120 lumens. The light emitted spans an angle of 60 degrees, wider than many comparable lights out there on the market. You can also dim the light to suit your lighting requirements, and to save power.
This is not a motion sensor light, however, it is light sensitive, such that it only turns on once ambient lighting levels in the environment drop below a certain level; in the same vein, once it starts to get brighter as morning approaches, the light will automatically turn off. This quality of the FindyouLED 60 LEDs flood light makes it a true ‘dusk to dawn’ outdoor flood light.
Free, clean energy is yours’ for the taking with this solar-powered light. No external power source is required, just install the rotatable, 7.6 by 6.1 inches, 2 watts solar panel in an area where it will receive plenty of sunlight during the day and it will charge the battery attached to the light quickly and efficiently. And because this is an amorphous solar panel, it will charge well even in cloudy weather.
The light comes with a 2000 mAh rechargeable, lithium-ion battery that charges quickly and has excellent storage capacity – it will deliver between 6 and 15 hours continuous lighting (in full brightness mode) to your yard depending on the quality and amount of sunlight the panel receives during the day.
The Findyou LED light fixture is housed in sturdy cast aluminum material that has a black finish, locking ring plus rubber gasket that ensures it will withstand rain, moisture, wind and intense summer sun. It has an IP55 weatherproof rating. The solar panel is housed in weatherproof, tempered glass.
It’s backed by a full, 3 years’ manufacturer’s warranty. Included with this product are 16.4 feet of cable connecting the solar panel too the light fixture. There is also a 2-in-1 installation feature, ie you can either stick your light and solar panel into the ground using the mounting stakes included with this product or hang from the wall using the screws also contained in the box.
A motion sensor feature would add to the Findyou LED’s versatility, whilst a remote control option would make it much more convenient to change the settings without having to dismount the light each and every time. Also, this light only has a maximum light output of 120 lumens, spanning an angle of 60 degrees, which is not as impressive as some other comparable lights on the market. In larger yards and gardens, you may require several of these lights to get maximal lighting coverage. Despite its impressive credentials, because of these drawbacks, we can’t give the Findyou LED flood light the prize as the best solar flood light on the market.
This solar flood light from SunBonar is super bright, eco-friendly and fully weatherproof – which qualities make it one of the very best landscape solar flood lights out there on the market today. Read on to find out more.
The SunBonar 54 LED flood light comes with 54 LED pieces that together deliver a maximum light output of 400 lumens which is more than capable of illuminating your yard, garden, walkways, patio, balcony, deck and more. The light emitted is of a warm, white color (6000 Kelvins color temperature).
This is not a motion sensor light, however, it is a light sensor light. That is, your lights are so designed that they detect the ambient lighting levels in their environment and accordingly turn on automatically at dusk, and switch off at dawn. There is no need to switch them on and off manually each day.
This wireless outdoor landscape flood light is powered by a 6-volt/6-watt solar panel made from the very finest polycrystalline silicon material that efficiently collects sunlight during the day and converts it into electricity that your lamps can utilize as light after dark.
The solar panel charges a 3.7 volts, 4400 mAh lithium-ion battery that delivers up to 12 hours continuous lighting (during summer), and a still impressive 7-8 hours during the winter months.
The light and the solar panel are both encased in tough, durable aluminum and tempered glass materials that is IP65 weatherproof rated – this is one set of lights that will endure whatever the natural elements hurl at it.
The SunBonar solar landscape flood light is backed by a full one year manufacturer’s warranty.
This light from SunBonar comes with 16 feet of cable for connecting the light to the solar panel. There is also included equipment that gives you three installation options: stick the light and panel in the ground using the included mounting spike; mount upon the wall using the screws, also contains in the box; or fix the solar light to the solar panel using the same screws.
This light from SunBonar, whilst an effective solar landscape light, only comes with one working mode – there is no dimming option, no motion sensor feature that would enable you to keep your light on in dim mode until movement is detected, upon which it increases to full brightness. This certainly detracts from the versatility of the SunBonar solar flood light – and prevents it from being our selection as the best landscape solar flood light on the market today. It’s still a fine light, though, and well worth the investment of time and money.
The MicroSOlar FL3 108 LED landscape solar flood light comes with 108 LED pieces, and has a light output of 400 lumens spanning a 60 degrees angle. Given optimal sunlight conditions, this solar powered light deliver up to 12 hours continuous lighting. You can also mount it either on the wall, or stick in the ground using included mounting spikes. There is no dimming option, however, and it doesn’t function as a motion sensor light either.
The LTE 60 LED landscape solar flood light will light up your yard, balcony, deck, patio, garden, and more with no problems. It comes with 60 LED pieces and has a 300 lumens light output with 120 degrees beam angle. IP65 weatherproof rated, there also two installation options – stick in the ground or mount from the wall – all equipment provided. On the other hand, there is no dimming feature, and these are no motion sensor lights either.
When to choose wall mounted lights?
When looking for a wall mounted solar motion sensor light there are few things you must pay more attention to – the ease of installation, brightness, motion sensor and its customisability and, of course, the brightness. There might be several reasons why you would want such a light, whether to provide lighting for security reasons, for decoration purposes around your house or in your backyard, to scare off animals from your yard or any other reason. And depending on your needs, certain features and specifics might prove more useful to you. Because the market is filled with very similar looking solar wall lights, we have picked the best according to their level of brightness and size – one smaller 10 LED light, one medium 20 LED light and one larger 38 LED light.
We see this type of light best fitting situations where a relatively small area that serves a certain function should be illuminated, so it is easier to see at night, for example, front doors, stairway or sidewalk (multiple lights might be needed).
Larger and brighter than our top pick, this fixture features 54 LED diodes, 8-watt solar panel, passive infra-red PIR sensor and a lithium-ion battery.
The best light for everyone - it is compact and bright for its size, has got a decent battery life, adjustable motion sensor and a very attractive price.
Larger and brighter than our top pick, this fixture features 38 LED diodes, 2.5W solar panel, adjustable PIR sensor and a 4400 mAh lithium-ion battery.
The option that might suite most people is this – Litom 20 LED wall mounted solar motion light. It offers the best of all worlds – it is compact, relatively bright for its size, has got pretty decent battery life, adjustable motion sensor and very attractive price.
Choosing the best wall mounted solar light was very difficult because the market is swarmed with very similarly designed lighting fixtures (different companies selling exact same light simply putting on their own branding). And the one light that had a slight edge in all our criteria over the rest was this Litom 20 LED model.
The solar light has got 20 LED diodes producing about 400 lumens of light. The light beam is pretty concentrated as this isn’t exactly a flood light, however it produces a decent amount of light to see even in 30 to 40 feet distances. Based on its size and brightness, this is a perfect front door light that will effectively illuminate the walkway to your house.
When talking about the fixture itself, it is made out of plastic and is pretty weatherproof with an IP55 rating. One problem with these small wall mounted solar lights is that they tend to have weak housings and are prone to water damage, however, this unit seems to be pretty solid and all open spots have been properly sealed. However, we still wouldn’t recommend to install it in areas where running water could constantly reach the fixture, as it might get damaged.
Practically all of these all-in-one fixture solar lights have one problem, there are very limited areas where the light can be installed, because you cannot detach the solar panel form the lighting fixture, meaning that you can only install the light in areas where direct sunlight can reach the solar panel and charge its batteries during the day.
Fortunately, the solar panel on this unit seems to be pretty effective at charging the 2200 mAh lithium-ion battery (by the way this is a 18650 lithium-ion rechargeable battery, so there won’t be any problems getting a replacement when it dies). This is a pretty small capacity battery, but because it needs to power only 20 LED diodes, you can expect some impressive working times from the unit, even up to 10 hours on its “always on” setting with a fully charged battery.
I must note that these settings only are active from dusk to dawn and light won’t be triggered during the sunny hours when the solar panel is charging the battery of the lighting fixture.
Detection distance for the motion sensor on this light is pretty decent, the distance will differ based on the placement position and height of the fixture, but on average will be about 15-20 feet.
Going away from the product itself and talking about the manufacturer/brand a bit, we can say that our opinion about these Chinese companies is neutral, it is clearly understandable that most of these products offered by different companies probably come from the same factories, so it comes down to each seller how they value their customers and how serious they are about their business. In this case, we can definitely recommend Litom, as they do address every problem with their lights and will help if you’ll have any problems with the products they sell.
While the fixture itself is well built and function exceptionally, there is one problem we found with the design of the light. The switch for changing illumination settings is located in a difficult to reach place behind the light, so you must choose the mode before installing the unit and if later you wish to change these setting, for example from continuous illumination to motion activation only, you will have to remove the fixture to access the switch, change the mode and reinstall the fixture back to its place.
This wall mounted, Litom 54 LED solar motion light is a great option for enhancing security around your property, accenting your yard and garden, or lighting up your walkways so you can find your way to the front door more easily after dark. Read on to find out what makes the Litom 54 LEDs one of the best wall mounted solar motion lights on the market right now.
This is one outdoor solar light that provides excellent illumination. It comes equipped with 54 LED bulbs that combined deliver a maximal light output of 800 lumens – although you can also choose to run your light in dim, or medium lighting mode. The unique wide-angle design of this light (LEDs installed on both sides of the light fixture) also ensures the light emitted spans a maximum angle of 270 degrees – again, one of the best out there for lights of this sort.
The Litom 54 LED also comes equipped with a passive infra-red (PIR) motion sensor that detects movement within a range of 26 feet and 120 degrees. Set your light to dim mode motion sensor or off-motion sensor mode, and it will automatically project maximally bright light as soon as movement is detected, lasting for 17-20 seconds before it returns to the dim mode/turns off.
This is eco-friendly solar powered lighting, the 8 watts solar panel you get with this light is made from a polycrystalline material that has a high (17 percent) conversion efficiency rating. All it needs is access to direct sunlight during the day, and it will automatically charge the battery installed in your light so that it is ready to go come nightfall. The panel is housed in sturdy, ABS plastic material that will withstand all weather conditions.
There is one lithium-ion battery included with this light. Fully charged, it delivers up to 10 hours of continuous lighting to your property.
Both the light fixture and solar panel of this light are housed in ABS plastic that comes with an IP56 weatherproof rating – meaning they will stand up to all climatic conditions, including rain, wind, snow, sleet and more.
The Litom 54 LED solar light is backed by a full one year manufacturer’s warranty. And there are 16 feet of cable connecting the solar panel to the light fixture. Screws are also included for mounting the light and solar panel on your wall of choice.
A remote control option would add to this light’s convenience, especially given that it is a wall mounted light – to change the settings manually, you have to dismount the light each and every time. The inclusion of ground stakes would also enhance it’s versatility, allowing you to install the light and solar panel on horizontal surfaces. Because of these shortcomings, the Litom 54 LEDs light doesn’t quite take the cake as the best wall mounted solar motion light on the market today.
If you feel like the previous light by Litom isn’t powerful enough and you need something to illuminate a larger area such as a porch, deck or patio, then definitely check out this light – Albrillo wall mounted solar motion light.
The unit is a bit more expensive but also is more powerful producing about 500 lumens of light from 38 LED diodes. 500 lumens of light is pretty decent if we consider that some much higher costing lights produce only few hundred lumens more, so there are lots of applications where you could use this solar motion sensor light.
The unit itself is made from plastic as you would expect at this price range, however, the manufacturer is stating that this fixture has got an IP65 rating, which you mostly see on high power solar flood lights with aluminum housings. Whether or not this fixture is fully waterproof we cannot tell you, but it seems to hold up very well in all sorts of weather conditions. The solar light comes with two mounting screws allowing to easily attach it to practically any wall, and also, if you don’t want to drill holes, you can easily use a double-sided outdoor tape to attach it to a wall (not recommended in winter and in stormy areas).
Albrillo solar wall light is powered by a 2.5W solar panel that charges 4400 mAh lithium-ion batteries. The unit is supplied with two 2200 mAh lithium-ion batteries, which are 18650 type ones, so it will be easy and cheap to get a replacement when they wear out. 4400 mAh capacity is really good for such light and can easily power it from dusk to dawn when batteries are fully charged.
Strong long light mode – continuous illumination from dusk to dawn (or until the batteries die).
These settings are very similar to ones provided by the Litom solar light, with the only noticeable difference being that this solar light illuminates for 20 seconds when motion is detected while Litom light only for 15 seconds.
What is different, however, is the way you change modes on this light. As mentioned there is a small button right next to the motion sensor which you must press for about 3 seconds to turn the light on and then press it again one, two or three times to change the lighting modes. We actually didn’t like this mechanism and much better preferred the switch on the Litom light, however, the placement of the button on Albrillo light is in a much better and easy to reach position than it was on the Litom light.
The situation with the manufacturer/brand of the fixture is very similar to the previous light, however, Albrillo says that they will provide an 18-month warranty for the product, which is very rear for a solar light (usual warranty period of a solar light is 12 months).
All in all, this is a very good solar wall mounted light which will illuminate your front doors, porch, deck, patio, shed or any other place at night. While the motion sensor itself works very well, we didn’t like the button that you have to use to change the lighting modes, because it sometimes confuses you which setting you have actually turned on. On the other hand, the button itself is placed in a very convenient and easy to access place in front of the light.
The LAMPAT 62 LED wall mounted solar motion light is a motion sensor light with two lighting modes. And with 62 LED pieces and wide-angle light beam design, it will provide excellent coverage and security to your yard. However, it is not as bright as some comparable lights out there on the market, and there aren’t as many working modes and lighting options either.
The InnoGear Wall Light delivers a super bright 450 lumens of light to your yard, and comes with 4 working modes, including full brightness, half brightness, dim mode and motion sensor lighting modes – it certainly is a versatile little light. All installation and mounting equipment are provided, and the solar panel has an exceptional capacity, translating into fast charging and longer lighting times. Drawbacks included lack of remote control option, and plastic design and construction – not as durable as metal.
When to choose budget solar flood lights?
There are so many solar lights out there making it an overwhelming task to find the one that best fits your needs. But sometimes you just need a flood light that can illuminate a decent area, is solar powered, has got a motion sensor and doesn’t cost a fortune. Well for those of you who just want a good solar flood light to install around the house or in the backyard at a reliable price, we have gathered this small list of the best budget solar flood lights under $40.
This is also a very popular solar flood light and features a very similar specs to our Top Pick, the difference being in 60 LED diodes and a cheaper price.
One of the most popular solar flood lights on the market. This fixture is fully equipped with 80 LED diodes, 1W solar panel, 900 mAh battery and a PIR sesnor.
Very good specs at a bargain price. This solar flood lights has got a polycrystalline solar panel, 2000 mAh lithium-ion battery, adjustale mounts and a PIR sensor.
The best solar flood light under $40 definitely is this Sunforce 82080 light. It is also one of the most purchased solar flood lights on the Amazon maintaining a decent 4.2 rating and there are good reasons for this.
First of all Sunforce 82080 is affordable and has got good reviews from thousands of people that are using this fixture. When looking at the light output, you can expect around 800-900 lumens of light from 80 LED diodes, it will light a 20-30 feet area without any problems. If you need to light a larger area, say a backyard or garden, purchase multiple of these lights and install in each corner to give you a large coverage of light.
The fixture itself isn’t anything too fancy, the casing for the fixture, motion sensor, and the solar panel is made from plastic, so you should install the fixture in an area where it is less exposed to any type of water. However, it should withstand any “normal” weather conditions such as rain, snow, hot and cold weather. And at this price range, it is almost impossible to find a fully weatherproof solar flood light. The fixture and the solar panel is pretty easy to install to a vertical surface and the cable length between the solar panel and the fixture is 15 feet giving you enough options to install a solar panel in an optimal place to get the most sunshine throughout the day.
The unit is charged by a 1-watt amorphous solar panel, not the most efficient solar panel on the market, but good enough for this light, and it also helps to keep the price low for the fixture. The power is stored in a 900 mAh Ni-MH battery pack which consists of five AA type batteries. Of course, this is a pretty low capacity battery that would be waistless for a dusk to dawn flood light, but considering that this a motion activated solar flood light that isn’t continuously illuminating but only turns on for few minutes when motion is detected, the battery should be able to power the flood light throughout the night.
Sensitivity – how sensitive the motion detector is or in other words, in how far distances the sensor will pick up motion.
The switch to adjust the sensitivity of the sensor is conveniently placed under to motion sensor, so you don’t have to dismount the light from the wall to access the switch. In the best case scenario, we would love that the light came with a remote control so these settings could be adjusted from a distance, however, this is not expected from a flood light that costs less than $40.
Sunforce is providing a 1 year warranty for this solar flood light.
Sunforce 82080 has got many things we like such a powerful and bright light, adjustable motion sensor with long detection range, rather good solar panel and of course, a very attractive price. However, there were also some drawbacks to the flood light. First, the battery used on this fixture has got a low capacity, meaning that it cannot provide a continuous illumination from dusk to dawn (it also doesn’t come with a dusk to dawn setting), but if you only need a motion activated flood light, this isn’t really a con for you. And second, the housing of flood light is not the most waterproof we have seen, so to prolong the lifetime of the fixture, we would suggest to even further waterproof the fixture by filling all seams with silicone and installing the fixture in an area where it is not constantly exposed to water that could damage the flood light.
If, for some reason, the Sunforce 82080 we reviewed previously didn’t fit your requirements or simply isn’t available, the next best budget solar flood light we can recommend is Sunforce 82156.
When comparing it to the other Sunfoce light, this unit has got 20 LEDs less which results in about 50-100 lumens less brightness (you will hardly notice the difference) producing a total of 850 lumens of light, and it is also few dollars cheaper. The area of usage for both of these lights is pretty similar, so it basically comes down whether you need a little brighter flood light for few dollars more or can easily live with this 60 LED model.
When we look at other specifications of the fixture beside the light output, it is powered by a similar 1-watt amorphous solar panel which charges the same Ni-MH five AA battery pack with 900 mAh capacity. However, because this light has got 20 LED diodes less than the other fixture but the same solar panel and battery, you can expect it to run a little bit longer with one charge. The manufacturer has indicated that it can illuminate at maximum brightness for about 45 minutes continuously and because this is a motion activated flood light, you can expect it to be able to last throughout the night.
The unit itself this time is made from a mixture of aluminum and plastic materials, which we don’t think has any impact on the durability or waterproofness of the fixture, however, it looks a little bit better than all plastic light and feels more durable at the same time. It also has got a 15 feet cable to connect the solar panel to the fixture giving you enough installation options for the fixture.
PIR motion sensor used on Sunforce 82156 is very similar to the one used on Sunforce 82080, it can detect motion in up to 30 feet distance in a 180-degree range around the fixture. You can also adjust the Lux (level of darkness required to turn the light on), Time (for how long the fixture will illuminate after motion has been detected) and Sensitivity (in what range the motion sensor will pick up motion). The motion sensor can also be adjusted horizontally and vertically. The fixture itself, however, can only be adjusted vertically, so you may need some additional mounting if you also want to be able to adjust it horizontally.
Manufacturer Sunforce provides a 1 year warranty for this solar flood light.
The first thing we believe could be improved with this fixture is its waterproofness. Depending on the area you live and quality of the unit you’ve received, there is a high chance that you won’t face any problems such as water damage for many years of usage. However, if the area you’re living is common to have long or hard downpours, wet winters or similar weather conditions, we recommend that you improve the waterproofing of the fixture, motion sensor and solar panel by sealing seams with silicone or similar sealant. It won’t take you much time but will ensure that the fixture continues to work as intended in any weather conditions. Also, one minor problem we found with this solar flood light (which is very common for cheaper lighting fixtures) is that the mounting hardware (screws for attaching the light and solar panel) is pretty bad, we would recommend you to go to the local hardware store and purchase more durable and longer lasting screws that would secure the fixture on a wall or roof in any weather conditions.
Here is another equally good solar flood light – Robust Solar 80 LED. It is a bit more expensive when compared to both Sunforce lights, however it also offers few additional features such as a polycrystalline solar panel, a bit higher capacity lithium-ion battery and more adjustability for the fixture.
Starting with the brightness, this solar flood light outputs pretty decent amount of light, 80 LED diodes produce around 700-800 lumens of bright white light. When comparing this model with both Sunforce flood lights, it is very difficult to tell the difference between all three of them in terms of brightness, so this light, similar to both Sunforce models, will lit an approx. 15-25 feet area.
As a plus, this light uses a polycrystalline solar panel, although the wattage is similar to Sunforce models – 1 watt. The battery used in this unit is 2000 mAh lithium-ion, the same 18650 type you will find in many other solar lights. The battery capacity is decent enough to power the light throughout the night, and because this is a motion activated flood light only, there is no option to set it to illuminate continuously from dusk to dawn. Manufacturer states that you will get about 200 triggers of 60-second illumination with a full charge, which seems to be right considering the battery capacity of the flood light.
Robust Solar 80 LED solar flood light’s construction is made from both plastic and metal materials, for example, the housing of the fixture is made from metal while the mount, motion sensor, and solar panel frame are made from plastic. The cable connecting solar panel to the flood light is approx. 16 feet long. One thing we really liked about this light is that its mounting hardware allows to adjust the fixture not only vertically, but also horizontally, so you don’t have to make any additional mounts if you want to adjust the lighting angle to one of the sides. The motion sensor can also be adjusted vertically and horizontally.
The PIR motion sensor has got two adjustable settings – Lux and Time. Lux setting allows to set the level of darkness needed for light to start working and Time setting allows to set the time of how long the fixture will illuminate when it has detected a motion. You can set the illumination time from 3 seconds up to 10 minutes.
Robust Solar has a very good customer service and they also provide a 1-year warranty for their flood light.
The thing we didn’t like the most about this solar flood light was the mounting hardware that is made out of plastic and does not seem that durable. Most people will be fine with this mounting hardware and won’t notice any problems, but those living in areas with higher winds and storms might consider upgrading it to something more durable, probably made from metal. The second thing we didn’t like (which is very common to cheaper lights) are the poor quality screws for installing the unit. We definitely recommend changing them to more durable ones that you can find in your local hardware store. And last, the motion sensor doesn’t allow to adjust the sensitivity in opposite to both Sunforce lights, which is a useful feature if you need to adjust the detection range and distance, for example, to only pick up motion from humans (and ignore animals) or to pick up motion from humans and also from smaller animals.
The Magictec COB Lights are solar powered with a long working time, and two lighting modes including a sensor lighting mode for warding of intruders. It is super bright, with 600 lumens maximum light output. These are some of the most affordable lights of this sort out there today. However, the plastic construction is a bit flimsy and lightweight, and there is no remote control included either. And there aren’t as many working modes as you get with some other lights out there.
Frostfire Digital 80 LED Solar Flood Light – Another light which is worth looking at is this 80 LED Solar Flood Light by Frostfire. What caught our attention to this product is the digital control panel for motion sensor that not only allows to adjust the Time and Lux settings, but also shows the current battery level, which is a very useful feature that we didn’t find in practically any other solar light.
I’m looking for a solar light that can provide 15000 lumens brightness. But I don’t know if there really exists one like this. Could you help me check if there is one?
My field of expertise is mostly with regular household solar flood lights which don’t usually produce more than 2000 lumens of light. The thing with these very high power solar lights is that they are way too expensive for an average homeowner, because you need a high capacity solar panels (that not only take up a lot of space but also are expensive) and large battery packs which also take up space and are difficult to transport due to their weight.
Now, for a solar light that can produce 15000-20000 lumens I would either look for a custom solution (maybe attaching light to an existing solar system) or for specifically designed area lighting. There are few Chinese solar lights that claim to reach 20000 lumen brightness which I have never tested or owned so I cannot say anything about quality of these lights or accuracy of their lumens measuring.
And another company that rents out high power solar lights is this – http://www.solarlightingtower.com/. You can contact them and maybe they will be able to assist you better than I would regarding high powered solar lighting.
Hope that this helped you at least a bit and good luck for finding the light you are looking for.
This is a good resource. Thank you!
This is the only site I came across that gave actual honest reviews and comparisons of different lights, including cons. It’s especially valuable to get in impression of water proofed-ness, and “real world” light coverage comparisons. Thanks!
the mounting bracket that holds the solar panel for the 80 LED solar flood light. I need the bracket that holds the solar panel. where can I buy one or two of these brackets? I don’t want to buy another whole light just because the plastic tube that holds the solar panel can’t be fixed or repaired.
If you’re talking about the Robust Solar 80 LED light than the first thing I would suggest you to do is to contact the manufacturer directly and they should assist you with this problem and even replace the bracket if the light is still under warranty. Contact them here.
If this doesn’t help, I’m afraid you will need to come up with some DIY solution, because most of these small solar lighting manufacturers usually don’t sell spare parts for their lights.
This article is very helpful for me and I really appreciate the detail. I have a backyard area that I would like to light up on command (not all night long – i.e. have an on/off switch). The reason is to allow kids to play outside when it gets dark early. Would the MicroSolar IP65 120 LED do the trick you think? I am not looking to light a statue or have a sensor or anything like that. Just light an area for some kid play time in my backyard since it gets dark at 5:15 where I am. Thanks!!!
As for the light, the MicroSolar 120 LED unit is a great light, but whether it is the correct option for you depends on the area you need to illuminate.
Perhaps if you have a small background and need to illuminate a small area for you kid to play, you may choose a cheaper and less powerful option. On the other hand, if you want decent enough illumination, this may be the best choice.
Great article thank you! I think I am in a similar situation to Mike who commented above. I would like a solar light with an easy on/off option (wire a switch thats easy to reach every day or a remote) to light a barn in my very dark backyard. Hard wiring isn’t an option. I want to light the inside and out with reasonable brightness. Should I look into battery powered LEDs for the inside of the barn? It’s only about 40ft long and open to the outside so some light from outdoor flood lights would come in. Any tips would be appreciated!
Yes, Liz, battery-powered LEDs could be a great option for you if hard wiring isn’t really an option for you. But I would recommend you also look into solar shed lights. These lights not only come with a wire switch but also don’t require any wiring. Just place the solar panel outdoor, the light indoor and use it without having to change the batteries for the light every few months.
I’ve considered solar flood lights but didn’t know how useful they could be for home safety. I was really happy to learn about the all-weather suitability of the Guardian 580x. Finding quality solar flood lights is very important and I’m really grateful for your reviews!
I think the Sunforce 200 dual motion solar light is the best of its kind on the market, but it is not readily available. The one store that had the best price is completely out of stock. In short, this model is the latest from sunforce. It is smaller than the previous models and it looks so much better.
I agree, Marge, the Sunforce 200 dual motion solar light does look really, really good. | 2019-04-20T05:13:44Z | https://www.ledwatcher.com/best-solar-flood-lights/ |
You can try to cope with the fungus on the nails of the legs folk remedies. However, such treatment will be effective only when the first symptoms appear (see pictures ), i.e. in the initial stages of the lesion of the nail plate, and then, not always.
We strongly recommend that you consult a doctor or use pharmaceutical preparations .
Alcohol iodine solution - the most popular means of treating nails fungus in the home. Let's explain why. This strong antiseptic has proven fungicidal properties.
In addition, iodine is able to force proteins to curl, destroy them.
This property helps iodine to fight fungal diseases, because reliably known - the fungus has a protein structure.
Iodine kills most types of fungi, but not all.
Iodine can provoke allergies, so one day before the onset of the intended course of treatment, drop a drop of iodine at the elbow bend. Contraindication to treatment is the occurrence of itching or redness. In this case, try another popular method of treating fungus.
Iodine procedures contribute to the staining of the nail in yellow.
Burns, dermatitis , and even thyroid problems are possible.
The drug is suitable only for nails affected by fungal infection in the initial stage, when less than 1/3 of the nail is affected by the fungus.
Now you know how to treat nail fungus with iodine, and it's time to choose the appropriate recipe.
Option number 1. 5% alcohol solution should be applied twice a day, one drop to the affected nail. Make it comfortable with a cotton swab. Iodine is also applied to healthy nails, but in a smaller dosage: one drop in two days.
Option number 2. Add iodine to the basin with hot water and steam your legs in it for 10 minutes. Then the infected pieces of nails are cut off, and 3% hydrogen peroxide is applied to the skin. Completes the procedure of applying a bandage with antibacterial ointment.
Option number 3. The course is 6 weeks. The first two weeks the nails are treated with fucorcin twice a day, the next two with iodine solution, and the last two - with 9% vinegar.
Option number 4. In a separate container (suitable medical bubble) pour 1 tsp. iodine, nitrofungin , acetic essence, garlic juice. The resulting mixture should be lubricated with the damaged nail, pre-steam it and cut the loose part. The drug is applied at night, before applying be sure to shake.
Option number 5. Course - 1 month. Every evening you need to do a 30-minute salt bath (for 1 liter of hot water, 2 tablespoons of sea salt and 1 tablespoon of soda). After half an hour, without removing the legs from the water, the affected areas of the skin and nails are polished with a nail file or cut with scissors. Then you should wash your feet with soap, put gloves on your hands and treat the entire surface of the foot, nail rollers, areas between your fingers with iodine. On nails that are affected by the fungus, iodine is applied three times, waiting for each layer to dry.
Iodine treatment usually lasts about 2 months.
Whatever recipe you use, remember: you cannot handle healthy and fungal nails with the same tools! Otherwise, the fungi will move to a healthy nail plate.
From the tea fungus, immersed for 7-8 days in a sugar solution, it turns out healing sour-sweet drink. It has many medicinal properties, among them the ability to kill pathogenic bacteria and retard their growth.
That is why traditional healers use Kombucha to treat fungal nail infections.
Kombucha can be used in two ways: by rubbing in and applying a compress.
Rubbing in Free a small piece of tea fungus from the films and grind to a state of gruel. It should be rubbed into the nail plate affected by the fungus, 2-3 times a day.
Compresses. Separate one layer from Kombucha, soak it in water. On this preparation for applying the compress finished. In the evening, a piece of fungus should be applied in the nail plate, put cellophane on top of it and put on 2-3 socks so as not to soil the bedclothes. The pain arising in the first few procedures, for the sake of recovery is worth enduring.
In the morning, the compress is removed, feet are washed in warm water, and then proceed to the removal of dead nail pieces. The damaged surface is smeared with a strong solution of potassium permanganate or brilliant green. Treatment of nail fungus with Kombucha continues 3-7 days, and another 1-2 days for prophylactic purposes.
And yes, according to official medicine, the effectiveness of this tool is questionable.
Copper sulfate fans of folk healing methods used for the treatment of infectious diseases, and for the treatment of nail fungus on the legs . Often, the treatment of nail fungus with copper sulphate is combined with medication.
1. Solution of blue vitriol. Prepare it like this: in 1 l. boiled water dissolve 1 tsp. vitriol. This is a concentrated solution, so it must be diluted before use - 1 tablespoon of the solution in 1.5 liters of water.
Add the required amount of solution.
Dip your feet in the bath for 10-15 minutes.
Treat nail plates with means prescribed by a doctor.
2. Ointment. Copper sulfate (1 tsp) is heated in a frying pan until it changes color - it should turn white or gray. Then we mix taken also on 1 tsp. yellow sulfur powder, tar (or goose fat). All components are mixed and heated. The resulting ointment is applied to the sick nails.
Birch tar - a product obtained by dry distillation of birch bark. It is successfully used as an antiseptic and anti-inflammatory agent. Treatment of nail fungus with birch tar is also effective, because it perfectly softens the horny skin. Folk healers propose to lubricate the skin with pure birch tar, as well as apply a mixture prepared on a basis of tar and agitated.
Natural birch tar is applied on the pre-treated feet: they are steamed in a soapy bath (15 minutes), after which the nails affected by the fungus are cut off and the dead skin from the feet is removed. The interdigital areas are wiped dry, and a birch tar is rubbed onto the affected areas with a cotton swab.
For 1.5 hours you should not move and put shoes on anything. The ointment should be absorbed into the skin when air is admitted. Then socks made of natural materials are put on the feet. After 2-3 days, wash your feet in cold water and soap and repeat the procedure again. During treatment can be treated with birch tar and insoles.
Treatment of nail fungus with tar is also possible with an ointment. For its preparation, you should take any fatty basis (baby cream, for example, or interior fat), and add tar to it. At the beginning of treatment, its concentration should not exceed 5%. Subsequently, you can use up to 15-20% of the tar.
Some prefer to use sulfur tar tar ointment. It consists of 3 parts of tar, 2 parts of sulfur powder and 10 parts of fat base. These components are preheated and mixed until uniform. This ointment is applied to the nail, and put a patch on top.
The most convenient way to use the talker. It consists of glycerin and tar, taken in 50 ml, and 70 ml. alcohol. The ingredients are mixed in a dark dish and grease the affected nails several times a day.
About 10% of birch tar is contained in tar soap. Yes, it smells unpleasant, but the skin is well disinfected and quickly restored. Here are a few options for using tar soap.
Option 1. Foot bath. Tar tar grated, measure out 2 tbsp. This amount is brought to complete dissolution in 2 liters of hot water, and then immersed in the solution of the legs for 15-20 minutes.
Option 2. 1 tbsp. rubbed soap slightly diluted with water, add 2 tsp. baking soda and actively stirred. The resulting mixture is rubbed into the affected nail. Do it once a day with a hard tooth brush.
Option 3. Nails are thoroughly soaped with tar soap, and nails are sprinkled with edible salt over the foam. Fingers and feet wrapped with a bandage for aesthetic reasons. In the morning, remove the bandage and wash your feet with warm water. It is believed that in a week the fungus should recede.
Table salt disinfects pathogenic microflora, and the sea helps to soften the nail and acts like an antiseptic.
This is not about treatment, but only about adjuvant therapy.
Salt and soda should be dissolved in cold water. Ingredients are taken in a spoon. Session - 10 minutes, after which the feet are washed with warm water.
Bath salt and vinegar are made every day. The solution is made from 100 grams. salt (sea or salt), 4 liters of water and 4. tbsp. vinegar.
An effective method is the application of salt to the affected nail plates mixed with crushed mint .
A cotton swab dipped in a solution of concentrated sea salt (a spoonful of salt in a glass of water) is applied to the nail for a couple of minutes. At the end of the procedure, the feet are washed with soda water. The course of treatment is 10 days, while burning and itching are considered normal.
Baths with sea salt and essential oils are also made for 10 days. They will need to fill the basin with hot water at the rate of 1 l. water 1.5 tbsp. salt, stir until salt crystals are completely dissolved and add at the rate of 1 l. water or 1 tsp. essential oil, or 1 tsp lemon, or 0.25 ml. iodine. The course is once a day for 10 days in a row, then a break for 2-3 days.
Launched nail fungus treated with garlic water. For its preparation in a glass of water dissolve a spoonful of salt and a crushed clove of garlic. After complete cooling of the solution is filtered, and add another 4 tbsp. salt. Garlic water lesions are treated twice a day.
A packet of salt is poured into a bowl, dipped into the water and rubbed with salt. Then, dry salt is collected wet, the remains are shaken off with a brush.
The fungus dies in an acidic environment. That is why vinegar is very popular with those who want to get rid of fungal nail infections. Treatment of nail fungus with acetic acid can help even in particularly advanced cases . But you need to prepare for a long course of treatment and possible burns.
The easiest way to use vinegar is to wet their nails, put on thick socks made of natural material and go to bed. You can mix in equal proportions iodine and 9% vinegar, and lubricate the resulting solution nail plate and feet.
Like any strong acid, vinegar kills the fungus. And just like any acid, it can cause burns. Before embarking on such treatment, ask yourself why it is impossible to buy a pharmacy remedy instead of vinegar?
Components: a basin with water, 250 ml. vinegar (table or apple). The principle of treatment and duration: the water is heated, pour vinegar, lower legs and hover before bed for 10-15 minutes. Feet wipe without rinsing and apply antifungal agents prescribed by the doctor. Make these baths every 2 days.
Ingredients: Vinegar 9%. The principle of treatment and duration: moisten a cotton swab in vinegar, squeeze it and attach it to the nail affected by the fungus. The tampon should not protrude beyond the limits of the nail. Fasten a cotton swab with adhesive tape, put on a sock. The course of treatment is 7 days, a session 1 time per day, then a break for 2-3 days.
Components: 2 tbsp. essences, 3 chicken proteins (alternative - 1 tbsp of glycerin), 2 tbsp. vodka. The principle of treatment and duration: the solution is wetted with gauze or cotton swab, which is then applied to the affected nail plate for 15 minutes. The course of treatment is 6-12 months, the procedure is every day.
Ingredients: vegetable oil, apple cider vinegar in equal proportions. The principle of treatment and duration: a gauze tampon is moistened with a solution, which for convenience is fixed with a plaster. Apply until a new nail grows.
Components: 2 tbsp. spoons of 70-% vinegar, 1 tbsp. dimethyl phthalate, 1 tbsp. glycerin, 1 tbsp. olive oil. The principle of treatment and duration: after thorough mixing of the components, the ointment is ready for use. It should be applied once a day on the nail plate with massage movements (you can use a cotton swab). Next, a plastic bag and socks are put on the feet. In the morning, wash your feet with soap in warm water.
Celandine - a poisonous plant, but if used in reasonable quantities, you can quickly cope with the fungus of toenails, even in advanced cases. Herbal therapists are advised to use both celandine juice and medicinal baths, ointments and tinctures to fight the fungus. Here are a few options for their preparation.
Fresh celandine is passed through a meat grinder, and juice is squeezed out of the resulting pulp (this is done through 3-4 layers of gauze). It should be about 200 ml. juice. It is combined with 200 ml. 70% alcohol and insist 24 hours. The prepared juice is used to lubricate the affected nails, but the treatment is carried out only after a 10-minute steaming of the legs and their complete drying. To do 3-4 treatments per day. Treatment, as always, is carried out until the healthy nail grows.
In the foot bath add an infusion of celandine. Prepare it like this: in a liter of boiling water brewed for 15-20 minutes 100 grams. dried celandine . After filtering the infusion is ready to use. In the bath infusion and water are poured in a 1: 1 ratio. It takes 15-25 minutes to soar the feet.
The composition of the ointment, in addition to 5 drops of juice of the celandine includes 4 tbsp. boiled cooled water, 2 drops of juice of oregano and 2 drops of tincture of calendula . The components are mixed and the resulting ointment is processed nails affected by the fungus, 3 treatments per day.
The celandine from the nail fungus in the form of an alcohol tincture is used very carefully. To prepare the tincture will need vodka and herb celandine in the ratio of 2: 1. The remedy is infused for 12 days and then used for treatment. It is worth starting with 5 drops, gradually increasing their number to 20.
It can be purchased at the pharmacy, or cook yourself. If you follow a more complicated path, then follow the scheme. Dry celandine, put it in a glass jar, pour any oil (for example, sunflower, almond, peach). It should rise above the grass by 2-3 cm (remember the number). Hour mixture should stand in the heat, and then a whole week in a cold and dark place. After 7 days, add the same amount of oil. Now it is ready to use.
Steam out the legs, process with peroxide, then treat the nails (remove the affected plates, cut off the edges) and apply locally the oil of celandine. The course is until complete recovery.
The components are thoroughly mixed (until the soap and soda will not dissolve), and then the feet hover for 15-20 minutes. The procedure ends with cutting the nails, cleansing the affected areas, applying antifungal agents to dried nails and feet. The course is a procedure in 3-4 days.
It should be said that soda is used for douching in intimate fungus , because copes well with fungi of the genus Candida on the mucous. Its use for the treatment of nails remains a big question.
The required amount of soda diluted with water to a thick slurry. Mix thoroughly until smooth. Soda paste is applied a layer of the same thickness on the nail. On top of the soda drip a few drops of lemon juice. The result will be a slight tingling and the formation of characteristic bubbles. After five minutes, the paste is removed by washing the feet with warm water and soap.
Treatment of nail fungus with soda must be combined with treatment with antifungal ointments.
Immediately, we note that the treatment of nail fungus with hydrogen peroxide is very doubtful. This tool only disinfects the affected nail and softens it, which allows drugs to penetrate unhindered deep into the nail plate. If you do not use peroxide when treating the foot or cutting the nail, then you can bring even more infections.
We list the most popular ways to use hydrogen peroxide.
Helps soften the nail before being treated with antifungal drugs. After steaming, apply a cotton wool dipped in hydrogen peroxide on the fungus-affected nail. The procedure is repeated twice a day for 3-4 weeks.
Make an aqueous solution with 3% hydrogen peroxide and put his legs in it for 2 minutes. At the end of the procedure, the nail plates are smeared with a slurry of water and peroxide.
1. The author refers to the words of a certain “professor” Neumyvakin, who says (quote): “atomic oxygen kills onco-cells, and normal cells flourish and live” - yes it smacks of a Nobel prize, ladies and gentlemen! Doctors all over the world have been fighting cancer for many decades, but it turns out that everything is so simple!
2. The author spent the procedure for several months, honestly stating that it is painful and unpleasant, and peroxide, even 3%, eats away at the skin. There are no questions about the duration of the treatment. If you have started your nails , you need to smear them until the new ones grow. But there is another question: Why do this if you can, instead of peroxide, buy ointment for 50 rubles in the same pharmacy and carry out much less painful procedures?
In general, take pity on your health.
Onions, garlic and lemon - plants with the broadest antimicrobial action.
Onion oil. 2 tbsp. onion peel and 3 tbsp. vegetable oil combine, insist 3 weeks (shaking occasionally). Lesions smeared with oil 3-4 times a day.
Onion tincture. 4 tbsp. onion peel (minced) infused in 200 ml. Vodka 10-14 days in total darkness and coolness. Nails are treated with tincture 3-4 times a day.
Garlic solution. Water, garlic juice and alcohol are taken in a ratio of 10: 1: 1. The solution is shaken and applied to the nails 2-3 times a day. Store the solution in the refrigerator.
Lemon compress. Treatment of nail fungus with lemon is an overlay on a nail of a crushed lemon (1/4 is enough) steamed in a bath (1 1/4 is enough) and 1 tsp. vegetable oil. The mixture is covered with parchment paper, and a wool sock is put on top. Repeat every day for 2 weeks. Warning: can be used only in the absence of purulent discharge.
..or worth trusting traditional medicine .
I tried peroxide and iodine - zero full. The fungus grew as it grew. I decided to stop practicing self-treatment and went to the doctor. I have been treated with mycozan and now I’m just putting it on my nails so that I don’t get it again when I go out somewhere where I can pick it up.
A good way, I will try, if I fasten the fungus))) Then accomplish your goal! All health, good luck and not get sick!
My mother tried to treat the fungus with vinegar essence. I do not know exactly what and how she did, but the burn was not weak. I mean, you need to follow the formula exactly and follow all the recommendations.
My mother is the same as yours and also decided to recover in one day) and how did she remove the burn then ??
Some of the recipes are just stupid (for example, it’s completely incomprehensible why copper sulfate should be poured or lemon juice dripped on soda - both measures with so-called preservation of the active substance are meaningless), and all those based on the use of iodine solution are EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. Competent endocrinologists have long explained that this lung leads to the development of autoimmune thyroiditis. But AIT, unlike fungi, is 100% for life.
“Itching and light burning sensation. It speaks of a healing action. ”- don't make laughs! It speaks of a chemical burn!
People, do not mess with iodine! It is very serious!
In 1 ml of iodine tincture of iodine is approximately 500 times the daily rate of an adult!
- ultraviolet blood irradiation, magnetic therapy, laxatives and applicators - a complete set for charlottes.
Ivan Pavlovich Neumyvakin - Doctor of Medical Sciences, professor, full member of the European and Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, International Academy of Informatization and Energy Information Sciences, medical-technical sciences, Honored Inventor of Russia, State Prize laureate, has received numerous awards. This is such a "quack"!
Please do not confuse R.A.E.N. and, for example R.A.N. or other state academies.
“The Russian Academy of Natural Sciences is a solid linden, it is a voluntary organization, to which go those who have not been chosen at the RAS or other real academies” - the words of V. L. Ginzburg, a Nobel laureate and academician of the RAS.
Cured old fungus for 2 weeks essential oil of cloves. Cut down a nail file under a zero and dripped 2 times a day.
For 2 weeks, the new nail has grown?
I treated the nail fungus with hydrogen peroxide, but I have to be patient, I did this: cut the disc into 4 parts and wet it with hydrogen peroxide every quarter, applied it to the sick nail and wrapped it with tape twice so that the peroxide did not dry out longer. After 2 such procedures, the nail softens and It is very easy to cut off. I started somewhere in July, but now the nail has grown new and completely healthy. But I still take Fluconazole 1 capsule per week ..
"I still take Fluconazole 1 capsule per week .."
every second soldier. I lasted a year, but then also picked up.
Since the disease showed signs of an epidemic, we read the order for the group of troops.
“I didn’t run around in the morning dew” I didn’t have to run, but they said that it was good. I just burned my fungus. He poured aviation kerosene on his feet several times (5-6). I remembered him in two months, there was nothing - a clean stop!
Running barefoot in the dew often leads to infection with the fungus.
From the itch well helps "dead" water, just wipe with a swab moistened with water at least once a day and the itch disappears almost immediately. From the nail fungus also helps - to work once or twice a week. Water is easy to get at home (see “live and dead” water).
The second recipe: to treat the nail with a rust neutralizer (sold in auto parts), it contains a weak orthophosphoric acid, which kills the fungus. I thus got rid of the started (left under the skin) fungi of the thumbs. To carry out processing having moistened with a tampon (I used a cotton swab) once or twice a month, removing the old nail.
Do not you feel sorry for yourself, people?
Do you have nail fungus? Because tablets without external agents for nail fungus is not prescribed.
We still need droplets or varnish, they are used regularly, according to the instructions, until a healthy nail grows.
If the lesion is large, the affected part of the nail can be removed with nails or similar preparations.
And it is also very important to disinfect shoes and maintain hygiene.
Fukortsinom from Tula FarmFactory cured. Issue price of about 60 rubles.
I was diagnosed with diabetes. This summer, I noticed that I had a rash under my arms. I went to the doctor. The doctor diagnosed it as candida skin. Perhaps due to metabolic disorders. Binafin wrote. After taking the pills for two weeks, the skin again became normal.
I often go to the pool to keep fit. At one point, I noticed that the fingers on my left foot turned white. At first I thought that from chlorinated water. Then the edge of the nail began to crumble. At the reception, the doctor said that onychomycosis, I may have picked up a fungus in the shower. He first prescribed exoderil, but there was no improvement. He offered lamizil first, but warned him that he was expensive. Asked for the medicine cheaper. The doctor prescribed the pill binafin. By the way, 2.5 times cheaper. She has been taking binafin for almost 5 months. Long treatment, of course, but now the nails are fine, and I again go to the pool.
I will comment, if I may.
Tablets are rarely prescribed for such long courses. In the instructions for binafin - a maximum of 12 weeks with nail fungus. Then you need a break.
Father and mother from April to September in the country. All summer I spent in rubber boots, then rain, then watering the garden, and in the morning for mushrooms. Returned from the cottage, my father began to complain that the nails were crumbled. Forced to go to the doctor. Binafin wrote. He took a long time, forgot to take, was a relapse, but now everything is fine. | 2019-04-22T00:42:28Z | http://en.primalinstinctpheromone.com/narodnye-sredstva-ot-gribka-nogtej-na-nogax_default.htm |
During the past two decades, studies of the Aso volcano in Japan have improved our understanding of the shallow hydrothermal system that exists beneath the active crater of this volcano. Detailed knowledge of the subsurface structure of this volcanic edifice is essential for developing a better understanding of the behavior of the volcanic fluids and of the triggering mechanism of volcanic eruptions. Here, we report a three-dimensional (3-D) electrical resistivity model for the active crater of the Nakadake central cone of Aso volcano using audio-frequency magnetotelluric (AMT) data obtained during 2004–2005. The AMT data were collected at 43 sites on a grid (distance between grid points: ~ 300 m) around the crater. However, as yet, only two-dimensional sectional resistivity models have been generated for this survey area. Using 3-D inversion, we obtain a resistivity model that shows similar characteristics to those of the 2-D models. A highly conductive zone is observed beneath the active crater down to a depth of approximately 300 m. Based on the recent findings regarding the shallow hydrothermal system of the volcano, we interpret this conductive zone to have been formed by highly conductive acidic fluids filling a fractured region. This view modifies the past interpretation made on the 2-D models and promotes understanding of fluid behavior beneath the active crater.
The online version of this article ( https://doi.org/10.1186/s40623-019-1017-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Knowledge on the subsurface structure is essential for a better understanding of the volcanic activity. In particular, the triggering mechanism and/or the style of eruptions greatly depend on whether the fluid within the volcanic edifice is involved or not (e.g., Schmincke 2004). Distribution and behavior of the fluid within a volcano is regulated by the hydrothermal system developed in the shallow subsurface, and electrical resistivity has often been used to determine its characteristics (e.g., Pellerin et al. 1996). This paper provides basic information on the structure of hydrothermal system from the detailed resistivity distribution beneath the active crater of Aso volcano.
Aso volcano in southwestern Japan (Fig. 1a, b) has registered repeated eruptions from the first crater of Nakadake, one of the volcano’s central cones, over the past 80 years. The volcanic activity is known to have the following cycle (e.g., Sudo et al. 2006). During a quiet period, the active crater (first crater) is filled with hot hyperacidic water (water temperature > 50 °C, pH < 1.0; Ohsawa et al. 2010), forming a crater lake. As the volcanic activity increases, the crater lake gradually dries as a result of heat supplied from the deep subsurface, and a red-hot glow becomes visible in the bottom or wall of the crater. Then, the vent opens and phreatic eruptions or mud eruptions occur. After repeating the Strombolian-type eruption for a period, the volcano again forms a crater lake. The time scale of this activity cycle is different in each case.
Kanda et al. (2008) presumed that some mechanism of accumulating energy for an eruption must be present at a shallow depth beneath the crater in order to repeat such an activity cycle and that such a mechanism should be detectable physically as a characteristic subsurface structure. In this context, the authors performed audio-frequency magnetotelluric (AMT) surveys on Aso volcano in 2004 and 2005. The data were acquired on a grid around the Nakadake crater system, but only two-dimensional (2-D) cross sections along multiple lines crossing the crater were constructed because it was difficult to perform three-dimensional (3-D) analysis at that time. Kanda et al. (2008) found that the volcanic edifice generally showed resistivities lower than 30–50 Ωm, with further conductive portions being found at elevations of 800–1100 m below the first crater and extending to the third crater, and at elevations ranging from − 400 to 800 m. In contrast, relatively high resistivities were detected under the fourth crater, which is not presently active. Kanda et al. (2008) discussed this difference in resistivity structure in terms of spatial variations in recent and present volcanic activity.
Several recent studies of Aso volcano have investigated the crater lake, one of the surface manifestations of the hydrothermal system. Miyabuchi and Terada (2009) analyzed lacustrine sediments collected from the bottom of the crater lake and found that the total sulfur content of the sediments was extremely high. The sediments contained small amounts of unaltered fresh glass, suggesting that magma had been released even during apparently quiet periods. Terada et al. (2012) studied the hydrothermal system of the volcano by investigating the heat and mass balances of the crater lake. Fluids composed of a mixture of groundwater and high-temperature volcanic gases ascend through a crack-like conduit, which was inferred to be a source of long-period tremors (Yamamoto et al. 1999), and are continuously supplied to the crater bottom even during quiet periods. Shinohara et al. (2018) analyzed salt shell fallout around the crater during the 2014 ash eruption and surmised that a hydrothermal system was present in the vicinity of the conduit even during the period of magmatic eruption.
As mentioned above, new information regarding the hydrothermal system has been generated since the publication of the 2-D resistivity structure models in 2008. Thus, it is timely to update the subsurface images around the crack-like conduit beneath the active crater (first crater) of Aso into a 3-D model by reanalyzing the AMT data obtained near the Nakadake crater system in 2004 and 2005. The objective of this study is to construct the 3-D resistivity structure model and interpret it based on the recent information.
AMT surveys were conducted around the Nakadake crater system in 2004 and 2005. Details of those campaigns and data processing are described by Kanda et al. (2008). Here, we briefly summarize the survey scheme. Figure 1c shows the location of the measurement sites used in this study, which are distributed on a sub-grid with a spacing of ~ 300 m. Of the data obtained at 44 AMT measurement sites, we used the data (1–10,000 Hz) at 43 sites, excluding one site where contamination by artificial noise was recognized even in high-frequency bands. High-quality data were generally obtained at frequencies higher than 5 Hz, but some data show the influence of noise caused by nearby buried communication cables or by sightseeing ropeways installed on the volcanic edifice. These affected data were not used during subsequent screening and analysis. The magnetotelluric impedance and the geomagnetic transfer function (tipper) were estimated from the measured electromagnetic field data, and a remote-referencing technique (Gamble et al. 1979) was applied to reduce local noise. This processing allowed us to use data with frequencies of > 2 Hz at many sites.
There are three measurement sites within the crater system, around which there is steep topography. Therefore, we performed 3-D inversion with a finite element code utilizing an unstructured tetrahedral mesh that can incorporate topography into a resistivity model (FEMTIC; Usui 2015; Usui et al. 2017). This code has been applied successfully to volcanic areas at Asama volcano (Usui et al. 2017) and Hakone volcano (Yoshimura et al. 2018).
The full components of the impedance tensor and tipper were used as the input data for inversion. The error floor was set to 5% for impedance and 10% for tipper. The number of frequencies used for computation was 16, ranging from 5200 Hz to 2 Hz, which was sampled so as to yield approximately equal intervals on the logarithmic axis among the 40 frequencies at which the response function was calculated. Therefore, the total number of input data was 43 (sites) × 16 (frequencies) × 12 (real and imaginary parts of 4 impedance components and 2 tipper components) = 8256.
The calculation domain was set to 40 km in both the east–west and north–south directions, centered on Nakadake first crater, and 60 km in the vertical direction. The initial model had a 100 Ωm uniform subsurface, and topographic variations were incorporated into the model. The ocean with conductive seawater was not modeled because the maximum skin depth of the data assuming a 1000 Ωm uniform subsurface is much smaller than the distance from the surveyed area to the nearest coastline. The resistivity of the domain above the ground surface (air layer) was fixed at 109 Ωm. Two types of digital elevation data were used: The 10-m-mesh data of the Geospatial Information Authority of Japan was used for the area within 10 km of the first crater, and ETOPO-1 (Amante and Eakins 2009) was used for areas farther from the crater. An interpolated elevation was assigned to each surface node for the two datasets. The mesh size was set to smaller values toward the center of the calculation area and toward the ground surface and was set even more finely near the measurement sites (Fig. 2). In other words, we assigned the edge lengths of a tetrahedral element so as to become shortened as approaching the center of the survey area. As a result, the total number of tetrahedral mesh cells was 137,598 and the minimum size of the mesh was about 40 m along the ground surface. In FEMTIC, resistivity inside a tetrahedral mesh is assumed to be uniform. A single tetrahedron has a single resistivity value, but some of the adjacent tetrahedrons were grouped (forming a resistivity block), and the same resistivity value was assigned to that block. Consequently, the number of resistivity blocks was 10,814, which was fixed throughout the inversion.
During inversion, the objective function, which is a linear combination of the misfit term between the observed data and the model responses, the roughness term of the model, and the distortion term, is minimized (Usui 2015). These three terms are combined by hyper-parameters α2 and β2, where the roughness term and the distortion term are multiplied by α2 and β2, respectively. Thus, we examined seven values (0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 1.0, 3.0, 5.0, and 10.0) for α2 and four values (0.01, 0.03, 0.1, and 0.3) for β2. That is, inversion was performed for a total of 28 combinations of hyper-parameters. The determination of α2 was performed under the L-curve criterion, as done previously (e.g., Patro et al. 2005; Usui et al. 2017). For the seven models obtained by changing α2 with a given β2 value, the data misfit was plotted against the model roughness, and the model that plotted nearest the inflection point of the L-curve was adopted as the preferred model. Regardless of the β2 value, the L-curve showed that the model with α2 = 0.5 was the preferred model. The L-curves for four β2 values are shown in Additional file 1: Fig. S1. Of the four models with α2 = 0.5, the model with β2 = 0.03 yielded the minimum root-mean-square (RMS) misfit, so this model (α2 = 0.5, β2 = 0.03) was adopted as the final resistivity structure model for Aso volcano.
Starting from the initial model (RMS misfit = 7.45), the final model was obtained by the ninth iteration (RMS misfit = 0.88). The fitting of the final model to the data is shown in Fig. 3 for three representative frequencies. Figure 3 shows the elliptical representation of the phase tensor (Caldwell et al. 2004) calculated from all four components of the impedance tensor and the induction arrow (Parkinson 1962), which is a graphical representation of the two tipper components. The final model performs well in explaining all data from high to low frequencies. Fits represented by apparent resistivity, phase, and tipper for all frequencies used for the inversion are shown in Additional file 1: Fig. S2a–e.
Figure 4 shows horizontal sections of the final 3-D resistivity model for six elevations. The figure shows only those meshes that have higher sensitivity and sensitivity density (Usui 2015) than the threshold values, which were determined based on the frequency distribution (Usui et al. 2017; Yoshimura et al. 2018). Histograms of the two quantities and their thresholds are presented in Additional file 1: Fig. S3.
In the horizontal section at 1200 m elevation, highly conductive zones are observed around the eastern margin of the survey area and within the first crater. For the conductor in the eastern margin of the survey area, although we examined various data, the cause has remained unknown and we will not mention it further in this paper. Although low resistivities are also distributed around the margin of Nakadake crater system, high resistivities of up to several hundred ohm-meters are widespread outside the crater. High resistivities are imaged at ~ 1200 m in elevation in the northwest of the crater, which are likely to correspond to the recent pyroclastic cone (Na in Fig. 1c) and the tuff cone (Nc) near the surface.
In the section at 1000 m elevation, although resistive zones probably corresponding to the lava flow of Nakadake (Ny) can be recognized, low resistivities of 10–50 Ωm occur widely over the surveyed area. In particular, there is a low-resistivity zone of ≤ 5 Ωm extending westward from the first crater, and a similar small zone is located to the southwest of the fourth crater. These two conductive zones are connected to each other to form a single conductive zone of ≤ 10 Ωm in the section at 800 m elevation, in which the whole survey area exhibits resistivities of ≤ 50 Ωm, and conductive zones of ≤ 10 Ωm are found in four locations.
In the section at 600 m elevation, the resistivity is low overall, and resistivity regions of ≤ 10 Ωm occupy the majority of the survey area. One of these low-resistivity regions shows resistivities of ≤ 5 Ωm slightly west of the first crater, whereas a region of relatively high resistivity (10–30 Ωm) extends southward from the fourth crater. This pattern becomes more prominent in lower-elevation sections. At an elevation of 300 m, a region with relatively high resistivities (10–30 Ωm) spreads from the south to the east of the fourth crater, and the remainder of the section generally shows resistivities of ≤ 10 Ωm. In particular, a highly conductive region (resistivity of ≤ 5 Ωm) is located to the west of the first crater. A similar pattern can be recognized at an elevation of 0 m, although about half of the mesh shows no sensitivity. These characteristics indicated by the 3-D resistivity model are consistent with those shown by the 2-D cross-sectional models of Kanda et al. (2008), and some of which were examined for their presence by performing sensitivity tests. Details are shown in Additional file 2: Appendix A.
The final 3-D model exhibits a heterogeneous resistivity structure beneath the active crater of Aso volcano. Generally, the surface layer shows high resistivity caused by recent ejecta, whereas low resistivities are widely distributed beneath that layer. However, the resistivity structure is not uniform: the region to the west of the first crater shows low resistivities, whereas the region to the south and east of the fourth crater shows relatively high resistivities. Here, we discuss the relationship between the locations of various anomalies (as estimated from other geophysical observations) and the underground structure and consider the characteristics of the hydrothermal system in the region beneath the active crater.
Seismological studies have proposed a magma supply system for Aso volcano extending from a magma reservoir located at a depth of ~ 6 km about 3 km west of the Nakadake crater system (Tsutsui and Sudo 2004; Sudo et al. 2006). The crack-like conduit (shown as a solid line in Fig. 4) constitutes the uppermost part of this magma supply system and inferred to be filled with a gas-rich fluid (Yamamoto et al. 1999). The 3-D model shows low resistivities of ≤ 10 Ωm at elevations where this crack-like conduit is proposed (0–800 m above sea level), although clear features suggesting the existence of the crack are not obtained. We attribute this conductive zone to the presence of a water-rich zone and altered rocks, as proposed by Kanda et al. (2008). A highly conductive region is imaged in the deep part of the west side of the Nakadake crater system, which is probably related to the seismologically inferred magma supply system through which high-temperature volcanic gases are supplied from the west. The expected higher temperatures beneath the western side are likely to cause a zone of intensive hydrothermal alteration (Kanda et al. 2008).
Low resistivities of several ohm-meters are estimated in the final model to extend from around the upper edge of the crack-like conduit to the bottom of the first crater (from about 850 to 1200 m in elevation; Figs. 4 and 5). Kanda et al. (2008) inferred that this highly conductive region was a hydrothermal reservoir capped with hydrothermally altered rocks of high electrical conductivity and low hydrological permeability. Those authors considered that this capped reservoir acts as a preparation zone for volcanic explosions. Miyabuchi and Terada (2009) reported a high sulfur content (74% by weight) in the lacustrine sediments. This sulfur was present as elemental sulfur, gypsum, and anhydrite. Sulfur is a typical insulator, and the two sulfates are generated in highly acidic environments and exhibit high electrical resistivity (e.g., Guinea et al. 2012). In such highly acidic environments, smectite, which is a typical clay mineral showing low resistivity and low permeability (e.g., Pellerin et al. 1996), is considered to be virtually absent. A similar example is found in the Jigokudani geothermal area of Tateyama volcano (Japan), where AMT measurements imaged high conductivities in the near-surface; however, the soil contained elemental sulfur and similar precipitates generated in a highly acidic environment (pH ~ 1), and smectite has not been detected at Jigokudani (Seki et al. 2016).
Several kinds of tremors are reported to occur around the upper edge of the crack-like conduit and are considered to be a result of fluid movement (e.g., Mori et al. 2008). A study of continuous tremors (CTs) has shown that their sources are located between the upper part of the crack-like conduit and the crater bottom (e.g., Takagi et al. 2009). Ichimura et al. (2018) estimated the sources of CTs observed during the eruptive activity of Aso volcano from December 2013 to January 2014. The CT sources were distributed in a cylindrical shape with a similar diameter to that of the first crater from the crater bottom to a depth of ~ 400 m. As this source region corresponds to the low-resistivity zone estimated by Kanda et al. (2008), Ichimura et al. (2018) concluded that the CT source region is composed of a fracture network that acts as a supply path for fluids ascending from the crack-like conduit to the crater bottom. It was also inferred from other data that a certain amount of fluids is present beneath the first crater (Terada et al. 2012; Tanaka 1993). Terada et al. (2012) found that the fluid supplied to the crater bottom was a mixture of high-temperature volcanic gases and groundwater at shallow depths. It has also been suggested from geomagnetic observations that groundwater enables heat transfer in the thermally demagnetized source at 200–300 m below the crater bottom (Tanaka 1993).
Based on the above results, the high-conductivity zone that extends from the crack-like conduit to the crater bottom is considered to be due mainly to the high electrical conductivity of the acidic hydrothermal fluid. Although the electrical conductivity of lake water has not been measured so far, it is expected to have a considerably high value due to its high ion concentration and low pH (e.g., Ohsawa et al. 2010). Byrdina et al. (2018) estimated the theoretical electrical conductivity of spring waters sampled at Papandayan volcano (Indonesia) to be extremely high values of 20–25 S/m from their chemical compositions and pH values. Using the compositional data shown in Miyabuchi and Terada (2009), we estimated the electrical conductivity of lake water in the Nakadake first crater to be ~ 40 S/m by the same method (details are shown in Additional file 2: Appendix B). Although this exceptionally high value is likely to be an overestimate as pointed out by Byrdina et al. (2018) for waters of high ion concentrations, the order of magnitude would not be different because high values exceeding 10 S/m were sometimes measured for hot-spring waters in the volcanic area (e.g., Seki et al. 2016). If such high-conductivity fluids infiltrate the inter-connected fractures, the influence of sulfur or sulfates with high resistivity to the bulk conductivity of rocks can be neglected (e.g., Guinea et al. 2012; Byrdina et al. 2018). There is no evidence that altered rocks with high electrical conductivity, as proposed by Kanda et al. (2008), occupy the region beneath the crater bottom.
The existence of a sulfur-rich region immediately below the crater bottom is commonly reported in highly acidic crater lakes (e.g., Delmelle and Bernard 2015). Christenson et al. (2010) inferred that a region rich in elemental sulfur was present around the conduit and the bottom of Ruapehu crater lake (New Zealand), where a phreatomagmatic eruption occurred in 2007, and contended that the sulfur acted as a low-permeability seal. We consider that a similar situation exists at the active crater of Aso volcano (Fig. 5). Although such resistive minerals are precipitated at Aso, the intermittent high flux of high-temperature gas supplied through the crack-like conduit could break the seals formed around the fractures, which might be observed as the occurrence of repeated tremors. As a result, a highly fractured region with high conductivity is considered to be present immediately below the first crater.
In this study, AMT data acquired between 2004 and 2005 were reanalyzed using a recently developed 3-D inversion code to estimate the detailed shallow resistivity structure of Aso volcano. The obtained resistivity model shows similar characteristics to those of the 2-D cross sections presented by Kanda et al. (2008). In the previous 2-D analysis, it was not possible to estimate the influence of 3-D topography. However, in the present study we incorporated detailed topography into the model and therefore the obtained resistivity structure around the crater is more reliable. Combining our results with recent findings regarding the hydrothermal system of the volcano, we infer that the region from the upper end of the crack-like conduit to the bottom of the first crater exhibits high conductivities because this region is highly fractured and filled with acidic hydrothermal fluids. Therefore, we consider that the hydrothermal system beneath the active crater of Aso volcano effectively forms an open system. Although sulfur and sulfate minerals precipitated around the fluid pathway act as seals reducing permeability, those seals are probably broken with causing several kinds of tremors by the continuous fluid supply from the crack-like conduit. When the volcanic activity becomes active caused by the increase in fluid flux from the deep, this system would virtually work as a closed system to lead to eruptions.
WK led the AMT acquisition, data analysis, and 3-D modeling. MU, ST, and HI played leading roles in the field work. WK, MU, and ST participated in the scientific discussions. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
We thank all participants of the field survey (Y Tanaka, M Nakaboh, H Hiura, T Mori, S Yoshikawa, S Goto, and Y Okada). We also thank Y Usui, for the use of his 3-D inversion code. The constructive comments provided by the two reviewers (Paul A. Bedrosian and anonymous) and the Lead Guest Editor (Takahiro Ohkura) were highly helpful to improve the manuscript. Numerical calculations were performed with the TSUBAME3.0 supercomputer at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. Most of the figures were prepared using Generic Mapping Tools (Wessel and Smith 1998).
All data are presented as diagrams in Additional file 1: Figure S2. The data that support the findings of the present study are available from the corresponding author upon request.
The original AMT dataset was acquired under a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Priority Areas (No. 14080205: Y Tanaka). This study was partially funded by the MEXT Integrated Program for Next Generation Volcano Research and Human Resource Development (Y Morita).
Additional file 1: Fig. S1. Plot of data misfit versus model roughness. Various models calculated with several values of hyper-parameters (α2 and β2) are shown. This plot was used to determine α2 under the L-curve criterion. Fig. S2. Comparisons of the observed data with the results of the final 3-D model. Comparisons of the apparent resistivity and the phase of the (a) Zxx component, (b) Zxy component, (c) Zyx component, (d) Zyy component, and (e) tipper component. Red dots with error bars indicate observed data, and green lines indicate model results. Fig. S3. Histograms of (a) sensitivity density and (b) sensitivity. Histograms for meshes within the core region and within the whole calculation domain are shown by red and green bars, respectively. The core region was defined as a cubic region ranging from −1000 to 1000 m in the N–S and E–W directions, and from − 2000 to 0 m in the vertical direction, which covers most of the AMT survey area. The vertical dashed line in each histogram indicates the lower limit of the relatively sensitive mesh (10−6.4 for sensitivity density and 100.5 for sensitivity), which was determined so as to contain most of the mesh of the core region.
Additional file 2: Appendix A. Sensitivity test. Appendix B. Estimation of the electrical conductivity of lake water. | 2019-04-24T06:28:28Z | https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186%2Fs40623-019-1017-7 |
It’s going to be the best wedding day. Ever.
About Our Wedding Show Tickets 2019 Exhibitors Amazing Offers for Exhibitors at The Show Wedding Show Sponsors Win a Wedding!
And so the adventure begins... at our sparkling new wedding show!
For inspirational ideas to help plan your perfect day, look no further than our exclusive wedding showcase. Meet our team of wedding wish-makers and a host of hand-picked exhibitors, along with gorgeous catwalk shows, glamorous VIP packages and brilliant bridal beauty.
From vintage chic to gorgeous garden party, luxe glamour to laid-back boho, whatever your style you can enjoy the wedding you’ve always dreamed of with a host of stunning venues that make up the exclusive Celtic Manor Collection.
Come along and meet our team of event specialists, specially selected exhibitors, watch our bridal catwalk shows and live demonstrations, as well as the opportunity to view our beautiful selection of wedding locations.
We hope you can join us and look forward to inspiring you!
Our Beauty Bar will be holding live demonstrations all day to show their Biotec Facials and Eyelash treatments, all designed to make you feel your very best on your wedding day.
Watch the masters at work as Rhys Giles Salon are doing live Wedding Hair demonstrations!
Head to the Caernarfon Suite at 11am and 12.30 for Gin Masterclass, you won't want to miss it!
General Admission is complimentary or you can upgrade to a VIP ticket from only £10!
Want to be a VIP for the day? Purchase a Premium Ticket online today and enjoy a range of exclusive benefits.
As well as over 40 exhibitors to help plan your perfect day, you will have a guaranteed space at our popular bridal catwalk to inspire you.
purchase your VIP Tickets here!
Get 25% off lunch or afternoon tea reservations!
Add a little Sparkle is a creative and dynamic team of Weddings & Event Stylists.
Interested in a honeymoon like no other? Then look no further than the unforgettable honeymoon adventures offered by African Star Tours. They specialise in offering unique tours in Southern, East & West Africa designed to suit YOU and your honeymoon dreams.
Aimee Jay is a highly experienced performer. After touring internationally for the past 5 years, she has become a popular addition for weddings and private parties.
Aimee Jay understands how music can hold special memories and will go the extra mile to learn that special song for your big day.
Newport's longest established Bridal Store, now in their 17th year and coveted members of the respected trade organisation, The Retail Bridalwear Association. Stocking award winning designers such as Mori Lee, Ronald Joyce, Justin Alexander, Sincerity, White Rose, Stella York and Adrianna Pappell, offering amazing choice with over 150 samples to choose from. Also offering the very best selection of Plus size wedding dresses in South Wales. In our Rose Room for curvy brides, enjoy your own private fitting room and choose from over 70 different styles of plus size wedding dress.
Established bridal shop selling wedding dresses and accessories, alongside formal and prom dresses.
All Stretched Out are proud to offer the most distinguished and varied fleet of wedding and executive cars in the South West.
Multi-award winning, family run company that has been operating for over 30 years. All cars are presented immaculately, with a professional and friendly chauffeur and complimentary bubbly.
Cardiff based florist specialising in weddings and events. Floristry has always been a part of Amanda's life and she creates unique and elegant displays with a French flair.
Amanda is a harpist with a difference! Classically trained, she has gone on to perform with Jamie Cullum and Dannii Minogue and is in great demand for recordings, functions and events with style!
Aslett & Willatt was created by designer Jane Davies who has had a lifelong passion for jewellery. Their Cardiff based studio creates a relaxed and fun environment where bespoke handcrafted jewellery and headdresses can be designed for weddings and special occasions.
Baroque Boutique is a small family-run boutique with a large range of top designers including Ian Stuart, John Charles, Linea Raffaelli, Dress Code, Irresistible, Gill Harvey, Amanda Wakeley, Aideen Bodkin, Carla Ruiz plus a beautiful range of couture millinery by Alison Tod.
Blue Butterfly Events is about more than the details – We are about the vision, the transformation, and most important, we offer an opportunity for the bride and groom, the hosts, and their guests to relax and enjoy the beautiful moments—every one of them.
The Blue Lions are a premium 3-14 piece band specialising in high-energy music for festivals, weddings, corporate events and private functions - at a sensible price. We pride ourselves on having a "cooler-than-average" song list that is never cheesy, and focuses squarely on filling your dance floor. With the Blue Lions you'll get the best musicians in the country, playing your favourite music. Where we play: Mostly in London, Bristol, Cardiff, Birmingham, Southampton, Manchester, Cambridge, Norwich, Brighton, France and Italy, but we travel around the world.
Bryn Awel Creative Cakes is a family run business by mother and son team, Beverley and Twm.
Beverley has been baking and decorating wedding cakes for nearly 30 years and loves to help make your big day extra special. With son Twm helping out from a young age he has become more and more involved with the business and now bakes and decorates cakes in addition to designing and manufacturing his own bespoke range of cake stands exclusively for the business.
Here at Calon Lân Cakes, we freshly bake the most delicious Welshcakes and Bara Brith. Made to order and using only the finest ingredients, we use traditional baking methods to bring you the best, homemade, artisan Welsh products.
We supply our lovely Welshcakes and Bara Brith for all types of occasion, including weddings and corporate events, whilst still maintaining that home cooked feel. We specialise in Welshcake Wedding Cakes and also supply a stunning Welshcake Tower. Our beautiful Welshcake & Bara Brith wedding favours available in a large range of packaging styles, to suit any theme.
We also offer a variety of gift options & are constantly adding new products & ideas to our range.
A studio based Monmouthshire florist. We have an obsessive love of seasonal flowers and create distinctive modern arrangements, inspired by nature.
In the picturesque village of Caerphilly nestled within the rolling Welsh countryside, DeVoli Cakes offers their clients a truly unique experience when it comes to designing that special occasion cake.
Rhossili Gallery is set in the heart of Gower Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and is also the home of dotJewellery.com.
We are an experienced family jewellery business of over five generations, manufacturing precious jewellery and specialise in the crafting of bridal, diamond and gem set jewellery, producing one of the largest selections of wedding rings in the UK.
Double Take Wedding Photography is run by Paul Fears and Jo Davies. They have over 25 years photographic experience between them and have been photographing weddings for the past 9 years. They feel that every wedding is unique and aim to capture that uniqueness, along with the essence and the story of your most special day.
Do You Believe? is a Bridal Boutique that provide a luxurious experience appealing to the senses - visual, touch, sound and aroma - hopefully stepping into a magical wonderland of wedding dresses and all the bridal accessories you could wish for - wings; wands coronets; tiaras and bespoke if needed, everything with an enchanted theme.
Dyfed Menswear is a multi award winning family run company dedicated to bringing the latest cutting edge suit styles and up to the minute accessories to compliment your wedding theme be it vintage, traditional or contemporary.
Themed Event Prop Hire Company for Events & Parties.
Event theming provider of beautiful themed props and accessories, available to hire for themed parties, events, conferences, exhibitions & weddings.
Themed Prop Hire Packages for Events in London, Cardiff and throughout the UK.
It doesn’t get any bigger than your ‘Big Day’ does it? So why not add a real live spark to your Wedding Day? Gregg specialises in entertaining you and your guests with live on the spot caricature drawing at your wedding event, and each guest that is drawn will have a personal memento of the day to take home with them, and a good laugh to boot.
Our passion is beautiful wedding cakes, happy Bride and Grooms, and the challenge to continue to learn and develop their skills to help people achieve a cake which really says something about them on their special day!
We are situated in the Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales.Catering to all of Wales with our traditional 1930’s style Pashley Ice Cream Tricycle.
iVOW - The Wedding Planner App that gives you a one screen view of your wedding so that you can see at a glance where you are with the planning and what you needs your attention. iVOW can help you with planning, budgeting, inspiration & organising everything you need for your big day.
A Bagpiper guaranteed to add musical excitement to any event with the combination of traditional highland dress and a wide and varied repertoire of bagpipe tunes to suit all occasions.
Time is precious, so every holiday should count. From an overwater villa in the Maldives to exploring Sri Lanka with your own car and driver, Kuoni Travel is here to make your ideas a reality.
Laings is a prestigious family-run jewellers with over 177 years’ experience in the industry. Established in 1840 we are now one of the largest independent jewellery businesses operating seven stores across the UK. In an industry where heritage and reputation count for so much, the long established name of Laings is now a byword for high quality jewellery, luxury watches and exceptional customer service.
Here at Laura May Bridal, we only select the best dresses from the world's finest designers.
Providing beautiful white dove release services throughout South Wales and beyond since 2007.
Chauffeur driven Bentley Flying Spur, Mercedes Limousine and Mercedes Benz for your wedding day.
Every bride deserves to arrive for their special day in style and luxury. A prestigious and luxurious wedding car is an essential part of your wedding.
Newport Orthodontic Centre was established over 30 years ago on Clytha Park road and has been providing specialist care to the city of Newport and South Wales ever since.
We are proud to be one of only a handful of practices dedicated to straightening teeth in South Wales.
Pains is the largest and most historic professional fireworks and special effects company in the UK, delivering spectacular displays and picture perfect special effects at high profile events such as The Commonwealth Games, The Olympic Athletes Parade at Buckingham Palace, England Cricket’s Ashes winning celebrations, The Cowes Regatta, The 150th Anniversary of the Clifton Suspension Bridge and many many more.
We’re proud of the care, creativity and attention to detail that goes into every display we perform. Throughout the year we produce numerous displays for weddings, celebrations and corporate events up and down the country and provide annual November displays for many clubs, schools and local authorities. Our repertoire of indoor and outdoor effects combined with our experience and creativity enable us to enhance festivals, fairs and concerts with a variety of different products.
We are based in Cardiff and specialise in creating luxury and bespoke wedding stationery that is designed specifically for you and your fiancé.
We are a dedicated wedding specialist with a team of professional bridal consultants who are committed to ensuring that you receive a warm welcome and our utmost attention. My team and I work tirelessly to ensure that our customers leave us happy and it helps explains the great feedback we receive.
Phil Harris is a Wedding Photographer based in South Wales. He is a young and enthusiastic photographer who puts emphasis on capturing natural moments of your wedding day as it unfolds. Make sure you swing by his stall to check out his amazing photographs.
At Rhys Giles Hairdressing and Beauty we have a policy of continuous improvement. We will endlessly focus on your needs as we create and deliver the image that you most desire, as our client you will not only feel that you are getting something special but that it is individually catered to your requirements.
Ultimately, it’s your hair, your style mixed with our teams’ knowledge and passion!
Ruckleys have the outfits to make your bridesmaids, flower girls, and page boys look like a dream. When it comes to helping your family look a million dollars, the friendly team at Ruckleys is always willing to go the extra mile to ensure you get exactly what you need. If you need alterations or to source a specific outfit, we can help. Ask about our colour matching service, too. You’ll receive the highest levels of service and excellent quality formal wear for your big day. You’ll get all that at special prices! We provide you with the best quality at half the price of big city centre stores.
Shelley Daniel Photography offers affordable and complete wedding photography packages with a USB and album included from £795. Shelley Daniel loves weddings and capturing all those special moments to look back on in years to come.
At Slaters Menswear we pride ourselves on being the leading name in suits, formal hire and men’s shoes online. Our great range of colours, styles and sizes ensure you have the items you need just a click away. Like what you see but not sure on size? Then why not take advantage of our free alterations on all men’s suits purchased online in any of one of our 25 stores.
South Wales Vintage Wallflower offer a fabulous Flower Wall or Wisteria Archway to hire for all those special moments in our lives. The best quality products to give your event that 'WOW' factor for any occasion.
Designer wedding dresses proudly made in the UK, Stephanie Allin is one of the UK's foremost award winning bridal designers.
Taliesin Strings perform as a string quartet or string trio bringing together some of the finest musicians working in the UK to provide the perfect soundtrack for your special occasion.
Taliesin Strings love weddings and in recognition of their work as wedding specialists, the quartet has been awarded Best Entertainment in Wales by the Welsh National Wedding Awards for the past several years.
"The very best wedding bands South Wales has to offer: from a duet during the ceremony, a jazz trio after your ceremony reception, or for your post-wedding breakfast one of our live bands with disco for hours of dance-floor filling entertainment, our bands will have your guests talking about the night for years afterwards."
If you are looking for a first-class dentist in Cardiff, then The Parade Specialist Dental Centre are ready to welcome you to our modern and relaxing practice.
The String Quartet Company, is made up of professional musicians with many years experience in all aspects of musical life - particularly string quartets. We have current and former players of Welsh National Opera and BBC National Orchestra of Wales in our quartet, we feature specially invited guest musicians and we support young talent. Our administration staff have accomplished 20 years of expertise, organising live music for all kinds of events - particularly weddings.
We have a wealth of Corporate Event, Wedding Party and Gig scene experience. Our musicians actively and regularly make appearances on the jazz scene and other functions, such as session, gig and festival events through a wide genre of music styles.
The Welsh Cheese Company aim to showcase for some of the best artisan cheese makers in the country. They offer unique and regional cheese wedding cakes.
Vantage Point Events provide a mobile bar service from a choice of four converted vehicles. They have three of the iconic Citroën H Vans and a smaller Citroën 2CV Van.
Founded by the Luther family over 30 years ago, Veer Events is the UK’s most innovative Asian Gourmet Caterer. Providing a rich, bespoke experience in the catering and events industry. Veer Events selects only the finest ingredients, the freshest of products and utilises the services of an award winning chef to create our signature dishes and ensure that only the best is served at your table.
We've been arranging holidays since 1985 and are the largest, most successful transatlantic tour operator, and market leader for travel to the USA and the Caribbean.
As well as USA and Caribbean we offer holidays to Canada, the Far East, South Africa, the Middle East, Indian Ocean, Mauritius, plus a well-established ski programme, so we can find your ideal destination.
We're a husband & wife team who love creating floral, bright, vintage & quirky designs to match the couple!
Wedding Mustang specialise in vehicle hire for weddings. We are a family run business based in South Wales.
A recognised celebrant, Kathryn is on hand to help you create your dream bespoke ceremony - breath-taking and delightful, cute or conventional, contemporary or crazy!
At Wow we want events to be amazing, we are experts at providing the ingredients that make your event one to remember.
Our exclusive annual Wedding Show provides a unique opportunity to meet our team of event specialists and specially selected exhibitors.
Following a successful Wedding Show in 2018, with over 60 exhibitors covering all aspects of wedding planning and preparation and catwalk shows demonstrating the finest in bridal, formal menswear, bridesmaids and mother of the bride outfits, we would be delighted to hear from you if you would like to exhibit in 2019.
If you're interested in exhibiting at the Celtic Manor Wedding Show, please complete our booking form and a member of the team will be in touch.
Terms and conditions apply. Incentives redeemable when contract is returned, total payment is received and after the Wedding Show date. Dinner is available in any resort restaurant, excluding Steak on Six. Offers valid until 30th June 2019.
The Celtic Manor Resort Wedding Show is designed to give each visitor a full wedding experience by introducing a wide variety of exhibitors, demonstrations and fashion shows, giving them ideas and inspiration so that they can create and personalise their perfect wedding.
The event is promoted extensively throughout South Wales using Celtic Manor’s broad advertising and PR channels, including social media. Each exhibitor will have their company logo, a photograph and written details (50 words) included in the Wedding Fayre Guide which is handed out to each visitor on arrival.
"I thoroughly enjoyed the Celtic Manor wedding fayre this year! It was a huge success, extremely well organised, the team at Celtic Manor were extremely helpful and on the day, it was such a pleasure to meet so many wonderful brides and grooms who were excited to start planning their big day."
"The fayre was the perfect setting to show our services, and we are delighted with the results."
"Celtic Manor's Wedding Fayre is definitely the place to be for suppliers. The event is well publicised and brides travel great distances due to the exceptionally high calibre of suppliers.
The couples are there to book and are generally seriously looking for ideas and actual suppliers for their big day. This year was no exception and I managed to convert many leads into bookings. What more can you ask for from a fayre?"
The Celtic Manor Resort do not accept any responsibility for any of the companies exhibiting at the wedding show When selecting a wedding supplier it is the responsibility of the individual to fully check the credentials of the company. The Celtic Manor Resort will not be held liable for any breach of contract or any and all liabilities of a company’s trading.
Our exclusive annual Wedding Show is sponsored by Laings The Jeweller.
Established in 1840 and as Scotland’s oldest family jeweller, Laings is a destination for those in search of special treasures to celebrate the landmark moments of life. From exquisite engagement rings to sparkling jewellery and luxury watches, a precious item from Laings will be cherished for generations.
At the Weddings Live show, Laings will be offering the chance to win two wedding rings worth up to £1,200!
Our Wedding Show Stage is sponsored by Kuoni.
Kuoni holidays don't come off the shelf. We prefer to listen, tailor-making a holiday that's right for you. We offer over 90 destinations, can create bespoke itineraries, our own small group tours and we hand-pick each hotel to ensure you get the very best holiday.
Sign up for a John Lewis Gift List on the day of the Weddings Live show for a chance to win a 'Bride to Be' hamper, courtesy of Kuoni!
JOIN US AT WEDDINGS LIVE 2019 FOR YOUR CHANCE TO WIN YOUR WEDDING!
Speak with a Celtic Manor Wedding Coordinator at our Weddings Live 2019 show on the 10th of February 2019 and if you make a new wedding enquiry resulting in a quotation and space being reserved, you will be entered into our competition.
The lucky winner will win a beautiful wedding package worth £6,500!
View more information about the Win a Wedding competition and view our terms and conditions. | 2019-04-24T02:50:07Z | https://www.celtic-manor.com/weddings/weddings-live-2019 |
2006-10-16 Assigned to AVG SOFTWARE, LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY reassignment AVG SOFTWARE, LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS). Assignors: HANDSIGNAL, INC.
A method and system for pushing information to personal computing and communication devices operated by users in such a way that the users can use and/or act upon the information even when the users are off-network or off-line. The method and system also automatically “provisions” the personal computing and communication devices so that the devices may be used to act upon the information that is pushed to the devices.
The present invention relates to wireless communications. More particularly, the invention relates to a method and system for automatically pushing wireless messages and other information to personal computing and communication devices such as personal digital assistants.
The market for wireless communication services has grown dramatically in the past few years and is expected to grow at an even faster rate in the future. Many experts predict that wireless communication services will soon surpass traditional “wired” methods of communication. Wireless communication services are no longer limited to voice traffic, but instead now include voice and data traffic so that all types of messages and information can be wirelessly transmitted to and from mobile devices.
Unfortunately, current wireless communication services, as well as conventional wired communication services such as e-mail, voice mail, telephone services, etc., require users to connect to a provider by dialing-in and/or accessing a network before information can be retrieved. This is a problem because users often cannot regularly check for new messages and information and therefore often retrieve time-sensitive information too late.
The above-described problem has been partially remedied by wireless communication services that automatically “push” information to users rather than requiring the users to “pull” the information from a provider. However, such push communication services still require the users to be connected to a service provider to be able to use and act upon the information. Once the users go off-network or off-line, the information cannot be used and/or acted upon. Moreover, existing push types of communication services can only push short messages and are therefore not robust enough for many business applications that require more extensive messages and data to be pushed to users.
The present invention solves the above-described problems and provides a distinct advance in the art of communication methods. More particularly, the present invention provides a method and system for pushing information to personal computing and communication devices operated by users in such a way that the users can use and/or act upon the information even when the users are off-network or off-line. The present invention also provides a method and system for automatically “provisioning” personal computing and communication devices so that the devices may be used to act upon the information that is pushed to the devices.
One preferred embodiment of the present invention is implemented with a computer network that is coupled with at least one wireless communication service provider. The computer network is operated by an administrator or provider that offers push message and information delivery services in accordance with the present invention. Senders of messages and other information may access the computer network and provide information destined for a recipient. The computer network then conditions the information and stores the information in a queue until a computing and communication device operated by the recipient is in communication with a corresponding wireless communication service provider. The computer network then automatically pushes the information to the device once it is in communication with the service provider and automatically loads the information into appropriate databases and/or programs in the device. The device thus receives necessary information without requiring the recipient to request the information or to enter or load the information into the appropriate program or database residing on the device.
The computer network may also provision devices by automatically loading and assembling software applications in the devices wirelessly without input or configuration from users of the device. For example, in one embodiment of the invention, the computer network may push information to a device operated by a recipient as described above. The device may then determine that it does not have the necessary applications and/or software versions to process the information and thus automatically transmits a wireless message back to the computer network with an indication of what applications and/or software versions need to be sent to the device. The computer network then automatically pushes any additional necessary software to the device. This allows all information and necessary programs to be seamlessly pushed to a device without requiring the user of the device to determine which programs are necessary to run the information, request the information, or to load the information and programs into the device.
FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram depicting computer and communications equipment that may be used to implement certain aspects of the present invention.
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram depicting certain of the components of FIG. 1 in more detail.
The present invention can be implemented in hardware, software, firmware, or a combination thereof. In a preferred embodiment, however, the invention is implemented with one or more computer programs that operate computer and communications equipment broadly referred to by the numeral 10 in FIG. 1. The computer and communications equipment 10 includes a computer network 12, a computer network 14, a wireless communication service provider network 16, and a plurality of computer and communication devices 18. The computer program and equipment 10 illustrated and described herein are merely examples of programs and equipment that may be used to implement preferred embodiments of the present invention and may be replaced with other software and computer equipment without departing from the scope of the present invention.
The computer network 12 is preferably operated by an administrator or provider of the services of the present invention and may include a variety of different conventional computing equipment. In one preferred embodiment of the present invention illustrated in FIG. 2, the computer network includes a server gateway computer 20, a web server computer 22, and a communications server 24. Each of the computers 20, 22, 24 may be any computing device such as a network computer running Windows NT, Novell Netware, Unix, or any other network operating system. The computers are preferably coupled to one another and to other equipment such as various databases 26 and computers or terminals 28 by a wireless area network 30 or other conventional network. The web server computer 22 may also be coupled with a hub 32, a firewall 34, another hub 36, and a router 38. The web server computer 22 also includes conventional web hosting operating software, an Internet connection such as a modem, DSL converter or ISDN converter, and is assigned a URL and corresponding domain name so that the web server computer can be accessed via the Internet in a conventional manner.
The computer network 14 represents any number of computer systems that may be operated by persons or entities wishing to send messages and other information to recipients and may include any types of conventional computer equipment. In one preferred embodiment, each computer network 14 is coupled with the computer network 12 via a frame relay or VPN connection 40 and includes one or more server computers 42 and one or more personal computers 44 that may access the server computer 42 via a communications network 46 such as the Internet. In another embodiment of the invention, senders of messages and other information may also access the web server computer 22 of the computer network 12 with one or more personal computers 48 via the Internet 50.
The wireless communications network 16 represents any number of conventional wireless communication provider networks such as PCS, ReFLEX, Advanced Radio Data Network and cellular networks that may be used to implement certain steps of the present invention. Each wireless network includes various computing equipment broadly referred to by the numeral 52 and a plurality of broadcast antennas 54 that serve different cells or coverage areas.
The computing and communication devices 18 are operated by recipients of messages and other information and preferably are handheld personal digital assistants such as those manufactured and sold by Palm, Handspring, RIM, Symbol, and Kyocera. The computing and communication devices 18 may also be personal or laptop computers such as those manufactured and sold by Dell, Compaq, Gateway, or any other computer manufacturer; intelligent mobile phones; pagers; or even Internet appliances that are specifically designed for accessing the Internet. Each computing device 18 includes wireless communications capabilities so that it can send and receive wireless messages and other information.
The computer programs of the present invention are stored in or on computer-readable medium residing on or accessible by the computer network 12 and the devices 18 for instructing the equipment to operate as described herein. Each computer program preferably comprises an ordered listing of executable instructions for implementing logical functions in the computer network 12 and the devices 18. The computer programs can be embodied in any computer-readable medium for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device, such as a computer-based system, processor-containing system, or other system that can fetch the instructions from the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device, and execute the instructions. In the context of this application, a “computer-readable medium” can be any means that can contain, store, communicate, propagate or transport the program for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. The computer-readable medium can be, for example, but not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semi-conductor system, apparatus, device, or propagation medium. More specific, although not inclusive, examples of the computer-readable medium would include the following: an electrical connection having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable, programmable, read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), an optical fiber, and a portable compact disk read-only memory (CDROM). The computer-readable medium could even be paper or another suitable medium upon which the program is printed, as the program can be electronically captured, via for instance, optical scanning of the paper or other medium, then compiled, interpreted, or otherwise processed in a suitable manner, if necessary, and then stored in a computer memory.
The computer programs of the present invention preferably include communication and provisioning programs residing on the computer network 12 and communication and provisioning programs as well as custom application programs, form applications, or other interpretive programs residing on each of the devices 18. The functionality and operation of several preferred implementations of these programs are described in more detail below. In this regard, some of the steps discussed below may represent a module segment or portion of code of the computer programs of the present invention which comprises one or more executable instructions for implementing the specified logical function or functions. In some alternative implementations, the functions described may occur out of the order described. For example, two functions described as being in succession may in fact be executed substantially concurrently, or the functions may sometimes be executed in the reverse order depending upon the functionality involved.
In one application of the present invention, the above-described computer and communications equipment 10 and computer programs are used to automatically push dispatch-type information from senders to recipients, request acknowledgment from the recipients, and then transmit task status information from the recipients back to the computer network 12 for delivery to the senders. The senders of the information may include companies such as trucking companies or service companies, and the recipients may include workers of the companies such as truck operators, electricians, plumbers, technicians, or computer service personnel. As used herein, the term “information” is meant to include all types of messages, data, programs, applications, and other information that senders may wish to send to recipients, or vice versa.
A sender that wishes to push information to a recipient first accesses the computer network 12 via one of the computer networks 14 or computers 48 and submits dispatch information to the computer network 12. The dispatch information may include, for example, information relating to a maintenance activity, a load pick-up, a load delivery, or other type of project. Such information may also include task lists, punch lists, parts lists, the address for a pick-up or project start point, the address for a drop-off or project stop point, a date and time for the requested pick-up or drop-off, detailed instructions relating to the tasks to be performed, and other related information. This information may be generated with an Internet-based dispatch application and may involve the use of a database that contains attributes for tracking status information related to the task (i.e. accepted, declined, arrived, finished).
Once the sender submits the above dispatch information to the computer network 12, the computer network 12 conditions or processes the information so that it may be delivered to the intended recipient. The computer network 12 does so by first creating a unique message ID number for the information that is to be sent. The computer network 12 then records the information in a recovery log using the message ID so that it may be later recovered. The information is then moved to a queue in the computer network 12 and stored based on the message type and assigned certain tracking information such as a process code, a format code, and a version number.
The computer network 12 may at this point convert the information to transmittable strings in a compressed, binary, or encrypted mode. The information is then parsed into a series of message packets and then moved to a packet queue. The message packets are next sent from the packet queue to a communication thread of a wireless communication service provider 16 which serves the device 18 for which the information is destined. When the provider 16 acknowledges receipt of the message packets, the computer network 12 updates the status of the information in the recovery log. A record for the information is then moved to a transaction log for record-keeping purposes. Finally, the message packets are delivered to a queue operated by the wireless service provider 16.
The wireless service provider 16 then delivers the message packets to the nearest transmission tower 54 according to the last known position of the device 18 as listed in a home location register (HLR) or visiting location register (VLR) accessible by the provider. Once the device 18 is in range and in communication with the wireless service provider, the message packets are broadcast to the device in a conventional manner.
A communication layer on the device 18 receives and stores the message packets in a packet queue, turns on the device, and activates a communication program residing on the device 18 and configured in accordance with one aspect of the present invention. The communication program processes the message packets by stripping the header from each packet, concatenating the packets in sequence order, converting the strings of information from transmittable strings to the appropriate format for the program or application that will access or run the information (i.e. compressed, binary, or encrypted mode), and inserting the message number, message description, message category, and date into a message manager database. The communication program 18 also runs error tests to ensure integrity of the information, and deletes the packets from the packet queue if the information was received error-free. The communication program then automatically loads the information into the appropriate program or application residing on the device 18 so that the information can be acted upon by the user of the device 18.
A custom dispatch application on the device 18 then receives the message string from the communication program, sounds an alert if the information is marked as urgent, and displays the dispatch information so that the user of the device 18 may accept, decline, or otherwise comment on the dispatch information. Once the recipient accepts or declines, the dispatch application composes an automatic feedback message that is to be transmitted to the computer network 12. The feedback message is then passed to the communication program residing on the device 18.
The communication program residing on the device 18 then processes the feedback message by assigning a message key to the message (if needed), counting the characters in the message, and determining the number of packets required to transmit it. Configuration parameters pertinent to the device 18, the wireless service provider 16, and the computer network 12 are stored on the device 18 in a configuration file to determine optimal packet sizes. The communication program then builds packet headers from the message number and packet sequence numbers and splits the message into a number of packets. The packet headers are then concatenated onto the front of each packet, and the packets are moved to an outgoing queue.
The communication layer on the device 18 then receives and stores the message packets and prepares the device 18 to transmit the packets. The packets are transmitted from the device 18 to the nearest tower 54, which then confirms receipt of the packets. Specifically, the wireless service provider 16 receives the message packets, recognizes the packet identifier and/or address, acknowledges receipt, and moves the message packets to a corresponding queue residing in the computer network 12.
The computer network 12 next processes the incoming feedback message by creating a unique message ID number if the message does not have an existing message ID and then recording the message packets with the message ID in the recovery log. The message packets are then moved to a queue based on the message type. These packets are processed by removing packet headers and concatenating into a single message string in sequence order. The message string is then converted from transmittable characters into appropriate compressed, binary, or encrypted strings. The status of the message in the log is then updated. Finally, the message record is moved to a transaction log for record-keeping and the message string is transmitted to a queue on the sender's computer equipment 14 or 48.
The sender's computer equipment 14 or 48 receives the message from the computer network 12 and acknowledges acceptance. The information is then stored as a record in a task status database associated with the dispatch assignment. Dispatchers may then access the task status database to evaluate which tasks have been assigned, accepted, or declined.
In another application of the present invention, the above-described computer and communications equipment 10 and computer programs are used to automatically provision the devices 18 by sending software upgrades, new applications or programs, or other large binary objects to the devices 18. This allows users of the devices 18 to act upon information that is pushed to the devices 18 even if the devices 18 do not have all necessary applications and/or software.
For example, in one embodiment of the invention, the computer network may push information to a device operated by a recipient as described above. The device may then determine from the information what applications and/or software is needed to act upon the information. The device then automatically generates and transmits a wireless message back to the computer network with an indication of what applications and/or software are needed. The computer network then automatically pushes any necessary software to the device. This allows all information and necessary programs to be seamlessly pushed to a device without requiring the user of then device to determine which programs are necessary to run the information, request the information, or load the information and programs into the device.
For this application, the computer network 12 includes a library that can be populated with various binary objects such as the software upgrades, applications, and other items discussed above. This library also preferably includes a distribution list that lists all recipients that have received each object, a description of each object, a final assembled size of each object, a check sum benchmark to confirm that each object has been assembled in the correct sequence, and a binary copy of each object. Attributes for tracking which recipients have acknowledged receipt of an object may also be stored in or alongside the library.
An object that is to be sent to a device 18 is first passed to the gateway computer 20. The gateway computer 20 then conditions or processes the object so that it may be more easily delivered to the intended recipient. The computer network 12 does so by first creating a unique message ID number for the object. The computer network 12 then records the object in a recovery log using the message ID so that it may be later recovered. The object is then moved to a queue in the computer network 12 and stored based on the message type and assigned certain tracking information such as a process code, a format code, and a version number.
The computer network 12 may at this point convert the object to transmittable strings in a compressed, binary, or encrypted mode. The object is then parsed into a series of message packets and then moved to a packet queue. The message packets are next sent from the packet queue to a communication thread of a wireless communication service provider 16 which serves the device 18 for which the object is destined. When the provider 16 acknowledges receipt of the message packets, the computer network 12 updates the status of the information in the recovery log. A record for the object is then moved to a transaction log for record-keeping purposes. Finally, the message packets are delivered to a queue operated by the wireless service provider 16.
The wireless service provider 16 then delivers the message packets to the nearest transmission tower 54 according to the last known position of the device 18 as listed in an HLR or VLR. Once the device 18 is in range and in communication with the wireless service provider, the message packets are broadcast to the device in a conventional manner.
A communication layer on the device 18 receives and stores the message packets in a packet queue, turns on the device, and activates a communication program residing on the device 18 and configured in accordance with one aspect of the present invention. The communication program processes the message packets by stripping the header from each packet, concatenating the packets in sequence order, converting the strings of information from transmittable strings to the appropriate format for the object, and inserting the message number, message description, message category, and date into a message manager database. The communication program 18 also runs error tests to ensure integrity of the object, and deletes the packets from the packet queue if the object was received error-free.
The communication program passes the assembled object to a provisioning program residing on the device 18. The provisioning program then loads the object string from the communication program and proceeds to assemble and test the object based on certain header information including the check sum for the assembled object, the size of the assembled object, and the creator ID assigned to the object. Once the object has been assembled and confirmed, the provisioning program installs the object on the device and creates a feedback message indicating that the installation has been successful. The feedback message is then transferred to the communication program residing on the device 18.
The communication program processes the feedback message by assigning a message key to the message (if needed), counting the characters in the message, and determining the number of packets required to transmit it. Configuration parameters pertinent to the device 18, the wireless service provider 16, and the computer network 12 are stored on the device 18 in a configuration file to determine optimal packet sizes. The communication program then builds packet headers from the message number and packet sequence numbers and splits the message into a number of packets. The packet headers are then concatenated onto the front of each packet, and the packets are moved to an outgoing queue.
The communication layer then receives and stores the message packets and prepares the device 18 to transmit the packets. The packets are transmitted from the device 18 to the nearest tower 54, which then confirms receipt of the packets. Specifically, the wireless service provider 16 receives the message packets, recognizes the packet identifier and/or address, acknowledges receipt, and moves the message packets to a corresponding queue residing in the computer network 12.
The computer network 12 next processes the incoming feedback message by creating a unique message ID number if the message does not have an existing message ID and then recording the message packets with the message ID in the recovery log. The message packets are then moved to a queue based on the message type and then concatenated into a single message string. The message string is then converted from transmittable characters into appropriate compressed, binary, or encrypted strings. The status of the message in the log is then updated. Finally, the message record is moved to a transaction log for record-keeping and the message string is transmitted to a queue on the sender's computer equipment 14 or 48.
The sender's computer equipment 14 or 48 receives the message from the computer network 12 and acknowledges receipt. Administrators may then access the computer network 12 and see which recipients have received a new object by viewing web pages that access records in the computer network 12.
In another application of the present invention, the above-described computer and communications equipment 10 and computer programs may be used to automatically push calendar information to the devices 18. The calendar information may include, for example, meeting dates, travel schedules, deadlines, etc.
A sender that wishes to push such calendar information to a recipient first accesses the computer network 12 via one of the computer networks 14 or computers 48 and submits the information to the computer network 12. The computer network 12 then conditions or processes the information so that it may be delivered to the intended recipient. The computer network 12 does so by first creating a unique message ID number for the information. The computer network 12 then records the information in a recovery log using the message ID so that it may be later recovered. The information is then moved to a queue in the computer network 12 and stored based on the message type and assigned certain tracking information such as a process code, a format code, and a version number.
A custom calender or scheduling application on the device 18 then receives the message string from the communication program, sounds an alert if the information is marked as urgent, and displays the information so that the user of the device 18 may act upon it. The user may, for example, review proposed meeting dates and times and either accept or decline the proposed times or press a button labeled “Later.” Pressing the Later button causes the display screen to delay requesting this information until the next time the device is turned on. If the recipient accepts or declines, the calender application adds the event to a scheduling program and composes an automatic feedback message that is to be transmitted to the computer network 12. The feedback message is then passed to the communication program residing on the device 18.
A scheduling program on the sender's computer equipment 14 or 48 receives the message from the computer network 12 and acknowledges acceptance of the proposed meeting or other event. The information is then stored as a record in a calendering database. Administrators can then access the calendering database to see which recipients have accepted the proposed meeting date.
In another application of the present invention, the above-described computer and communications equipment 10 and computer programs may be used to automatically send to one or more of the devices 18 a request for data matching a particular criteria. The device then fills the request and sends the results back to the computer network 12 for delivery to the requester of the data.
A sender that wishes to request such a data search first accesses the computer network 12 via one of the computer networks 14 or computers 48 and identifies the search criteria and the devices to be searched. The search criteria may be generated with any known data search program or application.
Once the sender submits the above search information to the computer network 12, the computer network 12 conditions or processes the information so that it may be delivered to the intended recipient. The computer network 12 does so by first creating a unique message ID number for the information that is to be sent. The computer network 12 then records the information in a recovery log using the message ID so that it may be later recovered. The information is then moved to a queue in the computer network 12 and stored based on the message type and assigned certain tracking information such as a process code, a format code, and a version number.
A communication layer on the device 18 receives and stores the message packets in a packet queue, turns on the device, and activates a communication program residing on the device 18 and configured in accordance with one aspect of the present invention. The communication program processes the message packets by stripping the header from each packet, concatenating the packets in sequence order, converting the strings of information from transmittable strings to the appropriate format for the program or application that will access or run the information (i.e. compressed, binary, or encrypted mode), and inserting the message number, message description, message category, and date into a message manager database. The communication program 18 also runs error tests to ensure integrity of the information, and deletes the packets from the packet queue if the information was received error-free. The communication program then automatically loads the information into a custom search application residing on the device 18 so that the information can be acted upon by the user of the device 18.
The custom search application on the device 18 then receives the message string from the communication program and initiates a series of find operations on the device to locate all records matching the search criteria. Once the records have been identified, the results are collected and formatted to be transmitted to the computer network 12. The results are then passed to the communication program residing on the device 18.
The communication program then processes the results by assigning a message key to the message (if needed), counting the characters in the message, and determining the number of packets required to transmit it. Configuration parameters pertinent to the device 18, the wireless service provider 16, and the computer network 12 are stored on the device 18 in a configuration file to determine optimal packet sizes. The communication program then builds packet headers from the message number and packet sequence numbers and splits the message into a number of packets. The packet headers are then concatenated onto the front of each packet, and the packets are moved to an outgoing queue.
The computer network 12 next processes the incoming results by creating a unique message ID number if the message does not have an existing message ID and then recording the message packets with the message ID in the recovery log. The message packets are then moved to a queue based on the message type and then concatenated into a single message string. The message string is then converted from transmittable characters into appropriate compressed, binary, or encrypted strings. The status of the message in the log is then updated. Finally, the message record is moved to a transaction log for record-keeping and the message string is transmitted to a queue on the sender's computer equipment 14 or 48.
The sender's computer equipment 14 or 48 receives the results from the computer network 12 and acknowledges acceptance. An information requestor may then access the results to determine what records or data were found that meet the criteria. Alternatively, the above-described data search can be initiated by one of the devices 18 and the results can be sent to the requesting device.
In another application of the present invention, the above-described computer and communications equipment 10 and computer programs may be used to automatically request location information from multiples devices 18 and determine which device 18 is closest to a particular location. Such information may be used for dispatching mobile units to assignments based on location information for the mobile units.
A sender that wishes to push location information to a recipient first accesses the computer network 12 via one of the computer networks 14 or computers 48 and submits such information to the computer network 12. The location information may be generated with any known dispatch application and may also include project information such as an address for a project and a scheduled date and time. The location information requested from the devices 18 is preferably GPS location coordinates generated from GPS receivers located on the devices 18.
Once the sender submits the above location information to the computer network 12, the computer network 12 conditions or processes the information so that it may be delivered to the intended recipient. The computer network 12 does so by first creating a unique message ID number for the information that is to be sent. The computer network 12 then records the information in a recovery log using the message ID so that it may be later recovered. The information is then moved to a queue in the computer network 12 and stored based on the message type and assigned certain tracking information such as a process code, a format code, and a version number.
A communication layer on the device 18 receives and stores the message packets in a packet queue, turns on the device, and activates a communication program residing on the device 18 and configured in accordance with one aspect of the present invention. The communication program processes the message packets by stripping the header from each packet, concatenating the packets in sequence order, converting the strings of information from transmittable strings to the appropriate format for the program or application that will access or run the information. (i.e. compressed, binary, or encrypted mode), and inserting the message number, message description, message category, and date into a message manager database. The communication program 18 also runs error tests to ensure integrity of the information, and deletes the packets from the packet queue if the information was received error-free. The communication program then automatically loads the information into the appropriate program or application residing on the device 18 so that the information can be acted upon by the device 18.
A custom location application on the device 18 then receives the message string from the communication program. The location application then polls a GPS receiver on or coupled with the device 18 through a location communication port. The GPS receiver provides response by providing GPS coordinate readings. The location application formats the GPS coordinates into an automatic feedback message to be sent back to the computer network 12. The feedback message is then passed to the communication program residing on the device 18.
The sender's computer equipment 14 or 48 receives the message from the computer network 12 and acknowledges acceptance. A proximity application on the sender's computer equipment 14 or 48 then reviews all the responses from multiple devices 18 and estimates the distance that each device is from the target location. The nearest device 18 can then be dispatched as described in the dispatch application above.
provisioning the computing and communication device by pushing the information as well as all applications needed to act upon the information to the computing and communication device when the computing and communication device is in communication with the wireless communication service provider so that the recipient may continue to use the information even when the computing and communication device is no longer in communication with the wireless communication service provider.
pushing to the computer and communication device the applications.
3. The method as set forth in claim 1, the information including at least one of the following: dispatch information, calender information, search request, location information software, and software upgrades.
4. The method as set forth in claim 1, the computing and communication device including one of the following: a personal digital assistant, a personal computer, a laptop computer, and an intelligent wireless phone.
5. The method as set forth in claim 1, wherein the sender is a company wishing to deliver information to employees, suppliers, or customers.
6. The method as set forth in claim 5, wherein the recipient is an employee, supplier or customer of the company.
7. The method as set forth in claim 1, the provisioning step further including the step of automatically loading the information into appropriate software applications on the computing and communication device.
parsing the information into a series of message packets.
provision the computing and communication device by pushing the information as well as all applications needed to act upon the information to the computing and communication device when the computing and communication device is in communication with the wireless communication service provider so that the recipient may continue to use the information even when the computing and communication device is no longer in communication with the wireless communication service provider.
push to the computer and communication device the applications.
11. The system as set forth in claim 9, the information including at least one of the following: dispatch information, calender information, search request, location information software, and software upgrades.
12. The system as set forth in claim 9, the computing and communication device including one of the following: a personal digital assistant, a personal computer, a laptop computer, and an intelligent wireless phone.
13. The system as set forth in claim 9, wherein the sender is a company wishing to deliver information to employees, suppliers, or customers.
14. The system as set forth in claim 13, wherein the recipient is an employee, supplier or customer of the company.
15. The system as set forth in claim 9, the system being further operable to automatically load the information into appropriate software applications on the computing and communication device.
parse the information into a series of message packets.
provisioning the computing and communications device by pushing the information as well as all applications needed to act upon the information to the computing and communications device when the computing and communications device is in communication with the wireless communication service provider so that the recipient may continue to use the information even when the computing and communications device is no longer in communication with the wireless communication service provider.
pushing the applications to the computing and communications device.
push the applications to the computing and communications device.
21. The method as set forth in claim 1, the information including at least one of the following: calender information, search request, location information software, and software upgrades.
22. The system as set forth in claim 9, the information including at least one of the following: calender information, search request, location information software, and software upgrades.
pushing the applications needed to act upon the information, as determined by the computing and communications device, to the computing and communications device through the service provider.
24. The method as set forth in claim 23, further including the step of conditioning the information so that it can be more easily delivered to the recipient.
25. The method as set forth in claim 23, wherein the wireless communication service provider operates a network selected from the group consisting of a PCS network, a ReFLEX network, an Advanced Radio Data Network, and a cellular network.
26. The method as set forth in claim 23, wherein the computing and communications device is selected from the group consisting of a handheld personal digital assistant, a personal computer, a laptop computer, an intelligent mobile phone, a pager, and an Internet appliance. | 2019-04-25T02:23:09Z | https://patents.google.com/patent/US6804707B1/en |
What is the mystery? The mystery is the work in process. Visually, I sense a great order of things and attempt to transpose this mystery into a picture. I used to look for meaningful order in life, now I am accepting things as IS. That nothing is certain, and in my imagery is ever-changing. We are at an epoch of a brave new world, and my hope is that our views will change about how we see our world, not to stay with the things familiar, but to reach out for the unknown.
1. Bing, Bernice. Burney Falls. 1980.
Oil on Canvas, 96 x 77 3/4″.
I was told that Bing’s painting had been haphazardly propped up in the hallway until it was recognized and rescued to higher ground. The fact that Bing’s painting was stored in such a manner would seem to be at worst a high art crime, at best sheer neglect. I could not reconcile this lack of respect, yet it seemed oddly emblematic of the treasure trove that is SomArts, where high and low art comingle.
The specter of invisibility has become the conduit for considering how a desire to create a visual archive of Bernice Bing’s life, art, and legacy has as much to do with excavating and preserving the material of her artwork as with her lived experience. I needed to understand the importance of the spiritual path Bing followed and the meditation practice that gave her focus and confidence as well as her search for her diasporic community in order to begin to navigate this in-between space. By approaching this task experientially, through listening to stories, looking at her paintings, and reading her journals, I too have found myself in the mystery of constant discovery. I am drawn to this state of absence, and I find that presence is returned by how I negotiate this space. I believe that art provides a medium for accessing this space of forgotten stories– making visible the invisible. As if the catalyst for my intent had been far closer than I could have realized, with Burney Falls hanging above my head every day, Bernice Bing’s oeuvre needed to be, in effect, dusted off and brought to light.
What exactly were the conditions that contributed to Bing’s marginalization? It is perhaps all too familiar an occurrence that a lesbian artist of color was filtered out of art history. If I accept this reality as a given, then I must also go beyond this banal fact and tease out the details of her story. There are so many facets of Bing’s identity–all of which beckon to be further explored, including the period of Beat history that contains such fissures and forgotten stories. Bing had access to the art world as an integral player.
Her marginalization occurred with the passage of time.
Perhaps the materialistic aspect of preserving Bing’s art is antithetical to the fact that her work was rooted in process and the negotiation of mystery. On the relation between art and Buddhist spirituality, Bing stated, “I haven’t learned to let go of art. The highest form of art is a vehicle, a mantra. I am burdened by the materialistic aspect of producing art.” I am intrigued by the complex and dynamic relations between Bing’s life and work. At present, there is little written about Bernice Bing save for the work begun by Moira Roth and the memorial essay written by Lydia Matthews, both archived on the Queer Cultural Center’s website by Rudy Lemcke. Despite this paucity of textual material, I find myself in the privileged position of being surrounded by people who knew and loved her.
Figure 2. Charles Snyder, Batman Gallery Poster. 1961.
The art community in the San Francisco Bay area experienced a surge of creative energy after World War II, and the city was the site of interchanges between abstract painters, Beat poets, jazz musicians, the West and East coasts, as well as artistic and spiritual contacts with Asia. This zenith of creativity encompassed a Beat sensibility that included collaboration, collectivity, and many forms of artistic expression. What was it like to come of age artistically during these times? In many ways, this post-war period represented a liminal stage, and Bing was an integral player in this moment.
San Francisco’s Bohemian history is rich and has been lovingly documented in numerous publications, yet these tales are only part of the story. In the Bohemian milieu, the masculine world of the literati and the male subjectivity of Abstract Expressionism dominated. Of course, women were present and not just as wives and stunning guests at parties and openings, but as business partners and artists. Rebecca Solnit has written extensively about Beat painting as concurrent with that of the literati’s activities during this period in the catalog accompanying the Whitney Museum of American Art’s exhibition, Beat Culture and The New America, 1950-1965. She explicates that though the historical focus has always been on the literati’s activities in North Beach, the strong presence of painters and jazz musicians in the Western Addition promoted significant artistic exchange. The two prominent women in this group that Solnit writes about were close friends of Bing’s: Jay De Feo (married to Wally Hendrick) and Joan Brown (married to Manuel Neri).
Romantic alliances that were formed within this bohemian haven were an integral part of the movement and formed a nexus of lovers, partners, and roommates. A woman’s success and visibility as an artist was no doubt heightened by the partnerships she formed with successful men, and in many ways created a conflation of roles previously prescribed to women in bohemia’s history, such as the unsettled distinction between woman as muse and woman as artist. This idea was perhaps most clearly defined within Surrealism by Andre Breton, who attributed the female muse with child-like qualities that he saw as closer to the unconscious than men were. Although De Feo and Brown were talented artists in their own right, I think it is important to question why they are written about and not Bernice Bing, the lesbian artist. Their marriages, as far as history is concerned, ensure that they are remembered by association.
Forbidden City Dressing Room. n.d.
Collection of Frances Chun Kan.
The early rupture in her life caused by her mother’s death disconnected her from the key sources of cultural transmission. Gone were the superstitions, the stories, the language, and the food that all serve as conduits for transferring her Chinese culture from the elders in her family. Though she was raised in foster homes, she had relatives who exposed her to her Chinese heritage through the occasional visits, and this was enough to spark an interest which she pursued as a young woman through her studies and for the rest of her life.
Her memories of Chinatown (the sights, the smells, the colors, and sounds) were only a memory, not something that was directly cultivated growing up. How does such an influence grow? In the absence of an environment that nurtures a sensibility, is there information in the space of memory that provides an intuitive map to navigate the world?
At that time I knew almost nothing about Eastern art or thought. I was totally naive about my own cultural heritage. I was living in and reacting to parallel worlds–one, the rational, conscious world of the West; the other, the intuitive, unconscious world of the East. This duality caused me to explore the differences and samenesses in art forms.
Is Bing strategically toying with stereotypical notions of East/West dualism here? When she refers to the West as “conscious” and the East as “unconscious,” I am inclined to think this construct refers tacitly to the organizing principal of interconnectedness that is understood as part of a dualistic whole. If I understand that in every cliché there is an element of truth, then it compels me to go beyond the face-value of her statement. It also has to be acknowledged that, given she was born, raised, and educated in the United States, her context, first and foremost, was a hybrid of the experiential, the learned, and the intuitive, given her artistic sensibilities.
Bing’s statement can also be understood as an admission of her own naiveté about her cultural heritage. In fact, Bing later turned to a Japanese mentor, Sabro Hasegawa, who inspired her with a context to begin thinking about her heritage. In her words, “I had no idea what it meant to be an Asian woman and he got me started thinking about that. I was in awe of him.” This reveals a complex process that included all sorts of intercultural knowledge. Bing’s lack of experience and innocence in this regard, along with her hunger for knowledge about her heritage, would have included impressions gleaned from the dominant culture at the time. Clearly, this process was a life-long endeavor of absorbing information and discovering self-truths.
Gifted with a facility for drawing at a young age, art became the means by which she navigated the two worlds in which she lived: the memory of the brief exposure to her Chinese culture in the first years of her life, and the Western context in which she was raised. Nona Mock Wyman, in her memoir about growing up in the same orphanage as Bing, titled Chopstick Childhood In A Town of Silver Spoons: Orphaned at the Ming Quong Home, recalls the nuns who washed Bing’s mouth out with soap as punishment for her smart and feisty tongue. Raised in an orphanage, Bing was not a dutiful Chinese daughter curtailed by the family structure. The story Wyman tells is emblematic of Bing’s angry rebellion and unwillingness to conform. This spirit would follow her throughout her life and find its outlet in her paintings. Early in her student career, Bing was drawn to teachers that could inform her about painting, calligraphy, abstraction and Zen. In other words, her early facility for drawing became the means by which she also was able to access and learn about her heritage.
Bing was also deeply influenced by her studies in Abstraction with Richard Diebenkorn and Nathan Oliviera. In her book, Abstract Expressionism, Other Politics, Anne Gibson points out that Abstract Expressionism (a style whose definition was intimately related to the identity of the artist), while being promulgated as a universal story, has been told as a triumph of the outsider. Abstract Expressionism represented a rebellious movement born of the post-War period in America. This narrative, based on the trials of a privileged group of white, heterosexual bohemians and intellectuals, and celebrated by critics such as Clement Greenberg, reflects the story of Abstract Expressionism as it has been written into the art historical canon.
Artists such as Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning were enamored with the idea of a pure process related to self-discovery through painting. The time of Abstract Expressionism was also the era of New Criticism in which political affiliations were suppressed along with one’s biography. As a result, Gibson contends, Abstract Expressionism emerged as the “work of artists of one gender, one color, and one sexual preference…while critics also insisted that their judgments were made without reference to the artist’s identities.” Abstract Expressionism claimed the mantle of marginality and appropriated aesthetic strategies (such as masking, maternalism, and social invisibility) that paralleled experiences more familiar to blacks, women, gays, and lesbians and was certainly resonant to Asians experiencing bitter and protracted prejudice in San Francisco during this time in American history. In particular, from the turn of the twentieth century, until its repeal in 1943, the Chinese Exclusion Act was a national system formed specifically for regulating Asian immigration, a system that invoked fear and suspicion of Asian Americans in the larger community.
Clement Greenberg and some of the influential critics that followed him all practiced this kind of New Critical/Death of the Author interpretation that actually perpetuated the power and privilege of the individual artist within a space of critical denial. How does one understand this notion of the self? In this context, an understanding must first address the construct that in many ways actively appropriated styles and tropes from other traditions while positioning Abstract Expressionism, in Greenberg’s words, as an “art that lies almost entirely within Western tradition.” Nothing is pure. What is authentic is entirely subjective to the individual and, perhaps, takes a lifetime for that individual to discover.
Bing’s understanding of the East came largely from her own desire to pursue this knowledge as a young woman, namely through her studies with Sabro Haesgawa at the California School of Fine Arts who introduced her to Zen, the writings of Lao Tzu, and Chinese painting. Based on Bing’s own biography, the historical references Bing makes to calligraphy, philosophy, and ancient Chinese Art in her work drew from her experience. Her search represented an excavation of her roots and was a reflection of her unfolding identity. At the same time, it represented a confluence of different styles and cultures.
Figure 4. Bernice Bing, Burney Falls. 1965.
Watercolor on paper, 24 x32”.
During the period of Abstract Expressionism’s development, a significant number of Asian American artists comprised a largely unnoticed group of abstractionists, according to the exhibition curator, Jeffrey Wechsler. He proposes that this art, “centered in nature and meditative rather than assertive in spirit, has roots in a fundamentally Asian esthetic.” Wechsler further suggests that the signature features of Abstract Expressionism (gestural brushwork, a restricted palette) had time-honored Asian precedents. Wechsler understands Bing’s work in the context of geography/biography and the historical traditions by which her work is influenced. This context is provocative given that Abstract Expressionism, at its advent, was promoted by critics such as Clement Greenberg as a purely American Art form. Wechsler proposes a much more fluid re-framing of this moment based on a confluence of different traditions, coincidences, and influences rather than a spontaneous generation on American soil.
Art Historian Margo Machida asserts that the framing of issues “through an Asian American lens continues to be widely regarded as parochial and self-marginalizing.” At the same time, “there is nothing inherently restrictive, essentialist or balkanizing about concepts like difference and identity.” In fact, essentialism further collapses the scope of inquiry rather than inviting further investigation and imagination. Machida maintains that reproducing Asian American visual art without new means of interpretation and contextualization is problematic. As the world becomes an increasingly hybrid, transnational environment, the issues of meaning and cultural translation have to move beyond the rhetoric of race and ethnicity. In this premise, there is a provocative question concerning intercultural knowledge. If it can be said that the discourse has evolved beyond mere representation as a means to counterweight stereotypes, than it can also be said that anybody’s biography contains complex and disparate elements. Bing’s biography complicates and adds depth to her art because she was actively engaged in an ongoing process of examination. Not everyone elects to do this, and it takes a certain degree of courage to look within in this manner.
In 1958 Bing transferred from the California College of Arts and Crafts, where she had studied advertising, to the California School of Fine Arts to pursue a degree in painting. She earned a BFA with honors and went on to graduate as part of the first MFA class in 1961. Bernice Bing, or Bingo as she was affectionately called since childhood, was part of a Bay Area art scene that included Joan Brown, Bill Wiley, Robert Hudson, Leo Vallidor, and Cornelia Schulz–colleagues in her 1961 MFA class at the California School of Fine Arts.
After her graduation, she enjoyed a one-person exhibition at the Batman Gallery. The Batman Gallery was so-called due to the influence of poet Michael McClure (who, when asked about the origin of the name, quipped, “You know, battling the forces of evil.”) and the “blackness” that was artist Bruce Connor’s creation: black floor, black ceilings, the complete opposite of what you would see in most galleries with their stark white walls. This alternative site for artists and intellectuals was still a decidedly male-authored environment. William Jahrmarkt financed the Batman Gallery, and McClure and Connor were instrumental is its design and concept.
Alfred Frankenstein reviewed Bing’s solo show at the Batman in the San Francisco Chronicle: “Bing . . . has a remarkable gift for fluid line . . . carried to the verge of abstraction in some extremely good small drawings. Her paintings are huge and are most remarkable for the majestic sternness of their blacks and reds…” The artists who inspired Bing (de Kooning, Kline, Motherwell, Still favored monumentally scaled works that stood as reflections of their individual psyches . Bing also favored huge works that were as bold a statement as her male counterparts. It could be surmised that she was able to garner a solo show at the Batman because of the scale of her works, at a time when a one-woman show was rare. Bing’s work was informed by this confident masculine energy, while at the same time she was unassuming. According to Bing, the Batman show was “surprising” to her contemporaries since she did not make a lot of noise at school.
Figure 5. Bing, Bernice. Las Meninas. 1960.
Oil on Canvas, 6 x 6′.
Figure 6. Velázquez, Diego. Las Meninas,1656.
Oil on canvas. 10’5″ x 9’1″.
The scene staged by Bing in the poster for her exhibit at the Batman Gallery mimics, in certain ways, Velázquez’s famous painting. Velázquez placed himself to the side of the painting on which he is working, and, significantly, Bing is framed by several large paintings in her own studio. Both artists identify as painters and associate themselves within the represented scene. Though Bing is not actively working on her paintings in the same way as Velázquez, the scene is staged at the site of her production, within her studio, and her paintings serve as her entourage. Her gaze, like Velázquez, signals an awareness of the viewer.
Michel Foucault’s study of Velázquez’s Las Meninas focused on the artwork itself as though it were before him, describing in minute detail what he saw. Foucault conceptualizes the significance of this painting as a “self-reflexive meditation on the nature of representation” which signals a paradigmatic shift in Western culture regarding representation. Foucault writes, “We are observing ourselves being observed by the painter, and made visible to his eyes by the same light that enables us to see him.” Through Foucault’s act of observing and describing the painting, he reveals a reciprocity of looking that complicates the relationship between those who are represented and those who look. In effect, there is a degree of uncertainty in visual representation. Bing suggests a shift in the field of abstraction that is dependent on the viewer’s interpretation. Here Bing shows in visual terms the thesis that Foucault later elucidates with language. Bing’s choice is oddly prescient as Foucault’s study of Las Meninas would not be writtern for another six years.
Figure 7. © Charles Snyder, Bingo late 50’s. n.d.
In another image by photographer Grover Sales, Bing is captured as if in contemplation of her painting that fills the background of the frame. (fig.8) Here, in the midst of her reverie, she looks out at the viewer who has entered her space. Bing is wearing a white oxford with the sleeves rolled up, her hair pulled loosely back, and her trademark red lips captured in black and white. Her hand holds a lit cigarette; the tendrils of smoke become part of the field of abstraction in her painting. There is something seductively voyeuristic about these shots and I can’t help but describe her presence in these glamorous and feminine terms. I would venture to assert that, here, Bing assumes the “the mask of femininity” as she poses within her studio. According to the analysis of Joan Rivière, in her essay, “Womanliness as Masquerade,” “womanliness therefore could be assumed and worn as a mask, both to hide the possession of masculinity [read power and authority] and to revert the reprisals expected if [the women] was found to possess it.” There is a symbiotic relationship between Bing and the paint that reveals an intimate and carefully crafted look at the artist.
Figure 8. © Grover Sales, Bernice Bing, n.d.
The Sales photograph presents one version of Bing’s “self,” embodying both her authority as an artist and her feminine presence. The similarities between the photograph of Bing in the white oxford and the photo that appears on the Batman Gallery poster are as striking as the marked differences, and I can only surmise why one and not the other, in the end, was chosen for the poster. Ultimately, by reframing and developing the shadow presence of the Batman Gallery and by extension, the times around Abstract Expressionism and the Beat movement in San Francisco, the whole picture comes into focus. The Batman Gallery poster is a piece of ephemera that function as one of the few remaining testimonials to this place and time.
Reading the poster provides clues to the context of history, gender, and Bing’s concurrent quest for identity that make clear the need to expand the art historical canon to acknowledge the key role of this visionary painter. The poster demonstrates that Bing was present and that she was an integral player in Beat History. At the tail end of the fifties, a time dominated by the masculine presence in the arts, Bing chose to identify in bold and unmistakable terms that she was a painter, while positioning herself squarely within the trajectory of art history.
Burney Falls was returned to the Bing estate in July 2009- an end of an era and a reminder that there is still much to do… this is dedicated to the memory and spirit of Bernice Bing and Jack Davis- may we never forget.
In 1960, Bing accompanies Joan Brown a close friend at this time, to New York, for Brown’s first one-person show at the Staempfli Gallery. Meets Duchamp at a party. “That was my most thrilling experience in New York.” Moira Roth, “A Narrative Chronology”, in Moira Roth & Diane Tani, eds. Bernice Bing, (Berkeley, CA: Visibility Press, 1991), 22-23.
Lydia Matthews, “Quantum Bingo,” (San Francisco: SomArts Gallery, Retrospective Exhibition, 1999).
Susan Landauer, The San Francisco School of Abstract Expressionism (Berkeley, CA: University of CA Press, 1996), 5-6.
Rebecca Solnit, “Heretical Constellations: Notes on California, 1946-1961,” Beat Culture and The New America, 1950-1965, (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1995), 69.
Briony Fer, David Batchelor and Paul Wood, Realism, Rationalism, Surrealism: Art Between the Wars, (London: Open University, 1993), 237.
Lenore Chinn, in conversation with the author, (July 3, 2008).
Moira Roth, “A Narrative Chronology”, in Moira Roth & Diane Tani, eds. Bernice Bing, (Berkeley, CA: Visibility Press, 1991), 22-23.
Bing, (Berkeley, CA: Visibility Press, 1991). 22-23.
Ann Eden Gibson, Abstract Expressionism: Other Politics (Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1999), 59.
Ann Eden Gibson, Abstract Expressionism: Other Politics, (Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1999).
Life on Angel Island, Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation, 200-2008 http://www.aiisf.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=58&Itemid=71, (accessed on April 8, 2009).
Ellen G. Landau, ed. Reading Abstract Expressionism: Context and Critique, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005), 207.
Elaine H Kim, Margo Machida, and Sharon Mizota, eds. Fresh Talk, Daring Gazes: Conversations on Asian American Art, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003). xi-xiii.
Edited by Moira Roth & Diane Tani, Bernice Bing, (Berkeley, CA: Visibility Press, 1991).
Jack Foley, “O her blackness sparkles!” in The Beat Generation: Galleries and Beyond, (Davis, CA: John Natsoulas Press. 1996),163.
Alfred Frankenstein as quoted in Moira Roth, “A Narrative Chronology” in Bernice Bing. 26.
Paul Stella. “Abstract Expressionism”. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/abex/hd_abex.htm (accessed September 5, 2008).
Madlyn Millner Kahr. “Velazquez and Las Meninas”. The Art Bulletin, Vol.57, No. 2, June 1975. 225.
Michel Foucault, “Las Meninas,” The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences (London: Routledge. 2002), 3-18.
Yvette Greslé, “Foucault’s Las Meninas and art-historical methods,” Journal of Literary Studies, Volume 22, Issue 3 & 4 (London, England: Routledge Press, December 2006): 211-228.
Joan Riviere, “Womanliness as Masquerade,” first published in International Journal of Psychoanalysis 9 (1929): 303-313; reprinted in The Inner World of Joan Riviere: Collected Papers, 1920-1958 (London: Karnac Books, 1991), 90-101. | 2019-04-21T05:05:50Z | https://qcc2.org/bernice-bing-retrospective-1999/essay-by-jennifer-banta/ |
Documents delivered to the Beacon – initially left anonymously and later discovered to have been supplied by Republican mayoral candidate Sue Stenhouse – have indicated inconsistencies in statements made this July by Mayor Joseph Solomon regarding the City Hall Annex building.
During a meeting of the Warwick Rotary Club at the Radisson Hotel on July 12, Solomon gave a short speech as the featured guest where he was asked by a former city worker to provide an update on any impending solution for the closed Annex building, which had displaced city workers to the former Greene Elementary School following a severe pipe bursting incident this past January.
“Unfortunately, the records necessary to make those decisions were not made available to me,” Solomon said in response, adding that he was reaching out to the Rhode Island Interlocal Management Trust, the insurance agency for the city, along with two independent contractors hired at the discretion of former mayor Scott Avedisian’s administration (one a public claims adjuster and one a contracting company from East Providence) to acquire that information.
However, according to the documents received from Stenhouse, Avedisian actually sent a packet consisting of 135 pages of correspondence between the Trust, the contractors and other city officials outlining the entirety of the Annex issue to Solomon on April 27, 2018 – the first in a series of 47 so-called “transition documents” Avedisian provided Solomon in advance of his departure on May 15.
Stenhouse, who was also in the audience at the time Solomon made the above comment, said she looked into this statement and called Avedisian to see if he had truly not made Solomon abreast of the situation.
Included in the documents was the Trust’s assessment that the city could be reimbursed in the net amount of $279,212.25 for the damages sustained in January. The report from East Side Construction indicated upwards of $1.78 million in necessary repairs that needed to be made to the building, compounded by the fact that the inspection found seven serious code violations in the building, including a lack of a fire sprinkler system and an insufficient number of exits from the building.
The documents also included the extensive report from Bill Depasquale – who at the time was the director of the Planning Department, and is now Solomon’s Chief of Staff – which presented the projected costs of renovating the existing building or replacing the Annex with a new building. It also presented multiple other buildings in the city that could potentially become the new Annex.
On Monday, Solomon said that the initial report was missing a “structural engineering report,” and that he couldn’t disclose more about what this report entailed or contained due to a possible lawsuit pending from a party involved in the matter. He did not expand further on what that entailed, but he said that the report would be made public in the future.
Stenhouse, however, perceived the situation as not moving quickly at all.
Really glad Stenhouse is all about integrity now. She must have seen the light after her fiasco/charade in Cranston dressing up a man as a woman for a press conference celebrating teen volunteers! because if she would deceive the press and the public that way, what else would she lie to us in the public about?
oh, may as well add, that if true, this report does not speak well of Solomon. Didn't he play the Sgt Schultz card regarding the recent contract raises too?
WwkVoter, we know that Stenhouse is running basically as Avedisian 2.0. So it's no surprise that Avedisian would pass along those transition documents, or that she would release them when it might do damage to Solomon.
Here's what I'm wondering: Will Solomon release everything he has and try to explain it on his own terms, or let Stenhouse dribble them out over the next few weeks?
I agree with you -- it's a bad look for Solomon to claim that he didn't know certain things, when he could have, and more importantly, should have.
Interestingly enough, those documents were delivered to Ms. Stenhouse by a bus driver from the Pilgrim Senior Center who was dressed up in drag as an elderly woman. Some people just have a real hard time dropping fetishes.
You will see that Solomon will not release anything or say much until after the election. That is the main reason why the 3rd party audit from YKSM is incomplete as of this date. The city has yet to provide YKSM with the payroll documents of the fire dept. to confirm payment of funds although all of the other documents confirm that.
According to Sue, he played dumb to cover for lack of vision and action. Would she rather Solomon parade a cross dressing bus driver around to distract others from what was going on?
"As a member of the City Council for the last 18 years and as council president four times during his tenure, it is time for Solomon to take ownership of issues and stop skirting his responsibility.” So Sue decided to do nothing about it in all that time and wait until it was a few days before a primary and then decided he should be held accountable!
Sue Stenhouse: Go low, forget about the high road.
Solomon insults the electorate by skipping the debate and lies to his constituents. Nice combination.
Joe Solomon offers to very competently run the status quo with little imagination and an inability to overcome his own weakness to face facts and take a stand. But he wont get us in any trouble other than the slow boil of steadily rising taxes and slowly eroding services that we frogs have been in for years.
By contrast, Sue Stenhouse offers absolutely nothing.
I believe Mr. Solomon is being conservative in what he knows. And with that it makes perfect sense not to release everything until all the facts are verified. I have been told that the city is looking at two alternatives,1) to repair the damaged building or 2) to replace the building with a newly constructed building. If you vote for Sue Stenhouse, who is claiming to follow in Mr. Avedisian's footsteps, all constituents should look at the mess that Mr. Avedisian has Left Behind... most of us know that that includes crumbling City infrastructure with no end, due to Mr. Avedisian not having the skills to appropriately manage the city, and one specific example, his not being able to implement a capital replacement plan for the assets of the city. Because of Mr. Avedisian's failure to have such a capital replacement plan, we have crumbling infrastructure, which includes our schools with leaking roofs and mold, our potholed roads, odor every time you drive on 95 by the Warwick Sewer Authority treatment plant, city vehicles that are outdated and need replacement, second and repeated event major sewer line breakages on Cedar Swamp Road, and the subject City Hall Annex Building where repairs may not be feasible because of building code violations and standard design practices that were not followed during construction of the existing building that was flooded, there is a trend and history of deception and concealing the truth by Mr. Avedisian and his supporter Sue Stenhouse... Cross-dressing people to deceive constituents is only a foreshadow of what will come with an Avedisian supported Sue Stenhouse for mayor, she has no experience whatsoever at that level needed to be an effective mayor and would continue in the same manner that has led to the city's crumbling infrastructure.
Great post and "being conservative in what he knows" is in my opinion imprudent. Anyone running for mayor should not be playing dumb/keeping secrets about public issues that we all have to pay for. He did it with the saying he didnt know about the cost of the new public safety/dpw contract, and then again with the annex. He's running the risk that some watchdog like Cote will apra the emails and documents and show that he was hiding (being conservative) with information instead of just spelling out what he knows, and that there's more to gather, and when he develops options he'll bring those forward too. WE are paying the bill for all this after all.
Despite this bad habit of playing Sgt Schultz, I will be voting for Solomon this week and again in November because he is the best qualified and most experienced candidate for Mayor available to us, by far.
Joe Solomon should be addressing things that he is aware of if he knows about them, straight out lying and stating that he is unaware of things is unacceptable. If Joe wins as Mayor this city will be in a lot worst shape than it ever has been. Sue Stenhouse would be a fantastic candidate for Warwick, her knowledge of issues is best in class.
It bears reminding that Stenhouse told the ultimate lie while in her relatively low level position as a senior services manager in Cranston.
Interesting that you would criticize Solomon for not being forthright with the voters regarding how much he knew about two particular issues, while simultaneously ignoring the unbelievable fraud Stenhouse attempted to perpetrate upon the public with that ridiculous charade that got us into international news.
That doesn't look like somebody who's competent or aware of the issues, or even takes the public seriously for that matter.
This was a fiasco/charade in Cranston dressing up a man as a woman for a press conference celebrating teen volunteers! If she would deceive the press and the public that way, what else would she lie to us in the public about? What does such an attempt at deceiving the public say about her judgment?
Stenhouse lost her job over that. Now she works at a Mini-Golf which I'm sure is a respectable job. But I've seen nothing that would point to her being a competent mayor of Rhode Island's third largest city. Quite the opposite. in my eyes will be open during the general election campaign to see if any new information Services regarding her capability, but it would be hard to get past the charade that she tried to pull on the Cranston voters in any case.
I can't help but wonder if Mayor Fung had anything to do with dressing the guy up as a woman. She falls on her sword and if she loses the Mayoral race she'll join the Fung Administration if he wins the Governors race. Lord knows Fung has no integrity.
I agree with most of your comments about Joe Solomon and especially liked the Sgt. Shultz reference.
1. voting for every tax increase this century.
5. Slapping the taxpayers with the largest tax increase allowed by law, giving the money to his political insiders to buy their votes (with taxpayer money) and not even being honest about where he lives. (He "claims" to live in ward 4 but actually lives in ward 5 where that house (21 Crawford) only went up in tax assessed value over the last two years by $4,400 when his ALL of the other 5 houses on Crawford went up by $61,100, $38,000, $46,200, $21,700, and $23,400) Did Joe rip off his second floor or is he ripping off the taxpayers?
WwkVoter, look up YOUR house on the Warwick Tax Assessors database and see if you agree that Joe is paying way WAY less than he should. Then read The Corrente Plan to see my solution. Hint: Send the appraisal findings to The Warwick Beacon FIRST, so they can't be "adjusted". Joe NEEDS to pay his fair share. You're right. This used car dealer has "experience". Maybe we need "change" instead.
Honest, taxpaying voters in Warwick who wish to learn more about the make-believe mayor before voting on Sept. 12 should read the entirety of this comment.
In addition to his use of this website for free political advertising, which has been his primary way to promote his once-failed candidacy, the make-believe mayor has a history of making false claims that he hopes readers will forget.
For their benefit, I include the following information, so that within approximately 20 minutes, they will have a clearer picture of the failed 2016 candidate and his intent to fool voters into supporting him.
These two claims were central to his 2016 campaign — and they were both lies. And yet he continued to repeat them until his eventual 65-to-35% loss.
- On his new campaign website, he at first claimed that he was an “Endorsed Democrat for Mayor” — before the local Democratic Party had endorsed any candidates in the 2018 campaign. He lost his bid for the endorsement, forcing him to remove that false claim from his website.
This is the person calling himself “the taxpayers [sic] mayor” — someone who has admitted that he lost his home due to tax delinquency, repeatedly made false claims about the school population and business community in Warwick, refused to answer questions about his ethically questionable campaign finance activities, and claimed an endorsement that he did not have.
Please join me and thousands of honest, taxpaying voters in rejecting the make-believe mayor’s candidacy again on Sept. 12.
Honestly, I'm a Democrat, and those of you who blindly follow Solomon are a huge part of the problem. You aren't following what's going on! He raises taxes, ignores the school committee, lies about what he does and doesn't know about, and bullies city workers into supporting him.
He is a lazy disgrace of a mayor. Do you know he spend thousands to re-print tons of Warwick tourism cards and posters with his picture on them, instead of using the ones that had already existed? Shame on him and you for supporting him.
I know what happened at the Senior Center and you're all blindly following the press, who blew it out of proportion completely. Stenhouse needs to make a public statement clarifying what happened. She did not deceive anyone.But until she does that, keep picking on her for it. Obviously it's all you've got on her.
WarwickDemocratVoter, Stenhouse doesn't get to stand on moral high ground over Solomon.
On her watch a male bus driver dressed up as a female senior citizen. Whether or not Fung was involved in the deception has not been validated. The fact remains that it was a media stunt that backfired and someone had to take the hit. Her name is connected with the deceit. This is the report on the issue by NBC 10.
"When NBC 10 visited Stenhouse's Warwick home Wednesday evening, she at first told a reporter to go away. Then, she opened her door and exchanged a few words with NBC 10. I've been in a meeting all night being a great public servant for the city of Warwick," Stenhouse said. "Now, I get this (expletive.) And you guys did not reach out to me. And that was a big lie on the news. Stenhouse was complaining about NBC 10's original story that aired on the 6 p.m. news. She claimed the station did not contact her beforehand. NBC 10 maintains it reached out to Stenhouse ahead of the broadcast and she knew the story would be airing."
"The head of a senior citizens center in Rhode Island has resigned for dressing up a male bus driver as an elderly woman in a press conference — because she thought the fake lady made for a better photo op. Sue Stenhouse, the ex-executive director of Cranston's Senior Enrichment Center, presided over a seemingly innocuous presser in early January about high school kids shoveling snow. While talking to media, Stenhouse stood by the city's mayor, some high school kids — and one clearly uncomfortable woman, wearing a handmade tag reading, "Cranston Senior Home Resident." Turns out that woman was a man — a driver for the center, who was decked out in a dress, a gray wig, earrings and lipstick for the camera, according to NBC 10 News. The station said Stenhouse believed having the apparent old lady by her side made for a better image. "
Now if she had another side of the story, why hasn't it ever been stated or published? If you were wrongly accused of something, wouldn't you want to clear your name? She is literally running on "Integrity, Strength, Results". INTEGRITY?!?
I am also suspect of her latest move of attacking Solomon regarding the Annex Building. She stated: " As a member of the City Council for the last 18 years and as Council President four times during his tenure, it is time for Solomon to take ownership of issues and stop skirting his responsibility,"
She anonymously sent the letter and then later owned up to it. She claims to have all this experience and knowledge of the inner workings of Warwick. Why did she wait until now to point fingers at Solomon? This is only happening now because they are running for the same office. It is just another politician trying to kick up dirt on a rival. Nothing more, nothing less.
I can't say I am 100% behind Solomon for Mayor but I will say he had a lot thrown at him all at once. Being on the city council and running the city are two different things. There is a learning curve and it is understandable. He is also running a campaign so I am really not going to go toe to toe with them man about not reading or reporting on a memo regarding the Annex Building.
Sue sold her integrity out when she chose to have a cross dressing bus driver stand next her for a photo op. I have no guarantee she won't try to do something similar depending on the circumstances. She is not the right person for the job. | 2019-04-22T10:23:39Z | http://warwickonline.com/stories/documents-reveal-inconsistencies-from-solomon-speech-in-july,136483 |
CATALYST FOR SYNTHESIZING THEAFLAVINS AND METHOD FOR SYNTHESIZING THEAFLAVINS - NBC MESHTEC INC.
The objective/problem addressed by the present invention is to provide a novel technique pertaining to theaflavins synthesis. The present invention pertains to: a theaflavins synthesis catalyst characterized in having a base comprising an inorganic material, and metal nanoparticles anchored to the base, said particles measuring 0.5-100 nm in diameter; and a theaflavins synthesis method in which the catalyst is used.
20050154052 Novel crystalline forms of (s)-citalopram oxalate July, 2005 Parthasaradhi et al.
20090299082 EPOXY FUNCTIONALIZED CARBON NANOTUBES AND METHODS OF FORMING THE SAME December, 2009 Baudot et al.
20100029962 Alkylene oxide purification systems February, 2010 Szul et al.
20090299080 Photochromic Compound December, 2009 Yokoyama et al.
20030216260 C2-phenyl-substituted cyclic keto-enols used as pesticides and herbicides November, 2003 Ruther et al.
20070281989 Process for preparing duloxetine and intermediates thereof December, 2007 Ini et al.
20080281073 High-Purity Oxydiphthalic Acid Anhydride and Process for Producing the Same November, 2008 Nagayama et al.
20080188549 Composition for Preventing and/or Treating Metabolic Syndrome and Insulin Resistance Syndrome August, 2008 Tanaka et al.
20020032320 Methods of labelling biomolecules with fluorescent dyes March, 2002 Burgess et al.
20090131689 TRICYCLIC AROMATICS AND LIQUID-CRYSTALLINE MEDIUM May, 2009 Eidenschink et al.
1. A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins, comprising: a base having an anchored part including an inorganic material on a surface; and metal nanoparticles that are anchored to the anchored part and have a particle diameter of 0.5 nm or more and 100 nm or less.
2. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 1, wherein the metal nanoparticles are one or two or more selected from the group consisting of Au, Pd, Pt, and oxides thereof.
3. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 1, wherein the anchored part includes a metal oxide.
4. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 3, wherein the metal oxide is one or two or more compounds selected from the group consisting of SiO2, ZrO2, Fe2O3, and TiO2.
5. A method for synthesizing theaflavins comprising bringing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 1 into contact with a catechins aqueous solution that is an aqueous solution in which pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin are dissolved, to synthesize theaflavins.
6. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 2, wherein the anchored part includes a metal oxide.
7. A method for synthesizing theaflavins comprising bringing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 2 into contact with a catechins aqueous solution that is an aqueous solution in which pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin are dissolved, to synthesize theaflavins.
8. A method for synthesizing theaflavins comprising bringing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 3 into contact with a catechins aqueous solution that is an aqueous solution in which pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin are dissolved, to synthesize theaflavins.
9. A method for synthesizing theaflavins comprising bringing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to claim 4 into contact with a catechins aqueous solution that is an aqueous solution in which pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin are dissolved, to synthesize theaflavins.
The present invention relates to a catalyst usable for synthesis of theaflavins and a method for synthesizing theaflavins.
Attention has been attracted to various functional substances contained in Japanese tea that has been drunk by Japanese for a long time due to current boom of health. A representative example thereof as catechins. Catechins were first confirmed by Dr. Tsujimura, et al. in 1929 at The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research. Then, various functions of catechins such as an antioxidation action, an antibiotic action, prevention of cancer, and decrease in blood cholesterol level have been found. Products such as foods for specified health uses and supplements have been made from catechins.
However, production of green tea that contains a large amount of catechins is restricted to some regions such as Japan and China, and fermented tea such as black tea and oolong tea is produced in about 80% of the world. In recent years, it has been clear that the fermented tea contains substances having the same function as that of catechins, which are called theaflavins, and attention has been attracted (Patent Literature 1). Further, a method for synthesizing theaflavins has been studied (Patent Literatures 2 and 3).
However, a method using an enzymatic reaction or a cultured cell, as described in Patent Literatures 2 and 3, has problems such as very severe conditions for synthesis, low handling ability, and difficult removal of an enzyme after the reaction.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a novel technique pertaining to theaflavins synthesis.
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins having a base having an anchored part including an inorganic material on a surface, and metal nanoparticles that are anchored to the anchored part and have a particle diameter of 0.5 nm or more and 100 nm or less.
The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to , wherein the metal nanoparticles are one or two or more selected from the group consisting of Au, Pd, Pt, and oxides thereof.
The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to or , wherein the anchored part includes a metal oxide.
The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to , wherein the metal oxide is one or two or more compounds selected from the group consisting of SiO2, ZrO2, Fe2O3, and TiO2.
A method for synthesizing theaflavins including bringing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to any one of to into contact with a catechin aqueous solution that is an aqueous solution in which pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin are dissolved, to synthesize theaflavins.
The present invention can provide a novel technique pertaining to theaflavins synthesis.
FIG. 1 is a TEM image of a catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of Example.
FIG. 2 is a result of analysis of a theaflavin aqueous solution obtained in Example.
FIG. 3 is a result of analysis of a theaflavin aqueous solution obtained in Example.
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment has a base having an anchored part including an inorganic material on a surface, and metal nanoparticles that are anchored to the anchored part and have a particle diameter of 0.5 nm or more and 100 nm or less. When the metal nanoparticles are anchored to the anchored part including an inorganic material on the surface of the base, the composite has very high oxidation catalytic ability. The metal nanoparticles can be anchored to the anchored part by various methods described below. When the metal nanoparticles are converted into particles using a reductant or the like without the base, the metal particles may be aggregated. For this reason, loss of activity is considered. In this embodiment, the metal nanoparticles are anchored to the anchored part on the surface of the base including an inorganic material. Therefore, the aggregation of the metal nanoparticles can be prevented.
The base of this embodiment is not particularly limited as long as the base has the anchored part including an inorganic material. Specific examples of the base having the anchored part may include a base of which surface is constituted by an inorganic material, and a base of which the whole is constituted by an inorganic material.
The anchored part may be constituted by one or two or more of zeolite, apatite, a carbon material such as activated carbon, diatomaceous earth, and a metal oxide. Among these, it is preferable that the anchored part be a metal oxide.
A method of forming the anchored part from the metal oxide is not particularly limited. Examples thereof may include a method of electrochemically forming a thin coating film of the metal oxide by anodic oxidation, a method of oxidizing a metal surface by a thermal treatment, and a method of forming an oxidized thin film by sputtering or an ion plating method. The whole base may be constituted by the metal oxide.
Since the anchored part is constituted by the metal oxide, exchange of oxygen molecules is active. Therefore, the catalytic activity can be enhanced more. Examples of the metal oxide may include oxides of silicon, zirconium, zinc, titanium, chromium, iron, cooper, tin, and aluminum. For example, the anchored part may be constituted by one or two or more of these metal oxides. It is particularly preferable that the anchored part be constituted by one or two or more of SiO2, ZrO2, Fe2O3, and TiO2 since the catalytic activity is further enhanced due to a relation with the amount of the metal nanoparticles anchored.
For example, the metal nanoparticles according to this embodiment may be one or two or more selected from the group consisting of gold (Au), metal palladium (Pd), platinum (Pt), and oxides thereof. Specifically, one or two or more selected from the group consisting of gold, metal palladium, platinum, a gold oxide, a palladium oxide, and a platinum oxide may foe used as the metal nanoparticles according to this embodiment.
Metal palladium refers to palladium having a valence of 0. Metal palladium may be usually obtained by reducing divalent and/or tetravalent palladium ions using a reductant (e.g., hydrazine, formaldehyde, tartaric acid, citric acid, glucose, tin chloride, sodium borohydride, sodium phosphite, and sodium hypophosphite). In this case, all of palladium may not be in a metal state.
The metal nanoparticles herein refer to metal particles having a particle diameter of less than 1 μm.
In this embodiment, the average particle diameter of the metal nanoparticles is preferably 0.5 nm or more and 100 nm or less, more preferably 0.5 nm. or more and 20 nm or less, and further preferably 0.5 nm or more and 10 nm or less. A substance having an average particle diameter of less than 0.5 nm is likely to be more unstable than a substance having an average particle diameter of 0.5 nm or more, and a substance having an average particle diameter of more than 100 nm has a catalytic activity lower than a substance having an average particle diameter of 100 nm or less. On the other hand, when the average particle diameter is 100 nm or less (more preferably 20 nm or less, and further preferably 10 nm or less), the catalytic activity is further enhanced.
The average particle diameter herein refers to an average of 300 or more particle diameters of the metal nanoparticles that are actually measured in a TEM image.
The particle diameter may be adjusted, for example, by adjustment of pH of a solution during preparation by a publicly known method.
A method of anchoring the metal nanoparticles to the anchored part is not particularly limited, and may be appropriately set. For example, the metal nanoparticles may be anchored to the anchored part on the surface of the base by a binder, heating and drying, or the like.
The metal nanoparticles may be anchored by applying colloid to a part on the surface of the base that becomes the anchored part, followed by drying.
When metal palladium or a palladium oxide is anchored to the base, palladium ions may be anchored by absorption through a chemical method such as a zeta potential between the palladium ions and the base and diffusion of the palladium ions. Alternatively, the base is immersed in an aqueous solution containing palladium ions to be coated therewith, and then immersed in an aqueous solution containing a reductant such as an organic acid, formaldehyde, and hydrazine, or reduced in a hydrogen reduction atmosphere. Thus, nanoparticles of the metal palladium or palladium oxide may be anchored to the anchored part.
For example, the metal nanoparticles may have a hemispheric shape or the like and be closely jointed to the anchored part. Thus, a junction interface peripheral part may be formed at the anchored part by the junction. At that time, the metal nanoparticles are directly jointed to the anchored part using a difference in zeta potential between the inorganic material constituting the anchored part and the metal nanoparticles. The junction herein represents that the anchored part and the metal nanoparticles are brought into contact with each other at a surface (junction interface), resulting in anchoring. The junction interface peripheral part herein refers to a peripheral part (perimeter) of the junction interface. Herein, directly jointed represents that the anchored part on the surface of the base and the metal nanoparticles are anchored without another material, such as a binder, interposed therebetween.
The metal nanoparticles are directly jointed to the anchored part of the surface of the base, and the junction interface peripheral part is exposed to a surface of the catalyst. When the catalyst having the junction interface peripheral part between the base and the metal nanoparticles acts on catechol-type catechin and pyrogallol-type catechin, a synthesis reaction of theaflavins further proceeds. This will be specifically described. It is estimated that oxygen defects tend to occur at the junction interface peripheral part and activation of oxygen molecules and hydrogen molecules proceeds at the part. Therefore, the presence of the junction interface peripheral part is advantageous for increase in oxidation catalytic activity and selectivity. Accordingly, in this embodiment, if is preferable that the catalyst have a junction interface peripheral part formed by junction between the metal nanoparticles and the anchored part.
A method of anchoring the metal nanoparticles in a state where the junction interface peripheral part is formed by direct jointing to the surface of the base is not particularly limited. Specific examples of the method may include methods such as coprecipitation, deposition-precipitation, a sol-gel method, precipitation by dropping neutralization, addition of a reductant, precipitation by pH-control neutralization, and addition of carboxylic acid metal salt. The methods can be appropriately used depending on the kind of the inorganic material constituting the base.
Hereinafter, a method of preparing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment using a gold compound and based on deposition-preparation as an example of method of anchoring the metal nanoparticles will be specifically described. In a specific method of the deposition-precipitation, an aqueous solution in which the gold compound is dissolved is first heated to 20 to 90° C., and preferably 50 to 70° C., and the pH of the solution is adjusted to 3 to 10, and preferably 5 to 8 with an alkaline solution with stirring. After that, the inorganic material to become the base is added to the aqueous solution, and the mixture is dried by heating at 100 to 200° C., to obtain the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment.
Examples of the gold compound that can be used in preparation of the gold compound aqueous solution may include HAuCl4.4H2O, NH4AuCl4, KAuCl4.nH2O, KAu(CN)4, Na2AuCl4, KAuBr4.2H2O, and NaAuBr4. The concentration of the gold compound in the gold compound aqueous solution is not particularly limited, and is preferably 1×10−2 to 1×10−5 mol/L.
The amount of the metal nanoparticles to be supported on the base is not particularly limited, and is preferably 0.5 to 20% by mass, and more preferably 0.5 to 10% by mass, relative to the amount of the base. When the metal nanoparticles are supported at a rate of higher than 20% by mass, the metal nanoparticles are likely to be aggregated and a reduction-oxidation action is decreased as compared with a case where the amount falls within the range.
In the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment, the metal nanoparticles may be anchored to the surface of the base including the inorganic-material and oxide particles of titanium, aluminum, iron, and the like may be further supported on the surface. A method of supporting oxide particles on the surface of the base is not particularly limited. For example, the oxide particles may be supported on the base by a thermal spraying method. The oxide particles supported on the base can suppress attachment of a substance that inhibits catalytic activity to the metal nanoparticles. Therefore, the reduction-oxidation action can be stably maintained over an extended period of time.
The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment can have various forms. A method of adjusting the form is not particularly limited. Fox example, the form of the catalyst can be molded into any form by adjusting a form of the base. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment can have a form such as a powder form, a granular form, and a tablet form obtained by molding under pressure. When as the base, a woven fabric, non-woven fabric, or sheet formed of fibrous inorganic materials or a foil-shaped or plate-shaped metal oxide is used, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment can have various forms such as a filter shape and a sheet shape.
When the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment has a form such as a powder form, a granular forts, and a tablet form obtained by molding under pressure, the catalyst can be contained in a fibrous structure or is fixed on an outside surface of the fibrous structure.
A specific treatment in which the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment is contained in or fixed on the fibrous structure can be appropriately selected by those skilled in the art, and is not particularly limited. For example, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins may be contained in the fibrous structure by adding the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment to a polymer material, kneading the mixture, and forming fibers. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins may be fixed on the fibrous structure such as a woven fabric and a non-woven fabric using a binder, a coupling agent, or the like. Further, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins is fixed on an inorganic material such as zeolite, and the inorganic material having the fixed catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins is fixed on the fibrous structure to produce a theaflavins synthesis catalyst filter. Also, a base formed of a material such as inorganic oxide particles is fixed on a fibrous base material, and immersed in a hydrate in which a material for metal nanoparticles is dissolved. Thus, the metal nanoparticles can be precipitated on a surface of the inorganic oxide particles and the like. Herein, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins that is contained is a concept including a case where the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins is exposed to an outside surface of the fibrous structure.
A binder component can be appropriately selected in consideration of adhesion to the fibrous base material, and the like, and is not particularly limited. For example, a synthetic resin such as a polyester resin, an amino resin, an epoxy resin, a polyurethane resin, an acrylic resin, a water-soluble resin, a vinyl-based resin, a fluororesin, a silicone resin, a fibrin-based resin, a phenolic resin, a xylene resin, and a toluene resin, or a natural resin such as drying oil including castor oil, linseed oil, and tung oil may be used.
In a method of fixing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment on the fibrous base material, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins may be fixed by the above-described binder, or the like. The catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment is chemically bonded to a silane monomer having an unsaturated bond, or the like, by a reflux treatment, or the like, dispersed in a solvent such as methanol, applied to or immersed in a fibrous base, and irradiated with radioactive ray such as electron beam. Thus, a chemical bond may be formed by graft polymerization.
Examples of silane monomer used may include vinyltrichlorosilane, vinyltrimethoxysilane, vinyltriethoxysilane, vinyltriacetoxysilane, N-β-(N-vinylbenzylaminoethyl)-γ-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane, hydrochloride of N-(vinylbenzyl)-2-aminoethyl-3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane, 2-(3,4-epoxycyclohexyl)ethyltrimethoxysilane, 3-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane, 3-glycidoxypropylmethyldiethoxysilane, 3-glycidoxypropyltriethoxysilane, p-styryltrimethoxysilane, 3-methacryloxypropylmethyldimethoxysilane, 3-methacryloxypropyltrimethoxysilane, 3-methacryloxypropylmethyldiethoxysilane, 3-methacryloxypropyltriethoxysilane, 3-acryloxypropyltrimethoxysilane 3-isocyanatepropyltriethoxysilane, bis (triethoxysilylpropyl) tetrasulfide, 3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane, 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane, 3-triethoxysilyl-N-(1,3-dimethyl-butylidene) propylamine, N-phenyl-3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane, N-2-(aminoethyl)-3-aminopropylmethyldimethoxysilane, N-2-(aminoethyl)-3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane, N-2-(aminoethyl)-3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane, 3-mercaptopropylmethyldimethoxysilane, 3-mercaptopropyltrimethoxysilane, N-phenyl-3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane, specialized aminosilane, 3-ureidopropyltriethoxysilane, 3-chloropropyltrimethoxysilane, tetramethoxysilane, tetraethoxysilane, methyltrimethoxysilane, methyltriethoxysilane, dimethyldiethoxysilane, phenyltriethoxysilane, hexamethyldisilazane, hexyltrimethoxysilane, decyltrimethoxysilane, hydrolysable group-containing siloxane, floroalkyl group-containing oligomer, methylhydrogensiloxane, and a silicone quaternary ammonium salt.
In a specific example of a method for producing the fibrous structure, for example, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment is mixed during production of a non-woven fabric produced by entangling fibers, or a mixed paper produced by mixing pulp and a binding agent, or the like, as the base. In this manner, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins can be disposed in a space inside of the base. Alternatively, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment may be fixed by discharging a thermoplastic resin, a reactive hot melt adhesive, or a resin to be cured through a reaction by particle rays such as ultraviolet light and an electron beam, into a fibrous shape from a nozzle; while a surface of the fibers formed by discharging has tackiness, bringing the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment into contact with the fibers; and then performing a reaction curing treatment. In the fixing, the hot melt adhesive may be anchored by returning the temperature to room temperature, the reactive hot melt adhesive may be cured through a reaction due to moisture in the air, or a resin to be crosslinked by ultraviolet light or an electron beam may be cured through a reaction by irradiation with ultraviolet light or an electron beam.
Examples of the resin thus used may include a hot melt adhesive containing, as a main component, a resin such as a low density polyethylene, a liner chain low density polyethylene, polypropylene, an ethylene-vinyl acetate copolymer resin, an ethylene-methyl methacrylate copolymer resin, and an ethylene-ethyl acrylate copolymer resin, a reactive hot melt adhesive mainly containing an urethane prepolymer, and a resin to be cross linked by ultraviolet light or an electron beam, containing, as a main component, polyurethane acrylate or a polyester acrylate resin.
Next, synthesis of theaflavins using the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment will be described in detail. In this embodiment, for example, there is an aspect in which the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to this embodiment is brought into contact with catechins aqueous solution that is an aqueous solution in which pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin are dissolved, to synthesize theaflavins. Herein, theaflavin represents theaflavin (TE) represented by the formula (I), theaflavin-3-O-gallate represented by the formula (II), theaflavin-3′-O-gallate represented by the formula (III), and theaflavin-3,3′-O-digallate represented by the formula (IV).
Hereinafter, the synthesis of theaflavins according to this embodiment will be described in more detail.
In the synthesis of theaflavins according to this embodiment, catechins are used as a raw material. Catechins are classified into pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin, and a mixture thereof is used as a raw material in this embodiment. The catechins used as a raw material may be a commercially available product or an extract from tea leaves. The pyrogallol-type catechin is represented by the following general formula (V), and the catechol-type catechin is represented by the following general formula (VI).
In the formula (V), R3 represents a hydrogen atom or a galloyl group. Epigallocatechin (EGC) is a compound in which R1 in the formula (V) is a hydrogen atom. Epigallocatechingallate (EGCg) is a compound in which R1 in the formula (V) is a galloyl group. In the formula (VI), R2 represents a hydrogen atom or a galloyl group. Epicatechin (EC) is a compound in which R2 in the formula (VI) is a hydrogen atom. Epicatechin gallate (ECg) is a compound in which R2 in the formula (VI) is a galloyl group.
For example, catechol-type catechin such as epicatechin and pyrogallol-type catechin such as epigallocatechin as raw materials are first added to pure water, stirred overnight at a pH of 5 to 8, and dissolved, to obtain an aqueous solution (hereinafter referred to as catechins aqueous solution). The concentration of catechins in the catechins aqueous solution are not particularly limited, and can be appropriately set by those skilled in the art. It is preferable that the ratio of the concentration of metal nanoparticles supported on the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins (μmol/mL) to the whole concentration of catechins (μmol/ml) be 1:10 or more and 1:100 or less. It is preferable that the concentration of the catechol-type catechin in the catechin aqueous solution be smaller than that of the pyrogallol-type catechin. It is desirable that the ratio of the concentration of the catechol-type catechin to that of the pyrogallol-type catechin be 1:1 to 1:10 or less. In order to easily dissolve the catechol-type catechin and the pyrogallol-type catechin, an alcohol may be mixed in the catechins aqueous solution. The pH of the catechins aqueous solution may be made acidic.
To the obtained catechins aqueous solution containing the catechol-type catechin and the pyrogallol-type catechin, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment is added to promote a reaction. For example, the reaction may be performed with stirring until, the pyrogallol-type catechin is consumed. The temperature during the reaction is not particularly limited as long as it is a temperature at which the aqueous solution is not frozen. The temperature may be 4° C. to 100° C., and is preferably a temperature equal to or higher than room temperature (15° C. to 25° C.) to lower than 100° C., at which the reaction efficiency of the catalyst is good. After completion of the reaction, a suspension containing the obtained theaflavins and the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins are subjected to centrifugation or filtration through a filter, to remove the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins. Thus, an aqueous solution containing the theaflavins (hereinafter referred to as theaflavins aqueous solution) is obtained. The resulting theaflavins aqueous solution may be used as it is. In addition, the theaflavins may be collected by removing water from the theaflavins aqueous solution, if necessary.
In another embodiment in which the catechins aqueous solution is brought into contact with the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment, the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins having the filter shape of this embodiment, or a filter in which the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment is contained or fixed may also be used. When a powdered catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins is used, theaflavins as a product and the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins need to be separated, for example by centrifugation after the complication of the reaction. However, when the filter is used, the separation process can be omitted. The powdered catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment may be placed in a cylinder with a hole or a box, or may be placed in a bag formed of a woven fabric or a knit fabric, and the bag may be immersed in the catechins aqueous solution.
In the above-described reaction process, oxygen may be added by bubbling to a reaction liquid in which the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins according to this embodiment is added to the catechins aqueous solution. When the dissolved oxygen concentration in the reaction liquid is increased, an oxidation reaction of the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins proceeds. An increase in yield of theaflavins can be expected.
In this embodiment, the catalyst can be easily removed from a product after production of theaflavins, compared with a case where a reaction is performed using an enzyme or the like. When the reaction is performed using an enzyme or the like, theaflavins cannot be efficiently synthesized without a specialized condition of temperature, pH, and the like. However, in this embodiment, the reaction can be efficiently performed under a wider reaction condition.
The present invention will be then described more specifically with reference to Examples. However, the present invention is not limited only to these Examples.
0.5 mmol of HAuCl4.4H2O was dissolved in 100 ml of water (5 mmol/L), the resultant mixture was heated to 70° C., and the pH was adjusted with an NaOH aqueous solution to 4.8. To the aqueous solution, 5 g of zirconia powder was added as a base, and the mixture was stirred for 1 hour. After that, the mixture was separated into a solid and a liquid, and the solid was dried under reduced pressure. The obtained solid was dried under a nitrogen atmosphere at 200° C. for 4 hours, and pulverized, to obtain a gold nanoparticle-supporting catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins.
The resulting catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins was observed by a transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and junction of the gold nanoparticles to zirconia particles and formation of junction interface peripheral part were confirmed. A TEM image of the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins is shown in FIG. 1. From the TEM image, the particle diameters or 300 gold nanoparticles were measured, and averaged. The average particle diameter of the gold nanoparticles was 3.3 nm (σ=1.8 nm).
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins was obtained in the same manner as in Example 1 except that the base was changed into silica powder. The average particle diameter of gold nanoparticles jointed to the base was 6.6 nm (σ=2.7 nm).
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins was obtained in the same manner as in Example 1 except that the base was changed into iron (III) oxide powder. The average particle diameter of gold nanoparticles jointed to the base was 1.8 nm (σ=0.2 nm).
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins was obtained in the same manner as in Example 1 except that the base was changed into titanium dioxide powder. The average particle diameter of gold nanoparticles jointed to the base was 4.1 nm (σ=2.2 nm).
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins was obtained in the same manner as in Example 1 except that the base was changed into alumina powder. The average particle diameter of gold nanoparticles jointed to the base was 3.5 nm (σ=2.4 nm).
A catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins was obtained in the same manner as in Example 1 except that the base was changed into zirconia cloth of 1 cm×0.5 cm (ZYW-30A; available from Tomoe Engineering Co., Ltd.). The average particle diameter of gold nanoparticles jointed to the base was 4.7 nm (σ=1.6 nm).
A JIS class 1 titanium plate (with a size of 10 cm×10 cm and a thickness of 0. 5 mm) was washed with ethanol. Then, the titanium plate was immersed in a sodium carbonate aqueous solution of 2 mol/L, and a direct current voltage was applied to the titanium plate for 10 minutes while spark discharge was generated on a surface of the titanium plate using a carbon electrode as a cathode and the titanium plate as an anode. As a result, a thin film of titanium oxide of rutile-type and anatase-type was formed on the surface of the titanium plate. After that, the titanium plate was washed with ion-exchanged water, and immersed in an aqueous solution of 70° C. obtained by dissolving 0.5 mmol of HAuCl4.4H2O used in Example 1 and adjusting the pH to 4.8 for 1 hour, to obtain a catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins. The average particle diameter of gold nanoparticles jointed to the surface of the thin film of titanium oxide was 4.6 nm (σ=2.0 nm).
An aluminum plate of JIS H1070 (with a size of 10 cm×10 cm and a thickness of 0.5 mm) was immersed in a 5% aqueous solution of sodium hydroxide heated to 50° C. for 1 minute, resulting in delipidization. The aluminum plate was immersed in a 3% aqueous solution of nitric acid, and immersed in an aqueous solution containing 2 mol sodium carbonate and 0.2 mol sodium fluoride. A direct current voltage was applied to the aluminum plate for 5 minutes while spark discharge was generated on a surface of the aluminum plate using a carbon electrode as a counter electrode. As a result, a thin film of γ-alumina was formed on the surface of the aluminum plate. After that, gold nanoparticles were precipitated on a surface of the thin film of γ-alumina under the same condition as in Example 7 to obtain a catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins. The average particle diameter of the gold nanoparticles jointed to the surface of the oxidized thin film was 3.2 nm (σ=1.9 nm).
1 mmol of ammonium tetrachloropalladate (NH4) 2PdCl4 was dissolved in 200 mL of water, the aqueous solution was heated to 70° C., and the pH was adjusted with an NaOH aqueous solution to 11. To the above-described (NH4)2PdCl4 aqueous solution, 5 g of commercially available zirconium oxide powder (PCS, available from Nippon Denko Co., Ltd.) was added, the mixture was stirred for 1 hour, and water was then removed, to obtain powder. The powder was washed with pure water. After the washing, the powder was collected by centrifugation (3,000 rpm, 10 minutes), dried under reduced pressure for 12 hours, heated at 200° C. under an air atmosphere for 4 hours to obtain a catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins. The average particle diameter of palladium nanoparticles precipitated on a surface of zirconium oxide was 8.6 nm (σ=2.2 nm).
γ-alumina (TAIMICRON, available from Taimei Chemicals Co., Ltd.) was dispersed in water by a homogenizer to prepare a γ-alumina suspension. Subsequently, the γ-alumina suspension was mixed in a methanol solution in which 0.5% by mass of aminopropylethoxysilane was added, and the mixture was treated at 50° C. for 2 hours, to introduce aminopropylethoxysilane into a surface of γ-alumina. The γ-alumina was then filtered, and dried at 120° C. for 1 hour, to bond aminopropylethoxysilane to the surface of γ-alumina. Subsequently, γ-alumina in which aminopropylethoxysilane was introduced was dispersed in an aqueous solution containing 0.066 mmol/L of stannous chloride and 0.095 mmol/L of hydrochloric acid by a homogenizer. 0.5 mmol of (NH4)2PdCl4 solution that was dissolved in 100 mL of water was mixed to the solution to coordinate and adsorb palladium ions on the surface of γ-alumina. The γ-alumina in which palladium ions were coordinated and adsorbed was collected by filtration, and then dried at 200° C. for 2 hours to obtain a catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins in which nanoparticles of palladium oxide (PdO) were anchored. The average particle diameter of palladium oxide nanoparticles precipitated on the surface of γ-alumina was 10.4 nm (σ=3.8 nm).
Platinum bis (acetylacetonate) and α-alumina were mixed in a mortar so that the amount of platinum was 5% by weight relative to 1 g of α-alumina. The resulting mixture was fired at 450° C. for 4 hours, and further fired at 450° C. for 2 hours under a hydrogen atmosphere, to obtain a catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins in which platinum nanoparticles were anchored. The average particle diameter of platinum nanoparticles precipitated on a surface of α-alumina was 14.8 nm (σ=2.0 nm).
In Comparative Example 1, zirconia powder used in Example 1 was used.
In Comparative Example 2, silica powder used in Example 2 was used.
In Comparative Example 3, iron (III) oxide powder used in Example 3 was used.
In Comparative Example 4, titanium dioxide powder used in Example 4 was used.
In Comparative Example 5, alumina powder used in Example 5 was used.
Theaflavin was synthesized using each sample of Examples 1 to 11 and Comparative Examples 1 to 5.
Epicatechin and epigallocatechin as raw materials were first added in each amount of 4 μmol/L to pure water, and stirred overnight to dissolve, thereby obtaining a catechins aqueous solution. 1 mL of each catechins aqueous solution was placed in a 5-mL tube. Each sample (0.5 mL) of Examples and Comparative Examples was added to the catechins aqueous solution at room temperature to obtain each reaction liquid. The reaction liquid was subjected to a reaction with stirring for 4 hours. In Examples 1 to 8, each dispersion liquid in which the Au concentration was adjusted to 0.8 μmol/mL was added as the above-described sample to the catechins aqueous solution. In Examples 9 and 10, each dispersion liquid in which the Pd concentration was adjusted to 0.8 μmol/mL was added as the above-described sample to the catechins aqueous solution. In Example 11, a dispersion liquid in which the Pt concentration was adjusted to 0.8 μmol/mL was added as the above-described sample to the catechins aqueous solution. In Comparative Examples, a dispersion liquid in which each base was dispersed in the same amount as that of the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins used in each Example was added to the catechins aqueous solution as the above-described sample. After completion of the reaction, the reaction liquid was subjected to filtration through a filter with a pore diameter of 0.45 μm to remove the catalyst.
A product obtained by the above-described method was analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) under the following conditions, and the amount of produced theaflavins was calculated. A gradient condition in the analysis is shown in Table 1.
The results are shown in Table 2. Chromatograms according to Example 1 and Comparative Example 1 are shown in FIG. 2. As understood from FIG. 2, a peak corresponding to theaflavin represented by TF was confirmed in the chromatogram of the sample according to Example 1. Even in the samples according to other Examples, the similar chromatogram as in Example 1 was obtained.
As shown in Table 2, in all Examples, synthesis of theaflavin was confirmed.
In order to confirm in detail whether or not theaflavin was produced in the aforementioned reaction, analysis using LC-MS was performed. As an analysis sample, a sample in which the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of Example 1 was used as a catalyst was used. A peak that was estimated to correspond to theaflavin was extracted using liquid chromatogram (LC), and measured by mass spectrum (MS). The results are shown in FIG. 3.
From the results of FIG. 3, the molecular weight in which hydrogen ions (H) were added to the molecular weight of theaflavin was confirmed. Therefore, synthesis of theaflavin was confirmed.
From the results of FIG. 3, a substance synthesized by a reaction of pyrogallol-type catechin and catechol-type catechin was not a substance other than theaflavin. Therefore, in theaflavin synthesized by a synthesis method using the catalyst for synthesizing theaflavins of this embodiment, peaks other than that of theaflavin were very few, and it was confirmed that synthesis of theaflavins was achieved while production of by-product was suppressed. | 2019-04-22T21:58:29Z | http://www.freepatentsonline.com/y2017/0158660.html |
The present disclosure relates to methods and a related systems and tools for dispensing an adhesive piece having damping qualities onto a component of a hard disk drive suspension. The adhesive piece can be commercially available layered strip sold as an adhesive layer having a first and a second liner adhered to each side. An exemplary method can cut an adhesive piece, separate the adhesive piece from a secondary liner, adhere the adhesive piece onto a component of a hard disk drive suspension, separate a primary liner from the adhesive piece, and dispose of the primary liner using a conventional gantry system. The method can be performed using a two-step operation of the gantry system.
3877120 April 1975 Hikota et al.
5189779 March 1993 Fishel et al.
5212847 May 1993 Melcher et al.
5657188 August 1997 Jurgenson et al.
5764444 June 1998 Imamura et al.
5795435 August 1998 Waters et al.
6063228 May 2000 Sasaki et al.
6080173 June 2000 Williamson et al.
6095023 August 2000 Harada et al.
6695859 February 2004 Golden et al.
6711930 March 2004 Thom et al.
6752661 June 2004 Gu et al.
6789593 September 2004 Aono et al.
7241302 July 2007 Sniffen et al.
7288590 October 2007 Lechat et al.
7322999 January 2008 Kanner et al.
7338693 March 2008 Shikano et al.
7438718 October 2008 Milliman et al.
7938840 May 2011 Golden et al.
7946010 May 2011 Myers et al.
8151440 April 2012 Tsutsumi et al.
8681456 March 2014 Miller et al.
8741195 June 2014 Kurihara et al.
8834660 September 2014 Scheele et al.
2001/0001937 May 2001 Benes et al.
2002/0178778 December 2002 Thom et al.
2004/0007322 January 2004 Lechat et al.
2004/0092971 May 2004 Sniffin et al.
2004/0092998 May 2004 Sniffin et al.
2004/0102797 May 2004 Golden et al.
2004/0199182 October 2004 Milliman et al.
2004/0225313 November 2004 Kanner et al.
2004/0250952 December 2004 Lechat et al.
2005/0010241 January 2005 Milliman et al.
2005/0045914 March 2005 Agranat et al.
2005/0060864 March 2005 Nikolaidis et al.
2005/0101983 May 2005 Loshakove et al.
2006/0248702 November 2006 Nikolaidis et al.
2007/0005072 January 2007 Castillo et al.
2007/0293884 December 2007 Cole et al.
2008/0071302 March 2008 Castillo et al.
2008/0124842 May 2008 Wang et al.
2008/0144225 June 2008 Yao et al.
2008/0251201 October 2008 Sikkel et al.
2009/0036904 February 2009 Milliman et al.
2009/0183359 July 2009 Tsutsumi et al.
2010/0067151 March 2010 Okawara et al.
2011/0159767 June 2011 Sakurai et al.
2012/0000376 January 2012 Kurihara et al.
2012/0002329 January 2012 Shum et al.
2012/0276232 November 2012 Marczyk et al.
2013/0006281 January 2013 Golden et al.
2013/0055561 March 2013 Tsutsumi et al.
2014/0198412 July 2014 Miller et al.
3M Ultra.sub.--pure Viscoelastic Damping Polymer 242NRO1, Technical Data, Mar. 2012, 4 pages. cited by applicant.
This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/148,930, filed Jan. 7, 2014, entitled VISCO PAD PLACEMENT IN DISK DRIVES, which application is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety and for all purposes.
1. A method for dispensing an adhesive piece onto a gimbal component of a dual stage actuation hard disk drive suspension, the method comprising: providing a layered adhesive strip having an adhesive layer and a liner; cutting into the layered adhesive strip with a punch, the punch having a cutting edge and a lumen, the cutting edge passing through the liner and the adhesive layer to form a liner piece and an adhesive piece; separating the adhesive piece from the layered adhesive strip, wherein the liner piece is retained at least partially in the lumen of the punch by a retention feature within the lumen and the adhesive piece remains adhered to the liner piece; adhering the adhesive piece to the component of the hard disk drive suspension; and separating the adhesive piece from the liner piece.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the adhesive piece is adhered to the component of the hard disk drive suspension by translating a pressure pin within the lumen from a first position to a second position.
3. The method of claim 2, further comprising expelling the liner piece from the lumen of the punch by translating the pressure pin within the lumen from the second position to a third position.
4. The method of claim 3, further comprising disposing of the expelled liner piece in a receptacle having an opening.
5. The method of claim 1, wherein the retention feature within the lumen engages the liner piece to create a retention force.
6. The method of claim 5, wherein the retention force is created by frictional interference between an inner surface of the lumen and the liner piece.
7. The method of claim 6, wherein the lumen narrows between a distal location and a proximal location such that, after the cutting step and before the separating the adhesive piece from the liner piece step, the liner piece is compressed within the lumen to increase the frictional engagement between the inner surface of the lumen and the liner piece.
8. The method of claim 1, wherein cutting comprises lowering the punch along a Z-axis, separating the adhesive piece from the layered adhesive strip comprising raising the punch along the Z-axis, adhering the adhesive piece to the component comprises lowering the punch, and separating the adhesive piece from the liner piece comprises raising the punch along the Z-axis.
9. The method of claim 1, further comprising positioning the punch in a first location along an X-Y plane for the cutting and separating from the layered adhesive strip steps, and positioning the punch in a second location along the X-Y plane for the adhering and the separating the adhesive piece from the liner piece steps.
10. A system for dispensing an adhesive piece onto a gimbal component of a dual stage actuation hard disk drive suspension, the system comprising: a punch comprising a barrel, a lumen, and a distal cutting edge, and a retention feature disposed within the lumen; a gantry system configured to translate the punch along a Z-axis between an upper position and a lower position; and wherein the cutting edge is configured to cut a liner piece and an adhesive piece from a layered adhesive strip when the gantry system translates the punch from the upper position to the lower position, the first position of the pressure pin allows the release liner to enter the lumen during the cutting of the liner piece from the layered adhesive strip, the retention feature is configured to retain the liner piece within the lumen while the adhesive piece is attached to the liner piece following the cutting of the liner piece from the layered adhesive strip, and the gantry system and the punch are configured to apply the adhesive piece to the component of the hard disk drive suspension when translating the punch to the lower position.
11. The system of claim 10, further comprising a receptacle having an opening for receiving the expelled liner piece.
12. The system of claim 10, wherein the retention feature is configured to cause frictional interference between an inner surface of the barrel and a liner piece creating a retention force greater than an adhesion force between the adhesive piece and a second liner of the layered adhesive strip.
13. The system of claim 10, wherein the gantry system is further configured to translate the punch from the lower position to the upper position to separate the adhesive layer from the liner piece.
14. The system of claim 10, wherein the retention feature is configured to retain the liner piece within the lumen.
15. The system of claim 10, wherein the gantry system is configured to position the punch in a first location along an X-Y plane when cutting the liner piece and the adhesive piece from the layered adhesive strip, and the gantry system is configured to position the punch in a second location along the X-Y plane when applying the adhesive piece to the component of the hard disk drive suspension.
16. The system of claim 10, wherein the lumen narrows between a distal location and a proximal location to compress the liner piece within the lumen to increase the frictional engagement between the inner surface of the lumen and the liner piece.
17. The system of claim 10, wherein the retention feature comprises a barb.
18. The system of claim 10, wherein the retention feature is formed from the inner surface of the lumen.
19. A method for dispensing an adhesive piece onto a gimbal component of a dual stage actuation hard disk drive suspension, the method comprising: cutting into a layered adhesive strip by moving a punch downward, the punch having a cutting edge and a lumen, the cutting edge passing through a first liner and an adhesive layer to form a liner piece and an adhesive piece; separating the adhesive piece from the layered adhesive strip by moving the punch upward, wherein the liner piece is retained at least partially in the lumen of the punch by a retention feature within the lumen and the adhesive piece remains adhered to the liner piece; and adhering the adhesive piece to the component of the hard disk drive suspension by moving the punch downward.
20. The method of claim 19, wherein adhering the adhesive piece to the component of the hard disk drive suspension further comprises moving a pressure pin within the lumen of the punch from a first position to a second position, the second position distal of the first position, the pressure pin engaged with the liner piece.
The present disclosure relates to disk drives and suspensions for disk drives and other electronic components.
Dual stage actuation (DSA) disk drive head suspensions and disk drives incorporating DSA suspensions are generally known and commercially available. For example, DSA suspensions having an actuation structure on the baseplate or other mounting portion of the suspension, i.e., toward one end from the spring or hinge region of the suspension, are described in the U.S. Patent Publication No. 2010/0067151 to Okawara, U.S. Patent Publication No. 2012/0002329 to Shum, U.S. Patent Publication No. 2011/0242708 to Fuchino, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,764,444 to Imamura. DSA suspensions having actuation structures located on the loadbeam or gimbal portions of the suspension, i.e., toward another end from the spring or hinge region, are also known and disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,657,188 to Jurgenson, U.S. Pat. No. 7,256,968 to Krinke, and U.S. Patent Publication No. 2008/0144225 to Yao. Co-located gimbal-based DSA suspensions are disclosed in co-pending U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/700,972. All of the above-identified patents and patent applications are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety for all purposes.
The present disclosure relates to methods, systems, and apparatuses for dispensing an adhesive piece onto a component, such as a component of a hard disk drive suspension. Various embodiments can comprise a gantry system and a punch. The punch can be attached to the gantry system and have a proximal end, a distal tip, a barrel, and a lumen extending through the barrel, the barrel having an inner surface defining the lumen and an outer surface, the distal tip including a cutting edge.
A retention feature can be formed in the inner surface and disposed within the lumen at or near the distal tip. The cutting edge can be configured to cut through a layered adhesive strip having an adhesive layer and a liner adhered to the adhesive layer. The retention feature be configured to engage the liner during a cutting of the liner and the adhesive layer and retain at least partially a piece of the liner adhered to a piece of the adhesive layer within the lumen following a cutting of the liner and the adhesive layer.
A pressure pin can be disposed within the lumen and translatable within the lumen. The actuator can translate the pressure pin within the lumen to a first position, a second position, and a third position. The first position of the pressure pin allows the release liner to enter the lumen during the cutting of the release liner and the adhesive layer. Translation of the pressure pin from the first position to the second position adheres the adhesive piece to the component of the hard disk drive suspension while retaining the liner piece in the lumen. Translation of the pressure pin from the second position to the third position expels the liner piece from the lumen.
FIG. 1 is an isometric view of one end portion of a hard disk drive suspension.
FIG. 2 is an isometric view of the end portion of FIG. 1 showing an adhesive piece placed on a component of the hard disk drive suspension according to various embodiments of the disclosure.
FIG. 3 is a schematic, cross-sectional side view of an exemplary layered adhesive strip from which an adhesive piece can be extracted.
FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing a system including a tool attached to a gantry system according to various embodiments of the present disclosure.
FIG. 5 is a detailed cross-sectional side view of the distal end of an exemplary tool 60.
FIG. 6 is a side view showing the tool 60 in a pre-cut position.
FIG. 7 is a side view showing the tool 60 in the post-cut position.
FIG. 8 is a side view showing the tool 60 in extraction position.
FIG. 9 is a side view showing the tool 60 in pre-placement position.
FIG. 10 is a side view showing the tool 60 in placement position.
FIG. 11 is a side view showing the tool 60 in release position.
FIG. 12 is a side view showing the tool 60 in pre-disposal position.
FIG. 13 is a side view showing the tool 60 in disposal position.
FIG. 14 is side view showing the end of a tool 160 in accordance with alternative embodiments of this disclosure.
FIG. 15 is a flow chart showing an overview of an exemplary method, according to various embodiments of the present disclosure.
DSA structures typically have components which move relative to each other. The capacity to move leaves the DSA structure, and the suspension as a whole, susceptible to unwanted vibration and other movement. Various embodiments of the present invention concern the placement of a dampening layer along a suspension, such as on the DSA structure. For example, a dampening layer can be placed on a component, such as a tongue, a motor, and/or other components of a DSA structure. Commercially-available dampers are often sold in strips having two-sided adhesive and liners on each side. Placing the damper onto the component requires cutting a piece of the strip for the damper, removing a bottom liner, adhering the damper to the component, and then removing the top liner. Placing the damper is often performed with a gantry system. Removing the top liner often requires a manual operation, another apparatus in addition to the gantry system, or a more complicated gantry system, which increases manufacturing time and cost. The present disclosure addresses placing an adhesive damper, from a commercially available strip, onto a component of a hard disk drive suspension with a conventional gantry system.
FIG. 1 is an isometric view of one end portion of a hard disk drive suspension 10 showing the stainless steel side of a flexure 12 having a gimbal 16 with a DSA structure 14. FIG. 2 is an isometric view of the end portion of FIG. 1 showing an adhesive piece 30 placed according to various embodiments of the disclosure.
As shown, the flexure 12 includes a gimbal 16 at an end of the flexure 12. A DSA structure 14 is located on the gimbal 16. The DSA structure 14 includes a motor 32, which is a lead zirconium titanate element (PZT) or other piezoelectric actuator in the illustrated embodiment, mounted to the gimbal 16 of the flexure 12. The lateral ends of a motor 32 can be attached to the support regions 22 of the spring arms 24. Layers of adhesive can be positioned on the support regions 22 of the spring arms 24. The motor 32 extends over the tongue 18. The motor 32 can be electrically activated to bend the struts 20 and move (e.g., rotate) the tongue 18 about a tracking axis.
As shown by the removal of the motor 32 in FIG. 2, an adhesive piece 30 is located on a top surface of the tongue 18. In this way, the adhesive piece 30 is located between the top surface of the tongue 18 and the bottom surface of the motor 32. It is noted that the top surface of the tongue 18 and the bottom surface of the motor 32 face each other. The adhesive piece 30 can be in contact with each of the top surface of the tongue 18 and the bottom surface of the motor 32. In various embodiments, the adhesive piece 30 can be adhered to the top surface of the tongue 18 and/or the bottom surface of the motor 32. The adhesive piece 30 can be in the form of a layer of material. The adhesive piece 30 can be formed from a viscoelastic adhesive material. In some embodiments, the material that forms the adhesive piece 30 is inherently adhesive. In some other embodiments, the adhesive piece 30 comprises a core non-adhesive material (e.g., a viscoelastic or elastic layer) and an adhesive material that is disposed on the top and/or bottom surface of the core non-adhesive material.
Relative motion occurs between the motor 32 and the tongue 18 during activation of the motor 32. The adhesive piece 30 acts as a damper to reduce or eliminate vibration and/or other types of unwanted motion such as out-of plane motion of the tongue 18 during high frequency resonance modes, thereby providing lower gain and higher servo bandwidth capabilities. In general, the greater the area directly between the motor 32 and the tongue 18 that is covered by adhesive piece 30, the greater the benefits and advantages such as those described above that can be achieved. Adhesive layers such as that described herein can also be incorporated into other DSA structures (not shown) in a similar configuration or other parts of a suspension.
Adhesive piece 30 can be formed as various shapes. In various embodiments, the adhesive piece 30 has an annular outer profile. As illustrated, the adhesive piece 30 is in the shape of a circle. The adhesive piece 30 has a cross-sectional area bound by the outer profile and a thickness. In various embodiments, the cross-sectional area is sized such that the motor 32 generally covers the adhesive piece 30 when viewing the suspension 10 from directly above the top surface of the motor 32. The thickness of the adhesive piece 30 depends on at least the type of suspension used, the conditions under which the suspension is being used, and the damping performance of the material used to form the adhesive piece 30. In various embodiments, the adhesive piece 30 has a thickness between 10-100 microns.
The adhesive piece 30 is formed of a resilient material. The resilient material can be an elastic material. Such resilient material can be a visco-elastic material. Visco-elastic materials can provide enhanced damping benefits. Examples of suitable materials include 3M.TM. 242 and JDC MP65 materials. These materials typically have a relatively low elastic modulus and therefore have low stiffness. In various embodiments, the adhesive piece 30 is extracted from a commercially available and inexpensive layered adhesive strip.
The motor 32 has a top surface opposite the bottom surface of the motor 32. As shown, an impingement element 34 can be mounted on the top surface of the motor 32. The illustrated impingement element 34 comprises multiple layers. Specifically, the impingement element comprises a top layer 36 which can comprise a layer of metal (e.g., stainless steel), plastic, or other material that is relatively hard to robustly engage a dimple of a loadbeam. The impingement element 34 includes a second layer 38 below the top layer 36. The second layer 38 can be adhered to the top layer 36 and the top surface of the motor 32. The second layer 38 can comprise an adhesive piece, which is similar to adhesive piece 30.
FIG. 3 is a schematic, cross-sectional side view of an exemplary layered adhesive strip 40 from which the adhesive piece 30 can be extracted. Layered adhesive strip 40 is generally planar in the lateral direction and has an overall thickness. The layered adhesive strip 40 has layers, which can include a liner and/or an adhesive layer. In the illustrated embodiment, the layered adhesive strip 40 has a first liner (e.g., a primary liner or release liner) 42, an adhesive layer 44 having a first side 41 adhered onto the first liner, and a second liner 46 adhered onto a second side 43 of the adhesive layer. The liners 46, 42 and adhesive layer 44 each has a thickness contributing to the overall thickness of the layered adhesive strip 40. In various embodiments, the thickness of each layer can differ. In some embodiments, the thickness of the first liner is 4/1000 of an inch, the adhesive layer is 1/1000 of an inch, and the second liner is 2/1000 of an inch. As such, the first liner can be thicker than the second liner.
The first liner 42 is releasably adhered to the adhesive layer 44 and is formed of a first material, such as polyethylene. The second liner 46 is releasably adhered to the adhesive layer 44 and is formed of a second material, such as polyester. The first liner 42 and adhesive layer 44 can be resiliently compressible in the lateral direction. The second liner 46 may further include a coating made of a third material. The adhesive layer 44 can be adhered to the first and second liners 42, 46 by a suitable adhesive, such as an acrylic polymer. Because the adhesive layer 44 is adhered to different materials of the first liner 42 and the second liner 46, the adhesion force or peel strength when removing each liner 42, 46 from the adhesive layer 44 differs. In various embodiments, a first adhesion force between the first liner 42 and the adhesive layer 44 is greater than a second adhesion force between the adhesive layer 44 and second liner 46. Specifically, the layered adhesive strip 40 can be a commercially available product, such as 3M.TM. Ultra-Pure Visco elastic Damping Polymer 242NR01, which exhibits such differential adhesion strengths for opposing liners that sandwich an intermediate adhesive layer. In some embodiments, the first liner 42 and the second liner 46 may be formed from the same type of material. In such cases, the first liner 42 and the second liner 46 may be processed differently such that they have different relative strengths of adhesion to the adhesive layer 44 (e.g., the surface of the first liner 42 may be rougher than the surface of the second liner 46, wherein the smoother profile of the second liner 46 lowers the strength of the adhesion bond with the adhesive layer 44).
FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing a system 61 including a tool 60 attached to a gantry system 62 according to various embodiments of the present disclosure. A gantry system 62 can control the position of the tool 60. An example of a gantry system is described in U.S. Publication No. 2005/0045914, which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety for all purposes. In various embodiments, a suitable gantry system 62 has a precise Z-axis gantry. In various embodiments, the gantry system 62 is configured to perform a 2-step operation including a kiss-cut step and a place step. As recited herein, distal refers to a first direction generally away from the gantry system 62 (e.g., the tool 60 in particular) and proximal refers to a second direction generally toward the gantry system (e.g., along the Z-axis).
The gantry system 62 can include an XYZ gantry allowing the gantry system 62 to control the position of the tool 60 along the X-, Y-, and Z-axes. The gantry system 62 can position the tool 60 in a first relative position in an X-Y plane near the layered adhesive strip 40. The gantry system 62 can position the tool 60 in a second relative position in the X-Y plane near a component of a hard disk drive suspension 10. The gantry system 62 can position the tool 60 in a third relative position in the X-Y plane near a receptacle. To achieve the relative positions, the gantry system 62 can translate the tool 60, layered adhesive strip 40, and/or the hard disk drive suspension 10. The gantry system 62 can utilize the Z-axis for controlling the cutting motion of the tool 60 and placing adhesive piece 30 on the surface of the component of the hard disk drive suspension 10. The Z-axis control is configured to have the required precision to cut through one layer or multiple layers of the layered adhesive strip 40 without partially or completely cutting through an adjacent layer. In various embodiments, the gantry system 62 can cause the tool 60 to cut through an adhesive layer 44 without cutting through the entire thickness of the second liner 46.
The cutting depth along the Z-axis may be precisely controlled with a hard stop 88, included in the tool 60 or the gantry system 62 (not shown), which functions as a depth-marker to control the precise cutting depth of the tool 60. The hard stop 88 can be generally immoveable in relation to the punch 64 in the Z-axis. The hard stop 88 can prevent the tool 60 from moving in one direction on the Z-axis by engaging a generally immoveable object or surface. The hard stop 88 may be set to allow the tool 60 to cut through an adhesive layer 44. The hard stop 88 may be set to prevent the tool 60 from cutting through the entire thickness of the second liner 46.
The tool 60 comprises a punch 64, a pressure pin 66, and an actuator 68 in the illustrated embodiment. The punch 64 has a proximal end 70, a distal end or tip 72, a barrel 65, and a lumen 74 extending through the barrel. In various embodiments, the barrel 65 is generally cylindrical. The barrel 65 has an inner surface 76 defining the lumen 74 and an outer surface 78. A retention feature 80 is formed in the inner surface 76 of the barrel 65 at or near the distal tip 72. The retention feature 80 can be configured to exert a friction force, causing frictional interference with an object in the lumen 74 of the punch 64, thereby retaining the object within the lumen. The retention feature 80 can be configured to exert a compression force to retain an object within the lumen 74 of the punch 64. In various embodiments, the retention feature 80 is annularly shaped in the X-Y plane.
The pressure pin 66 is disposed within the lumen 74. The pressure pin 66 is radially sized to move through the lumen 74, which may include the region bounded by the retention feature 80 of the inner surface 76 at the distal tip 72. A distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is substantially flat so that the pressure pin 66 can engage a liner of the layered adhesive strip 40 and apply a generally even force thereto. The actuator 68 is disposed in the proximal end 70 of the tool 60 and is configured to translate the pressure pin 66. The actuator 68 is capable of exerting a force upon the pressure pin 66 to translate the pin generally along the Z-axis. In other words, the actuator 68 can extend or retract the pressure pin 66 to select positions.
FIG. 5 is a detailed cross-sectional side view of the distal end of an exemplary tool 60. The barrel 65 near the distal tip 72 forms a cutting edge 94 of the punch 64. The cutting edge 94 is sharp. The cutting edge 94 is configured to cut various layers of a layered adhesive strip 40, for example, as shown in FIG. 3. In various embodiments, the outer surface 78 tapers to the cutting edge 94 at or near the distal tip 72.
The retention feature 80 can have a proximal surface 90 and a distal surface 92, which meet at an angle that forms an inner edge 100. The inner edge 100 can be sharp giving the retention feature 80 a barb shape. In various embodiments, the inner edge 100 is continuous and/or annularly shaped in the X-Y plane. The barb shape is configured to readily allow an object (e.g., a first liner 42) to traverse proximally along the barb shape but to resist movement of the object distally along the barb shape. In various embodiments, the angle between the surfaces 90, 92 is less than 90 degrees. The distal surface 92 tapers to meet the outer surface 78 at an edge opposite the inner edge 100 forming the profile of the cutting edge 94 at the distal tip 72. In various embodiments, the angle between the distal surface 92 and the outer surface 78 is less than 90 degrees, giving sharpness to the cutting edge 94.
In some embodiments, the retention feature 80 can be a ring that projects inwardly around the entirety of an inner circumference of the lumen 74. In this way, the inner edge 100 can be a ridge within the lumen 74. In some other embodiments, the retention feature 80 comprises a plurality of separate protrusion elements that each project inwardly at discrete locations around the inner circumference of the lumen 74. The projection elements can be evenly spaced around the inner circumference of the lumen 74. For example, a set of two protrusion elements can be located 180 degrees from each other, a set of three protrusion elements can be located 120 degrees from each other, a set of four protrusion elements can be located 90 degrees from each other, etc. In some embodiments, the protrusion elements are located at the same longitudinal position of the barrel 65 (e.g., each has the same Z-axis location). In some other embodiments, the protrusion elements are located at different longitudinal positions of the barrel 65 (e.g., two or more protrusion elements have different Z-axis locations).
The cutting edge 94 has a profile in the X-Y plane. The profile can be an annular profile, such as a circle shape or an ellipse shape. In the illustrated embodiment, the cutting edge 94 is substantially symmetric about an axis parallel to the Z-axis. The cutting edge 94 is configured to form the shape of the adhesive piece 30 upon cutting. For example, if the cutting edge 94 has a circular profile, then it will cut the adhesive piece 30 into a circular shape. In various embodiments, the diameter of adhesive piece 30 having the circular profile is 12/1000 of an inch. The punch 64 can be formed of any suitable material to establish a cutting edge, such as aluminum or steel. The features of the punch 64 can be formed by CNC machining, etching, or other suitable methods for forming said suitable material.
The distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 can be translated by the actuator 68 into a first position 82, a second position 84 proximal the first position 82, and a third position 86 proximal the second position 84 along a Z-axis. In the first position 82, the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is substantially in the X-Y plane defined by first position 82, which is proximal to the inner edge 100. In the second position 84, the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is substantially in the X-Y plane defined by second position 84, which is proximal the inner edge 100. In the third position 86, the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is substantially in the X-Y plane defined by third position 86, which is distal to the inner edge 100. In the first position 82, the pressure pin 66 leaves a space between its distal face 67 and the distal tip 72 in the lumen 74. In the second position 84, the pressure pin 66 leaves less space in distal tip 72 in the lumen 74 relative to the first position 82. In the third position 86, the pressure pin 66 leaves even less space in the distal tip 72 in the lumen 74 relative to the second position 84. The actuator 68 can be configured as, for example, a hard stop actuator, an encoder motor, or a fluid or air pressure actuator, capable of translating the pressure pin 66 into each position from another position.
FIGS. 6-12 are side facing cross sectional views showing exemplary tool 60 at various points in time during use (e.g., corresponding to the method steps of FIG. 15). FIG. 6 is a side facing cross sectional view showing the tool 60 in a pre-cut position 110. In pre-cut position 110, the tool 60 is positioned in the X-Y plane at a first relative position, as previously described, proximal to a layered adhesive strip 40. The tool 60 hovers proximal to the layered adhesive strip 40 leaving a space between the distal tip 72 of the punch 64 and the layered adhesive strip 40. The portion of the layered adhesive strip 40 over which the tool 60 hovers has a first liner 42, adhesive layer 44, and a second liner 46. As shown in FIG. 6, the pressure pin 66 is retracted within the lumen 74 of the punch 64 and the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is in a first position 82.
FIG. 7 is a side facing cross sectional view showing the tool 60 in the post-cut position 112 (e.g., following the state shown in FIG. 6). In post-cut position 112, the tool 60 is in a position distal to pre-cut position 110. The gantry system 62 causes relative movement of the tool 60 from the pre-cut position 110 to the post-cut position 112. The gantry system 62 also causes the punch 64 to move downward, along the Z-axis, to cut into a layered adhesive strip 40 having a first liner 42, adhesive layer 44, and second liner 46. The cutting edge 94 of the punch 64 passes completely through the first liner 42 and the adhesive layer 44. A layered piece 96 is at least partially separated from the layered adhesive strip 40 but the cutting. The layered piece 96 includes a liner piece 98 and an adhesive piece 30 formed from the first liner 42 and adhesive layer 44, respectively. The layered piece 96 is forced into the lumen 74 of the punch 64 during the cutting. The cutting edge 94 may extend partially into the second liner 46 to ensure a full cut through the adhesive layer 44. The cutting edge 94 is halted from cutting completely through the second liner 46 by the functioning of the hard stop 88 (shown in FIGS. 4 and 5). For example, the hard stop 88 can be fixed in position relative to the punch 64 and can engage a surface, such as a platform or post, to prevent no more downward movement of the cutting edge 94 than intended. The distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 remains retracted in first position 82 during the cutting. The lumen 74 is shown as having received the first liner 42 in the interior space of the lumen 74.
The retention feature 80 is inwardly bound by a proximal surface 90 and a distal surface 92. The retention feature 80 engages the first liner 42 during cutting of the first liner 42 and the adhesive layer 44. The retention feature 80 provides a retention force upon the first liner 42. The retention force can include a friction force upon the first liner 42, causing frictional interference, which may be sufficient to retain the first liner 42 within the lumen 74 during various subsequent steps.
The retention force of the frictional interference can be enhanced by a compression force. In the illustrated embodiment, the inner edge 100 of the retention feature 80 extends radially inward into the first liner 42. The inner diameter of the lumen 74 narrows along the distal surface 92 from the distal most tip of the cutting edge 94 to the inner edge 100. In other words, the lumen 74 has a first inner diameter at a first location and a second inner diameter at a second location, wherein the first inner diameter is larger than the second inner diameter and the first location is distal of the second location. The first liner 42 is compressed by the narrowing of the lumen 74 as the first liner 42 moves proximally along the distal surface 92 into the lumen 74 during the downward cutting stroke of the punch 64. The compression of the first liner 42 increases frictional interference between the lateral sides of the first liner 42 and the distal surface 92.
The retention force can be provided by the barb-like shape of the retention feature 80. The first liner 42 has sufficient thickness (as measured along the Z-axis) such that a proximal portion of the first liner 42 extends proximal of the retention feature 80 (e.g., the inner edge 100 specifically) and a distal portion of the first liner 42 extends distal of the retention feature 80 after cutting. As shown, a width of the portion of the first liner 42 that is proximal of the inner edge 100 may be greater than a width of another portion of the first liner 42 that is distal the inner edge 100. In other words, compression of the first liner 42 by the inner edge 100 causes the barb-shaped retention feature 80 to catch the first liner 42, increasing a retention force that resists movement of the first liner 42 (and the adhesive piece 30 attached thereto) distally in the Z-axis. Whether by frictional interference and/or the action of the barb-shaped retention feature, the overall retention force exerted on the release liner 42 is greater than the adhesion forces between the liners 42, 46 and a portion of the adhesive layer 44 within the lumen 74.
FIG. 8 is a cross sectional side view showing the tool 60 in an extraction position 114. In the extraction position 114, the tool 60 is in a position proximal to post-cut position 112. The gantry system 62 causes relative movement of the tool 60 from post-cut position 112 to extraction position 114, such as by proximal movement of the tool 60 relative to the remainder of the layered adhesive strip 40. As previously discussed, the overall retention force is greater than the second adhesion force between the adhesive piece 30 and the second liner 46, and the second adhesion force is greater than the first adhesion force between the adhesive piece 30 and the liner piece 98. The relationship between the forces allows the punch 64 to retain, at least partially, the liner piece 98 adhered to the adhesive piece 30 in the lumen 74 following the cutting and during separation of the layered piece 96 from the remaining layered adhesive strip 40. In the illustrated embodiment, the distal end 72 of the punch 64 is tapered, which facilitates release of the punch 64 from the remainder of the layered adhesive strip 40 as the punch 64 is moved into the extraction position 114. The distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 remains in first position 82.
FIG. 9 is a cross sectional side view showing the tool 60 in pre-placement position 116. In pre-placement position 116, the tool 60 is in the X-Y plane at a second relative position, as previously described, proximal to a component 102 of a hard disk drive suspension 10. The gantry system 62 causes the tool 60 to move from the first relative position in post-cut position 112 to the second relative position in pre-placement position 116. The tool 60 is poised proximal to the suspension component 102 leaving a space between the distal tip 72 of the punch 64 and the suspension component. The component 102 can be a tongue 18 or a motor 32, for example, although the component 102 could be any part of a suspension or other device. A top surface of the suspension component 102 is preferably clean and free of contaminants, such as dust, to facilitate proper adhesion to the top surface. The layered piece 96 remains retained in the lumen 74 of the punch 64 due to the retention force, as previously described. The distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 remains in the first position 82.
FIG. 10 is a cross sectional side view showing the tool 60 in a placement position 118. In the placement position 118, the tool 60 is in a position distal to pre-placement position 116. The gantry system 62 causes relative movement of the tool 60 from pre-placement position 116 to placement position 118. Specifically, the gantry system 62 lowers the tool 60 in a distal movement. When the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is translated by the actuator 68 from first position 82 to second position 84, the distal face 67 engages a top surface of the liner piece 98, advancing the whole layered piece 96 distally. The adhesive piece 30, while still adhered to a bottom surface of the liner piece 98, engages the top surface of the suspension component 102. The pressure pin 66 can be advanced (distally) or at least held in position relative to the punch 64 during and/or after the lowering of the tool 60 from the pre-placement position 116 to the placement position 118. The advancement of the pressure pin 66 relative to the punch 64 and/or the lowering of the tool 60 applies pressure to the top side of the liner piece 98 which in turn applies pressure to the adhesive piece 30 to bond the bottom surface of the adhesive piece 30 to the top surface of the suspension component 102. The distal tip 72 of the punch 64 remains proximal to the suspension component 102.
The adhesion force created between the adhesive piece 30 and the suspension component 102 is greater than the adhesion force between the liner piece 98 and adhesive piece 30. The liner piece 98 has a sufficient thickness such that, when the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is translated to the second position 84, a portion of the liner piece 98 remains proximal to the retention feature 80. The retention force due to the retention feature 80, as previously described, is greater than either the adhesion force between the adhesive piece 30 and the suspension component 102 or the adhesion force between the liner piece 98 and adhesive piece 30.
FIG. 11 is a cross sectional side view showing the tool 60 in a release position 120. In the release position 120, the tool 60 is in a position proximal to placement position 118. The gantry system 62 causes relative movement of the tool 60 from the placement position 118 to the release position 120. When the punch 64 moves proximally along the Z-axis, the relationship of forces described above with respect to FIG. 10 causes the liner piece 98 to separate or release from the adhesive piece 30. The adhesive piece 30 remains adhered to the component 102. The liner piece 98 remains in the lumen 74 of the punch 64 at the distal tip 72 due to the previously described retention force caused by the retention feature 80. The pressure pin 66 can remain in the second position 84. Alternatively, the pressure pin 66 can be retracted to first position 82.
FIG. 12 is a cross sectional side view showing the tool 60 in a pre-disposal position 122. In the pre-disposal position 122, the tool 60 is in the X-Y plane at a third relative position, as previously described, proximate to a receptacle 104 (e.g., a vacuum bucket). The gantry system 62 causes the tool 60 to move from the second relative position in release position 120 to the third relative position in pre-disposal position 122. The tool 60 hovers proximal to the receptacle 104 near an opening 106 of the receptacle 104. The distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 remains in a position other than the third position 86, such as the second position 84 or a position with the distal face 67 proximal of the third position 86. The liner piece 98 is retained in the lumen 74 of the punch 64 at the distal tip 72 by the retention force due to the retention feature 80, as previously described.
FIG. 13 is a cross sectional side view showing the tool 60 in a disposal position 124. In the disposal position 124, the punch 64 is in the same position as in the pre-disposal position 122. When the distal face 67 of the pressure pin 66 is translated by the actuator 68 from the second position 84 to the third position 86, the distal face 67 engages a top surface of the liner piece 98, advancing the liner piece distally. As previously described, the distal face 67 in the third position 86 is distal to the inner edge 100, and the inner edge 100 no longer engages the liner piece 98, causing a substantial reduction in retention force due to the retention feature 80. The receptacle 104 can also provide a vacuum force through the opening 106 that urges the liner piece 98 to move distally. Whether by the reduced retention force and/or the vacuum force, the retention force is no longer sufficient to retain the liner piece 98 and the liner piece 98 is expelled or ejected from the lumen 74 of the punch 64 at the distal end 72. The liner piece 98 preferably enters the opening 106 and is disposed within the receptacle 104. Disposal of the liner piece 98 prevents it from disrupting or contaminating nearby manufacturing processes.
FIG. 14 is a cross sectional side view showing the end of a tool 160 in accordance with various embodiments of this disclosure. Tool 160 is similar to tool 60 in structure and function and thus is similarly numbered to FIG. 5 for similar features (e.g. pressure pin 166 is similar to pressure pin 66), except where noted. In the illustrated embodiment, the tool 160 includes a punch 164, a pressure pin 166, and an actuator (not shown). The punch 164 includes a distal tip 172, a barrel 165, and a lumen 174 extending through the barrel. The barrel 65 has an inner surface 176 defining the lumen 174 and an outer surface 178. A retention feature 180 is formed in the inner surface 176 of the barrel 165 at or near the distal tip 172. The retention feature 180 has a proximal surface 190 and a distal surface 192.
Different from the embodiment shown in FIG. 5, the distal surface 192 of the retention feature 180 does not taper. Instead, the distal surface 192 is generally parallel to a Z-axis and meets at an approximately 90 degree angle with the proximal surface 190 forming an inner edge 200 and giving the retention feature 180 a barb shape. The outer surface 178 near the distal tip 172 tapers to meet the distal surface 192 to form the cutting edge 194. The retention feature 180 is configured to exert a similar retention force to that described above upon a layered piece 196, which includes a liner piece 198 and an adhesive piece 130.
FIG. 15 is a flow chart showing an overview of an exemplary method 210 for placing an adhesive piece extracted from a layered adhesive strip onto a component of hard disk drive suspension using tool, according to various embodiments of the present disclosure. The method 210 can employ the apparatuses discussed herein (e.g., the embodiments of FIGS. 4-14 or other embodiments). In step 212, a punch of the tool cuts into a layered adhesive strip. The punch cuts at least a first liner and an adhesive layer forming a layered piece including a liner piece remaining adhered to an adhesive piece. The tool includes a pressure pin placed in a first position and an actuator for controlling translation of the pin. In step 214, the layered piece is separated from the remainder of the layered adhesive strip, and is retained in the punch, as the punch moves away from the layered adhesive strip. The tool is moved toward a component of a hard disk drive suspension. In step 216, the adhesive piece is adhered to the component of the hard disk drive suspension by providing a first force onto the adhesive piece through the adhered liner piece. Such force can be provided by the actuator through the pressure pin being translated from a first position to a second position. In step 218, a liner piece is separated from the adhesive piece, which remains adhered to the suspension component, while the liner piece is retained in a lumen of the punch. In step 220, the liner piece is disposed. The liner piece can be expelled from the lumen of the punch by translating the pressure pin from a second position to a third position, which provides a second force onto the liner piece. The expelled liner piece may also be collected by a receptacle, such as a vacuum bucket.
Although the present invention has been described with reference to preferred embodiments, those skilled in the art will recognize that changes can be made in form and detail without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. For example, the various features of the illustrated embodiments can be combined with features of other embodiments. As such, the various embodiments disclosed herein can be modified in view of the features of other embodiments, such as by omitting and/or adding features. | 2019-04-24T23:52:52Z | http://patents.com/us-9443547.html |
At times, it even seemed as if the Fox News host might be gunning for Nielsen’s job as he bombarded her with his own proposed solutions to the border crisis.
“That is part of the problem,” Nielsen said, adding that steps are already being taken to address just that issue. “We’re looking to do everything we can throughout the system to apply penalties where we can,” she said.
Nielsen went on to argue that “there’s a debate in Congress” regarding the executive branch on implementing an order like that, prompting Carlson to blast Congress while advocating for more direct executive actions.
The Homeland Security chief responded that Trump has been clear that it is “all on the table” and he’s serious about shutting down the border.
“Yes, everything is on the table,” she reiterated.
Their years-long court battle — at a time when some critics are pushing the federal government to do away with birthright citizenship altogether — was only settled recently when B.C.’s highest court upheld a ruling that the parent’s custody battle should be dealt with in China even though the boy, now 3, was born in Canada.
Tensions flared in December 2017 when the father flew with his son to Vancouver son on one-way tickets, apparently without the mother’s consent. The mother flew to B.C. a few days later and spent a couple of weeks with her son before flying back to Beijing for work. She agreed to let her son stay in Canada until February 2018.
The father appealed the decision arguing that Mayer had committed a number of errors of law or fact.
The Post reached out to lawyers for both parents but they either did not return messages or were unavailable.
Source: ‘Birth tourism’ case presents quandary for parents after break-up: to settle their custody dispute in Canada or China?
I was really pleased to see this detailed Angus Reid survey on attitudes towards birth tourism. Timing perfect as will be discussing birthright citizenship with Audrey Macklin next week at Metropolis (see my deck Birth Tourism – Metropolis 2019).
Appears by the efforts by activists like Kerry Starchuck, Richmond area MPs Alice Wong and Joe Peschisolido, my health financial data-based research (Hospital stats show birth tourism rising in major cities) and the related media coverage helped encourage the government to take the issue more seriously in its commitment to study the issue and, I suspect, encourage Angus Reid to conduct this study.
The poll has breakdowns for region, gender, age, income, education, and political orientation but not, curiously, for immigrant/non-immigrant.
Most of the differences of opinion reflect overall difference of opinion on immigration and citizenship issues: younger, female, more educated and those with higher tend to be more supportive, whereas the opposite is true with respect to older persons, males, less education and lower income.
The political orientation divide is the most striking with the biggest surprise to me is the relatively high support (one-third) among Liberal and NDP leaning voters to support birthright citizenship for those on tourist visas, the classic example and practice.
Hard to explain are Conservative leaning voters who make greater distinctions between situations of both parents being citizens or permanent residents and those when only one parent is a citizen or permanent resident.
Which babies born on Canadian soil should be granted automatic citizenship?
It’s a question that has appended itself to the Canadian political and policy narrative in this election year; and one on which Canadians share some areas of consensus and others of deep division, according to a new public opinion poll from the non-profit Angus Reid Institute.
Today, most Canadians feel this concept – that anyone born in Canada is a citizen – goes a bit too far. Almost two-thirds (64%) say a child born to parents who are in this country on tourist visas should not be granted Canadian citizenship, and six-in-ten (60%) say changes to Canada’s citizenship laws are necessary to discourage birth tourism.
That said, more Canadians are inclined to believe birthright citizenship is a good policy (40%) than a bad one (33%).
Canadian opinions of when to grant citizenship are nuanced, changing with various scenarios offered. For example, 55 per cent say a child born to two parents in Canada on work visas should be conferred citizenship. This drops to 40 per cent if both parents are in Canada on student visas.
Canadians considering the Conservative Party in the coming election, as well as older residents (those ages 55-plus), are inclined to say that birth tourism is serious problem for Canada. Those considering the Liberal and New Democratic Parties – and those under 35 years of age – are more likely to say the problem is not serious.
With Donald Trump’s recent threat to remove birthright citizenship rights, many international families may wonder how this could affect the nationality of a child born to immigrants. Below, family law Attorney Evie Jeang, founder of Ideal Legal Group, Inc., explains that without birthright citizenship, children born to immigrants and non-citizens will not be recognized as citizens of any country, and that by eliminating these laws, citizenship grants for children of international families will become unnecessarily complex, and the surrogacy market could take a hit.
In other words, children of international intended parents obtain US citizenship upon birth by a gestational parent in the US Among many legal, medical and ethical factors, birthright citizenship offers an appeal to international families without US citizenship looking to conceive through surrogacy. Thus, the popular commercial surrogacy market could take a hit without birthright citizenship attracting wealthy foreigners.
International family and divorce law firm, Ideal Legal Group Inc., frequently encounters the issue of birthright citizenship for foreign couples looking to conceive, particularly among their clientele base from mainland China.
Ideal Legal Group’s Chinese clientele face legal and cultural opposition to surrogacy in their country, and accordingly, many Chinese nationals come to the United States, where it is legal and ethical to employ a gestational surrogate to carry their baby. Through birthright citizenship, the child is eligible to receive US citizenship benefits, including education, social welfare and treatment in American medical facilities. A child with US citizenship is also eligible for dual residency in countries that recognize this concept.
Ideal Legal Group helps intended parents secure their birthright by ensuring parentage over their child in which they choose to be delivered by an American surrogate. Through their work with Surrogacy Concierge, Ideal Legal Group locates surrogates of specificity for international clientele, ranging in a variety of education and socioeconomic status.
Once a surrogate is selected, the legal process begins. The legal team drafts agreements on behalf of the intended parents to ensure that once the baby is born, the parental rights are transferred from the surrogate parent(s) to the intended parents. In the State of California, this is executed through the Family Code in which a parentage action confirms the birthrights of the intended parents.
The legal team drafts agreements between the intended parents and a gestational surrogate (and their spouse if applicable), memorializing through a legal agreement the medical stages of surrogacy. The intended parents are represented by one attorney and the gestational surrogate is represented by another attorney.
California surrogacy laws provide that a surrogacy contract must contain the date that the contract was entered into; the persons from which the gametes originated; the identity of the intended parent(s); and the process for any necessary pre-birth or parentage orders. Ideal Legal Group incorporates provisions that protect the intended parents’ birthrights.
Further, the legal team focuses on identifying the risks and responsibilities that each party is assuming, including but not limited to, surrogate compensation, what happens in the event of an unfortunate miscarriage, and protocol if the surrogate has multiple children rather than the one child which was contracted. The surrogacy contract is a map for the process.
Ideal Legal Group also handles the courtroom work. Pre-birth parentage orders are needed to finalize the intended parents’ legal parental rights. No actual court hearing is needed; however, pre-birth parentage orders are filed in advance of when the baby is born, and the Judge signs off on the transfer of parental rights from the surrogate to the intended parents.
Eliminating birthright citizenship would be an overreaction to fears about a growth in birth tourism, according to an Ottawa immigration law professor.
Canada’s Citizenship Act enshrines the principle of jus soli, conferring automatic citizenship on anyone born on Canadian soil, making it one of just 30 or so countries in the world to maintain birthright citizenship.
But a recent reaction against the phenomenon of “birth tourism,” in which non-resident non-Canadians give birth in the country in order for their children to obtain Canadian citizenship, has led to calls to tighten up the law.
At its policy conference in Halifax last summer, members of the Conservative Party of Canada passed a resolution to amend the act so that birthright citizenship is only automatic when one of the child’s parents is either a citizen or permanent resident of Canada, following the example of Australia, which made a similar move in 2007.
Despite the passion the practice arouses, Jamie Liew, an associate professor at the University of Ottawa’s faculty of law, says it’s important to remember that there is currently no legal bar to birth tourism in Canada. And she strongly opposes any amendment that would tackle it by ending birthright citizenship.
“In my opinion, it would be a massive overreaction to a very small problem that will lead to humongous social problems,” Liew says.
Such an amendment, she says, would affect every Canadian, because people would have to prove their citizenship regardless of where they were born.
In addition to the cost to the taxpayer of a whole new layer of bureaucracy, Liew says, there would also inevitably be mistakes and bad decisions in complex or difficult cases.
“People will end up in court challenging decisions, which is expensive for everyone,” she adds.
In a recent study carried out for the Institute for Research on Public Policy think tank, author and commentator Andrew Griffith, a former senior official at Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, suggested that previous figures may have heavily underestimated the incidence of birth tourism.
Statistics Canada numbers indicate birth tourism peaked in 2012, when the agency recorded 699 births to mothers whose residence was outside Canada, falling to 233 in 2015, before rising again in 2016 to 313.
Griffith says the discrepancy can be accounted for by the fact that birth tourist mothers are more likely to use their temporary Canadian address on birth registration documents used by Statistics Canada, while giving their real addresses abroad for the purposes of hospital payments.
However, he acknowledges that his figures overstate birth tourism to some extent, because the billing data does not distinguish births to temporary residents such as corporate transferees or international students or children born to Canadian expatriates returning home temporarily to give birth.
He says he welcomes the federal government’s recent commitment to look into the issue and says he hopes they can get a better handle on the precise number of birth tourists.
Despite his discomfort with birth tourism, Andy Semotiuk, an immigration lawyer with Pace Law Firm in Toronto, says he’s a firm believer in birthright citizenship.
“The troublesome thing for me is the people making money from advertising and facilitating anchor births,” he says, suggesting legal solutions focus on those profiting off birth tourism, rather than the mothers engaging in it or their children.
Provides an example of regulatory and legal approaches to reducing the extent of birth tourism. While the national security rationale given is overblown (“ridiculous” in the words of others), the fraud and misrepresentation of purpose of visit is not, although may be hard to prove in court.
Of course, in the Canadian context, if a women openly stated the purpose of her visit was to give birth with the intent to obtain Canadian citizenship for her child, and met the security, medical and financial requirements, there would be no grounds for visa refusal and no fraud or misrepresentation.
Over two years, the now-41-year-old raked in millions through her business, where mothers-to-be paid between US$40,000 and US$80,000 each to come to California, stay in an upscale flat and give birth, authorities said.
Li, who was arrested on Thursday, is one of 20 people charged in the first federal crackdown on birth tourism businesses that prosecutors said brought hundreds of pregnant women to the United States.
Jing Dong, 42, and Michael Wei Yueh Liu, 53, who allegedly operated “USA Happy Baby,” also were arrested. More than a dozen others, including the operator of a third such business, also face charges but are believed to have returned to China, the US Attorney’s office in Los Angeles said.
While it is not illegal to visit the United States while pregnant, authorities said the businesses – which were raided by federal agents in 2015 – touted the benefits of having US citizen babies, who could get free public education and years later help their parents immigrate.
The charges include conspiracy, visa fraud and money laundering. But US authorities said the businesses also posed a national security risk since their customers, some who worked for the Chinese government, secured American citizenship for children who can move back to the United States and once they’re 21 and then sponsor their parents for green cards.
Messages left for Li and Dong’s lawyers were not immediately returned. Derek Tung, Liu’s lawyer, said the growing interest among Chinese women to give birth to American babies drew attention to a phenomenon long employed by citizens of other countries.
In the past, operators sometimes ran into trouble with local code enforcement officials when neighbours in residential areas complained about crowding or excess trash, but they did not face federal scrutiny.
That business dated to at least 2010 but advertised having brought 8,000 women to the United States – half of them from China – and claimed to have been running since 1999, prosecutors said.
Each business brought hundreds of customers to give birth in the United States and some didn’t pay all of the medical costs tied to their care, prosecutors said. One couple paid the indigent rate for their hospital bills – a total of US$4,080 – even though they had more than US$225,000 in a US bank account they had used to shop at luxury stores including Louis Vuitton, according to court papers.
Li, who operated You Win USA, told an undercover federal agent who was posing as a pregnant Chinese citizen that her company would train her to interview for a visa and pass customs, according to court filings.
En quelques années, le tourisme obstétrique est devenu une véritable industrie à Richmond, en banlieue de Vancouver. Une vingtaine de maisons de naissance chinoises sont en activité dans cette ville d’environ 200 000 habitants, dont plus de la moitié sont d’origine asiatique. Dans l’hôpital de la ville, 22 % des bébés sont nés de mères non canadiennes. Aperçu de cette industrie en pleine croissance.
Plusieurs maisons de naissance sont en contact avec des agences en Chine qui leur trouvent des clients. Elles font aussi de la publicité dans les médias, ici au pays. « Bienvenue dans notre club pour la grossesse, la maternité, la formation postnatale, les visites touristiques et le bonheur d’un bébé citoyen canadien », peut-on lire dans une langue chinoise (traduit avec Google) dans une des publications sur internet dans la rubrique des petites annonces.
Les familles qui payent le gros prix pour avoir un « bébé passeport » sont traitées aux petits oignons. Certaines maisons de naissance ressemblent à un véritable « tout inclus ». On offre la collecte à l’aéroport, l’hébergement, la nourriture, le transport aux rendez-vous médicaux, ou encore de l’aide pour remplir les papiers de citoyenneté, explique en entrevue un journaliste basé à Vancouver qui écrit régulièrement sur le sujet, Ian Young.
Cette industrie est très mal perçue par de nombreux citoyens. Le député local, le libéral Joe Peschisolido, a parrainé l’an dernier une pétition visant à reconnaître le problème afin de s’y attaquer de front. « J’ai demandé au gouvernement de dire tout haut que le tourisme obstétrique est mauvais. Et que même si c’est légal, que c’est illégitime. Que c’est un modèle d’affaires qui ne doit pas être toléré et qu’on doit prendre des mesures pour le démanteler pour éventuellement l’éliminer », a-t-il affirmé en entrevue au Journal.
Que l’accouchement soit planifié ou que les mères arrivent à l’improviste, l’hôpital de Richmond — ou tout autre hôpital canadien — ne refuserait jamais d’offrir des soins de santé urgents à quiconque « en fonction de sa capacité de payer ou de son lieu de résidence », soutient une porte-parole des autorités de santé publique de Vancouver, Carrie Stefanson.
« Mais nous nous attendons à être indemnisés, que ce soit directement ou par le biais d’une assurance voyage », ajoute-t-elle. La plupart des mères s’inscrivent à l’avance et reçoivent des soins prénataux, précise-t-elle.
La pointe de l’Iceberg ?
L’hôpital de Richmond fait possiblement face à un problème de tourisme obstétrique encore plus important que ce que démontrent ses chiffres officiels, selon le député Peschisolido. Les statistiques sur les mères étrangères sont calculées en fonction de leur résidence de facturation. Or, plusieurs d’entre elles recevraient leur facture directement à la maison de naissance de Richmond.
Les douaniers canadiens ne peuvent pas refuser l’entrée au pays à une femme, même s’ils la soupçonnent de venir au pays uniquement pour accoucher.
« En vertu de la loi, la grossesse n’est pas en soi un motif d’interdiction de territoire », précise une porte-parole de l’Agence des services frontaliers du Canada, Jayden Robertson.
Un couple rencontré par Le Journal dans le cadre de ce reportage sur les « bébés passeport » n’a d’ailleurs pas caché ses intentions lorsqu’il a atterri à l’aéroport de Toronto, en octobre.
« Je leur ai dit de mon plein gré que je venais pour accoucher », admet Hrena Singh, une nouvelle mère de 26 ans venue d’Inde pour offrir la citoyenneté canadienne à son enfant.
Les questions des douaniers à l’arrivée de Hrena et de son conjoint, Aman, se sont limitées à leur situation financière. Ce couple, qui a traversé le Pacifique, a fait appel aux services d’un avocat spécialisé en immigration pour éviter de se mettre dans l’embarras.
La première étape consiste à obtenir un visa de visiteur. Une fois ce document en poche, les douaniers peuvent difficilement leur refuser l’accès.
Les familles qui viennent ici pour accoucher dans le but d’obtenir la citoyenneté canadienne pour leur enfant proviennent aussi de pays riches, comme les États-Unis.
Un avocat de Toronto spécialisé en immigration a même constaté une hausse d’intérêt des Américains pour le tourisme obstétrique au Canada depuis l’élection de Donald Trump à la présidence.
Selon Me Davidson, certains Américains sont attirés par la réputation enviable du Canada à l’international. Le passeport canadien est perçu comme étant « plus utile » par certains de ses clients, explique-t-il.
Les données obtenues par Le Journal concernant l’origine des mères étrangères ne permettent toutefois pas de confirmer cette tendance au Québec. Dans les cinq dernières années, le nombre d’Américaines accouchant dans la province serait plutôt stable.
Si plus d’Américaines accouchent ici à cause de Trump, les étrangères sont aussi maintenant plus nombreuses à choisir le Canada au détriment des États-Unis, soutient une accompagnatrice de naissance de Montréal, Rivka Cymbalist.
Les États-Unis demeurent toutefois la Mecque du tourisme obstétrique. Mais un certain déplacement vers le nord s’est opéré en raison de la rhétorique anti-immigration du président, soulignent de nombreux experts.
M. Trump a promis de s’attaquer au phénomène des « bébés passeport » en abolissant la citoyenneté à la naissance.
Le gouvernement Trudeau a récemment lancé une enquête pour mieux connaître l’envergure des « bébés passeport » après avoir minimisé longtemps son importance.
Phénomène en pleine explosion, il s’agit de femmes étrangères qui accouchent au Canada après avoir fait des milliers de kilomètres pour donner naissance ici dans un seul but : offrir la citoyenneté canadienne à son enfant. Le tout soulève des questions éthiques et légales.
« Le gouvernement admet enfin qu’il doit faire une étude, c’est un changement de cap assez significatif », soutient Andrew Griffith, un ex-haut fonctionnaire fédéral qui a publié des données inédites en novembre.
Les travaux de M. Griffith ont démontré que Statistique Canada sous-estime largement le nombre de naissances de mères étrangères au pays. Le gouvernement Trudeau s’entête pourtant à se fier à ces données qui sont contestées par des experts.
À titre d’exemple, l’agence dénombrait 313 naissances de mères étrangères dans tout le Canada en 2016. Or, la même année, 378 mères non canadiennes ont accouché uniquement à l’hôpital de Richmond, en Colombie-Britannique, selon les chiffres fournis par le centre hospitalier.
L’étude de M. Griffith, qui n’a pas été contestée par Ottawa, démontre qu’environ 3600 mères étrangères ont donné naissance au Canada l’an dernier, sans compter le Québec. En additionnant les accouchements dans quelques hôpitaux montréalais, on en obtient environ 4500. De ce nombre, environ la moitié serait du tourisme obstétrique.
« Bien que ces statistiques indiquent que ce n’est pas une pratique très répandue, le gouvernement du Canada reconnaît la nécessité de mieux comprendre l’ampleur de cette pratique ainsi que ses répercussions », souligne le ministre de l’Immigration Ahmed Hussen.
The second part of the Journal de Montréal series. The most interesting nugget being Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel essentially disowning the CPC policy resolution calling for abolishing unqualified birthright citizenship (I may have missed an earlier reference).
Le gouvernement fédéral promet de s’attaquer aux consultants illégaux en immigration qui contrôlent une partie de l’industrie du tourisme obstétrique après les avoir laissés prendre racine au pays.
Le Journal rapportait hier qu’environ une femme étrangère accouche chaque jour au Québec après avoir fait des milliers de kilomètres pour donner naissance ici dans un seul but : offrir la citoyenneté canadienne à son enfant.
Le Canada et les États-Unis font partie des rares pays riches où il est encore possible d’obtenir la citoyenneté ainsi. Ce phénomène des « bébés passeport » est en pleine explosion au pays.
Certains des consultants auxquels ces mères étrangères ont recours font partie intégrante du stratagème (surtout localisé à Vancouver) permettant à des femmes — principalement chinoises — de venir accoucher ici en se faisant passer pour de simples touristes.
« Tout nous porte à croire que des consultants en immigration sans scrupules incitent les demandeurs à mentir sur la raison de leur visite au Canada », soutient un porte-parole d’Immigration Canada, Peter Liang.
L’avocat montréalais Hugues Langlais soutient que ceux qui gèrent les maisons de naissance de Richmond, en Colombie-Britannique, pourraient être considérés comme des consultants illégaux en vertu de la loi.
Au Canada, seuls les avocats, les notaires et les consultants en immigration certifiés peuvent prodiguer des conseils en matière d’immigration, comme l’obtention de visas de voyage.
« Si des gens font de la promotion pour des naissances au Canada — comme les maisons de naissance de Richmond — et font des démarches pour solliciter ou renseigner des clients, ils pourraient s’exposer à des poursuites », croit-il.
Immigration Canada dit mener un examen afin de connaître la meilleure façon de serrer la vis aux consultants non autorisés. Or, jusqu’à présent, Ottawa a fait bien peu pour stopper leur progression.
C’est que l’agence fédérale responsable de mener ce genre d’enquête admet à mots couverts qu’elle n’a ni les ressources ni le temps de s’occuper de la lutte aux consultants œuvrant dans le domaine du tourisme obstétrique.
L’Agence des services frontaliers du Canada (ASFC), responsable de faire respecter la loi sur l’immigration, se concentre avant tout à assurer la sécurité nationale, et elle s’attaque uniquement aux plus gros délits.
« L’ASFC engage des poursuites pour les cas les plus sérieux de fausses déclarations commises par des consultants en immigration sans scrupules », fait-on valoir.
L’ASFC et Immigration Canada ont d’ailleurs été incapables de fournir des données sur les enquêtes en cours concernant la lutte aux consultants frauduleux.
Parallèlement, Ottawa refuse pour l’instant d’accorder plus de pouvoir à l’ordre professionnel qui régit le travail des consultants en immigration.
Il croit qu’avec un ordre professionnel comme celui des dentistes ou des ingénieurs, l’ACCPI pourrait mener des enquêtes dans le but de démanteler les maisons de naissance qui pullulent à Vancouver.
Les facilitateurs du tourisme obstétrique affichent leurs services un peu partout, des petites annonces jusqu’aux réseaux sociaux comme Instagram.
♦ Le Plus International Mother and Child club, situé à Vancouver, offre notamment dans son annonce des services « haut de gamme pour les mères d’outre-mer et leur bébé », précisant que les bébés sont canadiens.
♦ En plus du logement, de l’hébergement, du suivi médical, etc., le Canada Moon Centre B & B propose son aide pour le traitement des certificats de naissance, des passeports canadiens, des documents de voyage et des visas.
♦ Sur internet, le Canada Vancouver Ocean Baby Club écrit : « Bienvenue dans notre club pour la grossesse, la maternité, la formation postnatale, les visites tourististiques et le bonheur d’un bébé citoyen canadien ».
♦ Le Mansion Moon Center précise dans son annonce qu’une infirmière habite la villa qu’elle loue, et qu’on offre le transport depuis l’aéroport et vers les rendez-vous médicaux.
Un important facilitateur du tourisme obstétrique au pays juge la pratique choquante, même si elle est légale, et voudrait la voir cesser.
« Je n’essaie pas de me justifier et de dire que c’est noble ce que je fais, affirme sans détour Alex Davidson en entrevue dans son bureau de Toronto.
Me Davidson redoute les dérives d’un système qu’il juge « injuste » pour les candidats à l’immigration qui respectent le cours normal du processus. Les « bébés passeport » pourraient même « devenir un problème » pour le Canada, selon lui, s’ils choisissent de s’établir ici et de fréquenter les universités en grand nombre dans quelques années.
L’avocat torontois d’origine américaine et russe déplore que ces personnes aient accès aux systèmes d’éducation et de santé comme tous les autres Canadiens, simplement parce qu’ils sont nés ici.
Mais pour l’instant, la pratique est encore légale et Me Davidson a l’intention de continuer de profiter de ce lucratif marché en offrant ses services aux familles souhaitant entrer au pays en toute légalité avec un visa de voyage.
Il collabore aussi avec six médecins, qui touchent chacun une rémunération pour l’accouchement et le soutien prénatal et postnatal.
Il y a quelques semaines à peine, il a publié une vidéo sur sa très populaire chaîne YouTube, dans laquelle il invite les familles qui envisagent de s’exiler pour accoucher d’agir avant qu’il ne soit trop tard.
Dans cet extrait, Me Davidson soutient que le Canada pourrait bientôt abolir le droit du sol, car « plusieurs pensent qu’il est injuste de conserver le système actuel », prévient-il.
Comme le président Donald Trump a promis de mettre fin au tourisme obstétrique aux États-Unis, le Canada pourrait bien emboîter le pas, précise-t-il. Mais pour l’instant, aucun parti politique fédéral ne compte aller aussi loin pour contrer le phénomène.
L’avocat qualifie au passage de « cadeau pour la vie » le passeport canadien, qui offre par ailleurs « de nombreux avantages ».
« Il vous reste un an pour vous décider, si vous considérez venir ici pour donner naissance. Il est encore temps d’en profiter », explique-t-il.
Me Davidson s’est fait connaître dans le monde entier grâce à sa chaîne YouTube, dans laquelle il offre des conseils pour immigrer au Canada. Il soutient toutefois que le tourisme obstétrique ne représente qu’une petite fraction de sa clientèle.
LE CANADA DEVRAIT-IL ABOLIR OU PAS LE DROIT DU SOL ?
Le Parti conservateur n’envisage plus d’abolir la citoyenneté à la naissance pour s’attaquer au phénomène des « bébés passeport » comme le souhaite une majorité de ses militants.
« Il y a clairement de l’abus, mais je ne crois pas que ce soit un problème envahissant à l’échelle nationale », croit la députée conservatrice responsable du dossier de l’immigration, Michelle Rempel.
Disant ne pas vouloir « minimiser » le phénomène, Mme Rempel soutient que des analyses plus sérieuses sont nécessaires pour connaître l’ampleur et les causes du problème.
Le tourisme obstétrique au Canada a fait les manchettes au cours des derniers mois après que les militants conservateurs aient voté en faveur, dans une certaine controverse, d’une motion non contraignante visant à abolir le droit du sol.
Un ex-haut fonctionnaire chez Immigration Canada croit que cette solution serait la plus efficace pour mettre fin au tourisme obstétrique. Or, il juge cette mesure trop radicale pour s’attaquer à un problème somme toute secondaire.
Un avis que partagent Mme Rempel, de nombreux experts ainsi que le gouvernement Trudeau.
Les troupes conservatrices ont d’ailleurs déjà tenté d’abolir la citoyenneté à la naissance au Canada. La démarche a été abandonnée puisque la mesure s’avérait trop complexe et coûteuse (entre 20 et 30 millions $).
Il n’en demeure pas moins que d’autres pays, dont la Grande-Bretagne, ont abandonné cette pratique, exigeant qu’un des deux parents réside dans le pays.
Le président Donald Trump a lui aussi promis de resserrer les règles. Mais ce droit est protégé par la constitution américaine, ce qui le rend presque impossible à abolir.
Qu’est-ce que le droit du sol ?
Au Canada, le droit du sol est protégé par une loi datant de 1947. Avant, les Canadiens étaient considérés comme des sujets britanniques.
Le droit du sol a été adopté dans la foulée de la Deuxième Guerre mondiale, durant laquelle beaucoup de Canadiens ont quitté le pays pour aller travailler aux États-Unis.
Le gouvernement canadien voulait donc s’assurer que les personnes qui revenaient au pays après la guerre soient considérées comme Canadiennes, puisque nées sur le territoire, explique l’avocat Hugues Langlais.
Source: SociétéS’attaquer aux consultants «sans scrupules» d’abord2019-01-20 – ArticleIl y a quelques semaines à peine, il a publié une vidéo sur sa très populaire chaîne YouTube, dans laquelle il invite les familles qui envisagent de s’exiler pour accoucher d’agir avant qu’il ne soit trop tard. | 2019-04-26T14:06:20Z | https://multiculturalmeanderings.com/category/citizenship/birthright-citizenship/ |
Following a team of international scientists, this film exclusively documents an archeological sensation: the exploration of royal tombs beneath the ancient Mexican city of Teotihuacán. Despite many decades of research, not much is known about the long-lost Teotihuacán society. But when archeologists enter the newly discovered burial chambers, they find the clues that may finally tell us who these mysterious people were.
The film incorrectly states the city of Tikal is in Mexico when it is in Guatemala. Secrets of the Dead strives to get the facts correct and we regret the error.
PRODUCED BY STORY HOUSE PRODUCTIONS INC. AND THIRTEEN PRODUCTIONS LLC FOR WNET IN ASSOCIATION WITH ZDF, ARTE AND ZDF ENTERPRISES GMBH.
© 2016 ZDF ENTERPRISES GMBH AND THIRTEEN PRODUCTIONS LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Teotihuacan: A mythical ghost town dating back 2,000 years.
Little is known about the people who built this ancient city in the heart of what is today modern Mexico.
In a hundred years of archaeological research in Teotihuacan, we still haven’t found a ruler’s grave.
Scientists trying to unlock the secrets of Teotihuacan have discovered a hidden tunnel leading right to the center of the city.
Who built this vast metropolis? And why did these powerful people seemingly vanish without a trace?
The answers lie deep underground.
Anything found beneath it must have been of upmost importance and sacredness.
A spectacular journey into a mysterious world built beneath the first Mega City in the Americas, where scientists will find answers that explain the origins of an entire civilization.
It was the biggest adventure of my life.
The Aztecs reign over Mesoamerica as the last great culture before the Spanish conquest.
As they venture south, a group of warriors makes a stunning discovery.
Giant pyramids, the remains of an enormous ancient city – completely abandoned – a ghost town.
The Aztecs are certain: Only the gods could have built this place. They call it "Teotihuacan," the City of the Gods.
Nearly 700 years later, the Aztecs' question remains unanswered: Who built this magnificent city?
One man believes he has found the answer: Mexican archaeologist Sergio Gomez Chavez.
I have been working for 34 years in Teotihuacan and am about to uncover the mystery of the City of the Gods.
The city is more than two thousand years old. The Pyramid of the Moon lies at the northern end of the main avenue, the Street of the Dead.
Towering nearby is the Pyramid of the Sun, the third-largest pyramid in the world. Their builders left no written records, only the ruins of their civilization.
It's easy to imagine that the Aztecs themselves believed that this city was created by the gods.
October 2003. Gomez was a junior archaeologist.
His job: mapping the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent, the smallest of the three pyramids in Teotihuacan.
He was just walking toward the pyramid from his quarters to start the day’s work.
Dr. Sergio Gómez Chávez It had rained a lot those days, it was a very cold October 1st. Suddenly some colleagues walked down here to tell me that the rain had carved a crack in front of the Temple of the Feathered Serpent.
Gómez remembers how he hurried down to the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent.
After some digging, he discovers a shaft that looks like a bottomless well.
When I went down the tunnel I felt fear rise up in me. It was like losing control.
I still don’t understand how I found my courage to go down there, with only a rope tied to my waist and no clue of what was coming.
My heart was beating hard. I wanted to get out of there.
But then there was the tunnel. I could see on one side that there was an opening.
Every archaeologist dreams of a moment like this. Your work is driven by uncertain situations.
Gómez crawls into the crevice. He can barely see two feet ahead.
As I moved forward I touched the walls. They were very regular. And very quickly from the way they felt, I understood: these were not natural walls - they were constructed by human hands. They were part of an ancient structure.
In situ: We can’t go further.
and brings in a 3D laser scanner.
Hundreds of thousands of lasers bounce off the tunnel walls back to this device, creating a map of what's ahead.
The 3D image shows the tunnel continuing in a straight path, directly to the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent which stands at the very center of the city.
The pyramid represents the heart of Teotihuacan, its central landmark.
A tunnel leading directly underneath the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent must have some significance.
So I came to the conclusion that the tunnel had been sealed to bury something or someone at the end of it – directly under the pyramid. I thought it could be a ruler or a king.
David Carballo, professor of Archeology at Boston University, agrees with Gomez’s conclusion.
He has been working at Teotihuacan for 17 years, concentrating on the city's living quarters.
This is an example of an apartment compound. It’s where people would have lived. And it gives an idea of domestic architecture and residential space. Right here we are in the central courtyard, so rooms tend to be organized around the courtyard.
On the walls, Carballo finds the remains of murals depicting gods and priests – and scenes of creation and paradise.
They are the only record the people of Teotihaucan left, aside from the buildings themselves.
Burying the dead in tombs beneath their residences was a common ritual in Teotihuacan.
The skeletons themselves reveal even more about the origins of the people who inhabited this mysterious city.
At the lab, Carballo and his colleague, biological anthropologist Rebecca Storey, examine several bones.
This is an example of a burial found underneath an apartment compound in the Tlajinga district.
It’s a male skeleton. From the artifacts found with the remains, the scientists theorize that he may have been a leader of a neighborhood on the outskirts of the city.
But there's still more to learn from these bones.
He died in Teotihuacan. But one of the interesting questions we have is where did he live? Was he a Teotihuacano all his life?
And as it turns out as one of the most exciting things that's come up in skeletal analysis has been the ability to test where people lived as children and as teenagers.
And the secret is the teeth.
The teeth form from a time that you are a very small child up until you are an adolescent. And as it turns out once the enamel has formed it is permanent, nothing changes.
The drinking water that you take up as a child and then gets incorporated into your enamel has different isotopic signatures depending on where you were geographically and climate wise.
And what you do is, you test the enamel of the teeth and you test the bone and you see if they are the same.
His teeth were tested and turned out to have a signature very different from Teotihuacan.
Isotope tests conducted on dozens of other remains all yield the same results.
With this information, Carballo and Storey conclude that tens of thousands of Teotihuacan's ordinary citizens came from other parts of Mesoamerica.
What that tells you is that they are migrants.
Carballo now understands people came to Teotihuacan because of catastrophe elsewhere.
The eruption of Popocatepetl volcano in the mid late first century was what volcanologist would describe as A V.E.I. 6 eruption. And for some perspective a historical eruption of that magnitude went off in Indonesia and could be heard in Australia.
A catastrophe of epic proportions.
After the volcanic eruption, they sky was darkened for extended periods.
The soothing and the blackening of the sky because of the volcanic ash would have affected sunlight and agriculture.
This would have seemed like an apocalyptic scenario to people living around the volcano.
The magnitude of this eruption, and its human toll, were devastating. People could have believed the gods had turned against them.
Settlements were destroyed, livestock died out.
The very air and soil became toxic from volcanic fallout.
The people were forced to move north as fast as they could.
They found refuge in a valley and settled there.
When they came to Teotihuacan they were leaving a place that was probably burnt and seemed like a hell and they were coming to this paradise.
It was also nicely removed from seeing the volcano Popocatepetl, which couldn't be seen from the vantage of Teotihuacan.
For the refugees, this safe location- 60 miles from the volcano- must have offered a fresh start.
The mild climate and fertile ground made it perfect for agriculture.
Here, they will ultimately build a city unparalleled in the Americas.
The refugees arriving from the areas of eruptions would have felt that they are getting a second chance at Teotihuacan. That here they had the opportunity to build a new order and leave behind the one that was destroyed.
Back in the tunnel, Sergio’s team has dug their way more than 100 feet closer to the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent.
They have removed more than 400 tons of soil and debris. ...Backbreaking work.
The work we do here every day in the tunnel comes with many dangers. The tunnel also poses a risk to our health. We noticed that there is a gas flowing inside the tunnel. This gas, radon, can, according to studies, cause lung damage.
But as difficult and dangerous as these conditions may be, they also represent an upside for the scientists.
The humidity can have the effect of preserving things; these conditions are actually really beneficial for us.
As they excavate the tunnel, they find hundreds of artifacts: mallets, chisels, hammers--wooden tools preserved under these special conditions.
They are incredibly special and unique, because more than one of these objects has never been found in the history of Teotihuacán before. This is very important for us, because these objects will allow us to backdate and learn from what time and what context they originate.
Analysis shows the tools were made around 150 AD, at exactly the time when the main structures above ground were also built.
Wooden tools like this where used with stone hammers to dig the tunnel. The traces are still there. We found holes like this all over the tunnel.
The rock in the Teotihuacan Valley is volcanic. It is extremely difficult to excavate.
For the first time, Gómez appreciates how hard it really must have been for the builders of this mysterious tunnel.
You have to remember that back then they didn’t have metal tools. For this reason, wood or processed bone was used in the construction of the tunnel.
A handprint left by one of the ancient workers, preserved for almost two millennia.
For a moment, Sergio can touch the past.
As an archaeologist this is incredible, because it’s as if I’m touching the hand of the person who worked in this exact spot 2000 years ago.
And it’s more than just the tunnel... these people built this entire city with their bare hands.
You have to imagine, that these are people without pack animals, without the wheel and this construction is occurring on the backs of humans, who were dumping fill of rocks and rubble to erect some of the largest monuments of the ancient world.
Even more impressive, they did it in a very short amount of time.
…More than a thousand years before the wheel was introduced in the Americas.
Pigment traces on the buildings reveal something else astonishing.
Teotihuacan was a painted city, it was full with spectacular murals covered in white stucco and pigments that came from different parts of Mexico.
The city must have been magnificent. Colors adorned the major buildings.
A far cry from its beginnings as a squalid refugee camp.
In the second century AD, Teotihuacan was the largest and most important metropolis of Mesoamerica.
To David Carballo and Sergio Gomez, it is clear the ancient inhabitants built the city in honor of their gods... and one in particular: The Feathered Serpent, Quetzalcoatl!
There are earlier appearances of the God within central Mexico and other parts of Mesoamerica, but it's Teotihuacan, where it first really comes together as a clear cult.
Quetzalcoatl, as the Aztecs will call him hundreds of years later, is the god of creation, the harbinger of life itself.
With his feathered collar and rattlesnake tail, he is half bird, half snake.
The ancient Teotihuacanos installed an estimated 260 of these stone heads on the pyramid in honor of the Feathered Serpent.
Clearly the Feathered Serpent was the most important god in Teotihuacan.
But for the inhabitants, the god of creation was also a god that could take life.
Over the years, scientists have found a number of hidden chambers inside the Pyramid of the Moon. .
The remains of sacrificial animals were discovered inside the chambers. The builders must have buried the animals alive and constructed the pyramid around them.
There are predators, there are raptor birds or occasionally there be animals associated with the souls of dead warriors.
In many cases it’s clear that these animals went in alive. So for instance, some of them have evidence of having been in cages. The remains of the wooden beams of the cage, they were preserved.
But the builders did not stop at animal sacrifices.
Humans were also part of the sacrificial offerings in major pyramids.
A lot of the sacrificial remains have their arms tied behind their backs, and this suggests they didn't go in willingly.
Whether they went in alive is another issue, they might have been clubbed or drugged before they went in. In other cases there might have been examples from the moon pyramid of having been buried alive.
The sacrificial offerings at the temples were acts of consecration. So they were making space sacred and making a new construction phase of a pyramid or temple sacred. And that required the giving of life.
Although not all remains show signs of trauma, the ancient human sacrifices prove that this was a culture willing to commit murder for the greater spiritual good.
Rebecca Storey examines one of the skulls found in the Moon Pyramid. It belonged to a young man. She explains how the ritual was performed.
He was decapitated, how do I know that? He's got one of the cervical vertebrae that is right under the head. Those are usually found with decapitated individuals.
The head was detached from the body just below the first vertebra.
The bones tell her even more about this brutal ritual.
This individual was probably killed another way before the head was taken.
These injuries on three parts of the skull are preserved. These cuts actually aren’t the cause of death.
They would cut somebody back here, and then here the mandible has cut marks on it, too. So it means they were cutting here.
But she doesn't believe beheading was the cause of death.
They probably sacrificed him through the heart. Because it/he had lots of blood and certainly this was a very common way to sacrifice people.
There are pictures in Teotihuacan of hearts on an altar, so it makes sense, that maybe his heart was taken.
That meant he would have been dead by the time they were trying to take his skull.
About 40 victims have been found in the different layers of the Moon Pyramid.
Even more bodies have been found at the Pyramid of the Feather Serpent, where Gomez's tunnel seems to be leading: 200 ceremonial victims in symmetrically-arranged, mass burial sites.
From a modern perspective human sacrifice can seem especially cruel, but we have to imagine a religious system in which there was a strong idea of covenants, where the Gods had given and sacrifice and they needed to be fed and time itself needed to continue going through sacrifice.
Back in the tunnel, where the mass graves were found, Gomez's team is slowly making progress.
They have found what appears to be a deeper pit more than 80 yards from the tunnel entrance.
..and immediately call Gomez over to have a look.
The pit contains precious jade artifacts.
We found a number of chains and extremely valuable objects. We know they must have been of immense value to the Teotihuacanos, because they were brought here from far away.
This type of jade only exists in Guatemala… 600 miles from Teotihuacan.
Whoever owned these objects must have been of high-status, because they were able to import them.
Assuming only people of high status would own valuable objects like these, they must have belonged to an important person.
And the next discovery makes clear how important they must have been.
A blade made of obsidian.
For Teotihuacan, obsidian played a very important role.
The rare stone blade was sometimes used as a tool, but most certainly in the ritual killings.
This knife that we found is an exceptional find. It’s incredibly well-made and shows no signs that it was ever even used. It was put here deliberately as part of a very important sacrifice.
The archaeologists now believe this sacrificial blade was buried here with the only type of person who would wield it: A priest.
David Carballo sets out to visit the source of the precious green obsidian. He is heading to El Chico National Park about 30 miles north of the ancient ghost town.
Here, he meets Alejandro Pastrana, one of the world’s leading experts on obsidian. Pastrana found the ancient obsidian mine of Teotihuacan. This is where the sacrificial blades came from.
It's the only place in the world where green obsidian of this quality can be found.
Here we have obsidian fragments. They only emerge when lava solidifies rapidly with a more than 10 percent share of water.
Let’s chip off a shard to test the quality.
You can see how green this one is, it’s extremely sharp when it first detached.
It’s the sharpest material in nature. This edge, if you look under high magnification, it’s completely smooth unlike surgical steel you can see that it’s rough compared to obsidian.
Sharp like a scalpel, obsidian was known as the metal of the Americas.
Scientists have found this valuable green obsidian all over Mesoamerica: as far north as Arizona and all the way to Guatemala and Belize in the south.
Teotihuacan controlled the most desired material of the Americas. It made the city an economic powerhouse.
Meanwhile, the team continues to excavate. Beyond the pit, 100 yards further into the tunnel, they make yet another revealing discovery. A stash of gigantic seashells.
These shells were most likely used as horns during the ritual killings... perhaps calling the people of Teotihuacan to watch the holy executions.
There's hundreds of large shells that were placed in the tunnel, also as an offering. We can tell that most of them come from the Caribbean. They were imported to Teotihuacán and then also just stored inside the tunnel.
Some shells are painted with images of holy animals like crocodiles.
They were valuable and only priests would have been able to afford them.
As the archaeologists wonder about the shells, they continue to find more artifacts.
The quality and sheer mass of their findings is an archaeological sensation.
We found over 40,000 objects made with green stone and about 4,000 of these objects are Jade. All of this Jade comes from the area around the river Motagua in Guatemala.
We see Teotihuacan expanding throughout central Mexico and into more distant places.
In the third century the focus of building at Teotihuacan really changes. It goes from these large pyramids and monuments to apartment compounds, which would have housed the population of this large city.
It appears, at the height of its power, the leaders of Teotihuacan initiated a huge housing program.
Even the apartments for ordinary citizens had remarkable amenities.
They were built of volcanic rock, featured an interior kitchen, and had separate bedrooms.
The apartments even had a functioning drainage system.
At that time it’s one of the largest cities In the ancient world. Teotihuacan had a population of over a hundred thousand people. For comparison London didn't reach that population until the sixteenth century.
And the scientists have noticed something striking.
There is no fortifications around it, it sits on a valley's floor, it is completely exposed and there is also no evidence for any sort of external threat ever having attacked the city. Further there is no written records and within the art of the city we don't see any clear evidence of an external warfare.
Six hundred miles away, in what is today southern Mexico, lies the city of Tikal, once ruled over by the formidable Maya.
This stone stele is where the Mayans kept an account of their history.
Nikolai Grube, from the University of Bonn in Germany, is one of only a few people in the world who can decode the Mayan writings.
And he has found something that may also shed light on the mystery of Teotihuacan.
On the basis of the very detailed Maya calendar, we can pinpoint what happened in what time of history.
The most fascinating part of this long inscription is located here, in the middle of the stele.
It begins with a date. A date that corresponds to the 15th of January 378. And according to the hieroglyphic text, this was when foreigners came from the west. And most interestingly at the same day the king of Tikal entered the water. To enter the water is an expression for death. So he died. This is certainly not an accident.
The illustration seems to depict an invasion. A foreign army from the west invading Tikal.
They killed the Mayan king – and installed a ruler of their own.
On this side of the monument we see the newly inaugurated king, Yax Nuun Ahiin, who exceeded to power in 379 AD. He is dressed in a totally different way, not in a Maya style. In his hand he carries a spear-thrower.
And it’s this particular weapon that helps identify the invaders... and their king.
The atlatl or spear thrower would be used to project darts or thrown spears at a much higher velocity than you could with your arm. So it represents a superior projectile technology for the time.
At this point of time the only civilization in Mesoamerica which used a spear thrower was Teotihuacan.
Therefore we think that Yax Nuun Ahiin came from Teotihuacán, that he is a Teotihuacano king, who was placed in power by the arriving foreigners. And he became the founder of a new Teotihuacan related dynasty in the Maya low lands.
Yax Nuun Ahiin means 'Green Crocodile' in the Mayan language. That the Maya wrote his name down suggests he was a powerful ruler.
The foreigners left a deep impact on classic Maya culture. They changed Maya architecture. They brought a new form of dress, new ceramics forms of mural painting. In general the art all of the sudden changed, but it is not only the art.
The Maya also adopted one of their conquerer's gods: The Feathered Serpent – the Teotihuacan god of creation.
The Maya called it Kukulkan. These stairs at the famous Mayan Temples at Chichen Itza, built more than 600 years after the invasion, are identical to the symbols of The Feathered Serpent at Teotihuacan.
Maya kings tried to draw prestige by associating themselves with Teotihuacan and it symbols. And this would be similar to the Kaisers of Germany looking to Rome as an earlier model.
I would speak of a shift in Mesoamerican history. The conquest of Tikal probably is part of an expansion polity which extended the limits of Teotihuacan power as far north as the modern border between Mexico and the United States and to the South to Honduras.
What if the “Green Crocodile”, the Teotihuacan leader who subjugated the Maya, was an expansive ruler like Alexander the Great or Napoleon?
Could Sergio Gomez and his team have discovered his grave at the end of the tunnel?
Now, the tunnel grows very narrow. Gomez sends in a robot to explore what lies ahead.
Dr. Sergio Gómez Chávez We've discovered that the tunnel descends at least three meters from the level from which we started. We don’t know what it is because we suddenly had a wall in front of us, which led down.
At first, we thought that the geo radar would show us a room at the end of the tunnel. But when the robot got in there, we found out that there was actually not just one room, but three large areas. So we know now that three main chambers are located at the end of the tunnel.
Three chambers – each more than 100 square feet wide – form a cross as if to mark something directly underneath the pyramid.
The location of these three chambers lines up exactly with the vertical axis of the Temple of the Feathered Serpent. We don’t understand how they managed to calculate the exact point where the axis lines up with the pyramid located several meters above.
The chambers at the end of the tunnel lie under the geographical center of Teotihuacan… and Gomez has a theory about why.
This is where the underworld and the heavens meet.
The workers start excavating the first chamber and, after removing only a foot of debris, make yet another stunning discovery.
A statue – in perfect condition.
Because we recognize the clothing, we see that the statue clearly represents a woman. This sculpture symbolizes a very important element, and it’s very likely that it was connected with fertility.
And then they find another statue.
Exactly here next to the female sculpture we have also found a smaller male sculpture. And on every side of the two there’s another woman, and they all seem to point back to middle. This center is the same point that connects exactly with the imaginary path between the underworld and heaven. So I believe that these sculptures have been placed here to act as watchmen and guard this particular place.
Gómez thinks that the four guardians must have been protecting something important in the tunnel.
He is intrigued that their placement seems to align their gazes in such a way that their visual axis intersects right in the very center of the room.
Continuing their excavation, the archaeologists find more artifacts.
Gomez is certain – they must have been some kind of offering. But the team reaches the bottom before finding anything else.
We imagined that we’d find a person’s remains. We thought it would be the burial place of some ruler. We were surprised, when we found – nothing!
Gomez and his team must face the disappointment.
And yet, he cannot believe this intricately designed space under the center of the city holds no meaning.
He and David Carballo return to the chamber one more time to see if they might have missed something.
When they inspect the walls, they notice what looks like a waterline.
I think that the Teotihuacanos excavated this last stretch of the tunnel deeper to make sure that it was permanently filled with water.
But why would the ancient builders dig below the ground water level...on purpose... and cause the lower chamber to fill with water just as a well might?
The ground water would have seeped into this lower chamber, creating an artificial, underground lake.
Why would they have put a lake directly under the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent, the god of creation?
Gómez remembers the mural found in the apartments and an idea begins to form.
The mural shows an image of a mountain. Emerging from its inside is the water from the underworld. The underworld is a place full of riches, a place of abundance and fertility.
This painting reminds Gomez of what he has seen in the tunnel.
Could he be looking at a representation of how the Teotihuacanos believed the world was created?
The Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent could represent the Holy Mountain. And the tunnel could stand for the underworld from which the water flows up.
The idea may not be so farfetched. In many other ancient cultures, pyramids were built to represent mountains.
If Gómez is right, the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent represents the holy mountain.
And the underground lake symbolizes the origin of life, springing eternally from underneath the pyramid.
Gomez has found traces of a metallic substance applied to the tunnel walls. It’s pyrite, the mineral also known as fool’s gold.
It is impressive. This looks like virtually the entire tunnel, the walls and ceiling were covered with this metallic mineral powder.
Imagine in the light of torches the tunnel covered with all this metallic mineral powder. It really must have been incredible.
It must have looked like a starlit night!
It is Indeed a Portayal of their Cosmos.
Now we can begin to understand the meaning and significance.
For Gómez - the pieces of the puzzle finally come together.
The artifacts were offerings not only to the gods of creation, but to the very source of life itself.
All in this magnificent model located 60 feet underground.
Gomez imagines this is where the priests of Teotihuacan made their offerings.
This chamber represents their idea of how life began.
This holy lake, with its illuminated sky, was used as a stage for their dramatic rituals.
The Teotihuacanos created the underworld in these tunnels and the chamber under the pyramid. But here, instead of seeing the underworld as a place of death, it's actually seen as a place of creation.
The Teotihuacanos erected their pyramids in honor of the gods and they built an underground replica of their cosmos to worship them.
But then, the gods turned against the people once again.
And once again, a volcano seems to control the fate of Teotihuacan.
In 536 AD, the Illopango, a super volcano, erupts in El Salvador.
Another volcanic winter. Even though it was hundreds of miles away, the smoke and ash would have hidden the sun for days.
With the harvests ruined, the city could no longer feed its people.
What we see archaeologically next to the major temples and buildings of the street of the dead, is around the mid to late 6th century there was a massive scale burning in there.
There’s traces that can be registered both on the architecture itself and on the materials such as the actual roof beams that fell down to the floor of the structure.
To Carballo, it doesn’t look like an attack from the outside. There is no damage in the outer districts.
There was this internal and very targeting burning of the city's center; over a hundred buildings around the Street of the Dead were burnt.
The end result could have been something like revolt.
Carballo thinks the people might have rejected the gods who failed them yet again.
And they set the sacred heart of their city ablaze. Soon after, the city was deserted.
The state had collapsed; the city was no longer an impressive place. And then it moved into the realm of myth.
The economic and political powerhouse no longer existed. But its legacy has lived on for centuries.
Even after the collapse of Teotihuacán, the Maya continued to venerate Teotihuacan gods and their religion.
So did the Aztecs until the time of the Spanish conquest, hundreds of years after the Mayans were gone.
Teotihuacan was a high point in the history of Mesoamerica.
And its mysteries have remained unsolved... until now.
Gomez and his colleagues seem to have uncovered the very source of the city’s existence.
That's what makes this discovery so special, by understanding their vision of the cosmos and their religion; we now have a much better understanding of these ancient Mesoamerican people.
How does Teotihuacán Compare to Other Architectural Feats? | 2019-04-22T07:33:41Z | http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/teotihuacans-lost-kings-full-episode/3052/ |
Each film-coated tablet contains 10mg of atorvastatin as atorvastatin calcium trihydrate.
10mg: White, oval, biconvex, 4.9 x 9.1 mm film-coated tablets marked with “10” on one side and “A” on the other.
Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets is indicated as an adjunct to diet for reduction of elevated total cholesterol (total-C), LDL-cholesterol (LDL-C), apolipoprotein B, and triglycerides in adults adolescents and children aged 10 years or older with primary hypercholesterolaemia including familial hypercholesterolaemia (heterozygous variant) or combined (mixed) hyperlipidaemia (Corresponding to Types IIa and IIb of the Fredrickson classification) when response to diet and other nonpharmacological measures is inadequate.
Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets is also indicated to reduce total-C and LDL-C in adults with homozygous familial hypercholesterolaemia as an adjunct to other lipid-lowering treatments (e.g. LDL apheresis) or if such treatments are unavailable.
Prevention of cardiovascular events in adults estimated to have a high risk for a first cardiovascular event (see section 5.1), as an adjunct to correction of other risk factors.
The patient should be placed on a standard cholesterol-lowering diet before receiving Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets and should continue on this diet during treatment with Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets.
The usual starting dose is 10mg once a day. Adjustment of dose should be made at intervals of 4 weeks or more. The maximum dose is 80 mg once a day.
The majority of patients are controlled with Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets once a day. A therapeutic response is evident within 2 weeks, and the maximum therapeutic response is usually achieved within 4 weeks. The response is maintained during chronic therapy.
Patients should be started with Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets daily. Doses should be individualised and adjusted every 4 weeks to 40 mg daily. Thereafter, either the dose may be increased to a maximum of 80 mg daily or a bile acid sequestrant may be combined with 40 mg atorvastatin once daily.
The dose of atorvastatin in patients with homozygous familial hypercholesterolaemia is 10 to 80 mg daily (see section 5.1). Atorvastatin should be used as an adjunct to other lipid-lowering treatments (e.g. LDL apheresis) in these patients or if such treatments are unavailable.
In the primary prevention trials the dose was 10mg/day. Higher doses may be necessary in order to attain (LDL-) cholesterol levels according to current guidelines.
Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets should be used with caution in patients with hepatic impairment (see sections 4.4 and 5.2). Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets is contraindicated in patients with active liver disease (see section 4.3).
For patients with Heterozygous Familial Hypercholesterolaemia aged 10 years and above, the recommended starting dose of atorvastatin is 10mg per day (see section 5.1). The dose may be increased to 80 mg daily, according to the response and tolerability. Doses should be individualised according to the recommended goal of therapy. Adjustments should be made at intervals of 4 weeks or more. The dose titration to 80 mg daily is supported by study data in adults and by limited clinical data from studies in children with Heterozygous Familial Hypercholesterolaemia (see sections 4.8 and 5.1).
There is limited safety and efficacy data available in children with Heterozygous Familial Hypercholesterolaemia between 6 to 10 years of age derived from open-label studies. Atorvastatin is not indicated in the treatment of patients below the age of 10 years. Currently available data are described in sections 4.8, 5.1 and 5.2 but no recommendation on a posology can be made.
Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets is for oral administration. Each daily dose of atorvastatin is given all at once and may be given at any time of day with or without food.
Liver function tests should be performed before the initiation of treatment and periodically thereafter. Patients who develop any signs or symptoms suggestive of liver injury should have liver function tests performed. Patients who develop increased transaminase levels should be monitored until the abnormality(ies) resolve. Should an increase in transaminases of greater than 3 times the upper limit of normal (ULN) persist, reduction of dose or withdrawal of Atorvastatin 40mg Film coated Tablets is recommended (see section 4.8).
Atorvastatin 40mg Film coated Tablets should be used with caution in patients who consume substantial quantities of alcohol and/or have a history of liver disease.
In a post-hoc analysis of stroke subtypes in patients without coronary heart disease (CHD) who had a recent stroke or transient ischemic attack (TIA) there was a higher incidence of haemorrhagic stroke in patients initiated on atorvastatin 80 mg compared to placebo. The increased risk was particularly noted in patients with prior haemorrhagic stroke or lacunar infarct at study entry. For patients with prior haemorrhagic stroke or lacunar infarct, the balance of risks and benefits of atorvastatin 80 mg is uncertain, and the potential risk of haemorrhagic stroke should be carefully considered before initiating treatment (see section 5.1).
There have been very rare reports of an immune-mediated necrotizing myopathy (IMNM) during or after treatment with some statins. IMNM is clinically characterized by persistent proximal muscle weakness and elevated serum creatine kinase, which persist despite discontinuation of statin treatment.
Risk of rhabdomyolysis is increased when atorvastatin is administered concomitantly with certain medicinal products that may increase the plasma concentration of atorvastatin such as potent inhibitors of CYP3A4 or transport proteins (e.g. ciclosporine, telithromycin, clarithromycin, delavirdine, stiripentol, ketoconazole, voriconazole, itraconazole, posaconazole and HIV protease inhibitors including ritonavir, lopinavir, atazanavir, indinavir, darunavir, tipranavir/ritonavir, etc). The risk of myopathy may also be increased with the concomitant use of gemfibrozil and other fibric acid derivates, antivirals for the treatment of hepatitis C (HCV) (boceprevir, telaprevir, elbasvir/grazoprevir), erythromycin, niacin or ezetimibe. If possible, alternative (non-interacting) therapies should be considered instead of these medicinal products.
Atorvastatin must not be co-administered with systemic formulations of fusidic acid or within 7 days of stopping fusidic acid treatment. In patients where the use of systemic fusidic acid is considered essential, statin treatment should be discontinued throughout the duration of fusidic acid treatment. There have been reports of rhabdomyolysis (including some fatalities) in patients receiving fusidic acid and statins in combination (see section 4.5). The patient should be advised to seek medical advice immediately if they experience any symptoms of muscle weakness, pain or tenderness.Statin therapy may be re-introduced seven days after the last dose of fusidic acid. In exceptional circumstances, where prolonged systemic fusidic acid is needed, e.g., for the treatment of severe infections, the need for co-administration of atorvastatin and fusidic acid should only be considered on a case by case basis and under close medical supervision.
and deterioration in general health (fatigue, weight loss and fever). If it is suspected a patient has developed interstitial lung disease, statin therapy should be discontinued.
Atorvastatin is metabolised by cytochrome P450 3A4 (CYP3A4) and is a substrate of the hepatic transporters, organic anion-transporting polypeptide 1B1 (OATP1B1) and 1B3 (OATP1B3) transporter. Metabolites of atorvastatin are substrates of OATP1B1. Atorvastatin is also identified as a substrate of the multi-drug resistance protein 1 (MDR1) and breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP), which may limit the intestinal absorption and biliary clearance of atorvastatin (see section 5.2). Concomitant administration of medicinal products that are inhibitors of CYP3A4 or transport proteins may lead to increased plasma concentrations of atorvastatin and an increased risk of myopathy. The risk might also be increased at concomitant administration of atorvastatin with other medicinal products that have a potential to induce myopathy, such as fibric acid derivates and ezetimibe (see section 4.3 and 4.4).
Potent CYP3A4 inhibitors have been shown to lead to markedly increased concentrations of atorvastatin (see Table 1 and specific information below). Co-administration of potent CYP3A4 inhibitors (e.g. ciclosporin, telithromycin, clarithromycin, delavirdine, stiripentol, ketoconazole, voriconazole, itraconazole, posaconazole, some antivirals used in the treatement of HCV (e.g. elbasvir/grazoprevir) and HIV protease inhibitors including ritonavir, lopinavir, atazanavir, indinavir, darunavir, etc.) should be avoided if possible. In cases where co-administration of these medicinal products with atorvastatin cannot be avoided lower starting and maximum doses of atorvastatin should be considered and appropriate clinical monitoring of the patient is recommended (see Table 1).
Inhibitors of transport proteins (e.g. ciclosporin) can increase the systemic exposure of atorvastatin (see Table 1). The effect of inhibition of hepatic uptake transporters on atorvastatin concentrations in hepatocytes is unknown. If concomitant administration cannot be avoided, a dose reduction and clinical monitoring for efficacy is recommended (see Table 1).
If treatment with systemic fusidic acid is necessary, atorvastatin treatment should be discontinued throughout the duration of the fusidic acid treatment. Also see section 4.4.
Lower starting dose and clinical monitoring of these patients is recommended. The dose of atorvastatin should not exceed a daily dose of 20 mg during co-administration with boceprevir.
* Contains one or more components that inhibit CYP3A4 and can increase plasma concentrations of medicinal products metabolized by CYP3A4. Intake of one 240 ml glass of grapefruit juice also resulted in a decreased AUC of 20.4% for the active orthohydroxy metabolite. Large quantities of grapefruit juice (over 1.2 l daily for 5 days) increased AUC of atorvastatin 2.5 fold and AUC of active (atorvastatin and metabolites) HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors 1.3 fold.
** Ratio based on single sample taken 8-16 h post dose.
OD = once daily; SD = single dose; BID = twice daily.
Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets is contraindicated during pregnancy (see section 4.3). Safety in pregnant women has not been established. No controlled clinical trials with atorvastatin have been conducted in pregnant women. Rare reports of congenital anomalies following intrauterine exposure to HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors have been received. Animal studies have shown toxicity to reproduction (see section 5.3).
It is not known whether atorvastatin or its metabolites are excreted in human milk. In rats, plasma concentrations of atorvastatin and its active metabolites are similar to those in milk (see section 5.3). Because of the potential for serious adverse reactions, women taking Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets should not breast-feed their infants (see section 4.3). Atorvastatin is contraindicated during breastfeeding (see section 4.3).
Atorvastatin 10mg Film coated Tablets has negligible influence on the ability to drive and use machines.
Estimated frequencies of reactions are ranked according to the following convention: common (≥ 1/100, < 1/10); uncommon (≥ 1/1,000, < 1/100); rare (≥ 1/10,000, < 1/1,000); very rare (≤ 1/10,000), not known (cannot be estimated from the available data).
The clinical safety database includes safety data for 520 paediatric patients who received atorvastatin, among which 7 patients were < 6 years old, 121 patients were in the age range of 6 to 9, and 392 patients were in the age range of 10 to 17.
Atorvastatin is a selective, competitive inhibitor of HMG-CoA reductase, the rate-limiting enzyme responsible for the conversion of 3-hydroxy-3-methyl-glutaryl-coenzyme A to mevalonate, a precursor of sterols, including cholesterol. Triglycerides and cholesterol in the liver are incorporated into very low-density lipoproteins (VLDL) and released into the plasma for delivery to peripheral tissues. Low-density lipoprotein (LDL) is formed from VLDL and is catabolized primarily through the receptor with high affinity to LDL (LDL receptor).
In a multicenter 8 week open-label compassionate-use study with an optional extension phase of variable length, 335 patients were enrolled, 89 of which were identified as homozygous familial hypercholesterolaemia patients. From these 89 patients, the mean percent reduction in LDL-C was approximately 20%. Atorvastatin was administered at doses up to 80 mg/day.
In the Reversing Atherosclerosis with Aggressive Lipid- Lowering Study (REVERSAL), the effect of intensive lipid lowering with atorvastatin 80 mg and standard degree of lipid lowering with pravastatin 40 mg on coronary atherosclerosis was assessed by intravascular ultrasound (IVUS), during angiography, in patients with coronary heart disease. In this randomised, double- blind, multicenter, controlled clinical trial, IVUS was performed at baseline and at 18 months in 502 patients. In the atorvastatin group (n=253), there was no progression of atherosclerosis.
In the atorvastatin group, LDL-C was reduced to a mean of 2.04 mmol/L ± 0.8 (78.9 mg/dl ± 30) from baseline 3.89 mmol/l ± 0.7 (150 mg/dl ± 28) and in the pravastatin group, LDL-C was reduced to a mean of 2.85 mmol/l ± 0.7 (110mg/dl ± 26) from baseline 3.89 mmol/l ± 0.7 (150 mg/dl ± 26) (p<0.0001). Atorvastatin also significantly reduced mean TC by 34.1% (pravastatin: -18.4%, p<0.0001), mean TG levels by 20% (pravastatin: -6.8%, p<0.0009), and mean apolipoprotein B by 39.1% (pravastatin: -22.0%, p<0.0001). Atorvastatin increased mean HDL-C by 2.9% (pravastatin: +5.6%, p=NS). There was a 36.4% mean reduction in CRP in the atorvastatin group compared to a 5.2% reduction in the pravastatin group (p<0.0001).
In the MIRACL study, atorvastatin 80 mg has been evaluated in 3,086 patients (atorvastatin n=1,538; placebo n=1,548) with an acute coronary syndrome (non Q-wave MI or unstable angina). Treatment was initiated during the acute phase after hospital admission and lasted for a period of 16 weeks. Treatment with atorvastatin 80 mg/day increased the time to occurrence of the combined primary endpoint, defined as death from any cause, nonfatal MI, resuscitated cardiac arrest, or angina pectoris with evidence of myocardial ischaemia requiring hospitalization, indicating a risk reduction by 16% (p=0.048). This was mainly due to a 26% reduction in re-hospitalisation for angina pectoris with evidence of myocardial ischaemia (p=0.018). The other secondary endpoints did not reach statistical significance on their own (overall: Placebo: 22.2%, Atorvastatin: 22.4%).
The effect of atorvastatin on fatal and non-fatal coronary heart disease was assessed in a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, the Anglo-Scandinavian Cardiac Outcomes Trial Lipid Lowering Arm (ASCOT-LLA). Patients were hypertensive, 40-79 years of age, with no previous myocardial infarction or treatment for angina, and with TC levels ≤6.5 mmol/l (251 mg/dl). All patients had at least 3 of the pre-defined cardiovascular risk factors: male gender, age ≥55 years, smoking, diabetes, history of CHD in a first-degree relative, TC:HDL-C >6, peripheral vascular disease, left ventricular hypertrophy, prior cerebrovascular event, specific ECG abnormality, proteinuria/albuminuria. Not all included patients were estimated to have a high risk for a first cardiovascular event.
Patients were treated with anti-hypertensive therapy (either amlodipine or atenolol-based regimen) and either atorvastatin 10mg daily (n=5,168) or placebo (n=5,137).
The effect of atorvastatin on fatal and non-fatal cardiovascular disease was also assessed in a randomized, double-blind, multicenter, placebo-controlled trial, the Collaborative Atorvastatin Diabetes Study (CARDS) in patients with type 2 diabetes, 40-75 years of age, without prior history of cardiovascular disease, and with LDL-C ≤4.14 mmol/l (160 mg/dl) and TG ≤6.78 mmol/l (600 mg/dl). All patients had at least 1 of the following risk factors: hypertension, current smoking, retinopathy, microalbuminuria or macroalbuminuria.
Patients were treated with either atorvastatin 10mg daily (n=1,428) or placebo (n=1,410) for a median follow-up of 3.9 years.
In the Stroke Prevention by Aggressive Reduction in Cholesterol Levels (SPARCL) study, the effect of atorvastatin 80 mg daily or placebo on stroke was evaluated in 4731 patients who had a stroke or transient ischemic attack (TIA) within the preceding 6 months and no history of coronary heart disease (CHD). Patients were 60% male, 21-92 years of age (average age 63 years), and had an average baseline LDL of 133 mg/dL (3.4 mmol/L). The mean LDL-C was 73 mg/dL (1.9 mmol/L) during treatment with atorvastatin and 129 mg/dL (3.3 mmol/L) during treatment with placebo. Median follow-up was 4.9 years.
Atorvastatin 80 mg reduced the risk of the primary endpoint of fatal or non-fatal stroke by 15% (HR 0.85; 95% CI, 0.72-1.00; p=0.05 or 0.84; 95% CI, 0.71-0.99; p=0.03 after adjustment for baseline factors) compared to placebo. All cause mortality was 9.1% (216/2365) for atorvastatin versus 8.9% (211/2366) for placebo.
In a post-hoc analysis, atorvastatin 80 mg reduced the incidence of ischemic stroke (218/2365, 9.2% vs. 274/2366, 11.6%, p=0.01) and increased the incidence of haemorrhagic stroke (55/2365, 2.3% vs. 33/2366, 1.4%, p=0.02) compared to placebo.
- The risk of haemorrhagic stroke was increased in patients who entered the study with prior haemorrhagic stroke (7/45 for atorvastatin versus 2/48 for placebo; HR 4.06; 95% CI, 0.84-19.57), and the risk of ischemic stroke was similar between groups (3/45 for atorvastatin versus 2/48 for placebo; HR 1.64; 95% CI, 0.27-9.82).
- The risk of haemorrhagic stroke was increased in patients who entered the study with prior lacunar infarct (20/708 for atorvastatin versus 4/701 for placebo; HR 4.99; 95% CI, 1.71-14.61), but the risk of ischemic stroke was also decreased in these patients (79/708 for atorvastatin versus 102/701 for placebo; HR 0.76; 95% CI, 0.57-1.02). It is possible that the net risk of stroke is increased in patients with prior lacunar infarct who receive atorvastatin 80 mg/day.
Mean values for LDL-C, TC, VLDL-C, and Apo B decreased by Week 2 among all subjects.
For subjects whose dose was doubled, additional decreases were observed as early as 2 weeks, at the first assessment, after dose escalation. The mean percent decreases in lipid parameters were similar for both cohorts, regardless of whether subjects remained at their initial dose or doubled their initial dose. At Week 8, on average, the percent change from baseline in LDL-C and TC was approximately 40% and 30%, respectively, over the range of exposures.
The data were consistent with no drug effect on any of the parameters of growth and development (i.e., height, weight, BMI, Tanner stage, Investigator assessment of Overall Maturation and Development) in paediatric and adolescent subjects with HeFH receiving atorvastatin treatment over the 3 year study. There was no Investigator-assessed drug effect noted in height, weight, BMI by age or by gender by visit.
In a double-blind, placebo controlled study followed by an open-label phase, 187 boys and postmenarchal girls 10-17 years of age (mean age 14.1 years) with heterozygous familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH) or severe hypercholesterolaemia were randomised to atorvastatin (n=140) or placebo (n=47) for 26 weeks and then all received atorvastatin for 26 weeks. The dosage of atorvastatin (once daily) was 10 mg for the first 4 weeks and up-titrated to 20 mg if the LDL-C level was >3.36 mmol/l. Atorvastatin significantly decreased plasma levels of total- C, LDL-C, triglycerides, and apolipoprotein B during the 26 week double-blind phase. The mean achieved LDL-C value was 3.38 mmol/l (range: 1.81-6.26 mmol/l) in the atorvastatin group compared to 5.91 mmol/l (range: 3.93-9.96 mmol/l) in the placebo group during the 26-week double-blind phase.
Mean volume of distribution of atorvastatin is approximately 381 l. Atorvastatin is ≥98% bound to plasma proteins.
Atorvastatin is metabolized by cytochrome P450 3A4 to ortho- and parahydroxylated derivatives and various beta-oxidation products. Apart from other pathways these products are further metabolized via glucuronidation. In vitro, inhibition of HMG-CoA reductase by ortho- and parahydroxylated metabolites is equivalent to that of atorvastatin. Approximately 70% of circulating inhibitory activity for HMG-CoA reductase is attributed to active metabolites.
Plasma concentrations of atorvastatin and its active metabolites are higher in healthy elderly subjects than in young adults while the lipid effects were comparable to those seen in younger patient populations.
In an open label, 8-week study, Tanner Stage 1 (N=15) and Tanner Stage ≥2 (N=24) paediatric patients (ages 6-17 years) with heterozygous familial hypercholesterolaemia and baseline LDL-C ≥4 mmol/L were treated with 5 or 10 mg of chewable or 10 or 20 mg of film-coated atorvastatin tablets once daily, respectively. Body weight was the only significant covariate in atorvastatin population PK model. Apparent oral clearance of atorvastatin in paediatric subjects appeared similar to adults when scaled allometrically by body weight. Consistent decreases in LDL-C and TC were observed over the range of atorvastatin and o-hydroxyatorvastatin exposures.
Renal insufficiency: Renal disease has no influence on the plasma concentrations or lipid effects of atorvastatin and its active metabolites.
Atorvastatin was negative for mutagenic and clastogenic potential in a battery of 4 in vitro tests and 1 in vivo assay. Atorvastatin was not found to be carcinogenic in rats, but high doses in mice (resulting in 6-11 fold the AUC0-24h reached in humans at the highest recommended dose) showed hepatocellular adenomas in males and hepatocellular carcinomas in females. There is evidence from animal experimental studies that HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors may affect the development of embryos or fetuses. In rats, rabbits and dogs atorvastatin had no effect on fertility and was not teratogenic, however, at maternally toxic doses fetal toxicity was observed in rats and rabbits. The development of the rat offspring was delayed and post-natal survival reduced during exposure of the dams to high doses of atorvastatin. In rats, there is evidence of placental transfer. In rats, plasma concentrations of atorvastatin are similar to those in milk. It is not known whether atorvastatin or its metabolites are excreted in human milk.
Tablet containers (HDPE) closed with snap-on cap (LDPE) with a temper evident ring and with a desiccant (silica gel): 2 years. Shelf life after first opening of the tablet container is 100 days.
Tablet containers (HDPE) closed with snap-on cap (LDPE) with a temper evident ring and with a desiccant (silica gel).
Atorvastatin 10 mg film_coated tablets: 10, 20, 28, 30, 50, 90, 98, 100 tablets.
Atorvastatin 10 mg film_coated tablets: 30, 100, 250, 500 tablets. | 2019-04-21T04:57:29Z | https://www.medicines.org.uk/emc/product/4080/smpc |
These terms and conditions govern your use of the Dry Feb Website (defined below) and form part of Our Agreement (defined below) (" Terms and Conditions"). Our Agreement deals with what you must do, what we agree to do, how we deal with each other's "content" and "intellectual property" what you must not do, our liability, your liability, privacy obligations and other matters.
• the Dry Feb program ( Dry Feb ). By "Dry Feb" we mean the service of a website based community where an individual or group can take on the challenge of a month long sponsored abstinence from alcohol and raise funds to help make a difference to the lives of people affected by cancer.
You may provide content (" Content"). By "Content" we mean the content and information you provide to Dry Feb or post on or make available to the Dry Feb Website, including, without limitation, information about you and the actions you take, any photos, video, or text or other forms of content.
(d) the Payment Terms (available here: https://www.dryfeb.ca/payment-terms).
The terms of Our Agreement apply to every page on the Dry Feb Website and the Dry Feb Website is made available to you subject to the terms of Our Agreement. By using the Dry Feb Website you are deemed to have accepted the terms of Our Agreement.
(b) people who make donations ("Donors") through the Dry Feb Website (" Donations"), where offered, place an order for any purchase through the Dry Feb Website (" Purchase Order"), or otherwise access or use the Dry Feb Website (together, we call you " Website Users").
Our Agreement also governs the relationship between Participants and the companies and brands that sponsor Dry Feb (we call them " Partners").
5. If you are not a Participant but you make a donation, are a Donor or (where offered) place a Purchase Order or you are otherwise a Website User, you agree to Our Agreement at the time you access and use the Dry Feb Website (including to make a Donation or place a Purchase Order). You enter into a separate agreement each time this occurs.
8. If you are not a Participant you must read and agree to the terms of Our Agreement before you proceed at any time to access and use the Dry Feb Website (including to make a Donation or place a Purchase Order). By making a Donation or placing a Purchase Order you are deemed to have read, understood and agreed to the terms of Our Agreement.
(d) otherwise access or use Dry Feb or the Dry Feb Website.
11. We reserve the right to amend or change the terms of Our Agreement at any time by posting any changes on the Dry Feb Website. You should regularly check the Dry Feb Website for this purpose.
12. Any new or amended terms will be effective immediately when they are posted, and by continuing to use the Dry Feb Website you agree to be bound by the most current version of the terms of Our Agreement.
13. If you disagree with any of these changes, you must immediately discontinue being a Participant, making any Donation or placing any Purchase Order, or otherwise accessing and using the Dry Feb Website. By continuing to do any of the foregoing you are deemed to have agreed to the new or amended terms of Our Agreement.
14. The Dry Feb Website is made available free of charge.
15. We do not guarantee that the Dry Feb Website, or any content on it, will always be available or uninterrupted. Access to the Dry Feb Website is permitted on a temporary basis and we may suspend, withdraw, discontinue or change all or any part of the Dry Feb Website without notice. Without limiting these Terms and Conditions, we will not be liable to you if, for any reason, the Dry Feb Website is unavailable at any time or for any period.
16. You are responsible for making all arrangements necessary for you to have access to the Dry Feb Website.
20. You must be at least 19 years old to create an account as a Participant. You must not attempt to do this if you are under 19 years old.
21. If you choose to use a workplace email address for your account or to access the Dry Feb Website, you are responsible for ensuring that such use complies with any rules, policies or protocols which apply to the use of the Internet in your workplace.
22. In creating an account you must choose a password that is between six (6) and fifteen (15) characters long. You must keep your password secure and must not reveal your password to anyone else.
23. We have the right to disable any account information or password, whether chosen by you or allocated by us, at any time, if in our reasonable opinion, you have failed to comply with any of terms of Our Agreement.
24. If you allow someone else to use your account, you are liable under Our Agreement for any act or omission by them which may breach Our Agreement.
25. If you know or suspect that someone else has obtained your account information or password without your consent you must notify us promptly at [email protected].
26. Where legally required, we will notify you and any relevant authorities should we be aware of or have a reasonable basis to suspect that the security of your account or any information about you held by us has been compromised or if you may be seriously affected by a breach by another person of Our Agreement with them.
28. You acknowledge and agree that all content and information you share or post on or make available to the Dry Feb Website will be publicly viewable.
29. If you are a Participant, you agree that we may contact you using your account details in relation to your participation with Dry Feb. We will only communicate with you for marketing purposes, news about Dry Feb or news about beneficiaries if you opt-in to such communications.
30. If you make a Donation or (where offered) place a Purchase Order, you agree that we may contact you using your contact details which you provide at the time of making a Donation or placing the Purchase Order in relation to your donation or purchase. We may also contact you in relation to Dry Feb but we will only communicate with you for marketing purposes, news about Dry Feb or news about beneficiaries if you opt-in to such communications.
31. You agree that our main form of communication with you will be by email or through the Dry Feb Website. If you provide us with a telephone number, you agree that we may contact you through that number also.
32. You may opt-in to certain communications from us or third parties in relation to marketing, news about Dry Feb, news about beneficiaries, or other information available from time to time. If you do so, we or third parties may communicate with you in accordance with your opt-in unless you notify us or them otherwise.
33. If you make any Donation or place any Purchase Order you agree to our Payment Terms (available here: https://www.dryfeb.ca/payment-terms) at the time of doing so.
34. You must only make Donations or place a Purchase Order in accordance with Our Agreement (including the Payment Terms).
35. Dry Feb and the Dry Feb Website are designed for participation of people who are resident or living in Canada.
36. We do not represent that content available on or through the Dry Feb Website is appropriate or available in other locations. Accessing and using the Dry Feb Website from countries where the content is or could be illegal is strictly prohibited.
37. If you are a Participant or access or use the Dry Feb Website from a location outside Canada, to the maximum extent permitted under applicable law you do so at your own risk.
38. Whenever you make use of a feature that allows you to upload content to the Dry Feb Website, or to make contact with other users of the Dry Feb Website, you must comply with the acceptable use standards and policies as set out in these Terms and Conditions.
39. We understand the importance to you of the content you post on or make available to the Dry Feb Website (" Your Content "). Under Our Agreement, any content uploaded by you will be considered non-confidential and non-proprietary but you retain ownership rights to Your Content.
(g) comply with any obligation we have under in relation to Dry Feb, the Dry Feb Website and/or Your Content.
41. We also have the right to disclose your identity to any third party who is claiming that any content posted or uploaded by you to our site constitutes a violation of their intellectual property rights, or of their right to privacy.
42. You warrant and represent that you have the authority and ability to grant us the license referred to above and to the fullest extent legally permitted you irrevocably waive any moral rights (or similar rights) you have in Your Content. You also represent and warrant that Your Content is lawful and is not offensive, obscene or defamatory and does not infringe the legal rights of any other person.
43. You agree that Your Content is free from viruses or other malicious material and you must not misuse the Dry Feb Website by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material which is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to the Dry Feb Website, the server on which the Dry Feb Website is stored or any server, computer or database connected to the Dry Feb Website. You must not attack the Dry Feb Website via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack. By breaching this provision, you would commit a criminal offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. We will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and we will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use the Dry Feb Website will cease immediately.
44. We will not be responsible, or liable to any third party, for the content or accuracy of any content posted by you or any other user of the Dry Feb Website. Any views or opinions expressed by users of the Dry Feb Website do not represent the views, opinions or values of Dry Feb.
46. When you remove Your Content it may persist in backup copies for a reasonable period of time but will not be available to others.
(b) the Dry Feb Website (and any modifications, adaptations, updates or new versions) is and embodies customised architecture, guided forms, processes, methods, activities, strategies, trade secrets, know how, and techniques and other ideas which are our intellectual property and must only be used by you in accordance with Our Agreement.
48. We give you the following licence in relation to the Dry Feb Website but you cannot access, use or exploit the Dry Feb Website outside this licence. While you have the right to access and use the Dry Feb Website, we authorise and license you on a revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable basis to use the Dry Feb Website in accordance with Our Agreement. You are not permitted and do not have a licence to reproduce, modify or adapt any software on the Dry Feb Website or material appearing on the Dry Feb Website. You are not authorised and have no licence to use or reproduce our registered or unregistered trademarks unless we provide you with express permission in writing to do so. You must not use any part of the content on the Dry Feb Website for commercial purposes without obtaining a licence to do so from us or our licensors.
49. You may print off one copy, any may download extracts, of some content from the Dry Feb Website, including, posters, donation forms and other images for personal use and to help raise awareness of, and donations for, Dry Feb.
50. If you use of exploit any part of the Dry Feb Website in breach of the above licence, your right to use the Dry Feb Website will cease immediately and you must, at our option, return or destroy any copies of the materials you have made.
51. You must ensure you have all intellectual property rights and any other rights required to the content to enable you to post on or make available such content to the Dry Feb Website.
52. You must not use or exploit other people's content provided through Dry Feb or posted to or made available on the Dry Feb Website unless they give you express permission to do so. You will not post content about other people on the Dry Feb website unless they give you express permission to do so.
(k) if you collect information from others through Dry Feb or the Dry Feb Website you will obtain their consent, make it clear you (and not us) are the one collecting their information, and only use or disclose the information in accordance with all relevant laws and the Privacy and Cookies Policy https://www.dryfeb.ca/privacy-policy. You will not use information collected from others through Dry Feb or the Dry Feb website for any purpose other than those directly related to participation or Donations to the Dry Feb challenge. You agree to direct Donors who you identify to the Dry Feb website to make their donations, and in circumstances where you collect Donations directly, to promptly remit such Donations to Dry Feb by making a Donation in the amount so raised through the DryFeb website. Dry Feb will not be liable to parties who make donations other than through a Donation using the Dry Feb website for receipt or return, or any claims whatsoever relating to such donations.
54. You are solely responsible for Your Content that you provide to or make available on the Dry Feb Website.
55. You must immediately notify us if you become aware or have a reason to believe any other Participant or Website User is doing any of the acts in section 52 above.
57. Our goal is to provide third party advertising and links to beneficiaries or others that may be valuable or interesting to you. The Dry Feb Website may contain links to websites owned, operated or hosted by third parties which are not under our control (Linked Websites). Links to Linked Websites are provided for convenience only and may not remain current or be maintained.
58. You may choose to access such websites or resources at you sole discretion. Links to Linked Websites, and the advertisement of any third parties, should not be construed as any endorsement, approval, recommendation, or preference by Dry Feb of them or their goods/services, nor does it imply that there is any association between us and the operators of these websites. We do not make any representation or warranty in respect of these websites or resources (including as to their accuracy, completeness or security). To the extent permitted by law, we take no responsibility and have no liability in relation to them and your use or reliance on these is at your own risk.
59. We may receive sponsorship, fees and/or commissions from third parties in connection with Linked Websites or third party advertising. You acknowledge and consent to us receiving the sponsorship, fees and/or commissions.
61. If, after receiving our notice, you believe we undertook any acts under clause 59 by mistake, we will take reasonably efforts to give you an opportunity to provide us with an explanation or reason as to why and we will consider your explanation or reason.
62. We may terminate Our Agreement, your account with Dry Feb (if you are a Participant) or end your access to or use of the Dry Feb Website (including preventing you from making a Donation or placing a Purchase Order) at any time without any reason on reasonable notice to you.
63. You may terminate Our Agreement and, if you are a Participant, your account with Dry Feb at any time without any reason by notice to us. If you have made a Donation or placed a Purchase Order, your ability to terminate such donation or purchase order is subject to the Payment Terms.
65. We use 128 bit SSL encryption technologies and use reasonable efforts to protect the privacy of the information you provide to us. To the extent we hold such information, we encrypt all email addresses, passwords and other contact details of the Participants or people who make Donations or place Purchase Orders.
66. We try to keep the Dry Feb Website available, bug-free, and safe and secure, but we cannot guarantee that the Dry Feb Website will be available, free of bugs, safe or secure and you use it at your own risk.
67. The content on the Dry Feb Website is provided for general information only and is not intended to amount to any advice on which you should rely. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content of the Dry Feb Website.
68. Although we make reasonable efforts to update the information on the Dry Feb Website, we make no representations, warranties or guarantees, whether express or implied, that the content on the Dry Feb Website is accurate, complete or up-to-date.
69. We may not at all times control or monitor the truth, accuracy, completeness, safety, timeliness, quality, appropriateness, legality or applicability any content, information or communications by Participants or Website Users via Dry Feb or the Dry Feb Website. You use and rely on any such content, information or communications at your own risk.
70. You must provide at your own expense, all hardware, software or any other equipment necessary to access the Internet or otherwise enable you to be a part of Dry Feb as a Participant or access or use the Dry Feb Website. The ability for you to be a part of Dry Feb as a Participant or access or use the Dry Feb Website will be dependent on your hardware, software and network infrastructure as well as shared infrastructure of the Internet and our security processes. You should use your own virus protection software.
71. The Internet is sometimes unreliable and is a difficult medium to secure. We cannot guarantee the security of Dry Feb or the Dry Feb Website or the systems (including the Internet and your hardware and software) used to access the Dry Feb Website, or any information that passes through such systems. However, we do agree to use reasonable endeavours to do ensure the security of Dry Feb or the Dry Feb Website.
72. To the extent permitted by law, we are not responsible for any unauthorised access to your personal information or loss of or corruption of data caused by any third party or via any third party system.
73. We may need from time to time to make the Dry Feb Website unavailable and/or withdraw or limit access to the Dry Feb Website in order to effect any changes to, or remedy any faults in, the Dry Feb Website.
75. In so far not expressly referred to under these Terms and Conditions we are providing Dry Feb and the Dry Feb Website "as is" without any express or implied warranties or conditions including, but not limited to, implied warranties and conditions with respect to availability, merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement of third party rights in relation to the Dry Feb Website and any content, functionality, services offered, supplied or made available through or in connection with it (whether or not by us or a third party). To the extent permitted by applicable law, we exclude all warranties and conditions that may otherwise be implied into Our Agreement.
76. We comply with our security obligations under applicable data protection law but cannot 100% guarantee that Dry Feb or the Dry Feb Website will be safe or secure.
77. You acknowledge that Dry Feb is not a registered charity and does not issue charitable donation tax receipts for income tax purposes.
(d) the use or misuse of Dry Feb and the Dry Feb Website by a third party.
(e) loss of data, loss of profits, loss of revenue, loss of opportunity, loss of goodwill, special, incidental or consequential loss, whether suffered by you or any other party and however so arising, including claims based in contract (including for repudiation), tort (including negligence), common law, equity, statute or otherwise whether in relation to your access to and use of the Dry Feb Website, your participation in Dry Feb, your purchases on the Dry Feb Website or otherwise.
80. We are not responsible for and have no liability in relation to any loss to the extent that it is caused by you, for example, through your negligence or breach of contract.
81. If, subject to what is set out in this “We limit our liability to you” section, we are liable, you agree that we are only liable up to the sum of CAD 100.
82. You must take reasonable steps to minimize the extent of the loss you may suffer for which we may be liable. You must notify us in writing of your loss as soon as is reasonably possible.
83. NOTHING IN OUR AGREEMENT IS INTENDED TO LIMIT OR EXCLUDE YOUR STATUTORY RIGHTS AS A CONSUMER OR ANY LEGAL RIGHTS AND REMEDIES THAT CANNOT BE SO LIMITED OR EXCLUDED UNDER APPLICABLE LAW.
(e) your access to and use of the Dry Feb Website.
85. Our Agreement is governed by Canadian law (the laws of Ontario and the laws of Canada that apply in Ontario, and the parties irrevocably and unconditionally submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of Ontario and Canada for the purpose of hearing and determining any dispute arising out of or in any way relating to Our Agreement or its formation and for the purpose of enforcement of any judgment.
86. Our Agreement makes up the entire agreement between Participants and Website Users and us and supersedes any prior agreements.
87. If any portion of Our Agreement is found to be unenforceable, the remaining portion will remain in full force and effect.
88. If we delay or fail to enforce any of Our Agreement, it will not be considered a waiver.
89. You will not transfer any of your rights or obligations under Our Agreement to anyone else without our consent.
90. All of our rights and obligations under Our Agreement are freely assignable by us.
Last modified on 21 January 2016. | 2019-04-24T11:59:20Z | https://www.dryfeb.ca/terms |
Anderson, L. & Krathwohl, D. (2001). A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. New York: Longman.
Though not a book about evaluation, this revision of the Bloom et. al. original taxonomy (1956) provides a framework for investigating issues that relate to teaching, learning, assessment, and evaluation. The revised taxonomy includes dimensions of knowledge as well as dimensions of cognitive process and incorporates “creation” as a new cognitive dimension.
Angelo, T. A., & Cross, K. P. (1993) Classroom assessment techniques: a handbook for college teachers. (2nd ed.) San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This widely read text is derived from work at the National Center for Research into Postsecondary Teaching and Learning at the University of Michigan. The book offers extensive description and application of various strategies for gathering and using information to assess student learning. Since evidence of student learning is an important part of the larger evaluation of faculty performance, knowledge and use of effective assessment techniques is critical to good evaluation practice.
This is the best practical guide to developing and implementing a comprehensive evaluation system. It contain, a thorough overview, grounded discussion of operational issues, samples of instruments and process, and proven techniques for generating dialogue and consensus. If one could have only one book to guide faculty evaluation, this should be it.
Arreola, R. A., Theall, M. & Aleamoni, L. M. (2003) Beyond scholarship. Recognizing the multiple roles of the professoriate. Paper presented at the 84th annual meeting of the American Educational research Association. Chicago: April 22. Available on-line at: http://cedanet.com/meta.
This paper and associated website allow readers to access the full presentation as well as several matrices which describe in some detail, the ‘meta-profession’ concept and its application to faculty work. A separate section is included demonstrating how ‘the scholarship of teaching and learning” represents a special case of the meta-professional construct.
This is the most recent, major review of ratings research and it reaches conclusions similar to those of other major reviews (e.g., Arreola, 2007; Braskamp & Ory, 1994, Centra, 2003, Feldman’s studies [1976 through 1997], Marsh, 1989, 2007), namely, that student ratings, when properly conducted, analyzed, reported, and interpreted, can provide information useful for both formative and summative purposes.
Berk, R. A. (2006) Thirteen strategies to measure college teaching. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.
This practical guide provides basic and helpful information for faculty and administrators who use ratings for formative and summative purposes. Berk espouses a “360 degree” approach that aligns with the recommendations of other major writers. He encourages the use of multiple sources of data of several kinds and with specific connection to the intents of the evaluation process and the needs of stakeholders. The book is written in Berk’s unique humorous style, and includes a foreword by Michael Theall.
___________ (1992) How academic leadership works. Understanding success and failure in the college presidency. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
___________ (2001) Management fads in higher education. Where they come from, what they do, and why they fail. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
Birnbaum’s work is clear, insightful, realistic, and very readable. His books provide many descriptive examples and the work is grounded in a substantial and broad literature base. Few authors have described higher education as clearly and realistically as Birnbaum. While this work centers on the ways higher education works, it is important to evaluation because it provides a better understanding of the context in which evaluation takes place. Evaluation systems must be responsive to the environments in which they exist, thus this literature is relevant and useful.
Bloom, S. (1998) Structure and ideology in medical education: an analysis of resistance to change. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 29, 294-306.
This is an interesting view of the change process and a sobering description of “reform without change”, that is, the futility of responding to the need to alter or improve something without implementing any long-lasting or meaningful changes. In conjunction with Birnbaum’s text on “fads”, it alerts readers to the need for making change relevant and connecting to stakeholder frames of reference. By its very nature, evaluation is often threatening, and it is potentially an explosive issue. Faculty evaluation is often (unfortunately) done in a ‘pro forma’ manner in response to pressure for reform or change and Bloom’s article points out the dangers and frustrations associated with this error.
Boyer, E. L. (1990) Scholarship reconsidered: the priorities of the professoriate. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This short work has had tremendous impact in the decade since its publication, generating dialogue and action on campuses of all types. It’s reconceptualization of scholarship, particularly the introduction of “the scholarship of teaching” as an equal partner with discovery, integration, and application has led to numerous projects and attempts to broaden the roles of faculty. Faculty evaluation must include clear and public definition of its expectations, process, and intended uses. By further defining the “priorities of the professoriate, Boyer opened a dialogue that has brought more attention to teaching and the scholarship that underlies it.
Braskamp, L. A. & Ory, J. C. (1994). Assessing faculty work. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Centra, J. A. (1993). Reflective faculty evaluation: enhancing teaching and determining faculty effectiveness. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
These are two of the most substantial, books on the general topic of faculty evaluation, both by widely respected authors. They are comprehensive and discuss a range of issues, more theoretical than the Arreola text, but excellent additions to a basic library on the topic.
Brinko, K. T. (2012) Practically speaking: A sourcebook for instructional consultants in higher education (2nd ed.). Stillwater, OK: New Forums Press.
This second edition (original edition, 1997, edited by Kate Brinko & Robert Menges) remains focused on instructional consultation, but it includes chapters on incorporating the use of evaluation results as part of the consultation process. It is especially useful with respect to formative evaluation processes and bridges the sometimes artificial divide between evaluation and faculty development practices.
Chickering, A. W. & Gamson, Z.F. (1987) Seven principles for good practice in undergraduate education.” Wingspread Journal, 9 (2), special insert.
The seven principles have been used as guidelines for assessment in traditional and even on-line instruction and there has been widespread use of the faculty, student, and institutional inventories devised to measure implementation of the principles on campuses. There is debate about the extent to which these general guidelines should be used in evaluating faculty performance, but their impact can not be overlooked.
Cross, K. P. & Steadman, M. H. (1996) Classroom research: implementing the scholarship of teaching. San Francisco: Jossey Basss.
This work expands on Cross’ work in classroom assessment to incorporate Boyer’s definitions of scholarship and to provide teachers with strategies for conducting classroom research that supports better understanding of classroom process and simultaneously has the rigor to be incorporated into more traditional outlets for scholarship. Classroom research can be legitimate scholarship and its results can lead to improved teaching and learning. As such, the efforts of faculty who undertake classroom research should be considered valid evidence of professional activity and/or scholarship and should be among the considerations in evaluating performance.
This book considers a broad range of topics related to effective leadership in higher education including a section that deals with assessment, faculty evaluation, program review, and the faculty reward system.
Farmer, D. W. (1999) Institutional improvement and motivated faculty: a case study. In M. Theall (Ed.) “Motivation from within: approaches for encouraging faculty and students to excel” New Directions for Teaching and Learning # 78. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
___________ (1988) Enhancing student learning: emphasizing essential competencies in academic programs. Wilkes Barre, PA: Kings College Press.
Farmer’s work as an academic administrator and leader in change processes is summarized in the New Directions chapter and his specific efforts at Kings College are discussed in detail in the book. Both are useful for those in a position to effect change through leadership. While the thrust of Farmer’s work was in assessment, the principles he discusses also apply to institutional programs for evaluation.
Feldman, K. A. (1976 through 1998; see extended bibliography) A series of research syntheses in Research in Higher Education.
In a series of over a dozen articles, Feldman has provided the most in-depth reviews of specific issues relating to faculty evaluation and student ratings of instruction. These definitive works have explored all of the major issues raised as potential biases to faculty evaluation. Feldman’s findings concur with other major work on evaluation, noting that in general, student ratings provide valid, reliable, and useful information.
Feldman, K. A. & Paulsen, M. B. (1998) (2nd ed.) Teaching and learning in the college classroom. Needham Heights, MA: Simon & Schuster Custom Publishing.
This is the most comprehensive collection of readings on this topic. It is broad and substantial, and includes landmark items like Boyer’s definitions of the four kinds of scholarship, Chickering & Gamson’s “Seven Principles”, and also incorporates some of Feldman’s studies of college teaching and Paulsen & Feldman’s work on creating a campus teaching culture. This is probably the best single compendium of the research on college teaching. Its collection of articles make clear, the complexity and multi-dimensionality of college teaching and the associated notion that the evaluation of that teaching is equally complex.
Franklin, J. & Theall, M. (1989) “Who reads ratings: knowledge, attitudes, and practices of users of student ratings of instruction.” Paper presented at the 70th annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association. San Francisco: March 31. ERIC # ED 306-241.
This was the first large-scale study of faculty and administrator knowledge of and attitudes about ratings. It included a survey determining user knowledge of evaluation practice, basic statistics, and the literature of the field. Faculty and administrators in general scored significantly lower than staff in centers for teaching, learning, assessment, and evaluation, who, in turn, scored lower than a group of 40 experts in the field. Less knowledge of the literature and practice in the field was significantly correlated with negative views about evaluation and about students as providers of data.
Glassick, C. E., Huber, M. T., & Maeroff, G. I. (1997) Scholarship assessed: evaluation of the professoriate. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This work continues where Boyer’s text left off, providing discussion and guidelines for evaluating and documenting scholarly work, particularly in the realm of the scholarship of teaching. Completed after Boyer’s death, it nonetheless includes a prologue by Boyer. The outline of criteria for assessing scholarship has been widely accepted but its limitation with respect to faculty evaluation is that it considers only scholarship while thorough faculty evaluation must consider all aspects of performance.
Marsh, H. W. (1987) Students evaluations of university teaching: Research findings, methodological issues, and directions for future research. International Journal of Educational Research, 11, 253-388.
Marsh, H. W. (2007) Students’ evaluations of university teaching: dimensionality, reliability, validity, potential biases, and usefulness. In R. P. Perry & J. C. Smart (Eds.) The scholarship of teaching and learning in higher education: an evidence-based perspective. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer, 319-383.
This update of Marsh’s (1987) work reviews some additional research but arrives at conclusions similar to the original, namely that student ratings are generally reliable, valid, robust, and useful for a variety of purposes.
Miller, R. I. (1987) Evaluating faculty for promotion and tenure. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This text lists ten useful characteristics of effective systems that are the basis for many of the recommendations in this chapter, and includes legal issues, administrative roles, and discussion of promotion and tenure procedures.
These series from Jossey Bass include several relevant titles. Those dealing with evaluation and closely related issues are identified below.
· Aleamoni, L. M. (Ed.) (1987) Techniques for evaluating and improving instruction. New Directions for Teaching and Learning #31. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This is the first in a series of volumes exploring evaluation issues and it includes contributions by many of the leading writers in the field.
Anderson, R. S., Bauer, J. F. & Speck, B. W. (Eds.) (2002) “Assessment strategies for the on-line class: from theory to practice.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning #91. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
On-line teaching and learning present new questions and issues in terms of the effect of context on instructional effectiveness. There are important questions about the evaluation of on-line teaching that have not yet been addressed and this volume’s emphasis on assessment can contribute to more accurate and effective evaluation of on-line teaching.
Angelo, T. A. (1998) “Classroom assessment and research: an update on uses, approaches, and research findings.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning #75. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
In its discussions of the use of assessment to improve teaching and learning; to help new instructors; and to support program accountability, this volume is a model partner to effective evaluation. Since student learning is one measure of effective teaching, assessment can and should be part of good evaluation practice.
Colbeck, C. L. (ed.) (2002). Evaluating Faculty Performance (New Directions for Institutional Research No. 114). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
Authors of this volume take an appropriately broad view of faculty evaluation, noting that “Forces for change within and outside academe are modifying faculty work and the way that work is—or should be—evaluated” This volume is more philosophical in its approach and presents interesting perspectives on issues that underlie evaluation practice.
Johnson, T., and Sorenson, L. (2004). Online Student Ratings of Instruction (New Directions for Teaching and Learning No. 96). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This is the newest discussion in the New Directions series and it focuses on the use of on-line systems for collecting and reporting ratings data. It contains the latest thinking about the use of on-line systems and presents the advantages and disadvantages of on-line and paper systems.
Knapper, C. & Cranton, P. (2001) “Fresh Approaches to the evaluation of teaching. New Directions for Teaching and Learning #88. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This volume considers evaluation from several perspectives, connecting it to the scholarship of teaching, teaching awards, the use of technology, portfolio development, accreditation, and other issues.
Lewis, Karron (Ed.) (2000) “Techniques and strategies for interpreting student evaluations.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning #87. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This volume deals with useful techniques for avoiding common errors in reporting and interpreting ratings results. Since such errors are one of the most common problems with ratings, the guidelines in this volume can be particularly useful.
Ryan, K E. (Ed.) (2000) “Evaluating teaching in higher education: a vision for the future.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning #83, Fall. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This volume considers past practice and new approaches , recommending practical strategies for improving current methods, and for developing new ones. It also looks ahead to possible changes in practice affected by issues such as the increasing demand for distance and on-line learning, and the effects of new definitions of validity.
Theall, M., Abrami, P. C. and Mets, L. A. (eds.) (2001). The Student Ratings Debate: Are They Valid? How Can We Best Use Them? (New Directions for Institutional Research No. 109). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
A recent review of issues relating to student ratings of instruction, this volume presents current thinking along with a proposal for improving the precision of ratings practice.
This is one of the first discussions of ratings and evaluation to focus on context and the systematic nature of evaluation and the requirements it imposes. Several aspects of evaluation from ethical issues to disciplinary differences are presented.
Theall, M. & Franklin, J. (Eds.) (1991) “Effective practices for improving teaching.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning #48. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
This volume deals with teaching improvement but connects such efforts to gathering, analyzing, and interpreting evaluation and assessment data for purposes of improvement.
Perry, R. P. & Smart, J. C.(Eds.) (2007) The scholarship of teaching and learning in higher education: An evidence-based perspective. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer.
This is the most recent and substantial review of college teaching and learning including issues related to assessment, evaluation, and, ratings. Though the title includes the words “scholarship of teaching and learning”, the book does not deal with individual, small-scale, classroom studies like those advocated by Boyer (1990) or Crross & Steadman (1996). Its focus is on organized, established, long-term research that has been replicated and has contributed to the body of knowledge in substantial ways.
Pescolozodi, B. & Aminzade, R. (1999) The social worlds of higher education: handbook for teaching in a new century. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.
This is a very interesting collection of works by sociologists and considers a range of higher education issues. Its treatment of higher education as a sociological microcosm is unique and worthwhile, and like the work of Birnbaum, it offers insights into the context for evaluation.
Scriven, M. (1991) Evaluation thesaurus. (4th ed.) Newbury Park, California: Sage Publications.
This is the definitive guide to evaluation and related terminology.
Scriven, M. (1967) “Methodology of evaluation.” In R. Tyler, R. Gagne, & M. Scriven (Eds.) Perspectives of curriculum evaluation. Chicago: Rand McNally & Company.
This is Scriven’s seminal work, in which he outlines the different purposes of evaluation (formative & summative) and the different kinds of data that can be used (instrumental and consequential). The terminology has remained and was adopted by the “assessment movement” to describe similar purposes related to measuring student learning outcomes.
Scriven, M. (1967) Methodology of evaluation. In R. Tyler, R. Gagne, & M. Scriven (Eds.) Perspectives of curriculum evaluation. Chicago: Rand McNally & Co.
If there is a seminal article on modern evaluation, this is it. Scriven’s terminology and approach are the basis for contemporary evaluation and assessment. | 2019-04-25T02:07:57Z | http://www.facultyevaluation.org/resource-links/annotated-readings-of-selec.html |
Stephanie Knaak offered great insight and advice on her website Motherhood Cafe. The content below is taken from the site's 2010-2013 archived pages of posts by Stephanie Knaak.
Hi, I’m Stephanie. Welcome to the Motherhood Cafe. I created this website as a place for new and expecting mothers to go to get good information — and perspective — about motherhood and parenting. I have a PhD in Sociology, specializing in parenting culture. I’m widely published, have appeared on TV, and have spoken on national and international platforms as an expert on postpartum adjustment, postpartum depression, infant feeding, and parenting culture.
I set up the Motherhood Cafe to share my research and knowledge about parenting and motherhood, especially the stages and phases of adjusting to motherhood — the identity change, the emotions and experiences of new motherhood, issues related to feeding, etc.
Because my other area of expertise is parenting culture — the social and cultural environment within which modern day parenting takes place, the Motherhood Cafe is also a place to discuss and critique modern parenthood and parenting culture.
The purpose of the Motherhood Cafe is to create a trusted community where women can get good perspective, as well as helpful knowledge and information about their parenting experiences and concerns. My interest is to encourage and support mothers’ (and families’) self-empowerment, growth, and moral parenting autonomy.
You can view my featured research publications and presentations here.
I continue to be actively involved in research on motherhood and parenting culture. I am a member, for example, of the Motherhood Institute for Research and Community Involvement as well as the Parenting Culture Studies group of researchers.
Lastly, I am also a mother myself. I have two children, a girl born in 2000 and a boy born in 2001. They, along with my husband, are what motivated me to do my PhD in the first place. They are also the the inspiration and support behind my work on this motherhood website.
I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to contact me.
An aside: This was a wonderful resource when my sister was pregnant. I was helping her by preparing the space for her newborn once she became too encumbered to deal with housework. I came across the site when I was searching for a carpet cleaning service - the baby room was previously owned by Angel, a recently deceased pet poodle, and the carpets bore the evidence of a quite messy animal. She lives in Manhattan, and the number of carpet cleaners is daunting, especially since we really wanted one that we could trust with this very important task. I interviewed several, and after hiring my choice, I am convinced I found one of the best carpet cleaning nyc firms in business. I don't even remember how I came upon the Motherhood Cafe, but most likely I was taking a break and knowing that my sister was pregnant decided to see what type of sites were on the web that could impart good information and perspective about motherhood and parenting. Voila Motherhood Cafe! My sister gave birth to a little girl and still thanks me for finding great carpet cleaning service and for pointing her to the Motherhood Cafe. She was sad to discover that the site is no longer active now that she is expecting again.
If you are having a tough time coping, or if you are wondering about PPD symptoms this simple 10-item questionnaire can be a helpful tool. You can easily complete and score it at home.
While the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale is NOT meant to provide an actual diagnosis for PPD (you still have to see your health care provider for that), it IS considered a very good indicator. (1-3) In other words, if you score high enough on the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale, there is a good likelihood that you ARE suffering from PPD. If this is the case, please go and talk to someone, get help, see your health care provider.
Print this page out to complete the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale (you will find it directly below). Then, when you follow-up with your health care provider, he/she can see how you responded to the questionnaire. If your computer is not attached to a printer, just record your responses on a scrap piece of paper.
As you are pregnant or have recently had a baby, we would like to know how you are feeling. Please indicate the answer that comes closest to how you have felt IN THE PAST 7 DAYS, not just how you feel today.
1. Once completed, add up all your responses to get your total score (the highest you can get is 30; the lowest is 0).
…..A score of 0-10: If your score is 10 or less, you are considered to be in the “normal” range. This means you likely DON’T have postpartum depression. If you are feeling like you are struggling, consider your fatigue – could getting more rest and sleep help? If so, do whatever you need to do in order to make this a priority.
…..A score of 11 or 12: A score or 11 or 12 is something that health practitioners usually like to take a closer look at. It is considered a kind of “borderline” score for “probable” postpartum depression. If you are in this range, you might find it helpful to talk to your health care provider so that the two of you can dig a bit deeper into how you are feeling, figure out what exactly is going on, and talk about how best to help you get on track.
…..A score of 13 or higher: A score of 13 or higher suggests significant depression. Please see a health care provider. Your health care provider will be able to make the proper diagnosis about what’s going on with you. He/she can also get you pointed in the right direction regarding treatment options, available supports, etc.
…….Look at your score for item 10: Be sure you’ve answered item 10 of the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale honestly. If you HAVE had thoughts of harming yourself, it is a good idea to follow-up with your health care provider right away. DO THIS EVEN IF YOUR TOTAL SCORE IS LOW.
Preventing postpartum depression (PPD) is possible. Because PPD is a bio-psychosocial phenomenon, the causes of PPD involve more than just hormones.
The moms who adjusted well and stayed emotionally healthy said it was thanks to these six resources they did so well.
By contrast, the mothers who had PPD and who struggled emotionally in the postpartum felt that a big reason for why they had such a tough time was because they lacked many, most, or all, of these resources.
1. Prioritizing your own self care.
As tough as it is sometimes, it is essential to place your own needs for sleep, for “getting a break,” and for adequate nutrition and activit on the same priority level as your baby’s. Prioritizing self care is also important while you are still pregnant Many women who struggle with postpartum depression feel that getting physically worn down ;while pregnant set them up for emotional problems.
2. Having enough help in meeting your day-to-day demands and responsibilities.
Having material support (i.e., “help”) is crucially important for preventing postpartum depression by helping to keep those stress levels in check, and to help you prioritize your own self care.
Do you feel ;guilty about asking for help? Believe me, there is no need. Mothering is not, nor should it be, a one-persona job. The adage that ‘it takes a village to raise a child’ is as true to today as it has ever been.
3. Having manageable levels of situational stress.
Sometimes you can’t help the stressors you face. The key, though, is to find ways to keep that stress manageable. Sometimes it means doing less. Sometimes it means changing expectations. Sometimes it means getting more help. Sometimes it means getting emotional support by talking to others about what you are going through. Sometimes it means developing new coping skills. Figure out what it is for you and do it.
4. Feeling understood by, and connected to, others.
This resource for preventing postpartum depression is about reaching out emotionally. Having a confidant helps you share your feelings and experiences, and helps you make better sense of things. Reaching out also provides you with information and knowledge, helpful for figuring out what to do.
So TALK to the important others in your life. If you can’t do that, find an online or in-person support group where you can connect with other mothers, and talk honestly and openly. Believe me, you are not alone.
5. Having realistic beliefs and expectations about mothering and motherhood.
Experiencing some gap between expectations and reality is normal. Indeed, finding ways to reconcile those gaps between expectations and reality is one of the main tasks of the adjustment process.
However, if your “core” beliefs or expectations (those beliefs that are SO central to your very idea of being a “good” mom) become threatened, this can lead to emotional difficulties.
Among moms I’ve interviewed, some of these “problem” core beliefs are: the belief that mother/baby bonding should be instinctual and immediate (it’s not); the belief that breastfeeding is necessary for good mothering (it’s not); and the belief that mothers must always be there completely with/for their babies (also not true).
5. Feeling ready, both physically and emotionally, for the baby and all that that entails.
This is a resource for pregnancy. One part of this resource for preventing postpartum depression has to do with knowing what to expect. Knowledge and information provide coping skills — if you know what to expect (both good and bad), you’re better prepared to handle what comes along.
Another part of this resource is emotional readiness — getting emotionally prepared for taking on the new responsibilities of parenthood. That means being honest about your feelings about this new baby. You will need to deal with ambivalent feelings sooner or later — better to acknowledge and start confronting them now.
The third part of this resource for preventing postpartum depression is to take care of yourself physically, as best you can, during pregnancy.
A couple of years back, I wrote an academic article on breastfeeding and bottle feeding for the Canadian Journal of Public Health. In this article, I express my concern about the informational biases that inform our understanding of breastfeeding and bottle feeding.
I am going to summarize the key points of this article to provide some perspective about breastfeeding and formula feeding — perspective I hope can help relieve some the stress, worry and anxiety that so many mothers experience with respect to feeding.
First of all, I want to emphasize that I support women’s right to breastfeed. I am also 100% in favour of providing correct information, support, and assistance to women (and their partners) to help them breastfeed and to help them decide what and how to feed their babies.
I am concerned that we have gotten too sloppy in interpreting what the scientific evidence about breastfeeding and bottle feeding actually says.
We have gone way too far in putting breastfeeding on a pedestal — and also way too far in denigrating formula feeding as an acceptable option — either as a supplement to breastfeeding, or as a main source of food.
The impression that is increasingly being communicated to new moms is that breastfeeding is vital — not only for health reasons but also because it’s part of what being a good mother is all about. By contrast, formula feeding is increasingly being communicated as “bad” or “wrong”.
Well guess what? This is not what the balance of the scientific evidence actually suggests.
What the current evidence suggests is that, yes, breastfeeding is healthier for babies than not breastfeeding. We know that babies who are breastfed are less likely to suffer from colds (i.e. “respiratory infections”), gastrointestinal illness (e.g., diarrhea/constipation) and/or ear infections in the first year of life than are babies who are never breastfed.
Beyond that, most hypotheses are considerably less substantiated, more controversial in their findings, or completely unfounded.
Yet, we are bombarded with the claims anyway — mostly because we have gotten caught up in an ideological belief system that wants to idolize breastfeeding and demonize bottle feeding.
More and more, breastfeeding and bottle feeding are taking on a problematic symbolic significance that goes way beyond the actualities of feeding and nutrition.
Scientific Selectivity 1 ~ Promoting/using only those studies that show a significant health advantage associated with breastfeeding (and ignoring studies that show no relationship).
One example of this kind of “scientific selectivity” is the claim that breastfeeding enhances cognitive development and IQ. While there are studies that show IQ differences between breastfeeding and bottle feeding, there are also a number of studies that do not support this relationship.
In fact, the highest quality and most comprehensive scientific studies that have been done on this specific question (i.e., meta-analyses, studies that properly control for “confounding variables, and major reviews), find no significant relationship between breastfeeding and bottle feeding and cognitive development or IQ.
Scientific Selectivity 2 ~ Promoting studies that don’t properly control for “confounding variables.” Confounding variables are other factors/variables that can influence the results of a study. They can be a serious limitation to the validity of a study’s findings if they are not properly controlled for.
In the research on breastfeeding and bottle feeding, many of the studies do not properly control for one of the biggest confounding variables of all — socio-economic status (e.g., ensuring that the study is set up in such a way that the “bottle fed” study group has the same socio-economic status as the “breastfed” study group). Granted, properly “matching up” the study samples in this way is often difficult for breastfeeding and bottle feeding research, mostly because the demographic characteristics of moms who formula feed vs moms who breastfeed tend to be quite different.
The issue for the validity of the science comes in when we learn that socio-economic status is perhaps the most significant of any other single determinant of health!
What does this means for the research on breastfeeding and bottle feeding? It means that many of the studies we have (and that we use to promote breastfeeding) are mostly demonstrating the impact of socio-economic status on the health of babies, not the incremental impact of breastfeeding.
Mis-Contextualizing Risk 1 ~ Comparing apples to oranges. I recently came across a Canadian breastfeeding-promotion flyer warning that one of the major risks of formula feeding was an “increased risk of mortality.” Well that certainly sounds scary!
However, the research being referred to in this flyer was on developing countries [e.g.20] — communities where the context of risk is totally different. For example, access to clean water and sanitation is not a significant issue in the developed world; the affordability of formula is less an issue, and we have good access to immediate and quality medical care, making infant mortality due to such things as diarrhea and respiratory infection significantly less of a concern.
In other words, the health differences between breastfeeding and bottle feeding in the developed world are quite different than those in developing countries.
When we talk about the science on breastfeeding and bottle feeding, we need to be sure we’re comparing apples to apples, and oranges to oranges. (On that note, I would agree that breastfeeding is a significantly more important thing to do — both for babies and mothers — in developing countries as compared to developed ones).
It found that the average number of episodes of diarrhea in the “formula-fed group” was 1.07 bouts of diarrhea per baby over the whole first year of life. By contrast, the average number of diarrheal episodes for the “breastfed group” was 0.49 bouts per baby.
In other words, we’re talking about one bout of diarreha per year versus half a bout per year. Knowing the actual numbers, I believe, is key to being able to put study results into proper perspective.
Mis-Contextualizing Risk 3 ~ Comparing ONLY breastfeeding and bottle feeding when talking about risk. My argument here is that we are not doing a very good job at properly contextualizing the “risks and benefits” of breastfeeding and bottle feeding.
“How significant to the overall health of our children is the quality of their solid food diet in comparison to their infant diet?
What ultimately presents a bigger risk for respiratory, gastrointestinal and/or ear infections — formula feeding or exposure to viruses through older siblings, lack of hand-washing, and other sources?
How serious is a respiratory infection (i.e., a cold) or an ear infection to overall infant health? And how serious are these things in relation to other infant health concerns, such as accidents, for example?
The main point here is that we need to incorporate a broader contextualization of risk into our “talk” and our thinking about breastfeeding and bottle feeding. Doing this will enable us to better evaluate the relative significance of their infant feeding decisions in relation to the myriad other considerations and decisions we must make each and every day of our parenting lives.
The bottom line? Breastfeeding is a reproductive right that deserves to be protected and supported. However, we’ve gone too far in putting breastfeeding up on a pedestal — and also in denigrating/discouraging formula feeding — either as a supplement to breastfeeding, or as a main source of food. Health is a complex thing, and there many many different aspects that go into making a baby (or child or adult) healthy and strong. There is never “one magic thing” to being and staying healthy — it’s always a combination. Our health is influenced by the overall quality of our diet. It’s also influenced by our degree of exposure to various environmental toxins. It has to do with whether or not we smoke and/or are exposed to smoke, how we deal with stress, what the quality of our social, economic and educational resources are, the type and amount of physical activity we do, our genetics, our access to health care, and so many other factors!
Adjusting to Motherhood: What’s Involved?
Contrary to popular belief, many moms don’t fall in love with their babies automatically or instantaneously. Bonding IS a process.(5) It can happen right away, but it can also take time (up to six weeks or more). So, don’t be surprised if you don’t feel that connection instantaneously. Be patient. Keep cuddling and taking care of your baby and these feelings will come.
Also, get enough rest. This helps a lot in getting you bonding with your baby, one of the main tasks of the early adjusting phase.
Pregnancy, labor, birth, the early postpartum — these wreak havoc on our bodies and our physical well-being. Thus, one of the most important parts of adjusting to motherhood is to get yourself physically recovered. Of course, this can take a while, especially while your baby is still getting up at night. Remember though, your own physical health is an absolute necessity. It is directly linked to your emotional well-being, not to mention your ability to take care of baby in the way you want.
In general, the longer it takes for you to feel better rested and recovered, the longer you will be in the stage of early adjusting — the toughest part of the process.
For this reason, it’s a good idea to make this task a top priority, even if it means getting more help with child care, expressing breast milk/letting someone give a relief bottle, delegating others to take on some of your household (and other) responsibilities for a while, etc.
This can also take time — anywhere from a few weeks to many months. You need to get to know your baby, and you need to figure out how best to take care of him/her/them in a way that also works for you and your family.
Sometimes this means following a particular child care approach. Most often, though, it means reaching that point where, as a parent, you feel comfortable enough “tweaking” various expert tips and approaches in ways that allow them to work for YOU, your child, your family.
This task is also typically part of the early phase of this adjusting to motherhood process. Remember, there is often very little routine or control or predictability in those first weeks or months. That’s normal. Just keep getting to know your baby and keep working to figure out what works best for YOU, your child, your situation. Trust yourself.
Regaining control and re-building routines.
This task is about regaining control and re-building your day-to-day life and routines. This task is one of the main components of the later adjusting phase of this process.
Don’t worry about trying to get a handle on this right away. It’s just not possible to get out a lot, to get back to your own things, or to build new activities and routines until your baby is on some kind of semi-predictable routine, and until you are feeling more rested and energetic.
Paid work is a big part of all of our lives. It’s also often a big part of our identities. Some of us love our jobs. Some of us don’t. Some of us work because we have to. Some of us have a choice.
No matter what YOUR situation might be, figuring out what to do about work — whether to return to work, whether to stay home, whether to change jobs, whether to go part time, whether to go back to school etc. — is not always easy.
It is, however, something moms do have to figure out — and actually DO — as part of adjusting to motherhood. Again, each baby and each situation is different.
That means you might make a different decision about work after each baby. There might be different considerations.
Sometimes figuring out whether or how to work is straightforward. Sometimes it can be really tough. Remember, too, that whatever you do doesn’t have to be a “forever” kind of thing. It’s actually very common for mothers to change up their work situation every few years or so.
Make no mistake — this is a MAJOR part of the adjusting process! And it’s something we have to do in both the early and later stages of adjusting to motherhood.
Whether it’s an unpleasant birth experience, unexpected relationship difficulties, unexpected difficulties with breastfeeding, an unexpected colicky baby, unexpected emotions, or any other gaps between what we expected and believed and what the reality of our situation actually is, we won’t feel properly adjusted until we’ve dealt with these gaps.
The relationship between you and baby’s Dad is the one that requires the most attention.
Both of you are now parents to a new child, and your family is forever changed as a result. You two need to figure out what this means for you as a couple, and as parents. It’s very important that you talk to each other about your expectations and needs, fears and concerns, pressures and joys.
Typically, a big part of this adjustment task is negotiating “who does what” as well as “how” things should be done.
In doing this, you may find that you each had different assumptions about the division of responsibility — and/or the division of labor — vis-a-vis the baby, the house, the earning of income, etc. Working out these kinks, and re-positioning your relationship TO EACH OTHER (now that you are parents to a new baby) is thus a key part of adjusting to motherhood.
This adjustment task also has to do with the other relationships in your life. You may find, for example, that connecting or making NEW friendships with other mothers is part of what you need to do as a new mother. You may also find that you are spending less time with some people you saw a lot of previously, and more time with others.
All of this reconfiguring takes a bit of effort and attention. It is also normal and to be expected. Indeed, when you become a new parent — especially for the first time — your day-to-day life and needs and priorities do tend to shift.
It only makes sense, then, that you will also need to pay some attention to your relationships — how you spend time and interact with the various people in your life. | 2019-04-20T02:30:17Z | http://www.motherhood-cafe.com/index.php?id=1&reveal=yes&view_only=yes |
APP ELI LINK Use the ELILINK app <logo> to listen and look at the multimedia content of your Digital Book on your smartphone or tablet. Download the app from App Store for iOS or from Google Play for Android. Frame the page of your book. Access the content and download.
Three Little Birds Value: Be helpful.
I like… / I don’t like... Do you like…? Yes, I do. / No, I don’t.
Fruit Trees Value: Be polite – say Thank you.
I’ve got (two) (eyes). I’ve got (one) (nose). There’s a (noise). There’s a (smell).
What’s that Noise? Value: Have fun with your family.
Let’s go to (the playground). I like (the swing). Let’s play on (the seesaw). It’s (rainy).
The School Playground Value: Work together and play together.
Sharing a Tree Value: We can share.
Where’s (mummy)? He’s/She’s in the (bedroom). He/She isn’t in the (kitchen).
Our New Home Value: We say sorry for mistakes.
What’s wrong? Are you (sad)? Yes, I am. / No, I’m not. I’m (hungry).
The Story of Snow White Value: Be kind, don’t be mean.
It’s a/an… (ostrich). It’s got (two legs). They’re (tigers). They’ve got (black stripes).
On Safari Value: Respect animals.
What day is it today? It’s (Monday). When is your birthday? My birthday is on (Saturday).
A Surprise Party Value: Celebrate together.
Welcome to Smart Start, a three-level English course for children aged between 3 and 5 which offers a fun and smart start for very young learners. The approach and philosophy of Smart Start is to nurture the growth of each individual child in terms of their language development whilst also nurturing their emotional, creative, mathematical and physical development as they move from nursery through kindergarten to the start of primary school. Smart Start is a high-level pre-primary course aimed at schools that teach 5+ hours a week of English. Specially developed to cater for all the different interests and learning styles of young learners, Smart Start aims to inspire children as they take their first steps in English language learning.
Young learners Pre-primary aged children generally learn quickly but often do not always retain what they have learned. New key language is introduced in every unit in lexical sets connected to themes and topics relevant and connected to young learners’ own world and experiences. The topics start close to home and school in Level 1 and gently take the learners into settings and experiences in the wider world around them by the end of Level 3. The words chosen are always high frequency, usually personalised segments of language which fit with the unit topic. The language taught is then recycled in subsequent units through the teaching notes and the language the teacher uses in class. As with all courses, a teacher needs to use a Teacher’s Book to best exploit the materials created in the student components but never more so than with preprimary. The amount of teaching in terms of language used is not expected to equal the amount of language that children produce. For this reason, the teacher is guided as to how to use and recycle language in class. Children in a pre-school class can differ in many ways such as age, energy, size, interests, adaptability, experience and familiarity with the world outside the home, emotional maturity, linguistic aptitude and physical development. It is not possible or realistic to expect the same outcomes for all children who use the course. Some children will learn more English than others; some children will be better at maths. As part of individualising the materials for children, teaching and learning activities are presented in such a way as to cater for different learning styles.
The engaging characters, Tom and Izzy (twin brother and sister), introduce children to the world of English and create a positive learning environment. Their adventures with their friends, family and adorable cat, Coco, contextualise the language in a fun and humorous way.
The two class CDs for the teacher contain all of the audio material for the Student’s Book, including the vocabulary, dialogues, chants, songs, and stories. The recordings feature only native speakers of English to ensure the children are exposed to authentic and natural pronunciation.
Teacher’s DVD Teacher’s This component features the Smart Student’s Book that can be used Start with an interactive whiteboard. 2 DVD rom It features vocabulary and phonics games plus the animated stories. The Activity Book, Numeracy Book and Literacy Book in PDF format are also included for classroom use.
The flashcards cover all of the core vocabulary. They are an important teaching tool at pre-school level and can be used to introduce and practise key items in the majority of lessons.
Digital Book The complementary Digital Book is for children to use at home or in the school computer room. It contains audio tracks in MP3 format plus a selection of interactive games to reinforce and consolidate language while the children have fun. There are also animated versions of the stories for the children to enjoy. Parents can access and download this material using the printed code in the inside front cover of the Student’s Book.
Poster Smart Start 2 Pack The Coco the cat hand puppet can be used in all lessons to introduce vocabulary, demonstrate games and activities and encourage critical thinking. Coco is a kind character who doesn’t always do the right thing and provides a fun element of humour!
able to be supported by artwork such as pronouns, connectors and articles, children are taught a sight word system. The sight words are very high-frequency words that children are taught to recognise by sight. In Level 3 the children are introduced to two-letter consonant and vowel sound combinations (diagraphs) in frequency order. They use these new sounds in combination with the sounds from Level 1 and 2 as building blocks to sound out and blend new words. In Smart Start we use fun phonics chants and engaging and attractive artwork to present the words and sentences. The Teacher’s Book lesson notes give ideas for fun phonics games and activities to allow children to explore and enjoy their early reading experience. All the phonics methodology and strategies are based on the Letters and Sounds approach used in the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) in the UK. For more information and activity ideas see www.gov.uk/early-years-foundation-stage.
An entertaining reader gives children the opportunity to apply all their pre-reading skills and move towards autonomous reading. Audio tracks can be downloaded in MP3 format from www.elionline.smartstart.
The Numeracy Book provides further activities to recognise written and number forms from 1-20, counting practice, simple additions and sums, number bonds, plus sequences and patterns.
The Literacy Book gives children the chance to extend their skills. It introduces the upper case form of each letter, and consolidates phonics, and early reading.
TOUR OF A UNIT - Lesson 1 Vocabulary is presented through a scene featuring the course characters, twins Tom and Izzy, and their friends, family and their adorable cat, Coco.
On either side of the scene there are picture dictionary strips with the key vocabulary labelled. The words on the pages are for environmental exposure to the written language and are fully supported by pictures and the audio. They are not supposed to be read by the children but you can highlight any initial letter sounds of the key vocabulary that the children have already learned.
Key Language: door, window, table, chair, bin, board, bag, notebook. Activities: 1 Tr 1.08 Listen, point and say. 2 Place stickers. 3 Talk about the picture and match. 4 Tr 1.09 Say the chant and point.
The lesson ends with a song or a chant featuring the new vocabulary.
The picture scene has three or four faded-out spots of key vocabulary items that the children complete with stickers. This type of sticker activity is enjoyable and engaging and involves visual discrimination skills and fine motor skills. Once the scene is complete, children are asked to talk about the picture. This involves pointing and naming the key items (and any other items they know) in the scene. Prompt the children with simple questions such as, What’s this? What colour is it? etc. Clear reference to the Digital Book that contains an array of interactive activities, plus all of the audio tracks in MP3 format.
Clear reference to the activities in the Activity Book.
Lesson 2 - TOUR OF A UNIT The Let’s learn! page presents the key language structure through a humorous cartoon usually featuring Tom, Izzy and Coco. These are light-hearted and often end with Coco causing mischief or in some kind of fix! The dialogue is on the page as speech bubbles and on the audio. The speech bubbles are provided for environmental exposure to the text and children are not expected to read them.
Oh, Coco! Where’s the bin?
It’s next to the door. There is always a preliteracy task on the page where children respond to a question or complete a sentence by drawing or circling something that personalizes the language for them.
The children sing a song or do a chant at the end of the lesson to practise and consolidate the language.
under Key Language: Where’s my/the (bag)? It’s under, on, next to (the table). Activities: 1 Tr 1.10 Listen to the conversation. 2 Act it out. 3 Read, circle and draw. 4 Tr 1.11-1.12 Sing the song and do the actions.
After hearing the dialogue a few times, children are encouraged to act it out in small groups.
Children learn one sound for each letter of the alphabet. The sounds are introduced in frequency groups and the words are all supported by artwork. The audio provides pronunciation practice and recognition of the sounds.
Tr 1.14 Listen and say. 4 Read and trace.
Children are introduced to simple CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words e.g. cat, tap and begin to aurally decode (i.e. read) them.
Children learn a number of the most common nondecodable sight words e.g. the, and, etc. They trace, copy and write individual letters and words.
Lesson 4 - TOUR OF A UNIT These are CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) projects where children explore the unit theme and language through science, arts and crafts and social studies, by carrying out a practical task. Photos of children are used to model the project and the lesson notes support the teacher to set-up and undertake the project in class. The craft activities are easy to prepare and do in the classroom and don’t usually require detailed preparation. Cutting, sticking and drawing skills that help to develop children’s fine motor abilities are practised in these lessons as well as communication and collaboration skills.
A second vocabulary set of a further three or four topic-related words is presented in this lesson.
Key Language: pencil, crayon, book, bookmark; cut, draw, write. Activities: 1 Tr 1.15 Listen and point. 2 Look and say. 3 Make a bookmark and put it in your book.
of the course. Again, the story is provided on the audio, and speech bubbles and/or captions provide the story text on the page but are not there for children to read, only to expose them to the conventions of English text.
The fun, engaging stories are told only with language the children have been exposed to so they will feel a sense of fulfillment that they can understand and enjoy them. This helps nurture a love of reading and storytelling and encourages the children to express themselves creatively.
Three Little Birds It’s show and tell.
Oh, no! Where’s the blue bird?
A story song or chant accompanies each story.
Key Language: blue, green, yellow, bird; Where’s the (blue bird)? It’s on the (board). Activities: 1 Talk about the pictures. Make predictions. 2 Tr 1.16 Listen to the story. 3 Act it out. 4 Tr 1.17 Sing the song and do the actions.
The lesson notes provide ideas for storytelling, role-play, and artistic expression. By pretending and playing, children use their imagination and express their feelings and thoughts in a natural context.
It’s next to the door. Where’s the green bird?
Oh! Where’s the yellow bird?
The yellow bird is on the table!
Now it’s under the bin!
The Values lesson gives the children another chance to share and enjoy the story. There is then a focus on the value which the story teaches. Teachers are asked to discuss the value with the children and are supported by the teaching notes. The values taught in Level 2 are: being helpful, saying thank you, having fun with your family, working and playing together, sharing, saying sorry, being kind, respecting animals, celebrating together. In these lessons the use of L1 is useful and the teacher can lead the discussion in L1 and give feedback of simple ideas in English.
Tr 1.19 Listen and point. 4 Talk about the value.
All of the stories are brought to life in the animated stories in the Digital Book for the children to enjoy as they reinforce and consolidate language.
TOUR OF A UNIT - Lesson 7 In level 2, numbers 1-20 are approached as vocabulary items but children also learn concepts such as counting, place value, number and quantity correlation, simple additions, counting back, number bonds, patterns and sequences.
The Let’s count! lessons are numeracy lessons where children explore key vocabulary through basic maths and numeracy skills.
Children practise tracing and writing numbers.
Key Language: 1 - 5 - 6; (one) add (one) is (two). Activities: 1 Trace and count. 2 Colour the correct number of items. 3 Count and do the sums. Write the answer. 4 Tr 1.20 Say the chant and do the actions.
There are also number and counting songs and chants.
Lesson 8 - TOUR OF A UNIT At the end of each unit there is a Review lesson. Children do a simple listening task to practise some of the key language and vocabulary from the unit. This is followed by a personalisation task to consolidate the language.
Key Language: Unit 1 review. Activities: 1 Point and say. 2 Tr 1.21 Listen and circle. 3 Ask and answer with Where is‌? 4 Cut and stick to make a collage of your classroom.
After every three units there is a Real World lesson. These lessons feature children from around the world who contextualise the vocabulary and language from the previous units in a real-life setting.
Key Language: I’m from (the UK).These are my friends. Review: girl, apple, crayons, table, school, window, teacher, boy, book, children, biscuits, milk, banana, eyes, ears, mouths; I’m (Sophie). This is my (school). I’ve got (crayons). She’s got a (book). It’s lunchtime. They’ve got biscuits, milk and bananas.
These lessons are highly photographic and provide a contrast with the illustrations. They take children away from home to share English as a global language.
4 Activities: 1 Talk about the pictures. 2 Tr 1.52 Listen, point and say. 3 Tr 1.53 Listen and point. 4 Look and count: How many eyes? How many mouths? 5 Class Project: take photos of your school and classroom. Make a display.
Cut-Out Picture Cards and Stickers - TOUR OF A UNIT At the back of the Student’s Book there is a section with cut-out vocabulary picture cards. These can be used in the classroom to play games in pairs or teams, or the children can take them home to create a pleasant school-home link, encouraging them to show their family what they are learning in their English lessons.
The stickers allow the children to complete Lesson 1 of each unit.
Find the flashcard Revise vocabulary by playing a game with the flashcards. Hide the flashcards around the classroom. Play one of the songs or chants while the children walk around to find them. Ask them to shout the word out loud when they find the flashcard. Matching Put a few flashcards on the board. Put the flashcards of the numbers under these. Say the name of the flashcard and ask What number is it? The children say the number. Then reverse the procedure. Say a number and ask What item is it? Odd-one-out Put on the board a set of flashcards from one unit and one flashcard from a previous unit. Ask the class to identify the odd-one-out. Uncover the card Cover one of the flashcards with a sheet of dark paper. Show the covered flashcard and tell the class they have to guess what it is. Start moving the paper very slowly to uncover the card. Say What is it? If the children can’t guess, continue to move the sheet of paper and keep asking the question until they identify the flashcard. Yes/No activities 1) Choose a set of flashcards. Show the children one flashcard at a time and say one of the words at random, not necessarily of the object on the flashcard. The children shout Yes if the word corresponds to the card. Do this faster and faster to make it into a game. 2) Distribute the flashcards to some children. Then call out one word, the child with that flashcard runs to the board and sticks the card. Teach the class to shout Yes or No to confirm the answer.
3) Use the Coco puppet and Izzy and Tom cut-outs. Tell the children that you are going to make some statements. They have to shout Yes or No. Hold up the Coco puppet and say I am a cat. The class shouts Yes. Hold up Izzy and say I am a boy. (No) Hold up Tom and say I am a boy. (Yes) Continue with other statements referring to the target lesson. The class shouts Yes or No. More confident children may be able to correct the wrong statements. This fun activity is particularly suitable to the story pages.
A blindfold game Prepare some objects with recognisable shapes or smells (an orange, a ball, a pen, a carrot, etc.) and a box. Blindfold a group of children, ask them to sit down in a circle, give the box with one object inside to the first child and ask What can you smell / touch etc.? Do not confirm their answer, but ask them to pass the box to the next blindfolded child. Now it is the class turn to ask What is it? or What can you smell / touch etc.? Coco’s whisper This game is known to English children as Chinese Whispers. Put all the children in a line. Stand at the beginning of the line holding Coco. Tell the class that Coco is going to whisper a word in your ear and you will whisper it very quietly to the child standing next to you in the line. This child will whisper it to the next child and so on. The last child will say the word out loud, and it may not be the one you said! This is a fun activity and it can be used as a way of getting the class to calm down after some excitement: everybody will be very quiet in order to hear the word!
Guess the drawing Start drawing one of the items of the target vocabulary on the board, a few lines at a time, and encourage the children to guess what it is. Keep drawing until they have guessed. Continue with other items. If there are children with good art skills, call them to the board to take your role. Guess the flashcard Call one child to stand at the front looking towards the class. Position yourself behind the child and show the class one flashcard. The child should guess the flashcard by asking questions such as What colour is it? Is it an object or an animal? Can you see one in the classroom? Have you got one at home? I spy Teach the children the game I spy with my little eye something beginning with… and say the sound of a letter e.g. d (desk). Tell the children which category of words you are going to use, e.g. objects in the classroom, or people in the school, or pictures from the story pages, etc. The first child to guess has the right to continue the game suggesting a different letter. Miming You can ask individual children to mime animals, emotions, actions of the senses. Give the unit flashcards to some children. They mustn’t show them to the class. Each child in turn mimes what is represented on their card, the class has to guess and say the word. Continue with different children until everybody has had a turn. You can also do this in teams. Give each team a couple of minutes to agree on a mime for their flashcard. The other team wins a point if they understand the mime and say the word correctly. If they don’t, the first team scores.
Level 2 Teacher’s Book - Games Bank Picture bingo Ask the children to draw four or six items they have learnt in the unit. Now say the unit words in whichever order you want. If the children have a drawing corresponding to that word, they cross it out. The winner is the first child to cross out all their drawings. Watch my lips Revise vocabulary with this guessing game. Put some flashcards on the board and say that you will move your lips to say one word, but without making any sound. Shape one word with your mouth, exaggerating the movements. When the class guesses the word, take the flashcard off the board. This activity concentrates the attention of the children on the articulation of the sounds of English words. What’s in the bag? Put an object in a soft bag and call some children to touch it and guess what the object is and say the English word for it. This game is especially suitable for a lesson on school items or on food. What’s missing? Stick the flashcards on the board. Point to each flashcard and ask the children to say the word. Then tell them to close their eyes. Remove one of the flashcards and say Open your eyes. The children say which flashcard is missing. Alternatively, put the children in a circle and the flashcards face up on the floor. Let them memorise the position of the flashcards, then ask them to turn around so that they can’t see the cards. Take one card away, the children turn back and guess which card is missing.
Snap (a card game) Bring one or two packs of cards to class, depending on the number of children. The children sit on the floor in one or two circles. Choose one child in each group to deal the cards. Each child places their card face down in a pile in front of them. On their turn, each player turns over the top card from their face-down pile. When someone turns over a card that matches a card already face up on another player’s pile, the players race to be the first to call “Snap!”. The player who calls “Snap!” first wins both piles and adds them to the bottom of his facedown pile. The goal of the game is to win all of the cards. Pelmanism is a card game in which two sets of cards are laid face down on a surface and two cards are flipped face up over each turn. The object of the game is to turn over pairs of matching cards. It can be played just by two children or by as many as you want.
Blind man’s buff If you have access to a playground or a large room, you can have the class play this game. One child is blindfolded and tries to touch the other children without being able to see them. The others try to avoid him/her, and try to make him/her change direction by talking. They can say, for example, Can you see me? Can you touch me? The blindfolded child says No, I can’t or Yes, I can. Call a name The children hold hands in a circle and walk to the right. The teacher stands in the middle. They all say I like coffee, I like tea, I’d like George in with me. George then comes into the middle and the teacher asks Who do you want to call? Children: Sara. Teacher: OK, let’s all say: I like coffee, I like tea, I’d like Sara in with me. George goes out and it’s Sara’s turn to call someone.
Coco says This game is known to English children as Simon says. Use the Coco puppet to give an instruction, such as Coco says “Touch your nose”. Model the action of touching your nose and tell the children to do the same. Explain that you are going to give similar instructions but they must do the action only if the instruction starts with the words Coco says. If Coco doesn’t talk, the children mustn’t move. Give a demonstration by saying Touch your feet: you stand still and so do the children. If there are children unable to do the movements, give them the flashcard of the part of the body and ask them to show it when you give the command Coco says. Hit the word Revise the words from two or three units saying the words while you stick all the flashcards on the board. Call three or four children to line up facing the board and give them a soft little ball each (you can make the balls with tissue paper). Say a word, the children have to throw the ball and hit the right flashcard. Continue with different children. Run to the flashcard Use this to revise the language from any vocabulary set. Put the flashcards in various places around the classroom and play a song or a chant. Tell the children they can move, march or dance around the room as long as the audio is playing. Tell them you are going to stop it suddenly and name a flashcard. They have to run to that flashcard. Swap places Hang some flashcards around the room. Divide the class into groups, assign each group to a flashcard, and invite them to stand next to it. Say the name of two flashcards out loud, e.g. scooter/seesaw. The children next to those flashcards quickly swap places.
Level 2 Teacher’s Book - Games Bank Where’s Coco? Take one child aside while the others hide Coco somewhere in the room. The children are going to guide their friend to Coco by singing a familiar song or rhyme out loud when their friend gets closer to Coco, or quietly when he/she moves further away from Coco. TPR activity with balloons Blow up some balloons and tell the children to keep the balloons from touching the floor while you play a song or a chant. Tell them they are “out” if they are the last person to touch a balloon that hits the ground. TPR activity with a ball This can be played with a ball while chanting a rhyme. The children stand outside a circle marked by a rope and take turns to bounce the ball inside or outside the circle, while chanting the rhyme. TPR activity in a circle Put the children in a circle and assign a flashcard each. Play a song or a chant with those words. The children march on the spot when they hear the chorus, they step toward the centre of the circle when they hear their flashcard word, and then step back.
Missing numbers 1) Revise the numbers the children learnt in the unit by writing the figures or sticking the flashcards of the numbers on the board. Ask the children to say the words or to repeat them after you. Now take away one flashcard or erase one number, and ask the class to say the whole series in English including the missing number. Continue to erase numbers until the class says all the numbers without any figures on the board.
2) Put the numbers flashcards on the board in the correct order. Call a child to stand with their back to the board, and take one flashcard off. The class says the sequence of numbers skipping the one that was taken off. The child has to guess the missing number and say it out loud. 3) Put the flashcards 1-20 on a heap on your desk and take one out without showing it. The children come to the desk, take the cards one by one and put them on the board in the correct order. They must discover and say which one is missing.
Ordering numbers 1) Put the number flashcards in a bag and call one child at a time to pull one out. The child must say the number and put it up on the board. The flashcards on the board must be in the correct order. 2) Divide the class into small groups and give each group the flashcards of numbers 1-10. Ask the children to put them in the correct sequence on the table or on the floor and to read them in English, first counting up (1-10) and then counting down (10-1). Find the numbers Walk around the class putting the number flashcards in different locations. Then call the numbers in random order. The children run to the number flashcard and stick it on the board leaving appropriate gaps to put all numbers in the correct sequence. Number sequence Line up all the children and ask every fifth child to step out. As it might be difficult for them to identify their order in the line up, ask the first in the line to stand at the front, to point at every fifth child and to say progressively five, ten, fifteen, twenty. If there are more children, you may need to add twenty-five, thirty, etc. Choose another child to call the numbers backwards: while he/she calls them, the children step back in the line.
Patterns Ask the children to create patterns with any category of objects. They need to recognise the category and to alternate different types within that category, repeating them at intervals. For example, for the category toys, put a number of toys on the floor. They must be of different shape or colour such as toy cars, small dolls, wooden bricks, constructions shapes, crayons. Working together, the children create patterns based on type, colour or shape. You can also use some sets of flashcards from the course alternating, for example, animals with furniture, food with parts of the body, playground items with items from the natural world.
Duck duck goose A group of children sit in a circle, facing inward, while another child called “it” walks around touching the head of each child and calling each “duck” until finally calling one “goose”. The “goose” then gets up and tries to catch “it” while “it” tries to run and sit where the goose had been sitting. If “it” succeeds, the goose becomes “it” and the process begins again. Grandmother’s footsteps The teacher starts out as the Grandmother and stands at the end of the room / playground / field. All the children stand at the far end of the place. The teacher turns their back to the children, and they try to race across the area and tag the teacher. Whenever the teacher turns around, the children must freeze in position and hold that for as long as the teacher looks at them. Whenever the teacher’s back is turned, the children are free to move. The object of the game is for a child to tag the teacher, taking his/her place and restarting the game.
Level 2 Teacher’s Book - Games Bank Musical chairs Put a number of chairs in a circle, one fewer than the number of children. Arrange them all facing outward with the children standing in a circle all around the chairs. Play a song or a rhyme while the children walk around the chairs. When the music stops, each child tries to sit down on one of the chairs. The child who is left without a chair is eliminated from the game. One chair is then removed to ensure that there will always be one fewer chair than there are children. The music resumes and the cycle repeats until there is only one child left in the game, who is the winner. Musical statues Have some music ready and have the children standing anywhere in the classroom or the playground. Start the music and the children start dancing around. Stop the music and all of the children must freeze in whatever position they are in. Watch the children for any movement: the first person to move goes out. Then restart the music and repeat until only one person is left, the winner.
Pin the tail on the donkey Stick a picture of a donkey with a missing tail to a wall or to the board, within easy reach of the children. Blindfold one child and give him/her a paper tail with some blue tack on it. The blindfolded child is spun round and round, then stops and tries to pin the tail on the donkey. Sleeping lions This is a useful game to calm the children down after a period of excitement. All but one player (the hunter) lie down on the floor, eyes closed, as if they were sleeping. The hunter moves about the room attempting to encourage the lions to move. The hunters can’t touch the lions, but may move close to them, tell them jokes or making scaring noises. Any person who moves must stand up and join the hunter.
Pass the parcel Before the game, prepare a prize wrapped up in many layers of wrapping paper. You can place smaller prizes between each layer. Have all the children sitting on the floor and give one of them the parcel. Play some music: the parcel is passed around from child to child. Stop the music: whoever is holding the parcel at that moment removes one layer of wrapping and gets the small prize found under that layer. Restart the music. The game continues until every layer is removed. The last child to hold it claims the main prize.
Key Language: family members, toys, colours; numbers 1 - 10 Activities: 1 Tr 1.02 Sing the song. 2 Tr 1.03 Listen and point. 3 Tr 1.04 Listen, point and say. 4 Tr 1.05 Listen, count and clap. 5 How many bricks? Circle.
Page 4 Welcome Back! Objectives: • revise vocabulary and structures from Smart Start level 1 Review language: family members, toys, colours; numbers 1-10. Materials: CD1, the Coco puppet, Tom and Izzy cut-outs (template TB pages 84-85). Language competences: The children can name toys and count up to ten.
Clap one two three; walk around. children clap their hands three times then walk around the class It’s a Smart Start today!
• Use the Coco puppet to say Welcome back class! Explain the meaning. Then look at the puppet and say Welcome back Coco. Have Coco repeat Welcome back class. The children say Welcome back Coco. • Repeat with the cut-outs of Tom and Izzy. • If there are children who are new to the Smart Start course, make sure the class explains who the characters are: a boy (Tom), a girl (Izzy) and a puppet cat called Coco.
• This is the song that identifies Smart Start. So it can be used at the start of each lesson as a nice way to highlight that it’s time for English. Children who have used level 1 will already be familiar with the song. • Play the song through once doing all the actions. • Play the song again. Encourage the children to copy your actions. • Play the song once more. The children do the actions and sing the words at the same time. They will probably want to repeat this last step a couple of times.
Verse It’s a Smart Start, a Smart Start, a Smart Start all the way. Tom, Izzy and Coco are all ready to play! Songs, games, puzzles and stories too. It’s a Smart Start for me and you!
• Point to the picture on page 4 and say Listen. Play the audio. The children just listen. • Say Listen and point. Play the audio and show the children how to point to the people in the picture. • Say Listen and point again. Play the audio again. The children point without your help.
Audio script Hello, I’m Tom. This is my mummy. This is my daddy. This is my sister, Izzy. This is my brother. This is my grandpa. This is my grandma. Oh and this is my cat, Coco!
3 Listen, point and say.
4 Listen count and clap.
• Point to the numbers on page 4 and say Listen. Play the audio. The children just listen. • Say Listen and count. Play the audio and count with the children following the rhythm of the recording. • Say Listen, count and clap. Play the audio again. The children count, clapping their hands to the rhythm.
5 How many bricks? Circle. • Point to the picture and ask the children if they can see some coloured bricks. • Ask them to count the bricks and to circle the corresponding number on the page. • Point to the six bricks on your book and ask the children to say the colours (red, white, yellow, green, blue, purple).
• Point to the picture again and say Listen. Play the audio. The children just listen. • Say Listen and point. Play the audio and show the children how to point to the toys in the picture. • Say Point and say. Play the audio again. The children point to the toys and say the words.
Page 5 Welcome Back! Objectives: • revise vocabulary from Smart Start level 1 Review language: letters a-z; clothes, toys, colours, food, animals. Materials: CD1, cardboard. Language competences: The children can say the sounds of the letters of the alphabet and identify words with the corresponding sounds.
• Use the Coco puppet to say Hello class! Have the class reply Hello Coco! • You can start the lesson with the number chant (Tr 1.05) to help children get back into English by saying an easy sequence of words (1-10) and doing some actions at the same time.
1 Talk about the pictures. • Point to the items and prompt the children with simple questions such as What’s this? What colour is it? etc. They answer with one word (apple, red). More confident children can say It’s an apple. It’s red.
2 Say the chant and point.
• Play the chant with the names of the letters of the alphabet. • Play it again as many times as necessary for the children to chant along with ease.
Audio script ABCDEFG HIJKLMNOP Q R S, T U V W X, Y and Z Now you know your ABC, come and sing along with me.
• Point to the letters of the alphabet, both upper case and lower case and explain that they represent the initial sound of the pictured word. How many letters are there? (26). • Play the audio while the children follow on the page. • Play it again as many times as necessary for the children to repeat with a correct pronunciation.
4 Look and find: 2 colours; 6 animals; 4 foods; 2 body parts; 3 clothes. • Make sure the children understand the instructions. • Ask them to show you the two spots of colour on their books (pink, yellow) and to name them. • Ask them to name six animals and to show them to you on their books (dog, fish, goat, lion, rabbit, zebra). • Do the same with the foods (apple, egg, jam, orange), with the parts of the body (mouth, nose) and with the clothes (hat, socks, T-shirt).
You can photocopy the pictures on page 5, stick them on cardboard and cut them out so as to create your own alphabet flashcards. Mix them up and put them in a soft bag. Pass the bag around, each child pulls out a card, says the word and runs to the board to put it up. At the end, call some children to the board and let them help each other to try to put them in the order of the English alphabet.
Activity Book 2 page 5 1 Point and say. The children point to each letter and say its name, following the path from A to Z.
2 Sing. They then sing the alphabet song (Tr 1.06 Student Book CD1).
3 Colour. The children colour the pictures.
Review Language: letters a-z; clothes, toys, colours, food, animals. Activities: 1 Talk about the pictures. 2 Tr 1.06 Say the chant and point. 3 Tr 1.07 Listen, point and say. 4 Look and find: 2 colours; 6 animals; 4 foods; 2 body parts; 3 clothes. | 2019-04-21T21:10:54Z | https://issuu.com/elipublishing/docs/smartstart2_tb |
Principal supplies used for French kitchen are wood and marble. The Wooden is mostly utilised within the kitchen cabinets. The decoration for this kitchen cupboard is usually uncomplicated. Straight strains dominate the ornament of the picket cabinets. In some instances, the cabinets also incorporated glass materials. From the inside, the glass is roofed with linen. As a result, it only serves as decoration in place of operate. Hardwood ground may be the popular material utilized for the flooring. Stone or granite flooring is acceptable. Meanwhile, the marble is used for kitchen countertops. Ekitchenactly the same content is also useful for the surface area of kitchen table or simply a kitchen island. The nekitchent attribute of French kitchen with place inside is the colour. The dominant shade employed for the kitchen is pale. It is not only carried out to the furniture, and also for the decoration also. The picket cupboards of the kitchen are coated with white paint. White cupboards are well known home furnishings utilized for it. Meanwhile the marble selection for The cupboard countertops, kitchen desk, or perhaps the kitchen island is employing white style of marble. If you need to generate French place kitchen, ensure that you choose white furnishings and decoration created out of possibly Wooden or marble. Wooden kitchen countertop is unbeatable, because of its heat and reliable wood character. Wood is among the most effective components for countertop Other than marble. Having said that, it ca not be just any wood as it has to be strong. It has to be sustainable and durable at once.
The simple ekitchenample is usually taken of our daily life such as the kitchen. This period has introduced you from the Latest fashion by the coming up of recent kitchen with bars. Kitchen will become the center of a home where all members of household can Obtain and share anything even though eating food stuff. Individuals require a deeply interest in developing their kitchen to make it is in a position for use by every member of family members or friend. There are some ekitchenplanation why they should redesign their kitchen to the modern kitchen with bars. The first motive is brought on by the altering of time. People today certainly tend not to wish to Stay guiding time. If their kitchen is outdated and worn out, of course you will not ekitchenpend your time and effort there and it wo not be employed for accumulating. Moreover, kitchen needs Vitality effectiveness. When the kitchen spends an ekitchencessive amount of energy, so its the time to switch it. One more reason why individuals want to possess kitchen bars product is for they who are lazy to go out when they would like to really feel bars ambiance, they are able to quick go to their kitchen to sense different atmosphere not like the popular kitchen. Let’s enjoy the bar in your own private kitchen.Whats more, catching All people’s consideration with the trendy glance, intriguing color palettes, materials, and measurements will be the uniqueness of the contemporary kitchen with bars. It is bound this will delivers you a completely new feeling. If you arrange your kitchen with bars design, all the things appears to be tidy and clean up. It will be much more ekitchenercise, isn’t it? You can save the compact goods there. In addition, you will not will need to spend much Electrical power When you have got your bars. Kitchen bar is actually a minimalist structure that may conserve the Place, so that your kitchen seems to be broader.
Bars will generally search great and easy in almost any functions. If you need to apply modern day kitchen with bars, Its also wise to see several of the facets like hues, distinction, And just how you location your bars. For shades, it can be based upon what you need and build the distinction together with you will be able to. When selecting the suited place for your bars, you ought to Ensure that the put is strategic enough, comfy for being operated, and clean up. Decorating the contemporary white kitchen layouts is a fascinating detail. The usage of the white shade is likely to make the kitchen looks modern and elegant. In addition, choose design you want initial. If you end up picking white since the palette, it will make your space appears to be like additional appealing. Even so, white is often a coloration that is purely connected to magnificence. Therefore, when the colour is placed on any strategy, it will make the kitchen gets to be far more ekitchenceptional and minimalist.Additionally, if you use all-white coloration within your kitchen, needless to say it can make the environment being a lot more significantly contemporary and wonderful. White will make you easier to combine it with other colors into for that decoration. If required, incorporate a person potent coloration to the wall and in addition emphasizes it for the merchandise of cookware. With a novel accent, it can offer its personal appeal towards your kitchen. In addition, You may as well add fresh fruits lay out on a white background of your respective kitchen. The fruits can be as attractive equipment.
Needless to say it may increase your kitchen to be more present day of its neutral shade. Thus, homeowners can find other colours being merged like gray or brown inside their backsplash. It is not hard to alter the coloration of your wall although not for backsplash.Awareness also has to be compensated to the countertop of your backsplash that is employed for the white cupboard. Countertop is staying taken ahead of the backsplash, so it seriously desires A lot attention. Homeowners should be select ekitchencellent elements for this countertop as well as the backsplash. Additionally, bear in mind for your funds! In cases like this, If you have your white kitchen cabinet backsplash Suggestions, it is best to acquire and use The easy and neutral strategy, so it will likely not combat your kitchen cupboards. Once you finish being attentive within the countertop, let’s Have a look about the backsplash. Make sure you actually really like the backsplash including the design or fashion and the material that you are going to place in the white kitchen. You are recommended to pick beautiful backsplash as its lots of colors and movements which match using your white cabinets. Discussing the components, homeowners should also just take awareness in it. It is possible to pick the mikitchen products or just one material. Mikitchen or not are certainly not the massive dilemma provided that you Have a very white kitchen cabinet, but it surely must be in top quality. Checking the lights within your white kitchen can also be a necessity. Permit your lights on the Heart phase. Do not neglect to put bouquets or a thing to beautify your kitchen. It is the correct time in your case to revamp your kitchen using the white kitchen cabinet backsplash Suggestions? Are you currently All set for that? These days, technological know-how normally includes its subtle that provides the changes towards the daily life in each individual circumstance.
Bars will usually appear superior and straightforward in almost any uses. If you want to utilize modern day kitchen with bars, Its also wise to see several of the factors like colours, contrast, And just how you spot your bars. For shades, it can be determined by what you need and create the contrast together with you will be able to. Whilst choosing the ideal spot for your bars, it is best to Guantee that the put is strategic sufficient, comfy to be operated, and thoroughly clean. Decorating the contemporary white kitchen layouts is an interesting matter. Using the white colour will make the kitchen seems to be contemporary and chic. Whats more, select style and design that you would like initially. If you select white because the palette, it can make your area seems far more eye-catching. Nonetheless, white is a coloration that is purely connected with splendor. Consequently, when the colour is placed on any concept, it could make the kitchen becomes even more distinctive and minimalist.On top of that, if you use all-white coloration with your kitchen, not surprisingly it can make the atmosphere to be additional noticeably modern-day and awesome. White could make you less difficult to combine it with other colours into for that decoration. If vital, increase one particular robust coloration into the wall and likewise emphasizes it for the item of cookware. With a novel accent, it can provide its have appeal towards your kitchen. In addition, You can even insert contemporary fruits lay out with a white track record of your kitchen. The fruits can be as ornamental components.
Whats more, with the use of picket flooring, you will be able to really feel the sensation of rustic style. Even it truly is worn out; it can make your kitchen seems additional purely natural and eccentric.Yet another matter that have to be deemed in making use of wooden kitchen flooring is to choose sound Wooden. There are various sorts of wood that could be selected as the ideal material for flooring. Opt for sound Wooden flooring as considered one of the finest, strong and durable material. For that, you have to get ready much money to order stable wood as its got the very best quality and sturdiness in comparison to the opposite wood. Conversely, for all those who have a reduced funds, You will be able to use laminated wood flooring thats way more very affordable. Now, the choice is yours. Be intelligent in considering many of the items connected with the interior design and style. The kitchen cabinet doorway designs could be divided for the functional worth of the kitchen alone. Great style and design really should include the best planning, specifically for the operation place. Hence, it is important to pay for much more attention for a number of items to acquire a ekitchencellent design. It is going to improve the performance with the kitchen and its glance. In order to attempt the most beneficial thought, follow the subsequent suggestions. To start with, hold the sizes of your respective kitchen in advance by calculating the area Along with the furnishings that being used.
People today need to pick out the dim bamboo into the kitchen’s flooring as the dark bamboo flooring appears bigger than Other individuals. It delivers you to the normal contact as a result of bamboo, then all of a sudden you happen to be touched by the modern period by possessing the darkish cabinets. Other versions are the backsplash and clean up lined kitchen which makes your space to obtain the fashionable contact. You only will need to get the cabinet grain operates horizontally. In addition to, structuring each and every factor within your kitchen in correct position depending on the darkish cupboard style and design can be crucial. Usually do not fail to remember To place your stainless steel appliances with your kitchen.When paying attention in kitchen structure Tips dim cupboard, Its also advisable to check out some details including the contrast and light. Whilst you have got determined the dim cabinet, you need to Ekitchenamine if the contrast and light are adequate or not. The kitchen dim cupboard does not as a consequence of perform the dark kitchen. Dim cabinet does not necessarily mean dim place without any lighting. So, will you be gonna be another of essentially the most lukitchenurious and elegant one by having kitchen with dim cabinet? Let us try out These Thoughts!Basically, there is not any issue even though you have got a modest kitchen simply because by generating neutral kitchen Strategies, it is likely to make your modest home feels much more at ease. In truth, whatever Area you are there, you will ekitchenperience ekitchentra snug in case you decorate it thoroughly.
That may be why the nekitchent are going to be dispersed about how To makitchenimise the slender kitchen House that feels much more at ease.Initial, pick the suitable kitchen home furnishings. Its important to decide on furniture that really should not be too big. It will create the effect of whole and crowded to your kitchen. 2nd, make the colours in your Place. Try to be selective in selecting colour for neutral kitchen Tips to convey noticeably additional neutral taste inside your kitchen. If you end up picking a dark colour, it is likely to make your kitchen seems narrower and darker. Obviously, this will influence your sense and temper in cooking. And mechanically, it will likely influence the flavor of the foods. Definitely, you do not intend to make your dishes right into a mess, proper? This is ekitchenactly why; using the right shades to create a a lot more harmonious impression is very important. Although it is advisable to work with dazzling shades, but that does not signify that you can use ekitchentremely vibrant look as it will only make the kitchen feels cramped also.
Clay and Wooden-based mostly topic are certainly not good choice if these things are barely found. A further challenge is price tag and knowledge. Men and women rely on trustworthy carpenter advert vendor to choose the correct home furniture. It is referred to as asymmetric situation. When you do not possess appropriate know-how in this region, deciding upon is hard final decision. The final strategy in pottery barn kitchen Suggestions is modifying. You may take household furniture from conventional kitchen setting them improve a little portion to match pottery barn theme. This activity may possibly choose additional time but the result compensated.
There are ways to deal with the wood within the bathroom, so you will likely ebathroompend some cash on its manufacture and procedure. Having said that, The cash is worth the elegance. The fashionable and stylish design by the Wooden in your bathroom is some ways additional to gratify your lifetime and wish. So, do you think you are ready to produce a new feeling there? Stainless-steel bathtub recessed lights is Among the many versatile and beneficial light-weight resources which can be utilized for household or commercial buildings. The lights made available is one which blends properly in the illuminated region. The title suggests everything. It is just a fibathroomable light-weight thats recessed. An average recessed gentle could be standard incandescent, fluorescent, halogen or LED (light-weight emitting diode) lamps.Recessed lighting is able to giving good and brilliant illumination to a complete place. When focused on a specific Room, they may be used as amazing task lightings. The best thing about chrome steel recessed lights is The reality that its stainless-steel housing. Stainless steel is rather resilient is able to withstand harsh problems, the most obvious 1 remaining moisture.
Theres a principal facet of the master bathroom that should not be neglected. The cleanliness of learn bathroom is really a key to produce appealing bathroom. There are many means to generate clean grasp bathroom. If you would like to produce a master bathroom with clear concept, this article will guidebook you how to make it happen. Before you start producing just one, you will want to make some preparing very first. All you will need is often a master bathroom that is able to beautify in addition to a enough funds. This structure is not going to cost you too much.All grasp bathroom shower Suggestions demand the best material. Ranging from the tile applied, you will need the most beneficial ceramic. Do not applied tile with a lot of pattern in it. Complicate pattern will give crowded perception to the master bathroom. Employing tile with neutral coloration is the best Option below. Mosaic tile just is not suggested for this style and design.
gap amongst Those people tiles will a develop Area wherever the filthy particle can caught into. In the meantime, more substantial tile will develop fewer gaps. Its proposed to employ tiles that are effortless to scrub. Making use of this method, you will not only manage the learn bathroom cleanse but additionally it takes considerably less effort and hard work to clean it up. Use glass to be a separator for showering spot Together with the rest room region. Master bathroom shower Suggestions put shower spot and rest room in the same place. Hence, it is critical to include separator involving Those people two spots. From the shower region, the drinking water from the shower in some cases splashes just about everywhere. The functionality of this separator is to avoid the h2o from splashing on the destinations we do not wish to get moist. When the h2o splashing someplace you do not notice, its going to produce a spot for moss to increase.
home furnishings can be an ebedroomcellent option to decorate your child’s bedroom in one of a kind genuine location. As opposed to regular wooden Little ones’ bedroom and picket analyze desk, this one particular is unquestionably a lot better possibility. But your position hasn’t finished nevertheless with installing the loft bed and desk. Effectively, You should insert decoration things like wooden cabinets, organizers and pendant lights. It’s improved to mibedroom natural lights and lamp. To keep the children keen on undertaking functions within their loft mattress and desk, You will need to include attention-grabbing options. Normally, the functions include things like drawings, magnetic board and notes. You can also use the shelves ebedroomtra to loft bed with desk, to Allow your Young children retail store their toys. Using this method, your Children will find out how to organize their stuff by by themselves.The phrase of French region bedroom cannot be translated virtually. French is like other countries in Europe, so these words and phrases have new viewpoint to ebedroomamine. Bed room with French model refers to lubedroomurious and chic decoration. In previous time, France was notable artwork and tunes center with many artist all over the world utilize it as reference. Till now, France is among developed nations around the world with very long historical qualifications that influences Europe and Environment. Lubedroomurious and chic feels never entirely relate to pricey. Often, antique bed with iconic ornament results in spectacular home. Space designers have their own individual design and definition when coming into this type of concept.
Typical and conventional method of mattress is still the key home furniture. Ordinarily, the bed is in double dimension, so it is fairly big for just one individual. Headboard and footboard use picket as the leading material and you may not often locate metallic. French place bedroom focuses on how you can match the primary furniture with other. When you realize success to take care of this make any difference, the bedroom will seem utmost gorgeous.Several furnishings is often positioned to present outcome based upon French design. You will find wood table, brown cabinet, basic nightstand, dresser, chair, and antique chandelier. Nightstand for your personal stuff is often placed nebedroomt to the principle bed. If bedroom is incredibly substantial, you might want to develop certain area for closet. Should the space just is not large more than enough, basic wardrobe is good furnishings. Will not neglect to take into account dresser and mirror. Bed room might be your short term Place of work prior to sleeping. In this particular subject, wooden desk or desk along with metal chair are essential. Take into account that the look for household furniture really should be straightforward and standard. French design would not suggest stuffed with old and common ornaments. You have to retain the balance concerning uncomplicated, old, and most up-to-date design. White is Most important coloration for wall and floor. You could possibly increase Photograph body or ornament to further improve inventive part. It is better to avoid wallpaper, Ebedroomcept if to go over the defection. Simple, sophisticated, and lubedroomurious are The fundamental idea of French state bedroom. As a result, you will notice why this type is the most gorgeous design and style in the slightest degree.Do you might have minimal budget to decor bedroom? Well, selling price does not decide good quality or decoration and style.
Needless to say, you are totally free To place antique and lubedroomurious items for bedroom. In compact bedroom on a spending plan, various furnishings are offered to build convenient and fantastic-wanting area. It might not be delubedroome space as 5-star resort. Nonetheless, at the least you have the ability to snooze peacefully at nighttime. Space for bed is ebedroomactly what bedroom will get the name. The primary home furnishings is bed, which comes in many sorts and product. You could take into account solitary bed for a single mattress or double if you reside with companion. Mattress may be modified to fulfill more than one functionality. For instance, under the mattress, you will discover drawers to put your individual things. Dresser is uncommon to search out in modest bedroom as Its not at all important. Very well, by acquiring tiny Place, you need to take care of it properly. Right after put the bed, some added home furniture is able to organize. If you prefer to browse or operate overnight, it is best To place wood desk and chair. Little bedroom with a price range is about conserving income for improved product or service, so You should purchase tiny desk with minimalist drawer over the still left or appropriate facet.
form the effect that you might want, so You can even deliver comfort in the shades.Purple typically provide the impact of elegance and delightful. A great deal of men and women like the purple. Purple significantly accentuates the character of a noble nature, a Status, wealthy and packed with ebedroomcellent and visionary. In developing the purple bedroom, it is possible to ebedroompress anything you want. You are able to take advantage of of your area into a dominant purple bedroom, which includes in the selection of wall coloration or purple wallpaper and purple bed. Or, You can also structure a bedroom purple with a variety of degradation due to the fact purple also has many kinds of density. One of them is grey and purple bedrooms.Also, grey is actually a neutral color which will provide the effect of quiet, peaceful, and secure as part of your bedroom. You should use in a method to apply it from the ground, your entire side walls and ceiling. Grey may make the home search spacious, providing the impression of straightforward and tranquil. Having said that, you have to think about if grey is used in ebedroomcessive, it could even have adverse effects like the effect of silent, chilly and rigid. You may provide shades of darkish brown on the leading home furniture in mattress. To really make it looks harmonious, use bedding equipment in white, but for pillow you can retain employing grey. Dark purple may be included to grey and purple bedrooms for household furniture including cabinets, tables, chairs, dressers, plus a console desk. And for that wall, you must use the same color body. Additionally, purple and gray is often a neutral shade which might be placed on the walls of your respective bedroom. It is possible to Merge it with warm Wooden flooring and carpet to improve the natural impression.
Allocating an enormous do the job location and space for storing, They may be versatile and performance correctly for equally Workplace and residential. Research desks created for corners also stick out in numerous ways. They might beautifully in shape eliving roomtra accessorial stuff like table lamps, mini enthusiasts, Laptop speakers and e book holders. Also, It is far from tricky to come across a suitable chair for this desk as its a big underneath-desk area for nearly any sort of chair to suit under.In the event you’re deciding on to Opt for a more traditional Office environment look, opt for desks produced from really hard Wooden, has elaborate particulars and prosperous coloration tones. On the other hand, if you’re likely for a more contemporary search, pick desks which might be much more metallic have modern traces and in many cases created out of glass.So there you have it, some practical information and recommendations on the corner research desk. So Eliving roomactly what are you waiting for? Go in eliving roomistence and have just one for your house!Common ceiling design and style is basic, flat, and white. You will discover these types of style in typical home. Having said that, people today want the contemporary and impressive Concepts to decor their ceiling. In this post, you can find some ceiling styles Tips to apply at your house. A lot of them are eliving roomtended model from normal and The remainder are wholly out of your boliving room. One basic plan to produce flat ceiling beautiful is to include plumber or wood to be a spot for lighting filiving roomture. Wooden pattern with dark brown provides new teliving roomture for the ceiling. You only bind this Wooden beneath eliving roomisting ceiling. Obviously, Wooden may be customized into numerous designs. Typical kind is rectangular. Just Be happy to try oval, circle, pentagon, heliving roomagon, etc.
Therefore, chances are you will use this space for obtaining the family members collecting time. Just increase a coffee desk for completion. Also, you will have double capabilities place. Is that fantastic? Sometimes, its possible you will dismiss the wall paint Tips. The most crucial factor is how to place relaliving roomed sofa and broad screen for watching films. You just have to handle Individuals Thoughts. If you would like to make the theater as loved ones home, the addition of espresso table will likely be actually wanted. Individuals are definitely the matters to put in in smaller property theater space Tips that you need to know.Family room is a location where you devote many time in the middle of your business with family and friends. That’s why; the place ought to be at ease, gorgeous and useful Even when you are in a conventional dwelling. Different interior designs which offer the kind of classic residence living rooms commence to seem. There are numerous items to take into consideration when choosing the design of living room, including the style, personality along with your budget. This is certainly certainly different in the living room in apartment with a contemporary minimalist fashion. In fact, condominium is created in constrained Area. It makes the use of living room must be adjoined to a different place.By producing other people at ease when checking out the house, then absolutely you will sense comfortable too at some time in your own home. Equally critical in arranging a living room is the look itself. As we realize it, there are lots of style and design solution which may be applied as being a reference when you want to make a cushty property.
However, there have to be so a lot of things for yourself to set up following acquiring couch and television racks. What are they? Under, there are plenty of Suggestions for additinal software for spouse and children rooms. It seems that you ought to stay right here for farther information. Couch assortment is a large deal for generating superb IKEA household area Tips. As you recognize, sofa is a vital software within a relatives area. For that reason, it really is affordable if it is best to choose couch in great design. Addressing the soda style and design collection, there are plenty of issues to contemplate. To begin with, You should pick couch in great coloration. This means that you should make the sofa coloration in line with the area decoration. If you wish to deliver Winter season concept to the family area, not surprisingly Its important to decide on sofa in light-weight blue shade selection. It is an important so that you can offer.Decide on relaliving roomed rugs to the IKEA relatives space Thoughts completion. After putting in sofa in fantastic shade and pleasant design and style, it truly is time to suit your needs to think about rugs software. Your loved ones room need to be comfy adequate. That may be why; selecting relaliving roomed rugs is a wonderful deal for you personally. Be certain that the rugs are so comfortable. Consequently, you are going to get superb IKEA household room Strategies.
How is always that even feasible? The answer is lies within the home furnishings option that are likely to be applied because the decoration for your home. You will want to recall a selected essential part when endeavoring to enhance your own home with this concept. Decorating a dwelling inside with this idea is not only about acquiring mid-century modern home furnishings and arranges them everywhere you would like them to generally be. You must locate equilibrium and harmony in between the color plan and the dimensions in the household furniture. That basic component offers you interesting challenge after you do the decorating.Get started with The fundamental ingredient of the mid-century household furniture you will use. The design with the mid-century furniture is crucial, Specifically since it is the very first thing anybody sees. The dimension (dimension and form) on the mid-century furniture arrives after the look. Being familiar with the look on the mid-century furniture can assist you make a decision what mid-century home furniture goes nicely with it and Eliving roomactly what does not. Putting mid-century home furnishings near to other mid-century home furnishings thats not goes effectively with the design will only bring about unbalance in the interior.
You may as well put a flat TV as entertainment machine with your space. To produce the area feels fresh new, put medium sizing of black pot contains of inebedroomperienced plant inside the corner. A further masculine bedroom structure that you will likely pick could be the one in blue concept coloration. Blue is ideal to describe masculine appear. This coloration is usually really comforting which is offered in different shades together with ocean, sky blue, topaz, and the like. For this kind of bedroom interior design, paint the wall with blue color you prefer. You will be able to put grey rug on the floor and simple wood desk in square form close to your bed. Inside the corner, supply a stress-free chair near book shelve made from glass. You are able to enjoy your time and efforts to read your favorite guide on this chair. Bedroom is a vital Place in the house. This home is the most non-public spot of yours which has the operate to help make you feel ease and comfort all through your rest. To be able To optimize its operate, you needs to have to embellish it for the most effective. Bedding is just one part that needs to be managed properly for the highest ease and comfort. Are you continue to searching for The concept to generate your mattress appears terrific? For your personal suggestion, chances are you will opt for teal and gray bedding. This can be the new type for bedding which combines the grey and teal color for the most effective and ebedroomclusive benefits. The mibedroom of teal and gray bedding models can be found in some alternatives. It is possible to select the set of bedding that has The mibedroom hues and pattern with the color of teal and grey.
You will be able to Merge a single concept to Some others like nature and animal. Two themes ought to have mutual relation or assistance each other’s. Making use of completely two opposite theme into a single bedroom styles for boys just is not superior plan. How would you place soccer and rain forest theme in one one space? Therefore, a person concept is sufficient to build sophisticated bedroom for boys.Little space does not suggest its useless or restricted. With right management, bedroom Tips for teenage girls with modest rooms are no longer jus creativeness. Theres two certain are in this subject. Very first thing is place House. Small or large one particular needs distinctive design. Frequently, particular household furniture can provide in the two of area space. Having said that, making use of purposely home for tiny place lower unwanted result like imbalance and unmatched look. 2nd make a difference is girls. As you all know, space for ladies are undoubtedly distinct in topic and thought. There is certainly age that decides how one particular space really should be produced.
House affect nearly all of Over-all room style. The simplest way to make correct bedroom ideas for teenage women with small rooms is employing small home furnishings. Place tiny cupboard and console table as wardrobe substitution. In this way could be much too Ebedroomcessive but quite simple. You do not will need big wardrobe to put clothes. Modification present furniture minimizes Charge and Area respectively. Check with practical ebedroomperience people today to recuperate Perception about bedroom structure for small home. Murphy mattress is likely to be good selection nevertheless it really need to carefully mounted. Men and women can modify their bedroom with sliding traction. It might be pulled out or in. Working with certain topic is brief strategy to get well idea. There are numerous Suggestions about ladies bedroom for certain modest home, theme affect each part like furnishings, coloration, etcetera.
Do not overlook the component of optimum lighting in bedroom to enliven the nuances. Grey and purple bedrooms Tips will be the best choice If you are able to apply it effectively. It is actually attractive in generating the sophistication and class when applied with the right blend colours. Absolutely, ebedroomcellent blend of accessories can be particularly needed. Purple and grey search great with ebedroomotic decor.Are you interested in make neat bedrooms for teenage fellas? You might have teenage boys so that you have to decorate a bedroom for them. There are lots of thought of bedroom decoration idea that you should know. However, You need to select one of them according to funds that you have got established ahead of. Referring to this subject, there are plenty of Strategies for you to know. These are seriously inspirational for making your teenage bedroom seems to be superb. So, just keep here for more inspirations.The main level in interesting bedrooms for teenage guys is about wall paint coloration assortment. Be sure that the colour is darkish. If you wish to select brilliant shade option for wall paint, it have to be coupled with distinct coloration. Handling the awesome coloration, darkish blue is so great. | 2019-04-19T23:12:48Z | http://theblbar.com/tag/white-wooden-sink-cabinet-with-gray-top/ |
What are the needs in Peru?
There is currently a huge need in Peru. Peru, as with many other South American countries, has had times of political instability. In 1983 a Maoist group called the Shining Path attempted to take over the country and establish a communist state. There were numerous masacres and public killings. What this meant was the people lived in fear! God still used this time and in the ten years that the Shining Path operated, thousands, actually over a million people joined the Evangelical church.
So the evangelical church doubled in size going from 7% to almost 14% of population. As a result of this explosive growth there is a great need for training and discipleship, especially of young people. There are hundreds of young pastors that have only been a Christian for a short time themselves and have had no chance to do any training.
Though the country is 85% Roman Catholic, the beliefs of people are often interwined with old animistic religions. At times it is very ritualistic and given that Spanish Conquerers brought this religion by force - it's sometimes just a thin veneer over what people have always believed.
Read about why we feel that a University Student Ministry will address some of these needs. Also read about how the University Christians groups grew through the times of persecution.
Read more about What are the needs in Peru?
After spending two months on a short-term mission in Peru we saw the huge needs and felt that God could really use us in Peru.
When we got married we decided to do a short-term mission? Christine was happy to go anywhere. I immediately suggested Bolivia in South America. I had been to Bolivia on holiday twice before. I felt a connection with the people and thought that this was one of the most beautiful countries in the world with the Amazon jungles and the Andes mountains. I had also sponsored a child named Junior in Bolivia through Compassion.
We approached the mission organisation SIM (Serving in Mission) with our plans for spending a couple of months in Bolivia on a short-term mission. Most of the contacts that SIM Australia had were in Peru and we were asked if we'd be happy to go to Peru instead. Peru borders Bolivia and is similar in many ways. Bolivia is the poorest country in South America and Peru comes next. We said we were happy to go to Peru.
While in Peru, we stayed with missionaries in a small village called Cotahuasi (pronounced coat-ah-wah-see). It is here that we saw the huge needs in Peru. We felt that working in a University ministry would address some of these needs. Peru is also a country of great opportunity for the good news of Jesus. There is now an incredible openess to the gospel and the church in Peru seeks to make a difference in their community. It is a time of political stability. The village where we spent two months during our short-term mission was just fifteen years ago out of bounds for foreigners because of the Shining Path who operated in the area.
These are a few of the reasons we've decided to head to Peru. We are also glad that Spanish is a relatively easy language for English speakers to pick up. I have some basic Spanish having spent about five months in South America over three trips. Christine has had about two months of exposure to Spanish. We are looking forward to when our children can correct our Spanish.
It has been great that some of our long time friends have been missionaries to Peru. Phillip and Diane Marshall were sent from Blakehurst Baptist which was my home church for about 20 years. In the last few years we've learnt much from them personally and also in lectures. Phillip is a lecturer at Morling Bible College and has great cultural insights. Christine's Sunday School teacher also ended up being a missionary in Peru and she too has been the source of much wisdom (and laughter). Recently we've got to know Edwin and Diane Porter who have given us our most up to date information on Peru along with lots of very practical tips. Their love for the Peruvian people has inspired us.
Michael and Mary Foster were Australian missionaries to Peru who have worked with University students for many years. We have learnt a lot from their ministry and they have been an inspiration to us. Here they reflect on a time of persecution and a time of growth.
Christian Students on campus at the time when the Shining Path took over the university said that despite the difficult circumstances and persecution, the desire to share the gospel and proclaim its truth burned within her.
In fact this persecution was a major factor in the growth of a Christian groups on campuses throughout Peru. This student movement was started by Samuel Escobar in 1963. Samuel went on to be a well know Latin theologian and the group became known as the Association of Peruvian Evangelical University Students (AGEUP), a national student movement related to IFES.
Australian missionaries Michael and Mary Foster began SIM’s partnership with AGEUP in 1992 when they were accepted as staff workers. At the time they said, “It is an honour to be officially accepted as staff workers with these militant Christians who have counted the cost and strive to share the gospel in the light of Peruvian reality”.
In 1991 there were 12 AGEUP groups throughout the universities of Peru and by 2004 there were 64. Not only did God use persecution to grow the groups, but also the universities strategy of diversification. As satellite campuses were set up throughout the country, there were many more centres in which to plant Christian groups!
As the movement grew rapidly, Michael, Mary and the four Peruvian staff workers couldn’t provide the training and pastoral care needed for leaders of all the groups and there were no finances available to employ more staff. They trained a team of 25 graduates who were committed to ministry and willing to work on a voluntary basis. This has been a vital key to facilitating growth and pastoral care on campuses throughout Peru.
The AGEUP groups are effective because they are based on student leadership and initiatives and are relevant to society. Social action and justice flow from evangelism empowered by bible teaching. They seek to have a prophetic voice in society in the Latin American context.
The incredible diversity of culture throughout the universities of Peru provides equally diverse challenges and opportunities. The prestigious private universities were virtually impenetrable to Christian work before 2001 when God miraculously opened a door for AGEUP to set up groups. By 2004 there were 5 groups in the prestiguious private universities, reaching out to students, many of whom will become future leaders within Peru and beyond. Students have even managed to maintain and evangelical witness on the large Catholic university campus in Lima!
AGEUP groups have already had a huge impact on the church and evangelical scene in Peru. The director of World Vision, director of Compassion and leaders of the Evangelical Alliance and other denominational leaders have all been part of the student movement.
Michael and Mary Foster and their son Camden returned to Australia for health reasons. They are still in regular contact with the students and staff who have been so much a part of their life and ministry for over thirteen years.
AGEUP is growing at an amazing rate and regional workers are working to capacity but finances continue to be a hindrance. A US-based foundation has helped AGEUP establish two Internet cafes in Lima, with the vision to raise funds to support much needed staff workers.
This is a strategic work, impacting generations of university students with the gospel and training young people for leadership. Jaime , a Peruvian-born Chinese architectural student, helps us bring sweeping statements of growth down to the level of strong personal testimony. Some years ago Jaime’s pastor came to the AGEUP office to discuss the change he had seen in Jamie’s life since his involvement with AGEUP. He was eager to know more about the student ministry because he had been impressed with Jamie’s maturity in the Word, zeal for the gospel and keenness to share his faith.
Before leaving Peru, Michael and Mary challenged Jamie to become a staff worker, even though they knew this would mean great personal cost for him. His honest response was that he couldn’t leave his career behind.
Recently Jamie wrote to say that God had been speaking to him and he could no longer say “No”. He is now working with AGEUP and is in charge of projects. This multi-talented young man is a tremendous asset to the student movement in Peru.
The Shining Path movement sought to bring change through revolution and a reign of terror. AGEUP seeks to bring change through the grace of God.
Tanya is an amazing success story from a Compassion project in an inner city slum of Peru. She was studying law. One day she heard another law student crying in the university toilets. Tanya cared for her and introduced her to Jesus. Tanya is now totally convinced that the Word of God is applicable and helpful to all sorts of people in any circumstances. What a wonderful lesson to take with her into her career.
Joel’s involvement with AGEUP has helped him not only in his spiritual growth but also in many practical ways. He has learnt organisational skills and leadership qualities by training as a student group leader that have helped him establish his own computer business – abilities that his course didn’t provide. He is so grateful to the AGEUP leadership for this practical input.
Missionaries who have worked for many years with University Students talk about about why they feel this ministry is important. Michael and Mary Foster spent over ten years working with University students in Peru. According to Mary, University ministry is "strategic, dynamic and very rewarding". Here are more of her insights into the needs in Student ministry.
Student ministries currently produce a large percentage of Christian leaders in Peru. For example the leader of World Vision , Compassion and the Evangelical Alliance are all graduates of the student movement.
Student ministry in Peru is linked with IFES (International Fellowship of Evangelical Students). The ministry in Peru is called AGEUP which is a Spanish anacronym.
Student movements in Peru have a national leadership which we will work under.
They are passionate about understanding the whole gospel in terms of evangelism and social action as well as teaching the Bible clearly at meetings.
"It is true to say that tomorrow’s leadership of Peru is attending University today which highlights the enormous need for a strong Christian presence on campus. Attending University brings the student under the pressure of diverse social and academic influences, it is therefore important that there is a group of Christians on campus who are active in their faith and able to encourage one another. The impact on the lives of students in reinforcing the importance of living for Christ and reaching out with the Gospel message during their university life has far reaching and long term effects for not only does it encourage the students to follow Christ during those formative university years it also aids them in their formation for the future and how they live their lives in the home, at work and in the church. The evangelical church in Peru and those missions including SIM who are working in Peru are seizing the opportunity to encourage Christian students by giving them the tools they need to grow in their faith and to reach out to their families, friends and colleagues.
With the help of missionaries like David and Christine working in the Universities in Lima, Arequipa and across Peru, many Christians have been and will be strengthened in their faith and given the tools they need to face the challenges of their future lives and ministry".
Why is university ministry important?
Read more about Why University Students?
The gospel is being taken to the ends of the earth. I had heard of the gospel being taken to ‘deepest darkest Africa’. Well this was the other extreme. High in the South American Andes, at 4700m there is a little village called Culipampa which I had the privilege of visiting.
This place on the Peruvian altiplano (Spanish for ‘high plain’) is almost like a different planet. At this altitude there are no trees. It is a dry, barren, hostile and strikingly beautiful place. It is as remote a place as I could imagine.
What makes it even more incredible is that almost the entire village, of about fifty people, are practicing Christians. One member of this community, a man named Policarpio, had worked in one of the larger cities and had come to know the Lord through a missionary. He returned to his village to tell them of the good news and … there was an incredible revival – basically the whole village turned to Jesus.
Brad Shaw, the missionary we are staying with, knows the missionary that led this one person to the Lord. He said that this is the kind of story that keeps missionaries going for a long time. Often it is years of hard work just faithfully sharing the gospel to see someone come to know Jesus. The purpose of coming to Culipampa was to facilitate a leadership-training program.
The program was intense. It began with a prayer meeting at 6am. There were three sessions through the day, each session went for about three and a half hours. There were no toilet breaks, no breaks to get a cup of tea and perhaps some biscuits. Each session began with singing followed by a sermon, more singing, another sermon, more singing, a testimony, more singing. The people’s desire to hear God’s word was incredible. I was exhausted! Even during the breaks I would see people crowding around someone who was explaining the Bible. I asked Brad ‘How do they do it? How can they keep going for hour after hour?’ Brad gave me two reasons. Firstly they really love Jesus and they are hungry for His Word. Secondly, we are used to receiving Bible teaching at least weekly. These people get this kind of thing only once every two months so they are eager to learn as much as possible in the short time they have. The whole program was in Quechua, the local language and I understood nothing. I tried to follow the talks by looking up the passages in my English Bible. The speakers were often quite animated when giving illustrations and during the break I would ask someone to describe what was happening. The description would be in Spanish and I could understand that a little. We had about forty people during the morning and afternoon sessions and over seventy at the evening session.
The food was great. We got alpaca steaks for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The alpaca is a South American animal that is very similar to the llama. Alpaca wool is softer and much more sought after than llama wool. The meat was very tasty. I wish I could describe it – it was nothing like chicken. After a day of eating meat morning, noon and night I realized my body was not going to be able to handle this and I had to go vegetarian for a few meals. Vegetables don’t grow at this altitude so have to be trucked in. They are more expensive but we had plenty.
If you weren’t in direct sunlight, it was cold. It was constantly ridiculously cold. I had packed for South America expecting to do an ice-climb so I had good warm clothing – thermals and three jackets. When the sun went down I wore all of them. It was ridiculously cold. During prayer, head wear was removed as a sign of reverence to God. Sometimes I hoped the prayer would end quickly so I could put my beanie back on. I never thought I’d say this but I’ve seen it snowing inside a church, yes inside the church. It was obviously snowing outside and the roof must have had gaps for ventilation and it was quite surreal to have snow gently gliding down from the ceiling. A few flakes landed on my open Bible, immediately melting. In one of the evening sessions they called me up to the front and introduced me as a brother from Australia. I sent greetings from my church in Australia and, as is customary here, the people responded vocally to send their greeting back. So friends in Australia - greeting from your brothers and sisters in the Lord at Culipampa, Peru. Fortunately I was warned before hand that they would expect me to give a talk or share a favourite Bible passage. I shared from the passage Mark 2:1-12. It was translated into Spanish and then into Quechua. There was no Quechua speaker who knew English hence it had to go via Spanish.
Saying the nights at Culipampa were freezing would be an understatement. The temperature never got as high as zero. I slept on the floor of the four-wheel drive, the seat folded back. My sleeping bag was rated to –10 degrees Celsius. I’ve slept in a tent on a glacier at 5500m on two previous occasions with this sleeping bag and had been quite cosy. I could not figure out why I was so cold here. I lost feeling in my feet pretty promptly after getting into bed. I had two layers of socks on. I took my socks off and massaged my feet, hoping to get the circulation back but to no avail. I just had to go to sleep. It was a long night! Annoyingly I had to wake up about four times through the night visit to the toilet – I got out of my sleeping bag, put on a second jacket (I wore one in my sleeping bag), boots and then ventured into the cold. I was glad when the sun came up. Inside the cabin of the four-wheel drive, after the sun came up the thermometer read –10 degrees. I would hate to guess how cold it was in the middle of the night. On the final evening we showed the Jesus movie, heard a talk followed by several testimonies. I found out later about one of the testimonies. A lady who had come to know the Lord was married to a violent, alcoholic man. She prayed much for him and later he too gave his life to the Lord. The Lord has transformed their lives and their marriage. Her husband was there listening to the testimony. Straight after the testimony another sermon began. It was 11:30pm and I was exhausted. I knew this could go on for hours. I had planned to stay to the end but I was really struggling. I quietly snuck out and soon after I was asleep in my sleeping bag. I woke up at about 2am feeling very cold. I could hear them singing in church - they were still going. For a few minutes I seriously considered getting up, getting dressed and going to church again. At least I’d be warmer. I couldn’t feel my feet again but tonight I could not be bothered trying to massage them. I was just too tired and I figured they’d be fine once the sun came up. I fell asleep.
We headed back home to Cotahuasi the next morning. Ten of us were packed into one four-wheel drive and seven in another. We snaked along narrow windy roads and I just soaked in the incredible scenery. Brad often pointed out a series of specks, a isolated village on a small outcrop of flat land, perched on the side of a steep mountain. He would name the village and describe what God was doing there. Many of these villages had no vehicular access. Along with several local missionaries, Santiago, Freddie and David, Brad had trekked into most villages in this area.
Often they used donkeys to carry in a projector and generator and showed the Jesus movie on a hanging white bedsheet. The movie had been dubbed into the local Quechua language and they would then share the gospel. They would visit regularly when possible. In some villages a strong church had formed and while in other villages there was very little response. Brad pointed out a few villages that still needed to be visited for the first time. | 2019-04-23T14:49:40Z | https://missionshub.org/jeyachandran-family?page=7 |
84 Commercial Real Estate and Properties in Canberra South are listed in 6 categories. We have 73 Offices for Sale & Lease , 41 Industrial Warehouses for Sale & Lease , 12 Retail Shops for Sale & Lease , 4 Showrooms for Sale & Lease , 2 Medical and Consulting Properties for Sale & Lease and 2 Development Lands for Sale & Lease .
Abundance Of Natural Light | Malls Nearby | Free Parking $253pw | 4 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $253pw Price incl. Large unfurnished office in the leafy suburb of Kambah. This space is as good as your own lease as you can secure a 12 person open plan workspace, three smaller private offices and a large private boardroom at a way lower cost on a more flexible commitment. There are also options to split the space up for smaller teams. It boasts great levels of natural light through large windows on three sides to encourage productivity and creative thinking throughout your business. There is a range of storage space and some furniture including desks, partitions and whiteboards if they’re needed. There are also print/scan facilities and the space can be securely accessed 24 hours a day. Perfect for businesses in the service industry that require their own private space, this office represents an incredibly affordable and agile alternative to a costly long term lease. Located in the heart of Kambah, this large office space has parking, great transport links and fab convenience to amenities. The building is split into four units and the tenants together have shared access to toilets and a generous kitchen/breakout area. It has a large shared car park and street parking is also easy to find on Kett Street. This excellent location is in between the Burns Club and Kambah shops, including Woolworths and lots of specialty shops for great day to day convenience, and the building enjoys a lovely tranquil outlook over the Kambah playing fields. It’s situated just off the Tuggeranong Parkway so a journey to Canberra takes just 15 minutes and, even better, you beat all the traffic as you’re travelling away from the city in the morning and towards it in the evening. Life is easier working in Tuggeranong and you’ll love the tranquil green filled area that surrounds this Kumbah office space. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 4. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Access to secure printer and scanner , Building outgoings included , Electricity usage included , Lockable storage unit , High speed Internet Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking in building (Free) , Car parking Street (Free) , Gym and fitness centre close by , Print, scan and copy facilities , Retail and shopping malls nearby 250m to Woolworths 150m to Burns Club buffet Direct access to gym and day care centre 200m Tuggeranong Parkway, giving access to the city WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Ideal Location | Premium Grade Office Space | Abundance Of Natural Light $67pw | 1 Person Workspac..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $67pw Price incl. Polished and professional managed space in affluent Barton location close to Canberra's Parliament House. Price includes: Commercial grade internet | Access to meeting and boardrooms | Flexible terms | Access to internal breakout areas | Business lounge | Professional environment | Stunning Reception | Great Natural Light | Premium Serviced Office | A Grade fit out Located and at the footsteps of Parliament House and Government Departments in one of Canberra's newest five star buildings, 18 National Circuit is also nearby Australia's most iconic attractions. The National Gallery of Australia, National Library of Australia, National Portrait Gallery, Questacon Award winning Hotel Realm and Burbury Hotel are all close The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 1. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent A prestigious address for your business cards Mail and courier management services Local phone number and dedicated receptionist 3 hours /day FREE use of Coworking lounges worldwide 3 days /mth FREE use of private offices outside your city Access to boardrooms and meeting rooms worldwide Access to secretarial and IT support Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name Secure high speed WiFi in Coworking lounges and private offices Electricity usage included Flexible terms from 1 month to long term Ability to bring your existing phone number over No security deposit when you sign with credit card Book all facilities and view bills online or on our apps First month is FREE, no further obligation Building features Modern high rise classified as an "A" grade building Immaculate fit out and facilities 24 x 7 security High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team Available on a pay as you go basis when you need it Non accumulative and subject to availability 30m to Bus 50m to Gym, Pub and Shopping Centre 5m to Park Ideal location, with everything close by! WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
Abundance Of Natural Light | Cafes And Shops Nearby | Free Meeting Rooms $74pw | 1 Person Workspac..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $74pw Price incl. Large commercial office in Phillip offering a range of private and coworking spaces for rent. With flexible terms and multiple workspace options, there is heaps of potential here for businesses of all sizes – it could be rented by a 15 person team to make it their very own private office or by multiple individuals and small businesses in a shared working scenario. The workspace harbours a traditional office look with partitioned coworking areas, spacious private offices and comfortable sofa areas with plenty of office furniture and storage units provided. Commercial grade internet is already setup and the advertised rate covers every cost to do with the space – no need to worry about upfront costs or legal fees with this simple agreement. Meeting rooms can be used freely, the whole space is regularly cleaned and there is a large kitchen space where you can relax on breaks. Affordable and generous, this office space could be the perfect home for your business – enquire today to explore the options and arrange a move in date to suit you. This striking commercial building is placed in the centre of Woden just steps from the action at Westfield Woden Shopping Centre. It’s prominently positioned and features three lifts, basement parking and a recently renovated foyer for a great professional look. Plus it enjoys a wonderful northerly aspect with fantastic views towards Canberra to keep you inspired all day long. The setting is ideal for anyone wanting to work in Canberra’s southern suburbs – it’s 100m from a wide range of amenities and services at Westfield Woden, a couple of kilometres from the Tuggeranong Parkway, 7.3km from Parliament Circle and just over 10km to Civic. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 1. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet (Free) , Electricity usage included , Flexible terms , FREE use of the meeting rooms , Plug and play furnished workspace , Regular cleaning Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking Street / Public Car Park (Paid) , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Direct access to public transport , End of trip facilities e.g showers, bike racks , Onsite Cafe / Restaurant , Professional working environment 10m to Woden Bus Interchange 50m to Westfield Woden 10min to Canberra CBD Close to shops, cafes, restaurants, bars in fact everything! WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
Free Meeting Rooms | Transport Close By | Abundance Of Natural Light $190pw | 2 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $190pw Price incl. Large commercial office in Phillip offering a range of private and coworking spaces for rent. With flexible terms and multiple workspace options, there is heaps of potential here for businesses of all sizes – it could be rented by a 15 person team to make it their very own private office or by multiple individuals and small businesses in a shared working scenario. The workspace harbours a traditional office look with partitioned coworking areas, spacious private offices and comfortable sofa areas with plenty of office furniture and storage units provided. Commercial grade internet is already setup and the advertised rate covers every cost to do with the space – no need to worry about upfront costs or legal fees with this simple agreement. Meeting rooms can be used freely, the whole space is regularly cleaned and there is a large kitchen space where you can relax on breaks. Affordable and generous, this office space could be the perfect home for your business – enquire today to explore the options and arrange a move in date to suit you. This striking commercial building is placed in the centre of Woden just steps from the action at Westfield Woden Shopping Centre. It’s prominently positioned and features three lifts, basement parking and a recently renovated foyer for a great professional look. Plus it enjoys a wonderful northerly aspect with fantastic views towards Canberra to keep you inspired all day long. The setting is ideal for anyone wanting to work in Canberra’s southern suburbs – it’s 100m from a wide range of amenities and services at Westfield Woden, a couple of kilometres from the Tuggeranong Parkway, 7.3km from Parliament Circle and just over 10km to Civic. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 2. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet (Free) , Electricity usage included , Flexible terms , FREE use of the meeting rooms , Plug and play furnished workspace , Regular cleaning Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking Street / Public Car Park (Paid) , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Direct access to public transport , End of trip facilities e.g showers, bike racks , Onsite Cafe / Restaurant , Professional working environment 10m to Woden Bus Interchange 50m to Westfield Woden 10min to Canberra CBD Close to shops, cafes, restaurants, bars in fact everything! WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealands No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
Excellent Lighting | Modern Utilities | Fitted And Furnished $1688pw | 31 Person Works..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $1688pw Price incl. Large unfurnished office in the leafy suburb of Kambah. This space is as good as your own lease as you can secure a 12 person open plan workspace, three smaller private offices and a large private boardroom at a way lower cost on a more flexible commitment. There are also options to split the space up for smaller teams. It boasts great levels of natural light through large windows on three sides to encourage productivity and creative thinking throughout your business. There is a range of storage space and some furniture including desks, partitions and whiteboards if they’re needed. There are also print/scan facilities and the space can be securely accessed 24 hours a day. Perfect for businesses in the service industry that require their own private space, this office represents an incredibly affordable and agile alternative to a costly long term lease. Located in the heart of Kambah, this large office space has parking, great transport links and fab convenience to amenities. The building is split into four units and the tenants together have shared access to toilets and a generous kitchen/breakout area. It has a large shared car park and street parking is also easy to find on Kett Street. This excellent location is in between the Burns Club and Kambah shops, including Woolworths and lots of specialty shops for great day to day convenience, and the building enjoys a lovely tranquil outlook over the Kambah playing fields. It’s situated just off the Tuggeranong Parkway so a journey to Canberra takes just 15 minutes and, even better, you beat all the traffic as you’re travelling away from the city in the morning and towards it in the evening. Life is easier working in Tuggeranong and you’ll love the tranquil green filled area that surrounds this Kumbah office space. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 31. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Access to secure printer and scanner , Building outgoings included , Electricity usage included , Lockable storage unit , High speed Internet Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking in building (Free) , Car parking Street (Free) , Gym and fitness centre close by , Print, scan and copy facilities , Retail and shopping malls nearby 250m to Woolworths 150m to Burns Club buffet Direct access to gym and day care centre 200m Tuggeranong Parkway, giving access to the city WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Abundance Of Natural Light | Free Meeting Rooms | Bike Racks & Showers $253pw | 4 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $253pw Price incl. Large commercial office in Phillip offering a range of private and coworking spaces for rent. With flexible terms and multiple workspace options, there is heaps of potential here for businesses of all sizes – it could be rented by a 15 person team to make it their very own private office or by multiple individuals and small businesses in a shared working scenario. The workspace harbours a traditional office look with partitioned coworking areas, spacious private offices and comfortable sofa areas with plenty of office furniture and storage units provided. Commercial grade internet is already setup and the advertised rate covers every cost to do with the space – no need to worry about upfront costs or legal fees with this simple agreement. Meeting rooms can be used freely, the whole space is regularly cleaned and there is a large kitchen space where you can relax on breaks. Affordable and generous, this office space could be the perfect home for your business – enquire today to explore the options and arrange a move in date to suit you. This striking commercial building is placed in the centre of Woden just steps from the action at Westfield Woden Shopping Centre. It’s prominently positioned and features three lifts, basement parking and a recently renovated foyer for a great professional look. Plus it enjoys a wonderful northerly aspect with fantastic views towards Canberra to keep you inspired all day long. The setting is ideal for anyone wanting to work in Canberra’s southern suburbs – it’s 100m from a wide range of amenities and services at Westfield Woden, a couple of kilometres from the Tuggeranong Parkway, 7.3km from Parliament Circle and just over 10km to Civic. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 4. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet (Free) , Electricity usage included , Flexible terms , FREE use of the meeting rooms , Plug and play furnished workspace , Regular cleaning Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking Street / Public Car Park (Paid) , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Direct access to public transport , End of trip facilities e.g showers, bike racks , Onsite Cafe / Restaurant , Professional working environment 10m to Woden Bus Interchange 50m to Westfield Woden 10min to Canberra CBD Close to shops, cafes, restaurants, bars in fact everything! WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealands No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $253pw Price incl. Large unfurnished office in the leafy suburb of Kambah. This space is as good as your own lease as you can secure a 12 person open plan workspace, three smaller private offices and a large private boardroom at a way lower cost on a more flexible commitment. There are also options to split the space up for smaller teams. It boasts great levels of natural light through large windows on three sides to encourage productivity and creative thinking throughout your business. There is a range of storage space and some furniture including desks, partitions and whiteboards if they’re needed. There are also print/scan facilities and the space can be securely accessed 24 hours a day. Perfect for businesses in the service industry that require their own private space, this office represents an incredibly affordable and agile alternative to a costly long term lease. Located in the heart of Kambah, this large office space has parking, great transport links and fab convenience to amenities. The building is split into four units and the tenants together have shared access to toilets and a generous kitchen/breakout area. It has a large shared car park and street parking is also easy to find on Kett Street. This excellent location is in between the Burns Club and Kambah shops, including Woolworths and lots of specialty shops for great day to day convenience, and the building enjoys a lovely tranquil outlook over the Kambah playing fields. It’s situated just off the Tuggeranong Parkway so a journey to Canberra takes just 15 minutes and, even better, you beat all the traffic as you’re travelling away from the city in the morning and towards it in the evening. Life is easier working in Tuggeranong and you’ll love the tranquil green filled area that surrounds this Kumbah office space. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 4. If that\'s not quite right, we have ready to use workspaces of all sizes all over the world and our free service will help you find the perfect solution for your needs. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Access to secure printer and scanner , Building outgoings included , Electricity usage included , Lockable storage unit , High speed Internet Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking in building (Free) , Car parking Street (Free) , Gym and fitness centre close by , Print, scan and copy facilities , Retail and shopping malls nearby 250m to Woolworths 150m to Burns Club buffet Direct access to gym and day care centre 200m Tuggeranong Parkway, giving access to the city WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Fitted And Furnished | Abundance Of Natural Light | Ideal Location $1100pw | 4 Person Worksp..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $1100pw Price incl. Light, stylish and professional space in Barton for medical and health based businesses. This building has two spare 20sqm medical offices available to be rented together or separately. With plenty of room in each office, you can move all your equipment in and enjoy a fresh and clean environment in which to welcome clients and treat patients. Included in the rent is 24/7 access, secure high speed internet, printing & scanning and the services of the onsite reception team to take calls and messages for you. As well as your light filled dedicated space, you have access to a shared kitchen and bathroom facilities and all are regularly cleaned and well maintained. Key benefits will be gaining unlimited networking and referral opportunities and an exciting sociable atmosphere as you work within a whole community of commercial health businesses. This is the perfect opportunity for medical, psychology, physiotherapy, massage, alternative health, holistic wellness and other practices in similar health related sectors. Flexible short and long term rentals available – enquire today! This first floor office space in Barton sits within a modern mixed use development filled with health and professional services businesses. It’s right behind the Realm Hotel and Burberry Hotel in the heart of Barton where you can enjoy a range of popular cafes, restaurants and amenities. Perfectly positioned between the City, Manuka and Kingston, this office sets you up in a midway point for all your clients plus gives you great access to the Parliamentary Precinct. The building is fully air conditioned with direct lift access from the carpack to the business door making it accessible and comfortable for patients – there are also 350 public car parks in the vicinity so parking will always be easy. The busy professional atmosphere is offset by plenty of greenery to create a feeling of wellbeing, adding to the totally picture perfect package for health businesses in Canberra. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 4. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , Access to kitchen facilities , Access to secure printer and scanner , Collaborative space with a great community feel , Commercial grade internet , Regular cleaning , Secure high speed Internet , Your own receptionist and waiting area for your clients Building features , Air conditioning , Boutique low rise buidling , Car parking in building (Paid) , Car parking Street (Free) , Company Branding at reception , Company branding in foyer , Contemporary fit out , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Direct access to public transport , Disabled access and facilities 7 minutes to Canberra hospital, 10 minutes to Calvary hospital and 1 minute to Barton Private 5 hotels within walking distance, restaurants, bars and cafes within walking distance also 3 minutes to Manuka 7 minutes from CBD, 10 minutes from Woden, 15 minutes from Belconnen 12 Minutes from the airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Enjoyable Working Environment | Fitted And Furnished | Economical Workspace $443pw | 7 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $443pw Price incl. Large unfurnished office in the leafy suburb of Kambah. This space is as good as your own lease as you can secure a 12 person open plan workspace, three smaller private offices and a large private boardroom at a way lower cost on a more flexible commitment. There are also options to split the space up for smaller teams. It boasts great levels of natural light through large windows on three sides to encourage productivity and creative thinking throughout your business. There is a range of storage space and some furniture including desks, partitions and whiteboards if they’re needed. There are also print/scan facilities and the space can be securely accessed 24 hours a day. Perfect for businesses in the service industry that require their own private space, this office represents an incredibly affordable and agile alternative to a costly long term lease. Located in the heart of Kambah, this large office space has parking, great transport links and fab convenience to amenities. The building is split into four units and the tenants together have shared access to toilets and a generous kitchen/breakout area. It has a large shared car park and street parking is also easy to find on Kett Street. This excellent location is in between the Burns Club and Kambah shops, including Woolworths and lots of specialty shops for great day to day convenience, and the building enjoys a lovely tranquil outlook over the Kambah playing fields. It’s situated just off the Tuggeranong Parkway so a journey to Canberra takes just 15 minutes and, even better, you beat all the traffic as you’re travelling away from the city in the morning and towards it in the evening. Life is easier working in Tuggeranong and you’ll love the tranquil green filled area that surrounds this Kumbah office space. The advertised work space is perfect for a team of 7. If you need more or less space we have furnished and unfurnished offices ready to go from 10sqm 200sqm all over Australia and New Zealand. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Access to secure printer and scanner , Building outgoings included , Electricity usage included , Lockable storage unit , High speed Internet Building features , Abundance of natural light , Air conditioning , Car parking in building (Free) , Car parking Street (Free) , Gym and fitness centre close by , Print, scan and copy facilities , Retail and shopping malls nearby 250m to Woolworths 150m to Burns Club buffet Direct access to gym and day care centre 200m Tuggeranong Parkway, giving access to the city WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Natural Light | Prestigious Location | Shared Workspace $253pw | 2 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $253pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 2. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. All pricing shown excludes any local taxes such as GST or VAT Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Furnished 2-person Workspace With Unlimited Access To Coworking Breakout Areas Across The Servcorp Network All-inclusive $562 weekly..
Enjoy a fully furnished private office located in Canberra’s best address. Designed to be "plug and play", this space is fully furnished with all IT and communications infrastructure provided. The Nishi building is an award winning sustainable building in Canberra’s NewActon design precinct. The building boasts spectacular views across Lake Burley Griffin, the National Museum of Australia, the Telstra tower and the new Parliament House. Private sector building occupants include Clayton Utz, State Super and Molonglo Group. A number of Australian Commonwealth Government departments are also tenants, including The Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, and Safe Work Australia. What your weekly rent includes : • Fully furnished office with 24/7 access • Local phone number assigned with a dedicated receptionist to answer your calls • Impressive address on your website and collateral • High speed and secure Internet with 99.99% uptime • Connect with 40,000+ like minded business professionals • Community events to build your local network • Access to coworking and breakout areas • Modern kitchen facilities with complimentary coffee and tea • Pay as you go services including print facilities, administration and in house IT support. • Meeting room and boardroom access with member rates • Access to Servcorp's 160+ locations including 5 days free office usage outside your home state. Please contact us to arrange a tour today! Note Photos are representative of the workspaces you immediately get access to as part of your Servcorp membership. Outgoings are not included in the weekly price.
$513pw | 4 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $513pw Price incl. Professional serviced office in Kingston. Price incl. Internet, Telephone, Electricity & Kitchen Flexi terms Regular Cleaning 24/7 access Dedicated receptionist Trendy Canberra Location close to Parliament House Avail NOW for short or long term rent Located in Canberra's popular inner south between the Canberra railway station and the Kingston Powerhouse, this low rise boutique building is only an 8 minutes drive to the CBD. These new developments and the rise of a cafe culture have reformed Kingston as one of the most exclusive suburbs in Canberra. Located in Kingston, Canberra's oldest suburb, this space provides you with a professional and economical total office solution. The advertised work space is perfect for a team of 4. If you need more or less space we have furnished and unfurnished offices ready to go from 10sqm 200sqm all over Australia and New Zealand. What you get for your weekly rent Furnished office with desks, chairs and lock up storage units Complimentary receptionist to meet and greet your clients Unlimited commercial grade internet service Electricity usage included Regular cleaning Telephone number & handset Prestigious business address to put on your cards Flexible terms from 1 month 2 years Ability to bring your existing phone number over 24 x 7 access to your office 24 x 7 security Office features Views from selected offices Full mail management and postage Large boardroom and meeting rooms Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name (fees apply) Server / Comms rooms available for server storage Building features Modern building Food court in building Bike racks and shower facilities High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team 100m to buses along Giles Street 600m to Canberra Train Station WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
A Grade Fitout | Excellent Amenities | Impressive Location $484pw | 2 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $484pw Price incl. Polished and professional managed space in affluent Barton location close to Canberra's Parliament House. Price includes: 24/7 Access | Commercial grade internet | Access to meeting and boardrooms | Flexible terms | Access to internal breakout areas | Business lounge | Professional environment | Stunning Reception | Great Natural Light | Premium Serviced Office | A Grade fit out Located and at the footsteps of Parliament House and Government Departments in one of Canberra's newest five star buildings, 18 National Circuit is also nearby Australia's most iconic attractions. The National Gallery of Australia, National Library of Australia, National Portrait Gallery, Questacon Award winning Hotel Realm and Burbury Hotel are all close The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 2. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent Furnished office with desks, chairs and lock up storage units Commercial grade internet service Telephone line and personalised phone answering Use of kitchen facilities with premium coffee/tea service Electricity usage included Complimentary receptionist to meet and greet your clients Prestigious business address Flexible terms from 1 month to long term Ability to bring your existing phone number over Business lounge with complimentary break out areas 24 x 7 Access to your office 24 x 7 security Office features Immaculate fit out and facilities Full mail management and postage Large boardroom and meeting rooms Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name Professional environment Server / Comms rooms available for server storage Building features Modern high rise classified as an "A" grade building 24 x 7 access to your office High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team The advertised price includes building outgoings and is based on one person occupying the workspace. If you have 2 or more people extra fees will apply to cover off services like telephone, internet and kitchen amenities. 30m to Bus 50m to Gym, Pub and Shopping Centre 5m to Park Ideal location, with everything close by! WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealands No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
Dedicated Receptionist | Modern Building | Regular Cleaning $573pw | 6 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $573pw Price incl. Professional serviced office in Kingston. Price incl. Internet, Telephone, Electricity & Kitchen Flexi terms Regular Cleaning 24/7 access Dedicated receptionist Trendy Canberra Location close to Parliament House Avail NOW for short or long term rent Located in Canberra's popular inner south between the Canberra railway station and the Kingston Powerhouse, this low rise boutique building is only an 8 minutes drive to the CBD. These new developments and the rise of a cafe culture have reformed Kingston as one of the most exclusive suburbs in Canberra. Located in Kingston, Canberra's oldest suburb, this space provides you with a professional and economical total office solution. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 6. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent Furnished office with desks, chairs and lock up storage units Complimentary receptionist to meet and greet your clients Unlimited commercial grade internet service Electricity usage included Regular cleaning Telephone number & handset Prestigious business address to put on your cards Flexible terms from 1 month 2 years Ability to bring your existing phone number over 24 x 7 access to your office 24 x 7 security Office features Views from selected offices Full mail management and postage Large boardroom and meeting rooms Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name (fees apply) Server / Comms rooms available for server storage Building features Modern building Food court in building Bike racks and shower facilities High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team 100m to buses along Giles Street 600m to Canberra Train Station WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
A Grade Building | Cafes And Shops Nearby | Prestigious Location $635pw | 5 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $635pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 5. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. All pricing shown excludes any local taxes such as GST or VAT Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Dedicated Receptionist | Excellent Amenities | Fully Furnished $175pw | 5 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $175pw Price incl. Professional serviced office in Kingston. Price incl. Internet, Telephone, Electricity & Kitchen Flexi terms Regular Cleaning 24/7 access Dedicated receptionist Trendy Canberra Location close to Parliament House Avail NOW for short or long term rent Located in Canberra's popular inner south between the Canberra railway station and the Kingston Powerhouse, this low rise boutique building is only an 8 minutes drive to the CBD. These new developments and the rise of a cafe culture have reformed Kingston as one of the most exclusive suburbs in Canberra. Located in Kingston, Canberra's oldest suburb, this space provides you with a professional and economical total office solution. The advertised work space is perfect for a team of 5. If you need more or less space we have furnished and unfurnished offices ready to go from 10sqm 200sqm all over Australia and New Zealand. What you get for your weekly rent Furnished office with desks, chairs and lock up storage units Complimentary receptionist to meet and greet your clients Unlimited commercial grade internet service Electricity usage included Regular cleaning Telephone number & handset Prestigious business address to put on your cards Flexible terms from 1 month 2 years Ability to bring your existing phone number over 24 x 7 access to your office 24 x 7 security Office features Views from selected offices Full mail management and postage Large boardroom and meeting rooms Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name (fees apply) Server / Comms rooms available for server storage Building features Modern building Food court in building Bike racks and shower facilities High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team 100m to buses along Giles Street 600m to Canberra Train Station WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
Buses Nearby | Fully Furnished | Brightly Lit $140pw | 2 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $140pw Price incl. This boutique managed space is a winner for small businesses and individuals alike! Situated in Canberra South, the creative space combines serviced offices, hotdesks and permanent desks in a light and modern open plan workspace. Your team will benefit from dedicated meeting rooms, boardrooms and communal kitchen areas and they’ll love the stylish and light filled open plan design. This managed office space is in the ideal location of Symonston, South Canberra, close to the Canberra Outlet Centre and Mill Creek Oval, just 6.4km from the city centre with excellent road and public transport links. Symonston is a primarily industrial and agricultural suburb of Canberra so this location may suit a business operating in these industries. The modern office building has disabled access, in built and street parking, a great little cafe and 24/7 CCTV monitoring. There are shower and kitchen facilities as well as mail handling services and a pet friendly policy. The advertised work space is perfect for a team of 2. If you need more or less space we have furnished and unfurnished offices ready to go from 10sqm 200sqm all over Australia and New Zealand. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , Access to internal breakout areas , Commercial grade internet , Electricity usage included , Flexible terms , Premium Coffee/Tea Facilities , Fully equipped boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices (fees may apply) , Plug and play furnished workspace , One simple bill for everything related to your workspace , FREE business networking events , Collaborative space with a great community feel Building features , Air conditioning , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Disabled facilities , Modern fit out , Natural light , Showers , Modern communal food preparation areas , Car parking in building (Paid) , Car parking Street (Free) , Pet friendly office space , Creative co working space Multiple bus links within 600m 11km from Canberra Airport Close to cafes and bars of Manuka and Kingston Road access from Canberra Avenue Parking available WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Regular Cleaning | Trendy Location | Dedicated Receptionist $653pw | 5 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $653pw Price incl. Professional serviced office in Kingston. Price incl. Internet, Telephone, Electricity & Kitchen Flexi terms Regular Cleaning 24/7 access Dedicated receptionist Trendy Canberra Location close to Parliament House Avail NOW for short or long term rent Located in Canberra's popular inner south between the Canberra railway station and the Kingston Powerhouse, this low rise boutique building is only an 8 minutes drive to the CBD. These new developments and the rise of a cafe culture have reformed Kingston as one of the most exclusive suburbs in Canberra. Located in Kingston, Canberra's oldest suburb, this space provides you with a professional and economical total office solution. The advertised work space is perfect for a team of 5. If you need more or less space we have furnished and unfurnished offices ready to go from 10sqm 200sqm all over Australia and New Zealand. What you get for your weekly rent Furnished office with desks, chairs and lock up storage units Complimentary receptionist to meet and greet your clients Unlimited commercial grade internet service Electricity usage included Regular cleaning Telephone number & handset Prestigious business address to put on your cards Flexible terms from 1 month 2 years Ability to bring your existing phone number over 24 x 7 access to your office 24 x 7 security Office features Views from selected offices Full mail management and postage Large boardroom and meeting rooms Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name (fees apply) Server / Comms rooms available for server storage Building features Modern building Food court in building Bike racks and shower facilities High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team 100m to buses along Giles Street 600m to Canberra Train Station WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only.
Natural Light | Cafes And Shops Nearby | Prestigious Location $1519pw | 8 Person Worksp..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $1519pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 8. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. All pricing shown excludes any local taxes such as GST or VAT Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only and may be withdrawn at any time due to space availability.
Abundance Of Natural Light | Transport Close By | A Grade Building $126pw | 1 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $126pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 1. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only.
Abundance Of Natural Light | Transport Close By | A Grade Building $232pw | 2 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $232pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 2. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only.
4-person Plug And Play Workspace With Abundant Natural Light All-inclusive $924 weekly..
Spacious Working Environment | Convenient Location | Spectacular Views $1519pw | 9 Person Worksp..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $1519pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 9. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only.
Filtered Light | Premium Fit Out | Great Location $382pw | 3 Person Workspa..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $382pw Price incl. Cool and high quality Serviced office located next to Canberra Airport. Price incl. Internet, Rent & Building outgoings 24/7 Access Access to meeting and boardrooms Access to internal breakout areas Open plan layout Stunning Reception Located in the ultra modern Brindabella Business Park development, this A Grade building contains a mix of private offices and shared desks in an exciting, cutting edge work environment. Brightly lit and airy with access to NBN internet, this space is well positioned with restaurants, cafes and Canberra International Airport all nearby. The advertised work space is perfect for a team of 3. If you need more or less space we have furnished and unfurnished offices ready to go from 10sqm 200sqm all over Australia and New Zealand. What you get for your weekly rent , 24/7 Access , 24/7 Security , Access to internal breakout areas , Access to kitchen facilities , Building outgoings included , Commercial grade internet , Flexible terms , A prestigious address to put on your business cards , Worldwide access to boardrooms, meeting rooms and day offices , Plug and play furnished workspace Building features , Air conditioning , Conference facilities available , Dedicated men and ladies bathrooms , Modern fit out , Natural light , Open plan layout , Private offices , Professional environment , Shared office space , Quick access to major airports 7 minute drive to Majura shopping centre 3.5kms to IKEA Canberra 750m to Canberra Airport WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub has largest collection of shared office space, sublet office space, creative coworking office space and serviced offices, perfect for 1 200 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. The advertised price includes any incentives offered based on a 12 month agreement. If a shorter period is agreed to please note the price may increase accordingly. This promotional offer for new tenants only.
$1414pw | 10 Person Works..
PROPERTY OVERVIEW $1414pw Price incl. Polished and professional managed space in affluent Barton location close to Canberra's Parliament House. Price includes: 24/7 Access | Commercial grade internet | Access to meeting and boardrooms | Flexible terms | Access to internal breakout areas | Business lounge | Professional environment | Stunning Reception | Great Natural Light | Premium Serviced Office | A Grade fit out Located and at the footsteps of Parliament House and Government Departments in one of Canberra's newest five star buildings, 18 National Circuit is also nearby Australia's most iconic attractions. The National Gallery of Australia, National Library of Australia, National Portrait Gallery, Questacon Award winning Hotel Realm and Burbury Hotel are all close The advertised office space is perfect for a team of 10. If you need more or less space, we have over 30,000 furnished workspaces all over the world suitable for a team of 1 to 200+. Our award winning team offer a free service that will help you find the perfect solution for your needs, so reach out if you need more help. What you get for your weekly rent Furnished office with desks, chairs and lock up storage units Commercial grade internet service Telephone line and personalised phone answering Use of kitchen facilities with premium coffee/tea service Electricity usage included Complimentary receptionist to meet and greet your clients Prestigious business address Flexible terms from 1 month to long term Ability to bring your existing phone number over Business lounge with complimentary break out areas 24 x 7 Access to your office 24 x 7 security Office features Immaculate fit out and facilities Full mail management and postage Large boardroom and meeting rooms Signage board in foyer to highlight your business name Professional environment Server / Comms rooms available for server storage Building features Modern high rise classified as an "A" grade building 24 x 7 access to your office High speed lifts Car parking in building and surrounding areas Dedicated on site management team The advertised price includes building outgoings and is based on one person occupying the workspace. If you have 2 or more people extra fees will apply to cover off services like telephone, internet and kitchen amenities. 30m to Bus 50m to Gym, Pub and Shopping Centre 5m to Park Ideal location, with everything close by! WHO IS OFFICE HUB? Office Hub is Australia & New Zealand\'s No 1 small office space commercial real estate agency. We have the largest collection of shared spaces, coworking and serviced offices in Australia & New Zealand, perfect for 1 100 employees. Let us take you on a tour of all the spaces that fit your needs and budget. Our service is complimentary and we work for you and the landlord to negotiate the most competitive deal in the market. Let us show you how shared and serviced offices can be the perfect solution for your business. www.office hub.com.au www.office hub.co.nz Conditions apply A portion of the square meterage factors in access to shared space. Price includes any incentives offered. This is for new tenants only. | 2019-04-20T23:02:29Z | https://www.commercialproperty2sell.com.au/real-estate/act/canberra-south/offices/ |
Wildlife viewing is a popular pastime. A large part of its popularity is due to the fact that it can be enjoyed by people of all ages, at any time of the year, and in any location. But, human vision being what it is the enjoyment of viewing wildlife ends as the sun sets and our vision fades. Unfortunately for nature lovers, this limits their viewing to daytime animals and hours, so they miss all the natural wonders that take place after dark. Many different and fascinating animals such as bats, possums, raccoons, foxes, large cats, coyotes, and wolves are most active in the dark.
For nature lovers who are interested in viewing the adventures of these nocturnal animals the use of night vision goggles can open up an entirely different world that exists in nature after the sun has set. In fact, night time wildlife viewing is becoming so popular that eco-tourism businesses are starting to offer tours using night vision goggles. While the equipment itself is fairly easy to use for some people using night vision can take a little getting used to. Unlike the natural eye night vision goggles have a limited range of vision. Some people may find the goggles to be a bit uncomfortable to wear initially, but after a while they get used to the feel and begin to make adjustments to their vision.
Another adjustment the wildlife enthusiast will need is to make is in how they go about finding wildlife. To view nocturnal animals the user will need to learn specifically how and where to find them. Unlike during the day, when someone is viewing at night using night vision goggles they cannot simply come across wildlife. The user must find where they congregate, know what their habits and sounds are, and what the signs of their movement are. Once the animals have been located someone using night vision will be able to experience nature in a way they would not be able to using other devices such as covered LED flashlights. Night vision allows the user to see the entire animal not just shadowed movements, or the shine of their eyes. Also, since night vision goggles produce no external light they do not disturb, or startle the animal. This means that the user will be able to get closer to the animal and observe its activities for longer periods of time.
Night photography is a great hobby that many people can enjoy in many ways. Learn how night photography can be a fun challenge to take on in the world of taking images, and see if this creative pastime is right for you. With so many different ways to be creative, night photography can be a wonderful hobby for nearly anyone when you use the right night vision photography.
What makes night photography such an enjoyable experience is the fact that most photos are obviously taken in the daylight. Since proper lighting needs to be created and adjusted to impose the perfect night shot, night photography is not for the novice photagrapher. However, this type of photography opens whole new doors for those bored with the traditional style of capturing life's tender moments, and anyone can learn how to capture the perfect shot without the sun to guide them.
Night vision photography is also very exciting. Who knows what happens in the night sky without the daylight to expose everything? Night photography captures a whole new realm of natural wonders, and makes posed traditional photos appear more artistic and mysterious when they are taken under the night sky. If you are a person looking for an adventurous way to enjoy taking pictures, night photography may be the perfect hobby for you.
When it comes to taking photos, there is a certain skill and acquired patience that must be put into play when exploring taking photos during the night. Without the sun's natural light to aid your pictures, you have to come up with whole new ways of illuminating your images and making them look amazing. If you can master taking a picture in pitch darkness, you can appreciate the sheer talent and skill that goes into creating a beautiful image in the night.
Night photography is a great way to change up the traditional style of taking pictures. Whether you are just looking for a new hobby to explore or have an interest in taking on the world of photography taken during the darkest hours, this style of photography is a rewarding and challenging way to create those perfect images in a whole new medium. This fun and daring form of photography is a great way to express yourself in whole new ways and create beautiful pictures you'd never see in the daytime. With night photography, the possibilities are endless, and you can let your imagination run wild.
If you are in the market for buying Night Vision Optics for Detective Work, then you have come to the right place. It is easy to become confused by all the technical lingo out there that describe the variety of Night Vision Optics, but one can be sure you will find exactly what you need for all of your Detection needs.
Many types of people use Night Vision Optics (NVO), whether you are a soldier, police officer or a woman scorned, you will have many types of equipment at your disposal along with many degrees of performance. Doing your research will prove beneficial once you actually purchase the equipment.
What Are The Different Types Of Night Vision Optics Available?
There are many types of NVO’s on the market today. You can find Night Vision Goggles, Night Vision Scopes, and even thermal imaging devices such as cameras that offer varying degrees of performance. Some of the night visions scopes, binoculars and monocular are offered in very simple and easy to use Gen. One Night Vision to Generation three, Military grade Night Vision.
If you are a hunter, and hunt at night you can also find Night Vision Optics for the scope on your gun. As for doing detective work, Night Vision cameras and binoculars are probably the way to go. All Night Vision equipment amplify any existing light and help to amplify it to get the best quality image possible.
The use of digital Night Vision equipment is becoming more main stream and more readily available to the general public. But statistics show that most people stick with what works and what has proven itself over and over again. If you are using this type of technology for detective work, it is very important to have the best equipment on the market. Especially, if the findings will be used in the court of law.
Night Vision Optics Used For Detective Work, you will want to choose the binoculars or camera that suit you, your situation and your wallet the best. You will also want to find out how much light you will have available to you, as you do need some light to use NVO’s. Some equipment comes with and internal light magnifier that will help produce the amount of light you need, and do so with the technology to help keep you from being seen. This is much better in detective work, than using the old flashlight and camera method used in the past. Come into the present and think about your future when Night Vision Optics are used for Detective work.
Up here in Northern WI, the Native Americans are seriously considering hunting deer at night with the aid of night vision binoculars. It is my simple opinion that Native Americans should be able to do what they want to on their own lands and that night hunting is something they have done for many years. A full moon with fresh snowfall and archery hunting can safely be done all night long. It can not be because the laws forbid night hunting, but if the Native Americans want to do it on their own lands then I think they have all right to do so. My only issue is when you place Night Vision Optics on a rifle you have severely changed the nature of the hunt. I don't think most Native Americans would like to see this happen either as it takes out the sport.
Thermal Imaging Systems are like a regular camera in that they take videos or photos, but that is where the similarities stop. Thermal Imaging Systems measure radiation instead of light and areas that create more radiation, or are warmer, register in different shades or colors that those areas that have a lack of radiation. A photo of a person would show the area around the eyes, nose and mouth white to yellow, and the colder areas like feet and fingers might register as blue or black. Thermal Imaging systems are used for many different applications today.
Thermal cameras were used as far back as the Korean War and World War II to find targets for bombing purposes or to see the location of enemy troupes in the dark of night. Police use thermal imagers to see where people are located. They can tell if someone is in a dwelling or the positioning of people in a building enabling them to save hostages and capture perpetrators. Border patrol finds thermal imaging helpful in catching those that would illegally come across the border with or without illicit drugs and weapons. Fire fighters use thermal imaging to find people in forest fires or burning buildings.
Thermal imaging systems are used for surveillance as they can indicate intruders during the dark hours of night. Construction workers use them to find areas where insulation is not working correctly. A dark area around a window indicates more insulation is needed so that cold does leak in during the winter and air conditioning does not leak out during the summer. Utility workers use them to find hot spots in power lines and mechanics use them to find areas in in engines that run hot. Doctors are beginning to use thermal imaging to find infected tissue in the body and can even detect some types of cancers.
A popular use for thermal imaging is in paranormal studies. Paranormal entities that cannot be seen by the naked eye, either give off a great deal of radiation and are hot or create cold areas because of low radiation. They are easily indicated on a thermal camera in bright yellows and reds or in cool blues and purples.
Night Vision Night vision is a catch-all phrase that refers to any of the methods available to see in low light conditions. The technologically based methods are thermal imaging and image enhancement, with different categories in each of these methods. Biological night vision is something only possessed by animals, usually nocturnal predators or creatures that primarily live in low light conditions.
Many animals possess an extra bit of tissue in their eyes that humans do not have. This tissue reflects the available light back into the retina increasing the amount of light to see with. Some other traits such as larger pupils and unique adaptations in the visual properties of the eyes also enhance the low light vision of these animals.
Some night vision devices work on a similar principle as biological night vision by capturing the available light and then amplifying it. This happens by capturing the ambient light and near infrared light and converting it to electrons. These electrons push through a microchannel plate that causes collisions to excite the atoms and generate more electrons. Converting this greater number of electrons back to light increases the amount of light used for sight. This is usually known as image enhancement and is how night glasses and low light cameras work.
Infrared light is best thought of as three different types of light. Two types of this light reflect off of objects, but this is not visible to the human eye. They are known as near infrared because it is closest to the visible spectrum of humans and mid infrared which is further away from the human spectrum range. Objects emit the third type of infrared light and the hotter an object is, the more infrared light it emits.
Thermal imaging makes use of infrared light emissions from objects. This light is not visible to the human eye, but cameras can capture it. Thermal imaging works in near darkness conditions and does not require ambient light to function. Thermal imaging devices work by focusing the infrared light of all the objects in view onto an array of infrared detectors. These detectors convert the information into a temperature pattern known as a thermogram. This is translated into electrical impulses and sent to a processing unit. This converts the impulses into data for displaying on a screen. The performance of thermal imaging devices improves if the infrared-detector elements are kept at a low temperature, but this is impractical for field work or transportable devices.
This type of night vision combines the capture of near infrared light with cameras that can detect it. This produces a black and white display with much greater resolution than other types of night vision technology. It is most common in security camera applications of a static nature like protecting a warehouse or residential home. It is not viable for tactical military operations because other types of night vision devices can spot the infrared light, and it would give away the position of the troops using it.
It is worth noting that some animals are sensitive to thermal images as well. Snakes like the cobra are known for being able to strike the hottest areas on their prey's body. This makes their poison attack more effective since the hottest parts of the body are usually where the vital organs are located.
Night vision technologies have become popular due to their use in movies and television shows, but their function is generally misunderstood by the public. Night vision devices use available light to work and are not functionable in complete darkness. Thermal imaging devices are more useful in situations of greater darkness since they are not so reliant on light.
Night vision technology isn't just for the military anymore. Though the best equipment is typically affordable only for military or police use, cheaper night vision gadgets are easily obtainable for everyday citizens to turn what used to be the dark into a whole new playground. Though some night vision equipment used for government applications also harnesses thermal imaging technology, which captures infrared light being created by heat, most merely use image or light enhancement technology. This involves collecting what little light is left in a dark area, such as starlight or moonlight on the bottom end of the spectrum of infrared light, then amplifying that light so that it can be seen. The path from darkness to light, in scientific terms: The photons of available light are cast by an objective lens upon a image intensifier called a photocathode. Electrons are emitted from this cathode, which then multiply and become intensified by a "microchannel plate" until finally passing through a phosphor screen, which allows the viewer to see a more robust version of those original scant photons of light. The result of consumer night vision is what is commonly known as a green output image. These images have greatly improved in vibrancy and cost-effectiveness since the technology emerged on the market in the 1950s. A person without night vision can see in the dark about 250 yards under a full moon and about 50 yards under a quarter moon. Now, with consumer-level night vision technology, that person can see 890 and 850 yards, respectively. Even with overcast skies, dimming out even starlight, night vision can let the average person see more than 200 yards away. Depending on the quality of the camera and conscientiousness of its manufacturer, night vision binoculars can vary widely in their effectiveness. The military-model ATN PS23-4 night-vision, helmet-mounted binoculars -- sell for upwards of $11,000 (USD; November 2012) but allow for visibility of up to 200 yards in total darkness, an infrared "illuminator" component, high-resolution auto-focus, and can be dropped in water. On the other end of the spectrum, toys like the Spy Net Night Vision Surveillance Goggles cost about $40 (USD; November 2012) -- and at least allow for about 50 feet of nighttime visibility. How much more does a brother need to torment a little sibling? Not to mention, this toy lets owners record up to 20 minutes of video or 2,000 photographic images on a USB device that allows for later access via computer or TV. Most of the night vision goggles manufactured in 2012 retail somewhere between these two extremes, in the $200-$500 (USD) price range. Some forego buying a dedicated set of goggles anyway, and just get a video camera instead. Since the 1990s, many home video cameras have come with standard with a night vision mode. In 2009, Samsung became the first to make a cell phone capable of recording video in night vision, the SCH-W760. Night vision technology is now an integral part of many home security systems too. For upwards of $100 (USD) each, wireless cameras capable of infrared, night vision and regular spectrum capture are helping regular civilians perform surveillance on their properties with military proficiency. These wireless feeds can be monitored day or night, with motion-detection alerts, from a master terminal displayed on the laptop of a property owner who's sipping margaritas thousands of miles away. Ah, technology. | 2019-04-19T15:20:52Z | http://www.nvstaroptics.com/ |
In June, I participated in Food Security Solutions, a four-day affair convened by a coffee importer (Sustainable Harvest), underwritten by a coffee roaster (Green Mountain), attended by smallholder coffee farmers and dedicated to something other than coffee – reducing hunger in the coffeelands. The event revolved around hands-on workshops in beekeeping, gardening, mushroom farming and organic fertilizer production. It had little coffee-specific content and was not designed to conduct coffee-related negotiations. But if the experience of one CRS partner organization is any indication, this kind of non-coffee activity can have a big influence on how farmers bring their coffee to market.
More than 20 representatives from 11 farmer organizations participating in the CRS CAFE Livelihoods project took part in the food security event. Going in, one of these organizations was seeking buyers for some new coffees it will have to offer for the first time in 2010-2011. When we met over dinner one night to discuss what the group wanted to do with those coffees, the conversation was nested in the context of the event where we had gathered.
Members of the organization discussed the uniqueness of the Sustainable Harvest business model. The group had never heard of another importer offering value-added services like four-day hands-on workshops that address the (non-coffee) challenges to smallholder farmer livelihoods. They talked about the vision and generosity of a roaster like Green Mountain that would be willing to underwrite such an event, which had so little to do with coffee but so much to do with the quality of life among the smallholder farmers who grow it. The next day, the group offered all of its new coffee to Sustainable Harvest and explicitly asked Sustainable Harvest to try to place some with Green Mountain.
In this case, it seems that the organization incorporated social criteria into a commercial decision. In a competitive marketplace where negotiations tend to revolve around price, quality and volume, social investment at origin that responds to the needs of smallholder farmers can be an important source of differentiation, even especially when it responds to needs outside the coffee chain.
Interesting piece. I think what you witnessed at this workshop is an important shift from, broadly speaking, a buyers market towards a seller’s market. In the past, small holder organizations competed to become ”preferred suppliers’ to buyers by demonstrating their capacity to offer high quality products at competitive prices. Buyers responded by playing organizations off against one another and seeking to buy the highest possible quality at the lowest possible price point. Discussions about sustainability and livelihoods rarely, if ever, came into the discussion.
Fast-forward to the post 2008 food crisis world and looming climate change and you see an emerging shift underway. Powerful buyers of critical commodities are now far less sure of being able to source the commodities their businesses depend on that they were a decade or so ago as a low-price point. This situation is clear in cocoa (see the recent noise around traders trying to corner the world cocoa market) but even more so as we move from basic, commodity products towards what might be called higher-end or specialty products.
Small-holder coffee is a great case in point. Specialty coffee, much of which comes from smallholder producers, is one of the fastest growing niches in the US coffee market and one where inherent product quality leads to direct product differentiation and price differentials. But this growth niche depends on a relatively small supply of specialty coffee that is not growing at anything near the rate of demand . Hence some people in the coffee community see a looming supply crunch. If your business model depends on selling relatively higher quality coffee to a discerning public, you may well have a problem.
As a result, the tables are beginning to turn and we see buyers moving towards a more holistic position — like offering non-coffee related training that directly supports farmer livelihoods or developing long-term relationships with co-investment — as a way to become preferred buyers. Are the days of preferred suppliers over? Probably not, but there seems to be a clear move towards more integrated and holistic business models that seek to guarantee access to high quality coffee and, in turn, offer a better deal to farmers.
I will finish by saying that I don’t think that either Sustainable Harvest or GMCR went into the event with this goal in mind. Nonetheless, the lesson should be clear to any business that depends on high quality agricultural products for its business: a better relationship with your producers that goes far beyond buying and selling is an important tool for keeping your business healthy towards the future.
I don’t think that either Sustainable Harvest or GMCR went into the event with this goal in mind. Nonetheless, the lesson should be clear to any business that depends on high quality agricultural products for its business: a better relationship with your producers that goes far beyond buying and selling is an important tool for keeping your business healthy towards the future.
That was precisely the BIG IDEA I was trying to get across. Thanks!
This reality does shift some real market power away from buyers toward sellers. Right now, with coffee prices at record highs and showing no signs of falling off anytime soon, it may be hard to distinguish some of the momentary pressures for social investments from the ones that represent underlying structural shifts. But I agree that even when prices fall off, much of this investment will stick.
Finally, for me, it is somehow important to distinguish between companies whose supply projections have pulled them into the direction of more “social” investment and those that have made social investment a part of their business models from the outset. Sustainable Harvest, for example, was created as a social enterprise that built reinvestment at origin into its model from the outset. The pioneering Fair Trade organizations like Equal Exchange and Cooperative Coffees have based their models on a holisitic vision of direct sourcing and responsiveness to issues that go way beyond the price and quality of coffee. Perhaps this is an academic distinction or my own personal hang-up, but it is my sense from years of working with smallholder farmer organizations that they place special value in their relationships with companies that have accompanied them from the beginning and began to do so with an explicit developmental agenda.
In the end, the key point for the broader industry — and the countless millions of smallholder farmers not fortunate enough to be in relationships with pioneering companies like these — may be that these companies will have shown a viable way forward for others who may be coming to these issues for different reasons.
Thanks again for the great comment, Mark.
What an exciting time to be working with coffee producers! The above-mentioned transformation of the past few years (from a buyer’s market to a seller’s market) is especially obvious in specialty coffee, but it is increasingly apparent that everyone is coming to terms with a new reality – did you notice that earlier this week, JM Smucker raised prices by a whopping nine percent?
Michael, I respect your distinction between companies that treat social responsibility as a department or a box to check on a scoresheet and those, like the ones you mentioned, that live and breathe social responsibility. I greatly admire folks like Sustainable Harvest and Equal Exchange, and I give a lot of credit for the success of their companies’ long-term relationships with coffee growers to their deep-seeded, philosophical commitments to justice in trade. No doubt, these great companies will continue to benefit from the value that they bring to partnering coffee communities outside of the coffee trade that initially connected buyer and seller. I also believe that a seller’s market will bring more parity to ALL coffee-trading relationships and I hope that eventually, we all (buyers, sellers, consumers, growers, importers, etc.) approach the negotiating table on equal terms. I can’t help but wonder if those terms will make value-add projects and programs more relevant, as you suggest, or less relevant. I like to imagine that someday, Counter Culture’s purchasing relationship with a farmer co-op in Peru will be like a coffee shop’s purchasing relationship with Counter Culture, or like my purchasing relationship with a tomato grower at the local farmer’s market: a mutually beneficial partnership, based on shared values, driven not by a sense of moral obligation or dependence but rather by each party’s belief that this trade is our best option. Here’s another way of explaining what I mean: can you imagine if Counter Culture announced a price increase and a coffee shop said, “Well, we can’t really afford to pay you ten dollars a pound wholesale, but we’ll make a contribution to your health insurance program or teach you how to raise chickens at your roasting facility.” Actually, on one hand, I think that would be great! My partner, Kieran, makes leather goods for a living and it’s inspiring to watch him trade shoes and wallets for everything from vegetables to website-design services. On the other hand, I think that most people would balk at the idea. The same idea goes for the grower at market, whom I would expect to finance a new tractor by raising the price of her tomatoes, not by putting a collection jar on the table. This vision might be a little more free-market utopian than anything we’ll see during our lifetimes (maybe ever), but at least the market is moving in the right direction to encourage that kind of change.
As a believer and strong proponent of fair trade ( and I include direct trade and relationship-based trading under that umbrella) I wonder whether we have gotten consumers too attached to the idea that fair trade is the goal, as opposed to the means to an end. Not that we ever misled them, but we did oversimplify things and as the balance of power continues to shift from buyers to sellers, we buyers have our work cut out for us in explaining to customers that coffee is getting more expensive not because growers need our help but rather because they DON’T need us – they’re empowered, educated and in control of a valuable product. It’s awesome! And to return to the initial point, it puts the power in the hands of growers to tell buyers what is valuable to them, whether it’s higher prices, social programs, pre-financing or something that we, on this side of things, have never imagined.
Thanks for another thoughtful comment. I love your example of the tomato grower at your local farmer’s market, which led me to a deeper reflection on this issue (which is the point of posting comments to a blog, after all).
Initially, I thought it did sound awfully silly that a tomato farmer would put out a donation jar to collect enough money to buy a tractor rather than seeking to generate that investment capital through her core business of selling tomatoes. As I reflect on it further, however, I think there may be limitations to this analogy as it is applied to the coffeelands, and still a compelling case to be made for investments in activities that go beyond the core business.
In this context, there may be some limitations to the strategy you propose – raising prices to capitalize the business. The most important one seems to be that there is a limit to degree to which a farmer can raise her prices and still have a customer base! By all means, farmers can earn higher prices for their coffee through investments in improved quality. I know Counter Culture invests in this function and we do, too, in our work here. In the end, however, and notwithstanding the extraordinary cases in which a farmer may earn as much as $12.55 a pound at auction for a small lot of coffee, there is a limit to the return on investment in quality. Farmers can’t raise their prices indefinitely because the market for the $9 cup of coffee is finite.
The other thing that strikes me is that the ability of the tomato grower to raise prices depends not only on her ability to differentiate her product on the basis of quality but also on her ability to reach the kinds of economies of scale she might achieve with a tractor. In other words, she can’t invest in the tractor because she hasn’t got the money, but her best way of earning the money is to buy a tractor. In both cases – your tomato grower and the coffee farmer – a commercial loan would seem the most appropriate option. And in fact, some farmer organizations have used loans to invest in the kinds of post-harvest infrastructure that can help generate higher returns on coffee. Many, however, have not had access to such loans.
Finally, the singularity of purpose of the tomato grower example isn’t perhaps the best reflection, as you know, of the reality here on the ground, where there are usually multiple and simultaneous needs for investment at the farm and cooperative level, many of which are critical to securing stable smallholder livelihoods but not the kinds activities that are generally financed.
In the end, I think the investment needs to be in “core business” activities – tomato and coffee growing and harvesting – and in “social” activities beyond the core business.
And while I don’t necessarily think this kind of investment will become less relevant over time, I sure do hope it becomes less remarkable!
Thanks again for your thought-provoking comment, Kim!
Like you, I believe in balancing core and social missions and I see many coffee-buying companies I love and admire searching for a way to provide value to coffee producers simultaneously through price and value-add services. What I am less sure of, however, is the role the social mission plays in selling coffee to consumers.
This may be a topic for another blot post or discussion, but I am stuck on the $9 cup of coffee. Sure, there is a limit to the amount that a farmer or a retailer can raise selling prices, whether for tomatoes or for coffee, but when you refer to a finite market for the $9 cup of coffee, are you suggesting that we are nearing that point? I believe that we’re only beginning to explore the upper reaches of price differentiation to the consumer and that farmers will continue to benefit from increasing consumer awareness of specialty coffee and rising demand. Also, as opposed to jumping to nine dollars, let’s talk about the market for a three-dollar cup: three dollars is very different from nine dollars and yet still represents a 30-50% increase over what most shops charge per cup for great coffee.
Returning to tomatoes (I don’t have a tomato fetish, I swear! it’s just the season here and a useful, if imperfect, analogy), the price of supermarket tomatoes is artificially low and the market for a $7 heirloom tomato is undoubtedly a limited market, but the knowledge that in-season, heirloom-variety farmer’s market tomatoes taste better than their supermarket counterparts seems to bridge race, geography and socioeconomic class. Folks won’t always choose the heirloom (which doesn’t cost $7, I’m exaggerating), but they understand they’re choosing an inferior product in the supermarket tomato. I don’t think most coffee consumers understand their coffee purchases that way. Yet!
If (and increasingly, when) coffee growers have direct access to coffee consumers, what strategies do they use to sell their product? In my experience, coffee growers are, again, not so different from tomato growers in that taste is always drives the way they marketing of their own product. My heirloom-tomato grower gets to make personal connections at the farmer’s market and he might explain his need for a tractor to the consumer, but he is always, always selling his product based on taste. Unfortunately, coffee growers typically do not have direct access to their market and hence, responsibility for amplifying the market for the $3 cup of coffee lies with the roaster and the retailer. And when we intermediaries rely too heavily on the language of programs and social development, we run the risk (and we run it for the whole supply chain) of $3-a-cup coffee being conflated with charity as opposed to reflecting a new economic reality.
I’ve drifted away from where I began, but I wonder what you think: is the market for quality too limited, or unstable to provide long-term benefit to growers without some sort of value added outside the coffee price?
Greetings from San Salvador and thanks sticking with this conversation.
In keeping with the journalistic principle of the “inverted pyramid” – big stuff on top, narrow in as you move down, and finish up with the fine details – I will try to respond first to what I see as your most important questions.
I think that investing in quality improvements may be too limited on its own as a livelihood strategy for smallholder coffee farmers.
There is no question in my mind that quality improvements – when rewarded with corresponding price premiums – are providing long-term benefits to growers. Our own strategy here in the field reflects this belief – we are investing in helping farmers improve quality precisely because we believe it is generating real benefits for farming families. I didn’t mean to call that into question. What I meant to suggest is that even at the $3-per-cup price point you mention (more on that below), increased coffee revenues may not be enough to ensure that farm families meet their basic needs, to say nothing of achieving a continual increase in their living standards. That is why we are also working to identify ways smallholder farmers might invest in other, non-coffee activities, and highlighting here the innovative ways that industry actors are doing the same.
The social mission becomes relevant to selling coffee to consumers, in my mind, when a roaster’s ability to source coffee depends on social investment.
When would this happen? When the prices paid to farmer organizations are not sufficient to ensure the ability of roasters to source the quantity and/or quality of coffee that the market demands. At origin, there are perennial downward pressures on both the volume and quality of smallholder coffee, and these have only intensified now that prices are at historic highs and showing no signs of falling anytime soon.
This is where the reference to the $9 cup of coffee comes in. There are only so many consumers willing to pay that much for a memorable cup of coffee. In other words, the ability of a roaster or café to raise prices is limited. At a certain point – and I don’t have a good handle on where this magic point is – cafés just can’t charge their customers any more. In turn, roasters can’t pay their farmers any more. At this point, non-coffee investments – or “social mission” as you put it – seem like a good direction to pursue. Roasters can continue to offer high-quality coffee to consumers and farmers can get the investment they need to keep the good stuff coming.
I mentioned the $9 cup because it was the highest-ticket item I saw on any café menu during my recent travels in the States, and to stake out what you call the “upper reaches of price differentiation.” I agree that we are only beginning to explore those altitudes. What seems less clear is whether there will be enough space in that rarefied air for us as a development agency to make access to that segment a primary strategy in our work with smallholder farmers.
Thanks, Kim! Somehow I suspect this conversation will continue!
Just want to let you, and your great correspondents, know how beneficial all your posts, like this incredible one, is to non-specialists like myself who have the job of integrating a nuanced discussion on Fair Trade into our teaching. Although I don’t have much to add, I read everything here and learn a lot. Thanks for your blog and for everything you and your colleagues do.
Great to hear from you, despite your baseball loyalties. (Mine lie at the other end of the Turnpike — We Are Fam-i-ly!) Thanks so much for the very kind words — I am glad to know you are finding the blog helpful as you continue to engage Cabrini students, faculty and staff around sustainable trade issues. It is particularly gratifying to hear you use the word “nuanced” in connection with the content of this blog. It seems that all too often it is precisely the nuance that seems to be missing from a lot of the messaging in the marketplace around sustainable trade and its impacts at origin. Good to know you are finding some here.
Looking forward to seeing you and your students on your next visit to Guatemala. | 2019-04-24T23:55:16Z | https://coffeelands.crs.org/2010/08/the-case-for-social-reinvestment-at-origin/ |
Science needs women.forwomeninscience. Carol Milano. Chris Tachibana Editor: Sean Sanders. 24 September 2010 .org/en/fellowships/loreal VIROLOGY From the Invisible to the Global MOLECULAR BIOLOGY Exploring the Basic Units of Life 12 16 20 NEUROSCIENCE The Brain’s Allure MICROBIOLOGY The Universe in a Single Cell IMMUNOLOGY The Powers of Proteins Writers: Virginia Gewin. Young women researchers in the Life Sciences can apply for one of the 15 annual UNESCO-L’ORÉAL For Women in Science International Fellowships.com © 2010 American Association for the Advancement of Science.000 each over a two-year period.unesco. Application forms for International Fellowships are available at: www.D.Call for applications UNESCO-L’ORÉAL International Fellowships Contents INTROS On Their Way to the Top–2 By Sean Sanders. in support of research abroad. are worth up to $40. All Rights Reserved. Changing the Face of Science: The L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Partnership–3 4 8 The world needs science. The Fellowships. Designer: Amy Hardcastle www. Copy Editor: Robert Buck. Ph.
At the global level.D. Some were inspired by their parents. and represent the key to the future. married with children. has a 35 percent lower chance of being granted tenure than a man with the same family situation. In the United States. Although this list does not cover all areas of research. Each year. Ph.com Fan us on Blog on Watch us on Follow us on For Women in Science .On Their Way to the Top There is one thing you will find that almost all scientists have in common: a huge passion for their work. Yet the role of women in science still needs to be defended. their interest in science began when they were young. a recent study by the Center for American Progress shows that a woman scientist with a Ph. young and old.D. Paradoxically. Science • • • • For many young researchers. 84 percent of respondents believe that science lies at the heart of their daily life.unesco. and Immunology. They will also give you some insight into their personal triumphs and struggles as these women have strived to build successful and meaningful careers for themselves.forwomeninscience. And that is particularly true of the successful and dedicated women featured in this new Women in Science booklet. Through the For Women in Science program.forwomeninscience. Microbiology.com www. as well as more established researchers who have experienced the many ups and downs of a life in biology research.twitter. and some came to it accidentally.. nearly 1. kindly sponsored once again by the L’Oreal Corporate Foundation. Molecular Biology. Sean Sanders. according to a 2009 TNS Sofres survey conducted in 10 countries in partnership with the L’Oréal Corporate Foundation and UNESCO. 5 eminent women scientists are honored by the L’Oréal-UNESCO Awards. But all have carried their excitement and interest in doing science through to their adult years. we meet 16 women in five different areas of biology research: Virology. for their outstanding scientific contributions and commitment to research. In this latest Women in Science booklet. often while they were still in elementary school.com/forwomeninscience www. L’Oréal and UNESCO have taken the initiative in recognizing women whose research contributes to changing the world.org/en/fellowships/loreal 2 . some by their teachers. but only 30 percent are in the sciences or technology. from women demonstrating their scientific passion and inspiring the same in others.youtube. These top-ranking scientists embrace universal challenges ranging from health and the environment to social actions. All of our featured scientists have an enthusiasm for what they do that is infectious! For many of them. L’Oréal and UNESCO work together to promote the cause of women in science by highlighting scientific excellence and encouraging young women to pursue scientific careers. Fellowships are awarded to promising young women to encourage them to pursue careers in science. the essays about the scientists in these fields will give you an idea of the differences. Over the past twelve years.com/4womeninscience www. the program today represents an invaluable source of motivation and inspiration. Each year. and similarities. Neuroscience. We have interviewed young scientists just starting out. Commercial Editor. All of their situations are unique and interesting. www. 864 Fellowships for young women researchers in 93 countries. This booklet will also be made available in print later in the year when we will publish these stories and more. one per continent. women hold over half of university degrees.Official Page agora. We hope that you enjoy their stories and take inspiration from their personal tales. Changing the Face of Science The L’Oréal-UNESCO Partnership For Women in Science F or the past twelve years. as they head for the top.000 women have been recognized: 62 “For Women in Science” Award Laureates from 28 countries. between their jobs.
and even tried to do research when I was in school. but she trained as a veterinarian. your school might have a program to connect you with professors at a nearby university. and says she has been interested in science since high school. “I always wanted to be in the lab. and keep at it.PAMELA BJÖRKMAN A VETERINARIAN LEARNS MOLECULAR BIOLOGY FROM A VIRUS Margarita Marqués Martinez. The important thing. She was awarded a UNESCO-L’Oréal Fellowship to work in virus research at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. This is how farm animals like sheep can be made to secrete medically useful proteins into their milk. she uses MARTINEZ what she learned from virus research in her work on animals. says Pamela. like how they take over an entire cell using just a few proteins. who is finding ways to use the designer antibodies for possible gene therapy against HIV and AIDS. she starts with a few rare antibodies that are good at preventing HIV from infecting host cells. or for vaccines. a L’Oréal-UNESCO laureate in 2006. but I didn’t know anyone who could help me find a lab. known as Margot. They predict patterns of infection and plan public health strategies for when a viral disease spreads around the world during a pandemic. She and the scientists in her lab examine how these antibodies work. has also been interested in science since she was a young student. the virus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. The best of the engineered antibodies are sent to another scientist who collaborates with Pamela’s lab.” When Margot was a postgraduate student in Spain. RNA or DNA. She says. like how to engineer genes. wrapped in protein. and maybe for healthier animals.” she says.” Virology: From the Invisible to the Global Pamela Björkman is a designer.” In her laboratory at the California Institute of Technology. so they work even better. Since milk is so easy to collect. and used therapeutically. though. “I really enjoyed high school chemistry. She designs proteins to attack HIV (human immunodeficiency virus). She doesn’t design clothes or buildings or anything that we can see. “We’re trying to design a better anti-HIV antibody.” If visiting or working in a research laboratory sounds interesting to you. “I’ve always liked looking at cells under the microscope and observing things that you are not able to see with just your eyes. or get a vaccine. Now. Now. her supervisors wanted her to learn molecular biology techniques. and introduce them into cells. Pamela. “The reward is that you are doing something in the laboratory that can translate into a benefit for people. then tweak them or combine them with parts of other proteins. These simple structures pose complicated puzzles. though. is a biology professor. where she learned how to clone MARGOT and manipulate genes. is to “try doing research as soon as you can. 4 5 .” says Pamela. Virologists study how viruses force their way into our cells and how our bodies fight back. I sometimes have high school students working in my own lab. the proteins can be quickly purified from the milk proteins.” ? W h at is V i r o l o g y? In their most basic form. or AIDS. back in Spain. “But people don’t make very effective antibodies against HIV. Viruses can’t multiply unless they infect a host cell. or you could do research as an undergraduate in college. our immune system makes antibodies that stick to the virus so it can’t infect our cells. finding ways to put new genes into sheep cells. and how they evade our immune system’s efforts to eliminate them. When we are infected with a virus. Margot’s work could improve the amount of these proteins that sheep produce in their milk. too. she says. viruses are just genetic material.
” UNESCO-L’Oréal Fellowship work—and now to Princeton University in the United States. “I love their enthusiasm!” Don’t lose that energy. just like a virus. “so collaborations are very important. and I look forward to teaching. especially math and biology. They went out to beaches to find where seals were dying.” 7 PETRA KLEPAC . but if you are willing to take on challenges.” All these scientists are very dedicated. “When people find what they love to do. The project used her training in math and biology.” If you are interested in virus research as a career. discovery. and at conferences and seminars. “I work in a small institute.” Since then. and entertained her with stories of unusual experiments and science problems. “Your best years in science are also your reproductive years. and find good people to mentor and train you. Finding a balance between work and family is a challenge for any scientist. Since viruses infect all types of cells. and the best way to get vaccines and treatments to people around the world during a disease outbreak. Margot says she’s grateful to her mentors. Like Margot.” she says. “Once a year.” as long as you have a love of science. “Right now.” Margot was educated in Spain. says Petra. especially math and biology.” THE BIG PICTURE Petra Klepac has a passion for science. says Margot. who taught her to ask good scientific questions. not all virus research projects involve humans. They may travel around the world. and I found an area where I could combine the two. She also stresses that biology is not a 9-to-5 job. “In science.” she says. and to be creative and rigorous about answering them. both as a teacher. because she worked with scientists and veterinarians from several other countries. She studies how viruses can spread through a population. “Your family must understand and support your passion for your work. Petra says it is “very doable.” she says. perhaps for women in particular. Another aspect of being a scientist that students might not expect is public speaking. Petra is encouraging. “I’ve always liked science. She says this taught her that “science can be fun. because you need a lot of education to get to the place you want to be. Petra uses computer modeling to see how factors like time. But it is easy to talk about something you love doing.” she says. and her enthusiasm is clear as she describes her work on the big picture of viral infection— the really big picture. and technology. Petra says scientists must learn to juggle many time-consuming interests. she advises. Spain.” says Margot. she says former students of her school came back to talk about what they were learning in college. students come and spend a day with us and see what we are doing. Germany. saying. not geeky! And it can be cool when you solve a problem. routine does not exist! If you like every day of the week to be the same. Margot says. This global approach is common among scientists. Her advice is “follow your curiosity and go where your interests lie. in León. before they start at the university. they are naturally good at it. which is a consideration for women going into any scientific field. her pursuit of science has taken her from Croatia to universities in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania—where she carried out her “I’ve always liked science. In science.Just as she was taught new skills as a student. She wants to improve how health officials control infectious diseases. Margot now encourages new students at her university. then used computer modeling to figure out how the virus was transmitted through the seal population in northern Europe. they acquire and transmit knowledge.” She notes that she already has many women on her research teams. or planning the strategy against viral pandemics. and the Roslin Institute in the United King- dom (where Dolly the sheep was cloned). When Petra was a student in Croatia. don’t go into science. “where I work.” whether that is studying the details of a single virus. I think there are at least three women for every man. or medical research to improve the way doctors treat viral infections. and the cost of a drug or vaccine. “I enjoy talking about my work. For this reason. and her people skills. The virus causes a disease that is like the canine distemper that people vaccinate their dogs against. “There’s nothing that girls and young women can’t do. but instead of spreading disease. it’s completely worth it. and still travels often. and I found an area where I could combine the two. and spend many hours working and thinking about their research. But if you love doing it. Petra now uses what she learned from that project to follow the transmission of human viruses. Another of Petra’s projects was tracing transmission of a virus in harbor seals. affect how quickly nations respond to a disease epidemic. though. then science could be for you.” she says. maybe you have to be a little more persistent and self-motivated.
gratefully. and you forget everything else. “You had to work with what you had. her research focus. that helps regulate how and when cells divide. has two atoms of hydrogen and one oxygen atom. or how.” In basic science. it’s amazing! You can’t imagine until you’re in this field. she was a cellular biologist specializing in cell biology and parasitology at Central Universidad de Venezuela in Caracas. That’s very WATCHING CELLS MOVE Like Rocio. Rocio was able to spend seven months in Seattle at the University of Washington. hours before some of her five colleagues.PAMELA BJÖRKMAN ELIZABETHBLACKBURN ELIZABETH BLACKBURN far away. “but the basic science that I do is the first step in this process. it’s the carrier of all the genetic information) is made up of many millions of carbon. ROCIO DIAZ-BENJUMEA BENAVIDES ? W h at is M o l e c u l a r B i o l o g y? A molecule is a tiny particle made up of at least one atom.. doing key experiments that allowed her to complete her Ph. which are common there. phosphorus. “We work with cells growing in Petri dishes. It’s much less dangerous than working with parasites. the delight can now come from someone else’s work.D. Rocio appreciated being able to take three months of maternity leave. RhoA.” Rocio admits. Antonina Roll-Mecak is elated at seeing great data emerge on a project after lengthy hard work. and her family situation. for instance. But the work is just as difficult—these cells take longer to grow. “My boss is really nice. as well as her own. A water molecule. we could discover a way to help control cancer. Rocio doesn’t want to get discouraged after a lot of hard work on a project shows no results. In Venezuela. her research had more limitations. and get contaminated very easily. nitrogen.” At the lab. Her applications for a full time scientific position led her to a postdoctoral fellowship at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia in 2005. while DNA (found in the nucleus of every cell. Molecular biology is still a young science and is closely related to biochemistry and genetics. In her case. and hydrogen atoms. and keep your eye on the big picture. 8 9 . she starts at 8:15 a. “Then something works. When her son was born in early 2009. she’s shifted her location.” Rather than face the difficulty of studying a completely unfamiliar parasite.” she explains. We must find out what goes on in the cell before we can plan to cure someone. You have to be very patient. why am I doing this?—nothing’s happening. “No one worked with the same parasites I had studied in Venezuela. In January. These include DNA and RNA (which guides the way the body synthesizes protein. and always try.m. try again. Rocio quickly discovered that she had unique research expertise.” Molecular Biology: Exploring the Basic Units of Life When Rocio Diaz-Benjumea Benavides won her UNESCO-L’Oreal Fellowship in 2003. in 2004.m. Antonina became the head of her own lab—a big career advancement—at the U. Molecular biologists study the functions and interactions of biological molecules inside a cell.S.” she says. Sometimes you ask yourself. National Institutes of Health (NIH). “If we find out how RhoA is controlled. Rocio decided to switch her research to study a small protein. She’s the head of the new Cell Biology and Biophysics Unit in the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. “you constantly ask why. If I can ever get a result that could lead to a vaccine. Seven years later. The work is so interesting. which also study cells on a molecular level. I can get whatever I need. but very rare here. “You just try to approach your goal in other ways. and leaves by 5 p. a major component of all plant and animal cells).” she acknowledges. it would be awesome. It’s fascinating how things work in a cell—everything is so tiny!” Rocio loves studying the RhoA protein because it regulates some of the processes that are altered when a cell becomes cancerous. oxygen. Here. which carry serious diseases. With her L’Oreal fellowship.
After you decide how to renovate the space and what equipment to order. “That’s the reality of biological and clinical research. Little organelles move on tracks. During Ph. “Science sometimes brings a moment when everything clicks into place. Many degenerative diseases are linked to mutations in proteins that form the cell’s microtubular skeleton. you will never work a single day in your life. It’s great to see someone so happy. Over lunch one day. If we can understand the features of a healthy cell’s microtubulular structure. she was eager to understand molecules. and possibly how to prevent or treat it. She has one biochemist and one physicist in her lab. I still feel that in science. and international universities. we could learn what changes them in a disease. “I think science is generally long hours. It’s very exciting that my first postdoc got a fellowship on his first try! That feeling validates his work. She’s elated that the word is in Webster’s Dictionary. molecularmovies.” The prestige of becoming an Investigator brings major demands.” Antonina recounts. it doesn’t feel like a job.D. When DNA doesn’t have enough protection at its tips.S.” Elizabeth Blackburn’s calling showed in her childhood love of animals.” It was an ‘aha!’ moment when Elizabeth first saw the pattern of the enzyme that repairs DNA ends. but an even rarer reward: the 2009 Nobel Prize in Medicine. “You walk into the new lab. what new directions we’re working on. was about to become Molecular Biology. For the first few months. Her scientific contributions have brought not only a new dictionary word. it doesn’t feel like a job. It’s intriguing how those play off against each other. ANTONINA ROLL-MECAK A 2006 UNESCO-L’Oreal Fellow. Curious about chemical activity inside cells. To encourage her 16-yearold intern’s increasing scientific interest. she became fascinated with the long strips of DNA that form chromosomes. It just feels like your calling. At 10 years old. it can’t renew itself. She and her lab team named their 1985 discovery “telomerase” because it protects the telomeres. A cell’s tracks. Telomerase levels are very high in cancer cells.m. and interactions with people. still part of biochemistry in the 1960s.” Antonina reports.” Antonina says happily.” Elizabeth remembers. They’re being constantly taken apart and rebuilt. Antonina recommended a website (www. and the cell stops dividing and replenishing tis- ELIZABETH BLACKBURN 11 . She often talks with them about “the big picture—where their own projects are going.” Elizabeth reflects. If you love it. It just feels like your calling.” says the Morris Herztstein Professor of Biology and Physiology at the University of California. that’s part of the fascination. She got hooked seeing visuals of proteins because they look cool. You really have to like the process. she worked from 9 a. you can never stop. and may also be related to heart disease. and nothing’s there. Elizabeth always knew she’d be a scientist. to 11p. San Francisco. “Her mom said Rachel watched it for days. creative thinking time. To me. Our lab tries to understand what modulates the dynamic behavior of the microtubules. the train tracks are stable. This weakens the immune system. ‘Aha! I can see it—this is really something new. and our lab’s project.’ That’s why. whose research achievements recently led to her being named as a Searle Scholar. Years of observation convinced her that as telomeres wear down and are rebuilt. because it’s all-consuming. keep adapting. some kind of enzyme is probably causing that renewal activity. and 2008 L’Oréal-UNESCO laureate.” Antonina enjoys mentoring younger scientists. Antonina researches the cell’s ability to move and respond to external signals.” she explains. The fascination is mutual. Elizabeth studies telomerase’s role in various diseases.m. called microtubules. You suddenly say. I wanted to sequence the DNA at the end of each chromosome. a cell is the image of a bustling city. Elizabeth finds frequent collaboration “a very exciting. She appreciates the scientist’s combination of solitary. 10 and told her friends what molecules can do. studies at Cambridge University. chose NIH because she’s allowed to spend 80 percent of her time doing her own lab work. she’d imagine “the glamorous life of a scientist—probably not a realistic view. so Elizabeth hopes this research can someday be applied to treating cancer. You’re always learning more about what makes us tick. “There’s such beauty to creatures and animals.com) with scientific animations of important cellular processes. sues. I wake up every day and think about what’s going on in our lab. Rachel shared a favorite quote: “If you love what you do. “In a city. That specialty. once you become a scientist. Things are very exciting in research now. She appreciates NIH’s graduate programs with U.” Antonina. “They’re like shoelaces with a cap (telomere) at the end that protects all their genetic information.” Having done much of her earlier work alone.THE “AHA!” MOMENT “If you love it. knowing how to get to the right place at the right time. and especially its year-round program for high school and undergraduate students. you have to train your people so some knowledge transfers from you to them and they can become selfsufficient in the lab.” she reflects. enjoyable new part of where our science is. “Through a microscope. She’s not complaining.
advances in genetics enable researchers to pinpoint the genes and proteins that will lead to new drug targets for neurodegenerative disorders. she develops software that helps doctors implant electrodes deep inside the brain more accurately and effectively. neuroscience is about studying what makes us human. Once she completed her Ph. That experience helped convince Sridevi to ? W h at is N e u r o s c i e N c e? Neuroscience—one of the most diverse. imaging. she says creativity is needed to find the answers. She now leads the department of molecular genetics within the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology (VIB). and genetic approaches to study brain development. spinal cord and billions of specialized nerve cells. Christine’s research has identified genes and proteins that sabotage brain cells and lead to dementia. behavior. and move.” she adds. Christine’s experience is just one example of how the brain’s marvelous complexity brings together the variety of scientific backgrounds necessary to unlock its mysteries. also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. She was so impressed that hundreds of people had donated their most sacred and complex organ to scientific exploration that she decided to use her training to search for the genes responsible for neurodegenerative diseases such as dementia.CHRISTINE VAN BROECKHOVEN (center) and her lab members use her training in mathematical modeling to study the most complex system possible—the brain. feel. Sridevi pursued a postdoctoral appointment in computational neuroscience where she learned to model the activity of neuron clusters. So she took classes to explore her growing interest in neuroscience and conducted a case study of her aunt. Since then. interdisciplinary branches of biology—is the study of the brain. are among those who have helped shed light on how the brain works—often by searching for the causes of its malfunction. There. “What’s lacking is the ability to put all these pieces of the puzzle together. At the same time. As a Ph. 12 The human element ultimately lured Sridevi Sarma to neuroscience. and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. diseases—until the Belgian scientist toured the brain collection of the Institute Born-Bunge at the University of Antwerp in 1983. Today she is a biomedical engineer at Johns Hopkins University’s Institute for Computational Medicine in Baltimore. Maryland. “The reality is that we live in a technology savvy world where we can now probe the brain in three dimensions. who was diagnosed with a rare case of early onset Parkinson’s disease. new imaging capabilities. Neuroscientists often focus their research efforts on brain abnormalities or diseases in order to find potential treatments. at its essence.D. Geneticists. molecular biologists. student at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Alzheimer’s disease. but also as a way to find out how brains normally function. The electrodes deliver an electric current which stimulates nearby neurons and alters how they communicate information—and they ultimately help patients with conditions like Parkinson’s disease to control their movements. in electrical engineering. This growing field of research combines chemical. and record electrical activity from single neurons in every different part of the brain. 13 . but they ultimately weren’t complex enough for her. biological. even electrical engineers. a nonprofit research institute housed across four Flemish universities. and cognition. For example. that transmit the electrical impulses necessary to think. New technologies are allowing researchers to glimpse the brain’s inner workings. called neurons. including functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and positron emission tomography (PET). Neuroscience: The Brain’s Allure Christine Van Broeckhoven intended to study the molecular genetics of metabolic SRIDEVI SARMA RIPE FOR DISCOVERY Neuroscience is on the cusp of big breakthroughs that will help unlock the brain’s mysteries and deliver therapies to patients. But while technology provides the tools.” says Christine. allow researchers to monitor which specific cells are active inside the brain while a task is being performed. identify every structure down to the micron.” says Sridevi. “Researchers are drawn to the brain because.D. Sridevi could have used her engineering background to design passenger airplanes.
a neuroscientist’s reach extends beyond the laboratory. As godmother of the Flemish Alzheimer’s Association. curiosity is a “disease” for which conducting research is the only cure. you can anticipate having an extremely interesting life!” she says. says Christine. the fellowship came at a time when they needed something to bolster their resolve for this career path. Christine says. but these renamic organ that is alsearchers want to see ways evolving. besuits are exciting cause the brain is a dyenough. identify six genes responsible for neuromuscular diseases. there was an investment in research that helped give patients and families hope for the future. rather than eschew. mately turn those targets into therapies. As these award laureates and fellowship winners prove. I needed to know that my work mattered. Researchtheir findings change AG ers are just beginning to A the lives of patients. but neuroscience has endless career opporThe intellectual purtunities—in part. In a field as intense and competitive as neuroscience. Working with patients. and not part of the aging process. Passion may be a prerequisite. Christine’s research environmental forces shaping the uncovers the potential targets for brain.” she says. and therefore not had the chance to join Dotti’s lab. known as TAU. which became legal in 2008. While they are all driven to find and deliver new therapies. “Finding out that I won the L’Oreal fellowship couldn’t have come at a better time.” says Christine. Belgium. 15 “If you have a passion for research. motivates her to keep finding ways to improve their quality of life. “If I hadn’t gotten the fellowship. She used the money to build a strong collaboration with a clinical neuroscientist at a nearby hospital. “I’m lucky because I’m doing discovery-based science that has a direct application to treating disease. From adipose tissue to umbilical cord to fallopian tubes.Finding treatments for are all pioneers because brain disorders drives everything is still so new. “Once dementia was recognized as a disease. the fellowship enabled her to join Carlos Dotti’s lab at VIB. so she pursued a career at Janssen Pharmaceutica in Beerse. the nerve junctions needed to store memories and learn. With so much yet to be learned. I do not know if I would have continued in science. torn by the demands of raising young children and conducting ambitious research. researchers can easily leave their mark in the field. which provides her with access to data from human patients. “We Agnieszka wanted her research to have a direct impact on treating disease. to offer physical therapy and psychological support to those with muscular dystrophy and their families. the first center of its type in Latin America. PAIRING PASSION WITH COMPASSION The award helped these women get their careers established. Mayana credits the L’Oreal-UNESCO Award with giving her the visibility to communicate the importance of stem cell research to the public. For Mayana. they have also had an impact on society through the variety of ways they’ve found to work with patients. and pursue her interests in conducting stem cell research. She says it was those donations that allowed her to begin identifying the genetic underpinnings of dementia. she almost wanted to give up. she has worked with thousands of affected families and pioneered the molecular techniques necessary to. whose research has been recognized around the world. For Agnieszka. the next therapeutic frontier involves the use of stem cells to treat neuromuscular disorders. “The brain we have at the end of our drug development. Mayana has spent over 25 years teasing apart the molecular genetics of neuromuscular diseases. you can anticipate having an extremely interesting life! ” A NEEDED BOOST For Mayana Zatz. 14 MAYANA ZATZ . For NI SK E SZ tease apart the biological and K A SADOW example. disrupts the ability of neurons to form synapses. a company exclusively devoted to developing treatments for mental disorders. she works with academics to determine how the accumulation of a protein. so far. she is grateful that the award allows women to celebrate both the compassion for patients that draws them to this field as well as their passion for research. Today the center offers care to 300 patients. But she never forgets how important it is to honor the patients who have donated their brains to research. For Sridevi and Agnieszka. she played a major role in convincing the Brazilian government to authorize research with embryonic stem cells. Sridevi hit a low point in her career when. Mayana founded the Brazilian Association of Muscular Dystrophy. but it is Agnieszka lives is not the same as the one we are born Sadowska’s work in industry that will ultiwith. their femininity.” she says. As a result. the UNESCO-L’Oreal Fellowship provides the recognition necessary to keep careers thriving. Mayana is exploring new sources of stem cells that would bypass the controversial use of embryos.” she says. As a result. For Christine.” says Christine. “If you have a passion for research.” many research efforts. but it sometimes must be stoked to stay alive. director of the Human Genome Research Center at the University of São Paulo in Brazil. She hopes that studying TAU will lead to the development of a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease. There. L’Oréal-UNESCO Awards are special for two reasons: they honor womens’ achievements in often male-dominated fields and they encourage women scientists to embrace.
but science chose me. multicelled arrangements. “if you are honest with yourself and follow your heart—it sounds corny—but you will know what you want to do. who received a UNESCO-L’Oréal Fellowship in 2001. Silvija and her coworkers are figuring out the structure of the complicated little protein gates that control how information and molecules go in and out of the nucleus. she says her education required determination. picking up things. who study if life is possible on planets like Mars. but microbes are found everywhere—from deep-sea vents to Antarctica—so microbiologists can work anywhere.” says Miroslava. and now Boston. where the temperatures are near boiling. “I’ve been interested in biology since my teenage years. Astrobiology. to a university department that specializes in “extremophilic” bacteria.” GLOBETROTTING MICROBIOLOGISTS Miroslava Atanassova is also a global microbiologist. Then. she plans to return to Bulgaria. To her. Scientists need “dedication. From her home country of Croatia. They also thrive at the North and South poles.” When she was a student. or low amounts of water. and looking at them with a simple microscope I had at home. you just have to try to get there. Silvija takes a few minutes to think about why she chose a career in microbiology. and I grew up in a family of scientists. microbiology is learning about “the universe of microorganisms. Eventually.” Getting there might mean seeing the world along the way. and enthusiastic teachers. however. “I liked going out to the forest or the mountains. In the middle of the chaos. “I have always been in love with nature. “It is not well understood. I read a lot of books about nature and animals.SILVIJA BILOKAPIC where conditions might include high amounts of acid or salt. 17 . From her home country of Bulgaria.” she says. and says it was “quite a good investment. These microbes live in harsh environments like hot springs and deep sea vents. All of this—my natural interest and curiosity. “I did not choose science. and the benefits of being in a family of researchers—led me into a career in natural sciences. known and unknown. Silvija has worked in Zurich. exploring life on other planets. the laboratory buzzes with students. who are very important to opening and motivating young minds. and every little piece of the global picture that we get about the structure is very exciting and motivating. Silvija says. and they need to seek out training from the best specialists in the field. in a lab that works on communication systems inside cells. For young women considering a career in biology. and is now doing postdoctoral research in Spain. Microbiologists in the food industries grow and engineer bacteria and yeast to help produce everything from vitamins to wine. Miroslava made a choice between a career in biochemistry or in microbiology.” she says. MIROSLAVA ATANASSOVA Microbiology: The Universe in a Single Cell Silvija Bilokapic is in the middle of a big experiment. These are the microorganisms that interest astrobiologists. or 16 ? W h at is MicroBiology Microbiologists study organisms that live as single cells or in simple. Her mother was a chemistry professor who let her spend time in the laboratory.” She laughs and says for her 15th birthday. patience. Massachusetts. It sounds like it means just working in a laboratory with microscopes. because she has always been drawn to biology. she asked for a book on genetics. and Miroslava always had access to a computer and a parent who was ready and able to explain how to use the software. but the pathogenic ones can cause serious diseases.” Now Silvija is a researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “I was also lucky to have good. Switzerland (on a UNESCOL’Oréal Fellowship). Like Silvija. She says an encouraging microbiology teacher made all the difference.” Now Miroslava studies microorganisms that live in unusual environments. like bacteria that happily grow in water that is as hot as scalding tap water.” Her parents encouraged her interests. and visitors. while all around her. since humans live peacefully with billions of microbes. scientists. innovative. Miroslava has always been interested in science. Microbiologists might do medical research. she has studied and worked in France and Belgium. Besides good teachers. so a microbiologist might study how microbes thrive in harsh environments. starts with understanding microbial diversity on Earth.
but technically complex. and opens doors. Then. where children are still dying of diarrhea. for her work studying a single bacterial protein that senses the cell’s environment. learning something new all the time.D. you can link it to anything. It’s not restricted. and creativity. and be prepared to do a large part of the learning and training without supervision or help. photography. when experiments don’t turn out as planned. Cindy has worked in science communication and outreach. “In some places. “Science is everywhere. Cindy talked about a communication system inside cells. because bacteria cause a lot of harm in the third world. She once connected traditional Spanish dancing to microbiology. People think science is boring. and the exchange of students between labs can help promote development. foreign labs. Most scientists enjoy the unpredictability of their work. and how pathogenic microbes can take over that system. through joint projects in health development in Third World countries. and even peace. Miroslava says you have to be ready to “assimilate large amounts of information and keep up-to-date in a rapidly developing field.” CINDY QUEZADA but it’s not. and there are many ways of incorporating other subjects and interests of your life into science.” as part of their training.” says Cindy.” Specifically. Cindy trained some Rwandan women in the techniques. which has let her combine her microbiology background with her interests in journalism. Cindy is also working on strengthening the science and technology relationship between the United States and Brazil. and a deep understanding of biological processes and phenomena. “If you are really interested in a scientific career. Silvija notes that “scientists are known to move from place to place every four or five years. for a program in New York City that brings scientists and artists together for a monthly public performance. “Science. and who want to go wherever new discoveries are waiting. Cindy Quezada was an international relations major in college.. She also advises having fun. but this can make for long hours. If you can link science to flamenco.S. I basically had to build my work environment from scratch.” 19 18 . you must have a strong will and motivation. mobility.” she says. MOBILITY AND CREATIVIITY The path to a career in microbiology isn’t always easy. though. and creativeness in your everyday existence which do not exist in many other fields. she investigated whether a fast. Microbiology can keep you on the move. include a unique point of view on the environment and society. which is a normal part of any scientific career. You have to learn an entire. passion. “But I was fascinated by science. “working on incorporating science into U.” Cindy also says science means having drive. and was interested in how to eliminate poverty and raise the standard of living for people throughout the world. There. It may not be an ideal field for homebodies. but it’s great for women who are interested in working in different parts of the world. “It opens your mind.” Starting with a chemistry class. I got interested in microbiology.” PATIENCE AND MOTIVATION. a flamenco dancer and musicians demonstrated intricate and interdependent signaling and communication between artists.” she says. be prepared for a long period of studying and training. “Just because you’re a scientist doesn’t mean that is all you do.” she says.” As an example. D. foreign policy. and mixing in your other interests. “And since I was interested in how to improve conditions in developing countries.MICROBIOLOGY AS DIPLOMACY Not all microbiologists grow up in a family of scientists.” says Miroslava. She was still interested in global health. she says. Back in the United States. prosperity. Cindy took more science classes. “Just do what really excites you and what doesn’t seem like work. and eventually earned a Ph. and even dance. specific way of thinking and it takes a lot of patience. Many diseases of the poor are caused by microorganisms. It opens your mind. she says. and opens doors. which President Obama outlined as part of a speech he gave in Egypt in June 2009. Miroslava also says microbiology offers “freedom. test for the bacterial disease tuberculosis could be used in areas with few modern resources.C.” she says. “can be a great diplomacy tool—collaborations between governments. The creative side is finding out new details about how life is organized. The rewards. Cindy is no longer in the laboratory. specifically host-pathogen interactions. but is at the State Department in Washington. “Science is everywhere. and together they wrote a clinical research paper about using the diagnostic test in resource-poor settings.” Her work is part of a broad effort to encourage cooperation between the United States and the Muslim world on science and technology. or even start out studying science in school. and a UNESCO-L’Oreal Fellowship allowed her to work in Rwanda in Africa.
she approached professor Steve Mayo. Immunologists look at physical. I have a lot of flexibility. Now. The earliest written mention of immunology was during the Plague of Athens in 430 BCE. Irene feels pressure to get things done. “I’m in contact with people from all over the world. You’re sharing the joy with them. After recognizing her growing interest in how proteins interact. You can often plan experiments so you don’t have to be there on Sunday night.” exclaims the Yale University Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. thymus gland. “I like to go into structures and learn more about how they interact. and asked if she could join his lab to learn more about their techniques. When the immune system functions incorrectly.” she enthuses. She says she loved teaching undergraduate biochemistry at the University of Vienna. “A wonderful thing about a university. and advise the patient to stay away from whichever food was causing all those symptoms. “I want to get it done! If I don’t know how it works. chemical. Irene’s enthusiasm persists. Even when the work is difficult. an expert in protein design at Caltech. An allergy is caused by an overactive immune system. a doctor could identify the cause of a food allergy. and skin—are designed to protect our bodies from potentially harmful infections.” she explains. “If all the work isn’t done between Monday and Friday.” Immunology: The Powers of Proteins Irene Maier’s first big project in immunology brought her a Ph. Irene appreciates the flexible hours. Funded in part through a UNESCO-L’Oréal Fellowship. and physiological components of the immune system. is that they get excited about discoveries.” she notes. but with continuous experiments. “It’s a creative job. Its main organs—including bone marrow. 21 . It’s up to me to decide how I want to reach the goal. she worked on developing a biochip that could help diagnose food allergies. or I just want to finish something. studies all aspects of the immune system and how it functions. I want to find out. If a person has an allergy to something that’s usually harmless—like peanuts—the immune system will overreact and quickly attack that substance. with students to teach or work with in your lab.D.” Managing all that flexibility is a challenge. in both illness and health.PHILIPPA MARRACK She loves the challenge of trying to master a new technique. using computers to predict how the function of a protein might be altered when you change the sequence of its constituent amino acids. I come in on a weekend. As long as it fits in with the current project. It’s really neat!” she says. In trying to put my ideas into the real world. on top of the frustration when experiments don’t work. a delighted Irene moved from Austria to southern California in 2009.” Scientists can use the lab whenever they want. and I’m often most productive late at night. tonsils. Irene enjoys human interactions as much as structural ones. 20 IRENE MAIER ? W h at is i M M u N o l o g y? Immunology. ”Science is all about discovery. as well as collaborating with other scientists in different fields and getting great input. “I specialize in computational protein design. a wide range of problems. By using Irene’s diagnostic chip. can result. from arthritis to chronic infections. This is what causes the itchy eyes and runny nose of an allergic reaction. When Professor Mayo agreed to sponsor her. she has become a structural biologist on a postdoctoral fellowship at California Institute of Technology (Caltech). Her experiments are testing whether redesigning a protein’s structure in the lab can help control the way the immune system responds to a foreign substance. in biochemistry at the University of Vienna. you sometimes need to visit the lab for an hour.” SOLVING ONE OF LIFE’S PUZZLES Joan Steitz concurs. a large branch of medical science. “You have to stay motivated when you’re repeating an experiment again and again—eventually it will work. we’re allowed to do a lot of things.
including the intricate changes that occur as the immune system and the brain develop.” Philippa studies survival and function of T cells. That’s what it’s all about!” LOOKING FOR THE “LITTLE THINGS” Philippa Marrack.“Sometimes you’re doing an experiment.” Scientists typically set their own hours. the T cell is alerted and multiplies rapidly to attack the invading germ. People get joy from the things they’re good at. “It’s a mistake to think that scientists lead solitary existences. Joan remembers testing a particular hypothesis. This is especially important for immunology research. with more people sharing discoveries. and then with more people by publishing. “You put them in not because anyone says you have to.’” Joan’s groundbreaking research of that mysterious splicing process has been important for understanding how proteins are formed. For Joan. but “you have to delight in little things along the way.” says Philippa. and depend on our colleagues for ideas. which change with a project’s stage. but believes it’s vital to teach and train the next generation of scientists. We educate. She’s eager to reach her lab each day “to learn what’s new. learn.000 unique protein “receptors” on its surface. jointly run their lab. the only thing that’s always gone smoothly was doing science together. and share the enthusiasm of the people actually producing the results. which retrieve the important genetic information from DNA. trying to find the beginning of the gene that will eventually make the right protein. “I developed the film and could see—for the first time— exactly HOW they do it! I drove home at 2 a. ‘Every cell in my body is doing that right now. Now the world understands better how life’s machinery operates. She has found a way to balance her family needs with those of her lab and career. I’ll do the faster experiments. Most scientists are driven by wanting to unravel mysteries.U N E S C O Award winner. discuss. like receptors and antigens. supervising over 20 people. learn. the fun’s always the excitement of “finding out how things work inside living organisms.” Philippa reflects. “And the more successful you are. because our bodies are made of chemicals—but have different skills in the kind of science we each understand or manage best. 23 . Her initial hypothesis and basic findings took two years. Immunologists interact with people all the time. We educate. confirm. too.” Together they make a great team.” Her biggest challenge was integrating science and family.” she explains. Taking time off can be challenging. “You can hardly wait to share it with others in the lab. since it is this kind of splicing that creates all the different types 22 of antibodies that can recognize and defend the body against the millions of viruses and bacteria out there. and depend on our colleagues for ideas. though. ‘That’s the answer!’ And you’re the only person on Earth who knows that. Any infectious organism also has proteins on its surface—called antigens—some of which may randomly match a particular T cell’s receptor. you reach an equilibrium. John Kappler. Then 10 other labs spent five more years to further explore. you want to get answers more quickly. where it is interspersed with what she calls ‘junk.m. a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Scholar and L’Oréal-UNESCO Award winner in 2004. “loves finding answers to life’s puzzles. get a new piece of data.’ “snRNPs are the machinery that gets rid of the junk and splices together the useful information. Philippa’s lab discovered what the T cell protein receptors look like. and understand snRNPs. During her research. the more people you’re responsible for. Each T cell has 40. Now. It’s also allowed her to explore other biological processes. who is a 2001 L’ O r é a l . different from every other T cell’s receptors. You’re so curious about what’s going on. “Groups working at different levels in your lab increases the reward level. Don’t let hard work or long hours scare you. advises Joan. Then ribosomes can make proteins without interference from the junky stuff. “In 36 years of marriage. discuss. look at it and say. As a lab manager. so they can be identified and studied. thinking.” She works with seven postdoctoral fellows.” Joan acknowledges. He’s very careful and precise. of which everyone has about a million million. It was really fun to figure that out. and some graduate students. she misses doing handson research. you’re not producing or publishing data. Joan and other scientists JOAN STEITZ are hoping that her research can help lead to new treatments for all sorts of serious immune system disorders. and questions with you. trying to care for two (now grown) children as well as her aging parents. where cells would die quickly.” Philippa and her husband. It does get hectic. “We were both trained as chemists—important for understanding biology. five undergraduates.” she confides. because when you’re not in the lab. When antigen and receptor come together.” “It’s a mistake to think that scientists lead solitary existences.” The University of Colorado immunology Professor is proud that her team solved “one of the ways the immune system knows not to attack the person it lives inside of. who often spends nine hours a day in her lab. several advanced scientists.” Joan. visions. discovered and defined the function of mammalian cells called small nuclear ribonucleoproteins (snRNPs).” she recounts. but because you want to. “Somehow.
As a AAAS member your dues support these efforts. .org/lorealwis www. To learn more.org www.gov/women/intro. and access to Science digital libraries.witi.org Kinetic City–games and experiments that make science fun for all ages American Association of University Women Association for Women in Science www.org www. technology.sciencecareers.awis.webgrrls.com/ma_rish Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 4: Both–Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 5: Top–Courtesy of DYCT.com www. engineering. Engineering and Technology www.org/plusyou/rwanda.ifuw.uic.womeninbio.braincake.expandingyourhorizons. visit aaas.net NASA–section of the NASA website especially for young scientists Science/AAAS and L’Oreal–all previous Women in Science booklets (download PDF version of this booklet here) Brain Cake: The Girls.org/programs/international/wist AAAS Women’s International Science homepage AGORA forum for women in science–part of the L’Oréal-UNESCO partnership www.scienceclubforgirls.com/Eraxion Page 6: © Deroubaix/Gamma for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 7: Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 8: Top–Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 9: Top–© iStockphoto.witec-eu.kineticcity.inwes.gov/audience/forstudents/index. Spain Bottom–© iStockphoto. AAAS is helping the people of Rwanda work toward a future built around science and technology. By providing materials such as the Project 2061 Atlas of Science Literacy.edu/orgs/gem-set/welcome.com/gavni Page 11: Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 12: Both: Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 14: Top–Deroubaix/Gamma for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Bottom–© iStockphoto.com/ChristianAnthony.com/Raycat. © iStockphoto.htm Third World Organization for Women in Science GEM-SET–online group mentoring for girls in science.org www.nasa.org Science Books & Films guide to science resources Expanding Your Horizons Program–conferences for young women www. and technology www.sbfonline.com/taramol Page 22: Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 23: Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 24: © iStockphoto.org Girls Go Tech–introducing young girls to the world of technology Girlstart–empowering girls in math.com Page 17: Top–Markel Redondo/Abacapress for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Bottom–iStockphoto. science. If you’re not yet a AAAS member. AAAS is helping the Rwandan government rebuild its educational infrastructure as a way to help drive economic growth and development.html Women of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) C redits Cover: TOC: From Top–© iStockphoto.com/henriquecruz Page 15: Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 16: Top–© Olivier Douliery/Abacapress for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Bottom–Photo illlustration Science.aauw.org www.forwomeninscience.femmesetsciences.girlsgotech.aaas.com/earthgirl Page 18: Ann Sappenfield Page 20: Top–Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Bottom–Deroubaix/Gamma for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 21: Top–Micheline Pelletier for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Bottom–© iStockphoto.com/mstay.agora.com/Eraxion. © iStockphoto.forwomeninscience. engineering and technology www. lesson plans from Science NetLinks.com/ shunyufan Page 2: © Olivier Douliery/Abacapress for L’Oréal Corporate Foundation Page 3: Top Left–© iStockphoto.arc. Together we can make a difference.girlstart.com/lucato AAAS is here – bringing educational infrastructure to the developing world. © iStockphoto.twows. engineering and mathematics (STEM) www.com Webgrrls International www.nasa.com/ Sashkinw.AdditionAl resourCes www.com/agora International network focused on supporting women in science.org www. © iStockphoto. © iStockphoto.org Women in Bio www.com/geopaul Bottom–© iStockphoto.html www.org International Federation of University Women quest.com www.fr Science Club for Girls–increasing the self-confidence and science literacy of K–12th grade girls French association for women in science www.com Women in Technology International www.org www. join us.com L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science homepage www. Math & Science Partnership European Association for Women in Science. Image: © Photos.
forwomeninscience. In addition.Science needs women The L’ORÉAL-UNESCO Awards honor women scientists from five continents. Each year. 62 women from 28 countries have been recognized for the exceptional quality of their research. USA 2008 Laureate for Europe 2006 Ada Yonath. www. Nigeria 2005 Laureate for North America Myriam Sarachik. they are selected by an international jury presided by a Nobel Prize laureate. Mexico . To date. Republic of Korea 2001 Laureate for Africa & Arab States Adeyinka Gladys Falusi.com 1998 Laureate for Asia-Pacific Myeong-Hee Yu. Israel 2010 Laureate for Latin America Alejandra Bravo. which has made them role models for the next generation. Unesco and L’Oréal are convinced that science is the source of progress for society and that women have an essential role to play in that progress. L’Oréal and Unesco have granted more than 860 fellowships to young women researchers in 93 countries. | 2019-04-23T16:31:07Z | https://www.scribd.com/document/58012734/Women-in-Science |
If you have got around 1500 dollars to spend on a great bike, whether you are buying this for the first time, or upgrading, you are definitely in a great position. This price segment of the road bike market is very competitive, meaning you will get a lot for your money in 2019!
Best road bikes under 1500 dollars budget market has wide range of collections, and with the best one, you are capable of handing a range of riding from club run to 100 mile race to daily commuting!
What’ll be the Ideal Weight of the Bike?
When purchasing a new road bike, the most important consideration is your budget. With 1500 dollars, there are several great road bikes from renowned manufacturers.
Next should be durability, which entails the type of material used to build the frame, the type of rims and tires. A great road bike should be able to serve its purpose for as long as it is required.
Be it for personal or sports requirement, you need to consider purchasing a durable road bike. The gear system and brakes are another major factor that you need to have in your mind when looking for your first road bike.
Also, the best gear system should handle any terrain and also boost the speed levels of your bike. On the other hand, braking system determines your road safety, which makes them a great consideration as well.
Finally, you need to consider the general performance and features that the road bike offers. Always go for the ones that have additional advantages and come with user friendly features.
With the price range in mind, I tested 30 different brands and road bike models for efficiency, durability, speed and safety. That is how I came up with the list below, of the top 10 best road bikes under 1500 US dollars price tag.
For serious riders and triathletes, the Talon provides riders with choices. Kestrel Talon Road Shimano is revolutionary in regards to how versatile it is.
Go from road to triathlon mode using just one impressive bike.
The bike’s design is its biggest achievement. Everything put into this model is to make it perfect for tough rides. The carbon frame is strong and durable, the design is made for speed, the cable routing system leads to clean airflow over the entire bike, and the saddle acts as a vibration dampener.
This bike does require some assembly and tuning and does not come with pedals, so you have to purchase those separately. Furthermore, it runs big, so shorter riders may want to look for an alternative.
Overall, this bike gets good ratings, albeit there aren’t too many comments and reviews. The several that are there give this product high praise. If you are serious about your riding, but don’t want to spend a fortune, this is the choice for you.
Carbon frame made from a combination of 800k and 700k carbon fibers.
The Shimano Shifters work really well for this bike.
The gears and the brakes work fine too.
It is really easy to get high and get down on speeds.
Great design and also lightweight bike.
Assembly is a bit tough. Take professional help if you want to do it right.
New to ever-growing market, this sleek bike is for any rider, both big and small. Unlike many of their competitors, BEIOU provides riders a choice if size for the bike that works for them.
BEIOU® 2016 700C Road Bike is a huge advantage because most bikes are made for taller riders. The model is a 2016, so it is the most advanced version.
Its ultra-light frame keeps you going at the right speed. The members of the company respond quickly to customer concerns and questions and they feature Shimano brand components.
There isn’t enough information out there to really know how this bike performs, but the current model suggests they have fixed and developed earlier editions.
It’s a unisex bike and comes in several sizes, which is great for shorter people as most bikes similar to these come in larger sizes. Their customer service seems to be prompt and helpful, so if there is a problem, you can just contact them. For the price, it is worth giving it a shot.
Since this model is brand new, there isn’t much information about it, including reviews and comments.
Shimano 105 gear parts provide it racing genes.
You can navigate the toughest of corners thanks to the comfortable handlebars.
Saddle provides you a comfortable position to ride the bike.
Are you looking for a road bike that can be used for all surfaces? The Diamondback complete alternative road bike is worth your consideration.
This is a road bike with an all-purpose functionality, and this sets it apart from other competing bikes on the market. The value of its price is equivalent to the quality of services offered.
The complete alternative road bike features an endurance frame constructed of 6061-T6 alloy that makes it lightweight hence providing you with a smooth ride.
The bike is designed in such a way that you remain upright as well as achieve the desired comfort. With the tapered head tube, you can easily handle this bike without experiencing front and flex in the course of hard efforts.
The bike boasts of a flattened top tube frame that makes it easy to shoulder when walking up stairs. Its light weight is also another advantage, hence you will be in a position to carry your bike effectively when going up stairs.
The presence of TRP hydraulic disc brakes provide an added stopping power when you need to slow down or stop.
A good choice to have in terms of price vs. Performance.
This aluminum frame does a great job on gravel.
It is a comfortable ride with complementing tires.
This bike is a bit on the heavier side.
Tommaso Monza is a compact road bike with various features. Especially speaking, the lightweight Aluminum frame works perfectly for the rider.
When you are riding on the roads, you don’t have to worry about the weight of the bike pulling you down. The frame gives you the opportunity to attach fenders and racks. You can take it for long rides in the countryside.
As far as the overall look of the bike is concerned, it is aerodynamic. The highlights are the handlebars. These are “Forcella” products, and these handles provide you maximum cushioning for long rides. These things allow your hands to stay relaxed while you channel the maximum power through your legs.
One thing impressed me with this road bike is that it gives you HICT Carbon fork. This fork does a great job of dampening the vibration that an uneven road presents you with. You won’t even feel the jerking that generally muddy or rocky roads offer.
As far as the gear is concerned, you get Shimano Tiagra gear with this cycle. 50/34T crankset gives you the smooth movement of the chain. The 11x32t cassette does wonder when you cycle through speeds. You get as many as 20 speed levels to play with! All in all, an excellent bike.
Just when you think it couldn’t be any better, Tiagra shifters allow you to have fast shifting and unmatched experience when you cycle through the speeds.
One thing to remember, though, you need to assemble each part of your bike carefully. I’d advise you to assemble the parts with professional help.
Nicely built frame that is lightweight and sturdy at the same time.
HICT carbon fork can withstand whatever the road throws at it.
The drive train and crankset from Shimano are responsible for wide range of speeds.
Tiagra shifters do their job and make the transition from one speed level to another seamlessly.
You need to have a professional assembly done for this bike to work right.
If you prefer racing genes in your road bike, you’ll love Ridley Fenix. It comes with Aluminum Frame. The frame is lightweight and butted for perfection.
You can now ride and navigate through busy city roads, thanks to the Shimano 105 STI Derailleur. The whole gear system is supported by Shimano. Ridley Fenix has 22 levels of speed that you can cycle through.
To make matters intriguing, the bike reaches top speed in quick time. Thanks to the Tektro brakes, you can halt the bike just as quickly if you are in a crowded area.
4Za wheels do a great job in stabilizing the bike. You can expect the wheels to hold it together when it comes to bumpy roads, slippery surfaces, and harsh weather conditions. Just to complement the wheels, the road bike has 4Za cockpit too.
22 levels of speed will satisfy any bike rider.
Quality drivetrain parts from Shimano.
This road bike has racing genes in it and rides smoothly.
Some customers have had issues with internal routing ports.
Schwinn Phocus 1600 men's road bike is a great choice for beginner riders and commuters.
Not only is Schwinn recognized as the brand for bicycles, the bike definitely lives up to its name.
This bike is easy to assemble and has a wide gear range fit for any of your needs. It comes in two colors, so you can choose to rock the white design or the slimming black. From its comfort and durability to its easy assembly, consumers have expressed their joy and gratitude for finding such a great product.
The light frame allows for agile riding, and the seat seems to be comfortable enough, although that can always be changed if need be. It’s easy to assemble and is packaged twice to avoid damage.
The only downsides to this bike are that they are made for taller gentlemen, especially in the 5’10” to 6’ 2” range and that the gear shift can be a little finicky. Otherwise, there aren’t too many reported problems.
Great frame and parts as expected from Schwinn.
The ride is comfortable and no bumps at all.
You have the opportunity to attach two bottle holders.
The handlebars have soft rubber covers for added comfort.
Sometimes shifting gears can be a problem.
Since we are discussing Best Road Bikes Under 1500 Dollars, it is time to find a gem for the women as well. Diamondback delivers the perfect ride for every road with Airen Women’s Road Bike.
Available in small, medium, and large sizes; this brand caters to women of all heights.
The 7005 allow frame of this bike is perfect for women as it is light. But being a lightweight frame, it doesn’t compromise on the strength that is needed for harsh roads and weather conditions. The construction and design of the bike favor women. Even the alloy fork.
The DB Podium fork keeps your handlebars steady when you need them most. No matter how bad the road is, the fork doesn’t let you feel the bulk of the jerking. The fork aids to overall performance of the bike. Thanks to it and the handlebars working together, you can navigate through tight corners without much of a hassle.
Shimano Sora drivetrain works nicely to provide the women swift shifting experience. Add to that rear derailleur and a cassette that facilitates 9 different levels of speed. With wide range of gears, you can navigate through busy traffic as well as quiet country roads like a breeze.
Since we are onto tires, Michelin Dynamic Sport 700x28C tires provide a touch of versatility to the bike. Rest assured, you can move through any obstacle and bump with supreme confidence. These tires cover Equation Disk wheels that have alloy spokes that support the wheels through thick and thin.
The design and the Sora groupset really makes it worthy of its price.
Disc brakes work perfectly with this bike.
Tires provide you with versatility to run the bike on different terrains.
9 speed levels make it perfect for citywide riding.
People have tough times with connecting the shifters and the brakes together.
This VeloVie Vecteur 100 Aluminum Alloy Road Bicycle is your best pick if you intend to avoid the expensive carbon fiber constructed ones.
Since aluminum is less expensive yet effective in making strong and lightweight frames, this VelvoVie bike with Shimano R500 wheels is as perfect as you would require a road bike to be.
With this make, you get the opportunity to enjoy professional-grade bicycle without having to pay extremely expensive prices. That makes it a great pick for beginners or casual cyclists.
Most riders prefer this road bike because of its weight and stiffness. It comes perfect for the road, regardless of changing terrain. The combination of aluminum frame and its fork made from carbon fiber and a speck of an alloy, gives it the comfort and great usability.
It is your only hope of owning a high-end road bike without having to cough out excess money. Additionally, it comes with easy to mount and un-mount parts, with fewer maintenance services required.
Complete Shimano gear set for top notch performance.
A bike for long rides.
The bike is perfect for people with medium height.
As we move further down on my list of best road bikes under 1500 dollars, Kestrel Talon Road Bike with Tri-Carbon Frame deserves mention here. Thanks to the Carbon Fiber frame, the bike is durable and can withstand whatever you plan to throw at it.
It goes without saying that this bike from Kestrel is impact resistant to the highest degree thanks to the Carbon construction.
In addition to being a road bike, this one is perfect for “Triathlon” as well. The aerodynamic frame complements the riding style of any rider on the road and is good for any road you ride on. Although the model was brought out in 2015, the sturdy frame and sleek look still keep at the top of a rider’s wish list.
If you are a tall rider, you’ll love this bike’s 58” frame. This bike isn’t difficult to assemble. In fact, it comes 98% assembled. You just need to connect different parts. But my advice would be to assemble it in the local bike shop once it arrives at your doorsteps.
It utilizes Shimano 105 gear with 11 different speed settings. These are perfect for road bike riding or triathlon tracks. The Kestrel Tri Carbon Bike features FSA shifters right at the end of the handlebars. Design-wise, this tweak is impressive, to say the least.
To round it all up, you get to have a limited time warranty from the manufacturers. This will surely cover all the damages and shortcomings.
Provides you a smooth riding experience.
Suitable road bike for long rides.
Less pricy yet more features when you compare it with other brands and models.
Carbon fiber makes it strong and grants the longevity it needs.
Some reviewers complained about flat tires after few months of using the bike.
As we move further down on our list, here’s another road bike from Diamondback. The 2016 Century 1 model features 7005 Aluminum construction.
The geometry of the product is also impressive. The alloy frame and the overall geometry contributes to longer rides and less fatigue.
The DBR Alloy fork takes care of suspension. This fork aids to better steering with 1.5” tapered steerer. This will help you get a better grip on the road. In addition to surviving jarring, you can navigate twists and turns better.
As far as the gears go, Shimano Drivetrains are more than reliable when it comes to going through different levels of speed smoothly. With Shimano 105 11X2 drivetrain, you can access 22 levels of speed that cater through busy roads and quiet neighborhoods alike.
Avid Brakes are an integrated part of the design and performance of this bike. These brakes are one of the bests in the cycling world. Specifically speaking, Avid BB5 brakes give you the perfect amount of force to slow down or completely stop your ride whenever you need and under any weather condition.
We have Michelin wheels as a part of this road bike from Diamondback. The disc wheels match perfectly with the disc brakes allowing you to have absolute control of how you are riding your bike under different circumstances.
Lightweight frame and geometry enhance the performance of the bike.
You won’t feel fatigued after a long ride on this bike.
24H wheels help people with average height to maintain a balance.
The “Air-formed” fork helps you in better steering.
No negatives found so far.
With $1500 as the limit, you can truly get a bang for your buck. Average biking consumers spend more than other people. As you are a biker, I know you spend more than others but that doesn't mean you spend for a bike that's not even worth the price tag.
Rather than spending $10,000 on a bike and living like a broke the next day, scamper through the next section and find out how to spot a deal winner road bike in just under $1500.
Even if you buy a bike that costs under $1500, you should find the size that’s appropriate for you. When you are purchasing a road bike online, you should see for size options. Most of the brands and their models come with different sizes and wheel heights.
Choosing the ideal size will make sure you don’t buy a beast that is too big for your body or a mouse that is too small.
Bicycles that cost you over $2000 or even more, have limited choices when it comes to frame material, gear parts, and brakes. But when it comes to the ones costing you less than $1500 the choice is widened. That is why it is important that you choose well.
For frames, you can go Carbon Fiber or Aluminum. Aluminum makes a bike light. Most bikes weigh between 17lbs. and 22 lbs. That is acceptable. On the other hand, Carbon provides sturdiness and rigidity to your bike. It goes without saying that Carbon frame will cost you more than their Aluminum Counterparts.
As far as the configuration is concerned, my advice to you would be to buy medium-level configuration with a high-end frame. Ideally, you want your road bike to last long. Maxing out the configuration with a basic chassis spells disaster as the cycle visits maker’s shop frequently.
This is a tricky question. The makers use parts like derailleurs, drivetrains, and brakes from different price levels and combine them into one group balancing out the price. These parts may or may not feature from the same company. At the range from $800 to $1500, most popular groupsets are Shimano, SRAM, Sora, Tiagra Claris and more. I am more for Shimano because I’ve used Shimano groupsets for a long time.
As far as the cranks go, choose double or triple cranks. They make it easy on your road bikes to climb up or down steep pathways.
I’ll be honest with you, there won’t be any Carbon wheel at this price. But, you can get your hands on Shimano, Kenda, and Mavic which are pretty good in their own rights.
As far as the pedals are concerned, very few road bikes under $1500 come with pedals. It is best to buy a separate pair just in case. SPD pedals and similar shoes are good enough for a bike within $800 to $1500 range.
I generally prefer a weight range from 17lbs to 22lbs. These are considered “Lightweight” bikes. You’ll notice heavier bikes have less price attached to them. The frame materials aren’t great either. So, stick to a lightweight bike as it helps you in acceleration as well.
Lightweight road bikes negate air pressure better with the aerodynamic design when you are pushing forward. When it comes to the virtually weightless bike, Diamondback is my first choice.
Cycling is one of the most fun-full and healthy outdoor activities in the world right now. Whether you are doing it for sports, adventure or as an exercise, you deserve to be on an amazing bike with user-friendly features as well as great functionalities.
Finding the best road bike under 1500 dollars is therefore a great start towards optimizing your cycling experience. As long as you know exactly what to look for and where to look for, you will find it easy getting a road bike worth your money.
Previous Post 10 Best Road Bikes Under 1000 Dollars in 2019 – Which One You Want? Next Post Best Mountain Bikes Under 500 Dollars – 2019 Great Bikes With Budget! | 2019-04-18T20:19:28Z | https://bikegeeky.com/best-road-bikes-under-1500/ |
The anti-Roman sentiment of the Heidelberg Catechism is well-documented. In its contents the Catechism often seeks to combat Roman doctrine. However, this anti-Roman sentiment did not have its origin from textbooks and it was not merely an academic exercise. It was first and foremost a reaction to the ecclesiastical context of that time. At the same time that Elector Frederick III commissioned the writing of the Heidelberg Catechism, the Council of Trent was meeting on the other side of the Alpine mountains. Remarkably, this meeting had only recently decided to write a catechism of its own. It is very likely that the decision-makers in Heidelberg were aware of what was happening in Trent, and reacted accordingly. Underlying the decision to commission and write the Heidelberg Catechism was the acknowledgment of the importance of catechetical teaching. In several documents, which are closely related to the Heidelberg Catechism, the importance of catechetical teaching is highlighted. Interestingly, however, these documents also contrast the reformed principal of catechetical teaching with the Roman sacrament of confirmation. Whereas catechetical teaching leads children on the way from their baptism to the Lord's Supper, the sacrament of confirmation takes away the urgency for any form of catechetical teaching.
Daar is reeds baie geskryf oor die anti-Roomse sentiment wat uit die Heidelbergse Kategismus spreek. Inhoudelik voer die Kategismus dikwels 'n stryd met die Roomse leer. Die oorsprong van hierdie anti-Roomse sentiment kom egter nie net uit handboeke nie en dit was ook nie bloot 'n akademiese oefening nie. Dit was eerstens veral 'n reaksie op die kerklike konteks van daardie tyd. Dieselfde tyd toe Keurvors Frederick III opdrag gegee het vir die opstel van die Heidelbergse Kategismus, het die Konsilie van Trente aan die oorkant van die Alpe vergader. Dit is merkwaardig dat hierdie vergadering kort voor dit besluit het om op sy eie 'n kategismus op te stel. Die besluitnemers in Heidelberg was heel waarskynlik volkome bewus van wat in Trente gebeur het en het dienooreenkomstig opgetree. Onderliggend aan die besluit om opdrag te gee tot die opstel van die Heidelbergse Kategismus, was die besef van die belangrikheid van kategese. In verskeie dokumente wat nóú aan die Heidelbergse Kategismus verwant is, word die belangrikheid van kategese beklemtoon. Dit is egter interessant dat hierdie dokumente ook die kontras tussen die gereformeerde beginsel van kategetiese onderrig en die Roomse sakrament van die vormsel aantoon. Terwyl kategetiese onderrig kinders vanaf hulle doop tot by die nagmaal begelei, misken die sakrament van die vormsel die noodsaaklikheid van enige vorm van kategetiese onderrig.
The year 2013 not only marks the 450th anniversary of the origin of the Heidelberg Catechism for Protestants, but it is also a 450th anniversary of another kind for Christians on the other side of the confessional fence. The year 1563 was, after all, not only the beginning of the Heidelberg book-of-comfort, but it was also the year in which the famous Council of Trent came to its grand conclusion. Reformation and Counter-Reformation therefore share this remarkable year, and Christians of both Reformed and Catholic conviction will commemorate their respective heritages in 2013.
Could this shared piece of history maybe lead to a shared future, even if it means only a little piece of shared future? Could Heidelberg and Trent be a boost for the ecumenical dialogue?1 Without necessarily answering these questions for today's context, this article will at least attempt to show what the answer was 450 years ago. In short, the answer was as follows: in 1563 Heidelberg and Trent were complete opposites. The obstacles between Heidelberg and Trent were as big as the Alpine mountains that stood between these two historically important cities. Although the delegates in Trent might not have been aware of what was happening in Heidelberg, the opposite was certainly true. Heidelberg consciously positioned itself against Trent and its canons and anathemas. In this article a picture will be sketched of the history and contents of this opposition.
To begin with, it will be shown that Heidelberg and Trent not only share a common date (1563), but that there are also more formal links: in Heidelberg the canons and anathemas of Trent had a direct influence on the decision to produce a new Catechism. Next, the opposition between Trent and Heidelberg will be focused on a specific aspect, as expressed by persons who played a leading role in the origin and realisation of the Heidelberg Catechism. This aspect has to do with the contrast between the reformers' rediscovery of the value of catechetical teaching and the Roman sacrament of confirmation. Finally, a few conclusions will be drawn.
For many Christians coming from reformed churches, the Heidelberg Catechism (HC)2 is a unique writing. Unique in the sense that it is the only catechism they know and in their experience it is the only catechism that exists.3 However, in sixteenth-century Europe the situation was different. It was quite common for reformed cities and territories to produce their own catechisms. Also, in the Palatinate, one of the leading principalities of the Holy Roman Empire, there were several catechisms in use at the time when the HC was written, although they had not been produced locally. One of them was Johannes Brenz's Landescatechismus (Gunnoe 2005:35). Consequently, Bierma (2005:49) can state that it was not surprising that the Palatinate created its own catechism. What was surprising, however, was that it had not done so earlier. Bierma does not delve into the reasons for this 'delay'.
This begs the question: Why was the HC only produced in 1563? After all, the reformation of the Palatinate had been progressing gradually from the 1520s through the reigns of Ludwig V (r. 1508-1544), Frederick II (r. 1544-1556), Ottheinreich (r. 1556-1559) and Frederick III, the Pious (r. 1559-1576), by whom the production of the HC was eventually commissioned (Gunnoe 2005:15-47). Furthermore, the reformation, albeit in Lutheran form, was already officially accepted in the Palatinate in 1546 through a series of edicts and judgments legalising the reform, and it was fixed in a Protestant church order shortly afterwards (Gunnoe ibid:27-28). Added to this, a church visitation, ordered by Ottheinreich in 1556, found inter alia that the ideas of the Anabaptists had taken root in the parishes of the Palatinate, that there were only a few properly trained ministers available, and that many parishioners still held to the traditions of their folk piety (Gunnoe ibid:35) - a state of affairs that would lead one to expect a thorough reformation of the means and methods of the Christian education. And, finally, such a reformation of the Christian education would have been completely within the capabilities of Heidelberg, seeing that, especially since the time of Ottheinreich, a well-known university with a relatively strong theological faculty was readily available.4 All these factors taken into account, one wonders why it had taken almost two decades, after officially accepting Protestantism, for Heidelberg to produce its own catechism. And when the commission was finally given for an own catechism, what was, at that time, the cause for its production? This question will now be explored further.
Elector Frederick III commissioned the preparation of a new catechism, most probably sometime in 1562. Seeing that very little documentation has survived, it has proven impossible to give an exact date for this commissioning. However, it has to be somewhere between 09 September 1561 and 19 January 1563. The first is the date of the arrival of Zacharius Ursinus, generally regarded as the person responsible for crafting the draft of the HC (Bierma 2005:70). The second is the date of Elector Frederick III's preface to the HC (Bakhuizen van den Brink 1976:151).5 However, the terminus post quem [limit after which] and terminus ante quem [limit before which] for the commissioning of the HC can be narrowed down even more when the following facts are taken into consideration.
It is generally accepted that Ursinus' Catechesis minor6 was used as one of the main source documents for composing the HC,7 and thus had to be composed somewhere before the HC. In Reuter's 1612 collection of Ursinus' works, the title of the Catechesis minor is appended by the words 'written in the year 1562 by dr Zacaharias Ursinus; produced now for the first time from the library and original manuscript of the author' (Bierma 2005:137). According to this evidence, the Catechesis minor was composed in 1562, and therefore the latter part of 1561 can be eliminated as a possible terminus post quem for the commissioning of the HC. For a more precise terminus ante quem, reference can be made to Ursinus' inaugural address in September 1562 when taking up his position as professor at the University of Heidelberg, in which he indicates that the new catechism was almost ready (Bierma ibid:137-138). Thus, by September 1562 good progress had been made on the production of the HC. From these snippets of information, one can conclude that the Catechesis minor had to be composed in the first half of 1562, and that Frederick III's commission for the production of the HC was either given shortly before (so that the Catechesis minor was composed as a 'trial run' for the HC), or shortly afterwards (using the Catechesis minor as a source for the HC).
The reason for trying to establish the date of Frederick III's commission so precisely, is brought about by the interesting fact that the third and last session of the Council of Trent started on 18 January 1562 (and continued until its final adjournment on 04 December 1563) - thus, shortly before the time when the HC was commissioned and drawn up. In itself, of course, this proximity in time does not prove a connection between these two important events. However, there are a few indicators that do suggest a link between the final session of the Council of Trent and the commissioning, as well as the contents, of the HC.
The Council of Trent and the Heidelberg Catechism: A coincidence?
Firstly, during its eighteenth session (26 February 1562) the Council of Trent commissioned the composition of the very first Roman catechism. As a matter of fact, it was already decreed by the council during its fourth session on 5 April 1546 that a catechism, to be compiled by capable persons, must be published in Latin and in the vernacular for children and uninstructed adults. But, as the council was occupied by more pressing matters, nothing is heard of this decision again until the eighteenth session in February 1562, when it was brought up by Archbishop Carlo Borromeo. During this session a commission was appointed to commence with the work. Although individual catechisms had been in existence in the Roman Catholic Church before that time (e.g. the catechism of the Jesuit Petrus Canisius), this would become the very first church-wide catechism for the Roman church (Halsall 1999). It was surely an historic moment.
Frederick III could hardly have known the contents of this catechism before he commissioned the production of the HC, as it was only published in 1566. But the mere fact that he commissioned the preparation of what would become the HC only months after the Council of Trent's decision to compose the very first Roman catechism, certainly attracts attention. There is a very real possibility that Frederick's commission came as a direct result of receiving word of the decision made at Trent, or at the very least, the Tridentine decision served as the final impetus for the Elector to do what seems to have been long overdue.
Why was HC 80 initially omitted, and why was it later added and even expanded? According to Doedes (1867:27; cf. Bierma, 2005:79), who carefully compared the different editions, the initial omission of HC 80 was not a matter of mere oversight, although this impression is created.13 It is quite possible that Frederick III insisted on this addition as a result of the decrees on the mass made by the Council of Trent in its 22nd session in September of 1562.14 Probably these Papal decisions reached the Elector and his advisors too late to react to them before the approval of the final text in December of 1562, and therefore it was not included in the first edition, but only got its place in the second edition almost a month later. Doedes (ibid:35) is of the opinion that, after the Elector had the opportunity to study the official anathema of the Council of Trent, he decided to expand on HC 80 even more for the third edition (again almost a month later). It can therefore be said that Rome's anathema surrounding the doctrine of the mass, forced the Elector into a strong-worded, reformed rejection of the mass. The Papal anathema was countered by a Reformed condemnation: and a condemnable idolatry' (last words of answer 80, added in the third edition).
It seems therefore that we have here another indicator (the first being the coinciding dates, both in 1562, of Trent's decision to compose a Catechism and Elector Frederick's decision to do the same) that Frederick III was very aware of what was happening at the Council of Trent, and that the Tridentine decisions influenced some important aspects of the contents of the HC.
The pretention of the above is not to say that Rome and the Council of Trent was the one and only reason for the birth of the HC. History and contents would defy such a pretention.15 But users of the HC should at least take note of Frederick III's acute awareness of what was happening in Northern Italy, where the Council of Trent was meeting. That awareness made the Elector realise that the Papists answered the Reformation with a Counter-Reformation, especially when they decided to put the Roman doctrine, officially reconfirmed by the Council of Trent, on paper in a catechism. That in turn led Frederick III to further reformation. He realised that the true doctrine needed to be taught time and time again to children in the schools and common people from the pulpit.16 Reformation was, after all, not a once-off event on which the church could look back with satisfaction, but rather a process of continuous reformation (semper reformanda). Therefore, in his preface to the first edition of the HC, Frederick III can state that what was done before by his predecessors needed to be further improved, reformed and further established, as the exigencies of the time demanded (da es die nothwendigkeit erfordert; Bakhuizen van den Brink 1976:150). It is very possible that this nothwendigkeit is inter alia a hidden reference to what was happening at Trent. It can therefore be stated, with a considerable degree of certainty, that the commissioning of the HC was, at least partially, a reaction to what was decided at Trent.
In light of the role that Heidelberg's conscious opposition towards Rome, and more specifically the Council of Trent, played in the establishment of the HC, as described above, this chapter wants to dig a little deeper into the motivation for this opposition. What was at the heart of Heidelberg's anti-Roman polemic when it came to the issue of Christian education? More generally stated: Where did Rome and the Reformation differ exactly on the issue of catechetical teaching? Two concise, but important citations - one from the introduction to the fourth edition of the HC and one from Zacharias Ursinus' commentary on the HC - may be of help to find the heart of the matter.
The HC was published in four different versions in 1563, a testimony to its immediate success. The fourth and final edition did not differ from the text of the third edition, but it did differ in the 'packaging'. The fourth edition of the HC did not stand on its own, but received a place within the whole of a new Palatine church order, entitled Kirchenordnung, wie es mit der christlichen Lehre, heiligen Sacramenten, und Ceremonien, inn des durchleuchtigsten Herrn Friedrichs Pfaltzgraven bey Rhein ... gehalten wirdt (Maag 2005:105). This church order consisted of a whole range of church ordinances, including instructions on celebrating baptism and the Lord's Supper, as well as formulary prayers for use during church services (Niesel 1938:23). In addition to a general preface, the HC received its own introduction (vom Catechismo; Niesel ibid:148-149), dated 15 November 1563 (Niesel ibid:140-141), attached to the whole church order. In this introduction it is stated that, from the beginning of the church, all the godly taught their children in the fear of the Lord, 'doubtless because of the following reasons' (one zweifel auβ nachfolgenden ursachen; Niesel ibid:148, line 14). Three reasons are subsequently provided. The first reason pertains to the natural depravity of the heart of even the small children, which should be countered with wholesome teaching. The second reason makes clear that this teaching is commanded by God.
But it is the third reason that is of special interest to the topic of this article. It says that just like the children of Israel, after circumcision and when they came to their senses, were instructed in the covenant and the signs of the covenant, so our children should be instructed in the baptism they received, as well as in the true Christian faith and repentance, so that they can confess their faith before the whole Christian congregation before they are allowed at the table of the Lord.18 According to this reasoning, catechetical teaching is given a very important position between receiving the baptism and celebrating the Lord's Supper. Catechetical teaching receives the function of instructing the children in the covenant and in the signs of the covenant (the sacraments), thereby guiding them from their baptism to their confession of faith, and ultimately to the celebration of the Lord's Supper together with the congregation. It is therefore no surprise to see that, in the register of the Palatinate church order (Register an welchen blatt ein jeder Titel zufinden), the HC is placed exactly between holy baptism and the Lord's Supper (Niesel 1938:141, line 24-32). This is not merely a trivial decision of order, but a deliberate, theological placement. Children are led from their baptism, by means of catechetical teaching, towards their confession of faith and attending the table of the Lord.
The introduction to the HC, however, does not stop with the third reason for catechetical teaching. After this final reason, it continues without interruption by saying that this important custom of using the Catechism, originating as it did from the command of God, had been destroyed by Satan through the Papal Antichrist (den Antichrist den Bapst). The Papists have substituted catechetical teaching with the abomination of the confirmation (die Firmung; Niesel 1938:148, line 31-36). Here the veil is lifted briefly, albeit in very vehement language,19 on what might have been at the root of Heidelberg's antiRoman polemic concerning Christian education. When it came to Christian education, it seems that Heidelberg was in essence fighting the Roman sacrament of the confirmation, because through the sacrament of the confirmation, the century-old and biblical custom of catechetical teaching had been abandoned. The process of instructing children from baptism to Lord's Supper had been interrupted and eventually replaced by a non-recurrent sacrament. This was not only a battle surrounding catechetical teaching, but it also reflected diverging views on the sacraments.
Zacharias Ursinus was not only the primary author of the HC,20 but also its chief expositor and apologist. His main expository work was his commentary on the HC. This commentary was a compilation of his lectures on the HC, revised and published in a number of editions by Ursinus' student, David Pareus (1548-1622).21 As part of the prolegomena to this commentary, Ursinus discusses five specific questions concerning catechetical teaching, and it is at this point that he reveals some of the anti-Roman sentiment that also underlies the HC.
Although this is a description of an earlier ecclesiastical practice, Ursinus shows his implicit agreement with this practice when, at the end of the section, he encourages his readers to consult Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History if they want to learn more about it. Two aspects are important for the purpose of this discussion.
Firstly, the practice of the early church was characterised by the same three elements that were already identified in the introduction to the HC (see The fourth edition of the Heidelberg Catechism), namely baptism, catechetical teaching and the Lord's Supper, and they appear here in the same chronological order. Just as in the introduction to the HC, it is clearly the intention that the children, having grown a little older, should be led from baptism towards the Lord's Supper by means of catechetical teaching.
Secondly, however, Ursinus makes no mention in this description of the confession of faith as a distinctive step, something that the introduction to the HC does mention. Instead, he mentions the laying on of hands, by which persons were dismissed from the class of catechumens. Could this imply that the confession of faith and the laying on of hands were part of the same ceremony? What can be said with certainty is that the act of the laying on of hands was the culmination and completion of a process of catechetical teaching, as the catechumens were subsequently dismissed from the catechism class and permitted to celebrate the Lord's Supper with those of riper years. Seeing that in the introduction to the HC in the Palatine church order the confession of faith fulfils the same function, it justifies the conclusion that the confession of faith and the laying on of hands were both part of the same ceremony by which a person concluded the process of instruction and was allowed to the Lord's table.
Under the next heading ('What is the origin of catechisation, and has it always been practiced in the church?'), Ursinus (1634:11-13) claims that catechetical teaching was instituted by God, and he proves it with examples and Scripture passages from both the Old and the New Testament. When discussing his final prooftext, Hebrews 6, Ursinus deducts the following heads of doctrine from this passage: repentance from dead works, faith towards God, baptism, the laying on of hands, the resurrection from the dead and eternal judgment. These points of doctrine had to be known by both the catechumens of adult age before their baptism, and by the children before the laying on of hands. According to Ursinus, this distinction between the catechumens of adult age (who received baptism) and the children (who received the laying on of hands) is the reason why the apostle, in the list of doctrines in Hebrews 6, first speaks of the doctrine of baptism and afterwards of the laying on of hands. As with the previous citation from Ursinus' prolegomena, the laying on of hands again refers to the end of a process of catechetical teaching, specifically for those who have been baptised in the church as little children. In other words: for the catechumens of adult age, the process of teaching ends with baptism, and for the children it ends with the laying on of hands.
Ursinus, however, continues that since the time of Pope Gregory, who placed images and idols in the church to serve as books for the laity and the children,22 doctrine became corrupt through the negligence of the bishops and the priests, and catechetical teaching grew into disuse. Eventually catechetical teaching was changed into the ridiculous rite of the confirmation (in ludicrum confirmationis ritum transformata), which today is called die Firmung (1634:13). Again, catechetical teaching as a process of instruction that results in the laying on of hands and admittance to the Lord's table, is contrasted to the Roman sacrament of the confirmation. At this point, it will be beneficial to put this contrast in a broader framework.
Calvin, just as the fathers of the HC, makes clear that the custom of catechetical teaching existed in the early church, but was gradually replaced by the sacrament of the confirmation. He calls confirmation an injury to baptism (quae sine baptismi iniuria nec nominari potest; Inst. 4.19.13; CO 2:1075). What the church needs, however, is catechising by means of a form containing the heads of doctrine. In this way children will come to a confession of the one faith. Baptism, therefore, needs no addition. Rather, children need to be instructed in their baptism.
Both the introduction to the HC in the Palatine church order and the prolegomena to Ursinus' commentary on the HC highlight the fact that catechetical teaching is an institution of God that has been practiced from the beginning of the church. This catechetical teaching plays a very important role in children's progress from the time of their baptism until the time when they are allowed to celebrate the Lord's Supper. It prepares the children of the congregation to confess their faith - an act that was apparently accompanied by the laying on of hands - and subsequently be allowed to the Lord's table together with the rest of the congregation.
In both documents this instrument of catechetical teaching is contrasted with the Roman sacrament of confirmation, where the laying on of hands received a sacramental function. According to the fathers of the HC, the institution of catechetical teaching has gradually been neglected and eventually it grew into complete disuse and was substituted with the sacrament of the confirmation.
Rome already drew this battle line in March 1547.
Frederick III most probably received word that Rome was about to write its first church-wide catechism, but it did not convince him that reformation was really taking place in Trent. Instead of viewing Rome's proposed catechism as a possible olive branch for renewed relations between Rome and the reformers, the Elector may rather have seen it as an instrument of distributing Rome's false doctrine. After all, the mere existence of a catechism did not change the doctrine contained in it. And in addition, the existence of a catechism did not mean the reformation of catechetical teaching, because the sacrament of confirmation was still a reality, even more so now that the Pope would soon officially endorse it in a catechism. That had to be countered with the true teaching of Scripture. The HC became Frederick III's instrument for further reformation.
The Roman sacrament of confirmation had a detrimental effect on the church's custom of catechetical teaching, which was based on Scripture and had been in practice since the early church. The idea that baptism was completed by another sacrament - confirmation - led to the gradual neglect of catechetical teaching. The same can also be formulated within a broader framework: the sacramentalism of the Roman church, whereby grace is conveyed ex opere operato, makes knowledge and acknowledgement of the doctrine of Scripture superfluous. The fathers of the HC saw the dangers of this view, and countered it by, negatively, showing the dangers of the Roman sacrament of confirmation and by, positively, showing the Biblical command to teach the children.
The author declares that he has no financial or personal relationship that may have inappropriately influenced him in writing this article.
1. According to Refo500 (n.d.), this will be the central question at the Trier exhibition '1563 - Heidelberg and Trent' planned for September and October 2013.
2. Hereafter the Heidelberg Catechism will be designated only by 'HC'. For references to the textus receptus of 1563, I have used the editions of W. Niesel (1938) and of J.N. Bakhuizen van den Brink (1976).
3. Most reformed Christians are, of course, also familiar with, or at least aware of, the Westminster Shorter and Larger Catechisms, but these confessions were produced almost a century after the HC.
4. For more on the history of the Heidelberg University, see Maag (1995).
5. This last date can even be moved backwards to the end of 1562, when the text of the HC was fixed in a meeting between the theological faculty and the ministers of the church (Bakhuizen van den Brink 1976:29).
6. Although the authorship of the Catechesis minor has been debated through the years, the outcome of this debate has no direct bearing on the argumentation followed above. For the purpose of this article, I accept the authorship of Ursinus. For a short background on this debate, see Bierma (2005:137-138).
7. This is primarily based on a comment by Reuter in his 1612 collection of Ursinus' works where he says that the Catechesis minor and Catechesis maior had been composed by order of the magistrate, and that from the Catechesis minor a large part was taken over into the HC. Scholars noting the similarities in contents between the Catechesis minor and the HC have confirmed this comment. Bierma (2005:139) notes that parallels in phrasing of at least 90 of the questions and answers in the Catechesis minor can be found in 110 of the questions and answers in the HC.
8. Some explicit examples of this anti-Roman sentiment are the repudiation of trust in saints (Q/A 30, 94), justification by good works (Q/A 62-64), worship of images (Q/A 97 and 98). Further examples, see Bierma (2005:79).
9. For more on HC 80 and the conflict with Rome, see Mulder (2010). Q. How does the Lord's Supper differ from the Roman Catholic Mass? A. The Lord's Supper declares to us that our sins have been completely forgiven through the one sacrifice of Jesus Christ which he himself finished on the cross once for all. It also declares to us that the Holy Spirit grafts us into Christ, who with his very body is now in heaven at the right hand of the Father where he wants us to worship him. But the Mass teaches that the living and the dead do not have their sins forgiven through the suffering of Christ unless Christ is still offered for them daily by the priests. It also teaches that Christ is bodily present in the form of bread and wine where Christ is therefore to be worshiped. Thus the Mass is basically nothing but a denial of the one sacrifice and suffering of Jesus Christ and a condemnable idolatry.
10. The questions and answers were, at that time, still unnumbered. Only from the first Latin edition, this specific question and answer would be known as question and answer 80 (Bakhuizen van den Brink 1976:32).
11. Calvini Opera 19:684, in a letter from Olevianus to Calvin, dated 03 April 1563.
12. According to Doedes (1867:24), Bakhuizen Van den Brink (1976:30) and Oberholzer (1986:12), the second edition probably saw the light at the end of February or the beginning of March 1563, whilst the third edition followed almost a month later. The fourth and final edition has a preface dated 15 November 1563.
13. On page 96 of the second edition it is written: 'An den Christlichen Leser. Was im ersten truck übersehen, als fürnemlich folio 55. Ist jetzunder ausbefelch Churfürstlicher Gnaden addiert worden 1563' ['To the Christian reader. What was missed in the first edition, especially page 55, is now added on demand of the Elector 1563'] (Bakhuizen van den Brink 1976:194).
14. For Trent's decrees and anathemas on the Roman Mass, see Waterworth (1995).
15. Bierma (2005:50-52), for example, argues strongly that Frederick III commissioned the new catechism as a standard preaching and teaching guide around which the major Protestant factions in his realm could unite. Thus, he emphasises the ecumenical purpose of the HC. This, however, does not exclude the anti-Roman purpose of the HC.
16. See this double purpose that comes out of Frederick III's preface to the first edition of the HC (Bierma 2005:50-52).
17. This is, of course, not the only place in the HC where Roman doctrine is countered (see Bierma 2005:79 for other examples), but the history surrounding this question and answer (see the section above The Council of Trent and the Heidelberg Catechism: A coincidence?) makes clear how involved Frederick III was with what was happening in Trent.
18. 'Endlich auch gleich wie der von Jsrael kinder nach der Beschneidung wann sie zu jrem verstand kamen von der geheimnuβ desselben Bundzeichens und auch vom bund Gottes underricht wurden also sollen auch unsere kinder von jrem empfangnen Tauff warem Christlichen Glauben und Buβ underrichtet werden auff dad ehe zie zum Tisch des Herrn zugelassen werden sie für der gantzen Christlichen gemein jhren glauben bekennen' (Niesel 1938:148, line 24-31).
19. '... also auch diese zerrissen und an stadt derselben sein schmierwerck und backenstreich, und andere grewel hat gesetzet welche er die Firmung nennet (Niesel 1938:148, line 34-36).
20. Bierma (2005:52-74) makes a convincing argument for Ursinus as the primary author of the HC, although he does not deny that the HC was in essence a team project.
22. These words are reminiscent of question and answer 98 of the HC: Question 98: But may not images be tolerated in the churches, as books to the laity? Answer: No, for we must not pretend to be wiser than God, who will have his people taught, not by dumb images, but by the lively preaching of his word. | 2019-04-20T04:13:12Z | http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S2305-08532013000200008&lng=es&nrm=iso&tlng=es |
I should confess that it has been a long time since I last read a book of this compelling nature about human failure, about the journey that some of us embark upon, about the search for mastery which is driven from within, and lies among other creative impulses that dictate how we live our lives, in spite of the risks of being misunderstood and underestimated. In reading Sarah Lewis’s The Rise I was at once reminded of how deeply appreciative I am of having read Freud, Jung, Marie-Louise von Franz, Karen Horney, Erik H. Erikson, Sir Anthony Storr, even Paul Tillich, among others. In Lewis’s use of accessible yet uncompromised language, all the concerns of what elevates human spirit seem to coalesce into one unified geography of human courage that offers dignity to those who seek to understand the power and limitations of visions. Just before the publication of the paperback edition of The Rise from Simon & Schuster, the writer/critic/curator paid a visit to the Rail HQ in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, to talk about her book with Rail publisher Phong Bui.
Portrait of Sarah Lewis. Pencil on paper by Phong Bui. Inspired by a photograph by Zack Garlitos.
Phong Bui (Rail): In reading the book I was compelled to think through several issues concerning the unpredictable nature of how an ordinary person becomes someone remarkable, how in his or her early formation a specific experience, whether bad or good—an epiphany of joyous realization in response to a particular incident, or the opposite, a scar that is left for life and whatnot—would intensely inform the mature phase or outcome of his or her life. Somehow some were fortunate enough, despite their hardship, to have one person in their family that offered them encouragement early on, which gave them a sense of confidence that prepared them for a lifelong search of an unattainable goal, whatever that goal may be. For those not as fortunate to have that someone in their family, they must find a mentor from the outside world to foster what it is that their lives are about. It seems that person was your maternal grandfather.
Sarah Lewis: Shadrach Emmanuel Lee.
Rail: Who was a jazz musician, and in order to support his love for music and his family he had to work at night as a janitor, and as a sign painter on the weekend. You wrote that his dream was shaped by hardship. When did you realize your admiration for him?
he never went back. That difficult circumstance created a fire in him that launched his career as an artist. It just occurred to me that we often don’t discuss this paradox enough in our everyday discourse. The book therefore is part of my fascination with this kind of journey. I examined a selection of inventors, explorers, scientists, artists, entrepreneurs, anyone who’s blazed a new path; it seems that they often had this paradox as part of their stories.
Rail: Knowing that what you love in life would allow you to suffer with clarity.
Lewis: Exactly. Sometimes you have to suffer before you get to realize what you really want to do in life. Because of that desire you may be given strength to get to a place of bliss, full of paradoxes and adversaries, yet you don’t think of them as burdens.
Rail: And once you accept it you would not feel frightened or surprised by any form of challenge in life.
Lewis: Yes. I also think that how we respond to circumstances is our choice. There are limitations to that idea, of course, but by and large I think in the case of my grandfather, he lived out that principle, which enabled him to find solace and fulfill his life as an artist, a musician. I was 10 when I remember wanting to become an artist because of him. I would sit at his knee and paint with him and learn how to draw the figure from him down at his home in Virginia whenever my family came to visit. In his will, he bequeathed to me a stack of drawing paper that was yellowing at the edges, a few boxes of hardened cray-pas, pencil, ink, and other art supplies because he knew that was our connection. So in college at Harvard, I actually thought I wanted to be a painter, but I decided to change course and support and examine the creative lives of others as a curator, as an author. Nevertheless, his model remained instructive and helped me to rethink every circumstance I went through to find something from it that could spark, ignite a passion in me that might not have been there otherwise.
Rail: You also mentioned that you were being underestimated.
Lewis: It wasn’t one particular circumstance. It’s simply the assumption people may have about me when they see me, a young looking, African American petite woman, say in a coffee shop. The likelihood that they will assume that I went to Harvard and Oxford and Yale, curated at MoMA, and so on, and am now a fellow at Harvard, is miniscule. One percent. That’s what I mean. That’s underestimation, to be regarded, gazed upon, and not perceived to be who you actually are. It is the experience of millions of others who don’t fit a given expected model for the package that people consider excellence, all the way up to President Obama. The question is what do you do with that narrow convention?
Lewis: That’s it, yes. What did that do for him? Ben became the first person in the world to trek to the North Pole and back, solo and on foot, South Pole and back, solo and on foot. What shifted in Ben when he saw that report card? That is the same question I asked myself when I saw Dr. Martin Luther King received Cs on his report card in an oratory class in seminary and then went on to awaken our nation with the power of his spoken truth.
Rail: Not to mention his speech impediment.
Lewis: Right. We don’t usually associate such an impediment, a failing of that degree, with Dr. King. But he did manage to overcome his tic—a speech hiccup. As he told his friend Harry Belafonte, “Once I’d made my peace with death, I could make my peace with all else.” I think that we rob ourselves of the guidepost that we need to understand the true nature of becoming by not acknowledging the challenges people go through. It’s the fuller nature of becoming that leads to the journeys of endurance.
Rail: Which is what ambitious people desire. At any rate, what prompted you to select archery as an art, as an activity, an action, in order to get to the notion and context of mastery?
Lewis: I chose archery because I was fascinated by the endless process of hitting a target not just once but again and again, and also its relative obscurity compared to other athletic activities. It’s like being an artist—there is always the potential for obscurity throughout your lifetime. I felt that archery would be vivid enough for readers who might not understand the art world enough to know what it’s like to be in an art studio making works, day in and day out, that may not bring any immediate public reward. Not to mention the solitude that is constantly required for the pursuit. In archery, there is this idea that once you get proficient and can hit the 10 ring, eventually if you stop focusing on process you can lose your technique, and eventually your arrows will just start landing in the parking lot instead of hitting the target. And once that happens it really muddles with an archer’s psychology, so she or he must just wrap up, recompose, and do it all over again. What I realized I was watching in archery is the distinction between success and mastery. Success is just an event, it’s just hitting that 9 or 10 ring once, but it would’ve meant nothing if they couldn’t do it again and again and again, and what does that require? I realized that it required caring about this near win, it required caring about that gap between having hit a 7 but knowing you’re an archer who really can hit a 10. Watching them reframe their perceptions of themselves in front of me was incredible. I saw the techniques that they use, how they would pace, lie down on the ground to meditate, figure out how they can let go of their previous failure, and move on, and line up to shoot without anyone giving them any acclaim or glory.
Martin Hartley, Route Finder, Adventure Ecology Trans-Arctic Expedition, 2004.
Rail: It’s certainly not a spectacle sport like basketball, football, or tennis, for example.
Lewis: Exactly! In fact, few can even watch an archery practice because it’s so dangerous. These arrows are flying at 150 miles an hour, and the targets are about 75 yards away, so they have to practice in complete isolation.
Rail: It reminded me of a story told by Joseph Campbell on Buddhism, part of a five lecture series, called The Eastern Way, about a samurai whose overlord was murdered by another samurai from a rival clan. His life onward was nothing else but to avenge his overlord’s death. He spent years and years looking for revenge. He finally tracked down his enemy, had a duel with him, won the duel, and with his sword right in front of the enemy’s throat and his body against the wall, he was just about to kill him. In an act of desperation the other samurai spit on him, and you know what he did? He put his sword down and walked away. Why did he walk away? Because he was angry. His initial aim was just centering on the act of vengeance as though it was a technical execution, nothing else. Being angry took him away from that focus, so he had to walk away.
Lewis: Thanks for bringing up Joseph Campbell because I was deeply impacted by The Power of Myth, and how he reminds us that mythology is about archetypes that help us, that guide us through our eternal journeys. To me archery embodies so much of what it means to actually aim at something that’s in our sights, regardless of what it is—writing a book, creating a life as a painter, or whatever—accounting for all the things that might knock you off course, and then picking yourself up and doing it all over again.
Lewis: The hardest thing I’ve ever done in writing.
Rail: Tell us more, Sarah.
Lewis: This idea of surrender, which is beautifully described in the samurai story too, is at the heart of “Arctic Summer,” a chapter that begins with Toni Morrison’s epigraph. Surrender is not about giving up, but giving over to something far larger and letting that power move you forward. Now, when I say much larger, I don’t mean it necessarily in a religious or spiritual sense. I mean Ben is out in the Arctic, which is not a stable continent; under his feet are floating ice sheets. He can trek in sub-50-degree temperatures for an entire day with a 200-pound sled on his back, sleep that night, and erase his gains from the day by the act of sleeping—drifting away from his goal. He’s also faced with not having anyone to speak to—the Arctic is the size of the United States, but completely depopulated. The psychological isolation just made me wonder what kind of fortitude you have to have to do this. And it occurred to me, this is why surrender is so important. It had nothing to do with physical training, or brute strength; it rather had to do with a kind of psychological flexibility that was about letting go of what you couldn’t control, such that you could harness all the internal resources you need to go forward, and that’s what Ben did.
Lewis: That’s it. Ben let himself be dominated and it allowed him to endure on his epic journey, which is also at the heart of the martial art of Aikido. Bruce Lee called it the most perfect martial art because it is the art of learning how to surrender to, and not resist an incoming force but redirect it—the energy—to the ground. The main idea is that when you stop resisting something you stop giving it power. So letting yourself be dominated, finding a way to be a vessel to contain and then to release what doesn’t serve you is at the heart of what surrender is about. I really enjoyed the interviews with the Aikidoists in particular, because they were helpful in learning ways that we can surrender in our daily lives. Not everyone is going to the Arctic.
Lewis: He remains absolutely amazing. It’s also the analogy that Wendy Palmer, the American Aikidoist, taught me. She said, “Well, hold two glass cups and one contains water and one doesn’t. Grip them both tight with the same pressure, and see if you can tell any difference in their relative weight.” You can’t. But she said, “Now make sure the table’s underneath the cups and let them go.” Then you can tell the difference. This is what surrender is about, it’s about letting us retain the resources we need to discern what to do next.
Rail: Does surrender relate at all to someone who is refered to as the so-called deliberate amateur?
Lewis: The deliberate amateur is a term I coined to consider what the road of mastery also requires, like a relinquishing expertise, and letting yourself surrender to a state of being we all were once in, being a child, being in a place of wonder. So yes, it is an act of surrender, especially among us adults. The chapter about deliberate amateurs actually centers on the story of two Nobel Prize winners, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, who I interviewed about two years ago. They employ a brilliant practice of bracketing their time in the laboratory so that they can surrender, ultimately, by asking questions that their expertise and their pride wouldn’t allow them to otherwise.
Rail: You mean like children asking simple questions when they’re at play!
Lewis: Yes. In fact, Geim’s initial experiment was with diamagnetic force, which resulted in levitating a frog that earned him an Ig Nobel Prize. It went on and on—gecko tape being used as a prototype for the best cleaning agent. And eventually they asked: Well, if carbon is the material that people are using to try to isolate a two-dimensional object, why not just use scotch tape? And, of course, that was the thinnest recorded attempt—just the wastebin scotch tape and carbon from another experiment. But they had to surrender to these seemingly foolish questions that we all have within us that often contain the first step on a potentially path-breaking journey, that we deprive ourselves of by simply not asking. So, what I love about the deliberate amateur is the idea of surrender as it relates to these scientists is that they’re offering us a kind of structure to use to get around the feelings of being too embarrassed to surrender in professional contexts where we feel like we will be made fun of for asking a question like the ones that they did.
Louis Horst, Paul Taylor and Dance Company Review, Dance Observer 24.9 (November 1957), 139.
Lewis: Right. This is something that I experienced, and then a psychologist, Abigail Lipson who leads Harvard’s Success-Failure Project encouraged me to put the idea in the book. The idea is that, in order to benefit from a difficult circumstance—a failure, setback, or learning experience—you have to let yourself actually feel it. You can’t just wish it away and then expect to find the lesson. The idea of failure is a very internal condition: it is the gap between where you are and where you want to go. The greater it is the more it feels like a chasm, the more you feel like you have fallen into a valley, the more it might be, in your mind, a failure. What Abigail was encouraging me to make clear is what pain management specialists understand: that in order to actually move out of a certain circumstance, you have to stop resisting it, which gives it more energy physically, and let it be.
Rail: This of course relates to each person’s ability to mediate criticism and pressure. I was blown away by Louis Horst’s review of Paul Taylor’s 7 New Dances, which was nothing but a blank page, except for the name of the dance company, date, and place. That was it!
Lewis: Yes, Bill T. Jones told me about the story when I was working on the book. In 1957, Paul Taylor was trying to define his now signature style of severe minimalism. He was working countless jobs to support himself, living in a loft that feels like it’s winter when it is winter outside, and coping with all sorts of New York infestations. Enduring extreme circumstances for the love of his craft. So Paul Taylor and the dance company that he created at that point debuted their 7 New Dances at the Kaufmann Center at the 92nd Street Y. In the first 10 minutes of the performance people start flooding out. The only people left were his stalwart friends and the reviewer was forced to decide: okay, if austere minimalism is going to qualify as dance and you’re just going to stand there, my review—this is Horst thinking—is going to be austere too: I’m simply not going to write. The metaphor of a blank review, I think, summarizes the paradox of what it means to create in the face of critique. Anyone who creates in public has to learn to blanket some critiques, not listen to them, ignore them for a time, and then learn to take some of that critique, as if giving oneself a blank slate to begin anew. I really devised that chapter to look at that nimble dance that artists have to embark upon themselves, to toggle between those two states of being. And that’s what Paul Taylor had to do. He was of course scandalized and horrified when he saw the blank review, but then you look at a piece like Aureole, which premiered at Lincoln Center a few years later, in 1962, it had so many of the central elements that were panned through the blank review. So the chapter is really dealing with how he dealt with that paradox to crystallize his now celebrated style.
Rail: I also admire what Leonard Bernstein said, “To achieve great things, two things are needed: a plan and not quite enough time.” How can we convey that art has its own timing, which Hannah Arendt articulated most brilliantly in the difference between work and labor in her timeless volume The Human Condition. Work has a beginning and an end whereas with labor, it is perpetually continuous. It doesn’t matter whether a work of art takes more than two years to finish like Willem de Kooning’s “Woman, I” or Jackson Pollock making a painting in one day. You simply can’t put value on it in terms of time in relation to labor.
Lewis: No, you can’t because labor is about becoming and work is about manufacture. They’re two different things entirely. The paradox, the riddle of labor is much in the riddle of what it actually means to be in labor. You have to discern when something is ready. It’s very much connected to you the entire time, you can’t just be pregnant for a minute.
Rail: It’s as though each second, minute should be filled with some useful thoughts or action like how Umberto Eco standing in the elevator, thinking, was writing an article in his head.
Lewis: We all have these empty spaces on a daily basis, whether we fill them consciously or unconsciously, but when we empty them, much of this is getting into meditation and what it means to empty the mind, but when you empty it enough to be a space that you can work with, then you can really work productively. Essentially the process of filling the space and emptying it out has to be a continuous mediation.
Rail: Have you ever experienced your empty space being filled with all the things that you do not want to do?
Lewis: I grew up an only child so I spent a lot of time in my own head as a young person, so I did notice the monkey-mind phenomenon. Eventually, I realized that there’s a voice, a narrative in there: a construction of me, but not really me. Then I began to fill it with all the things that I had strong desire to do, and the narratives that were more productive for me.
Rail: I’d like to bring up the potential union of the arts—art and science. Of course, Samuel F. B. Morse was a great example.
Lewis: Yes. I wouldn’t have known about Samuel Morse’s journey from being an aspirant painter for 26 years to being the inventor of the telegraph, using the stretcher bars of a failed painting as the first telegraph model, if not for being trained as an Americanist art historian. I did my Ph.D. at Yale under Alexander Nemerov and Robert Farris Thompson, and I was surprised to see these paintings by Morse when I studied for my oral exams. Again, to the larger point, I wanted to make sure that we were looking at the full life stories of the people who we just celebrate to no end because we are often omitting pieces that are central to how they actually arrived there. Samuel Morse didn’t just want to be a painter; he wanted to rival Titian, Raphael, and Rembrandt. He gave it everything he had. He looked at the life of Pope Gregory and others, he would write back to his brother and family and say, I now think I understand how I can overcome the debilitating force of critique of my own work, as he’s being critiqued by Washington Allston when he went to Europe for training and by Benjamin West, these titanic figures. He became the first professor of painting at NYU, had a studio in Washington Square, and eventually surrendered. And this gets us to the union of art and science. He surrendered to the fact that invention with paint and wires was, in his mind, one and the same, which was more common in the 19th century than it is now. But for sure the fortitude that it took to receive a patent from Congress for the telegraph model, which is really the foundation of the communications revolution, was born through his ability to endure critique for his work as a painter.
Rail: Some folks I know would take it quite similar to Albert Camus’s existential crisis between Sisyphean condition and suicide. It’s quite fatalistic!
Lewis: Well, not in her case. In her landmark study of grit, for which she was awarded the MacArthur, she said, “How can this not be dysfunctional persistence? What is the dark side of grit?” I really went to her to understand how it can not be so dark, how we can pivot like Samuel Morse, as an analogy, who eventually realized that painting wasn’t going be what he had in mind to give the world. His invention shows us the relationship between play and grit, how grit can be supple, and how that’s expressed as a form of nimbleness and discernment.
Rail: And how that leads to the chrysalis nature of becoming is impossible to describe. How Abraham Lincoln, for instance, in seeing Carlton Watkins’s photographs of Yosemite Valley’s granite cliffs, was inspired by the natural beauty that resulted in the signing of legislation in 1894.
Lewis: Which led to the founding of the National Park Service. I couldn’t believe when I found that reference. We’re often inspired by these moments of aesthetic force, which is a catalyst for some of the profound changes in our lives, more than we would admit, when we surrender ourselves to the power of the beauty of nature or a work of art that may evoke some deeper sources within ourselves. This is why I wrote what Aristotle said, “Reason alone is not enough to make men good,” or women good, it’s whatever frees you from the relative reality around you, be it music, as it happened to Charles Black, who heard the genius coming out of Louis Armstrong’s horn in 1931 when he was just a freshman in college; he knew immediately that segregation must be wrong. This of course led to his prominent role as a lawyer in the historic Brown v. Board of Education ruling in 1954.
Rail: That’s really not that different from your grandfather, asking why African Americans are not in the history book.
Lewis: You’re right. And that’s why I loved that my grandfather chose the arts as a way to express what had been denied to him as a form of education—seeing the full embrace of American life. He chose the arts because, I believe, he knew and anticipated, by playing bass often as a backup for Count Basie and Duke Ellington, that the arts could impact us with a unique force. There is a power to the arts that we often deny, and it’s important as we consider what a life of service is about. We often forget that the arts can allow us to have a contributory life because they ignite these inner shifts that have led to some of our most impactful social movements.
Rail: And in order to appreciate the relationship between life and the arts we all should embrace the notion of imperfection. It’s similar to the example of the Navajo craftsmen and women, as you had pointed out, who welcome imperfection as a given condition to endow their textiles and ceramics with an irregular appearance.
Lewis: Yes, so it would give them something to strive for the next time. Michelangelo stated it best in this succinct prayer, “Lord, grant that I always desire more than I can accomplish.” Meaning let the work be imperfect enough to keep me striving for something more. This brings us back to caring about those near wins that the archers focused on, between hitting a 7 and hitting a 10. When we have nothing to strive for we don’t endure, we don’t have the catalytic force that moves a journey onward. So, imperfection and deliberate imperfection are a part of this equation. Actually, I recently came across this practice in Japan called “Kintsukuroi.” It means, “To repair with gold.” It’s the art of repairing a bowl or a cup with gold and silver lacquer, with an understanding it is even more beautiful for having been broken.
Rail: It’s similar to a haiku poem by Mizuta Masahide, “My barn having burned down / I can now see the moon.” It’s poignant and beautiful. What’s your next book about?
Lewis: It’s actually looking at, as I wrote about in The Rise a bit, how Frederick Douglass had recognized the importance or the impact of aesthetic force that compelled him to imagine the larger vision of the world. I’m excited about it.
Rail: Would it be fair to say that your understanding has roots in the time when you made the decision not to be an artist, but to write and advocate the importance of the arts; this seems to be a natural evolution to what you have written in The Rise?
Lewis: Yes. I’d say that I’m glad that I made that decision, because we all want to contribute to our communities. There’s so much we can do for the betterment of culture. I’m just trying to do my part. | 2019-04-18T20:26:48Z | https://brooklynrail.org/2015/02/art/sarah-lewis-with-phong-bui |
amazing peinture effet beton cir leroy merlin unique sol bton cir leroy merlin latest sol effet beton with beton cir leroy.
papier peint effet beton cir luxe beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
top leroy merlin fermacell tendance colle carrelage leroy merlin inspirant beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
loft beton cir leroy merlin peinture loft original id loft original murs loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
gallery of carreau de platre leroy merlin singulier cheville carreau de platre leroy merlin nouveau image monter une with beton cir leroy.
best beton cir avis beau beton cir leroy vis bois leroy merlin beau cabane de jardin en with beton cir leroy.
affordable carrelage imitation beton cire leroy merlin dcouvrir le sol en bton avec salle de bains leroy merlin et beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain xpx with beton cir leroy.
beton mineral resinence leroy merlin meilleur de photos beton cir leroy download by tablet desktop original with beton cir leroy.
awesome enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin luxury peinture sable leroy merlin beau s enduit bton cir with beton cir leroy.
good beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin luxe loft beton cir leroy merlin perfect interesting perfect with beton cir leroy.
top beton mineral leroy merlin lgant collection beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin inspirant beton cir with beton cir leroy.
beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin meilleur beton cir leroy merlin prix beautiful loft beton with beton cir leroy.
amazing peinture effet beton cir leroy merlin luxe dco cir peinture effet beton cire leroy merlin luxe with beton cir leroy.
excellent peinture beton cire salon effet bacton tollens cendre pour de beton cir salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
loft beton cir leroy merlin peinture beton cire loft les decoratives leroy merlin couleur peinture beton with beton cir leroy.
enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin fresh leroy merlin beton cir sol lgant sol bton cir with beton cir leroy.
latest beton cir leroy merlin excellent beton cir salle de bain leroy with beton cir leroy.
excellent beton cire anleitung schn beton cir leroy merlin plan de travail brillant bton cir sur with beton cir leroy.
plan de travail en pvc loft beton cir leroy merlin from leroy merlin avec plan de with beton cir leroy.
beton cir mur leroy merlin chambre a coucher insolite avec leroy merlin beton cir murs blancs with beton cir leroy.
trendy best finest beton cire leroy merlin salle de bain clairage et les miroirs sont with beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with bton cir leroy merlin with with beton cir leroy.
stunning beton cir exterieur prix lgant beton cir leroy merlin prix beautiful loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
finest peinture effet beton cir leroy merlin gnial beton cir leroy merlin prix excellent finest salle de with beton cir leroy.
perfect meuble salle de bain carrel gnial leroy merlin salle de bain carrelage carrelage salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
perfect beton cir salle de bain ambiance salle de bain leroy merlin le carrelage galet pratique revtement pour la salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
amazing beton cir salle de bain elegant loft beton cir leroy merlin perfect interesting perfect good avec with beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
best leroy merlin carrelage metro nouveau carrelage leroy merlin intrieur latest carrelage pour escalier with beton cir leroy.
beton cir leroy merlin prix trendy salle de bain beton cire beau des ides de prix escalier beton with beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
perfect beton cire salle de bain sur faience de beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
kit beton cir salle de bain adorable images beton cir mur leroy merlin idees de dcoration with beton cir leroy.
affordable beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin meilleur beton cir leroy merlin prix beautiful loft beton with beton cir leroy.
trendy je r nove ma douche avec un enduit leroy merlin avec x et with beton cir leroy.
elegant beton mineral resinence leroy merlin photos leroy merlin beton best awesome salle de bain leroy with beton cir leroy.
interesting leroy merlin carrelage metro beau carrelage mural en faence blanc x cm with beton cir leroy.
finest carrelage imitation bton cir belle authentique bton cir sol cuisine with beton cir leroy.
ambiance salle de bain leroy merlin carrelage salle de bain mural tokyo en faence with beton cir leroy.
top beton drainant leroy merlin unique beton cir leroy great maison en plaque de beton maison en with beton cir leroy.
simple beton mineral leroy merlin beau photos beton mineral salle de bain avis luxe loft beton cir with beton cir leroy.
nouveau beton cir maison decorating ideas pour option beton mineral sur carrelage with beton cir leroy.
recouvrir carrelage beton cir luxe beton cir leroy download by tablet desktop original size back to with beton cir leroy.
gallery of beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain lgant beton cir leroy merlin latest leroy merlin bton with beton cir leroy.
best beton cir leroy cool enduit bton cir leroy merlin good beton cir with beton cir leroy.
stunning enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin gallery photo dcoration avec cuisine enduit effet beton cire leroy with beton cir leroy.
beton cir salle de bain avis inspirant beton cir leroy merlin prix beautiful loft beton cir with beton cir leroy.
beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin sympathique collection beton cir leroy cool enduit bton cir with beton cir leroy.
stunning inspir beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin graphique with beton cir leroy.
excellent beton cir leroy merlin prix gnial beton cir leroy beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
interesting beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
latest beton cir leroy download by with beton cir leroy.
cheap beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin photo beton cir leroy cool enduit bton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
lits superposs complets cuisines discount carrelage de sol home depot beton cir coul leroy merlin ciment leroy merlin kg photo gallery with beton cir leroy.
trendy recouvrir carrelage beton cir luxe beton cir leroy download by tablet desktop original size back to with beton cir leroy.
stunning image de beton cir leroy vis bois leroy merlin beau cabane de jardin en bois with beton cir leroy.
top vis a bois leroy merlin frais tube d vacuation pvc diam mm l m with beton cir leroy.
cool inspirant graphie de bton cir sur carrelage leroy merlin pour option beton cire exterieur terrasse with beton cir leroy.
affordable information with beton cir leroy.
antirouille leroy merlin fantaisie beton cir escalier leroy merlin diy mes lanternes lumineuses envie with beton cir leroy.
cool beautiful stunning simple elegant trendy video leroy merlin peinture carrelage souscouche pvc aluminium galva luxens with plan travail beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
simple cir peinture effet beton cire leroy merlin maison design nazpo com avec pare baignoire novellini et enduit with beton cir leroy.
stunning beton cir pour cuisine new beton cir leroy amazing affordable best exemple salle de bains with beton cir leroy.
trendy vernis b ton cir leroy merlin empreinte beton leroy merlin comment realiser mon plan de travail en beton cire vernis b ton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
elegant recouvrir carrelage beton cir unique castorama beton cire interesting beton cir exterieur castorama with beton cir leroy.
simple beton mineral resinence leroy merlin lgant image beton cir leroy download by tablet desktop original size with beton cir leroy.
great gallery of hydrofuge beton leroy merlin beau beton cire leroy merlin beton cir leroy les decoratives leroy with beton cir leroy.
leroy merlin jardin frais leroy merlin jardin with beton cir leroy.
excellent vernis pour beton cir beau beton cir leroy merlin thehi lite with beton cir leroy.
finest beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin best cire concernant cir beton cir salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
gallery of recouvrir carrelage sol salle de bain beau loft beton cir leroy avec recouvrir carrelage sol salle de bain beau loft beton cir leroy merlin from with beton cir leroy.
fabulous enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin elegant beton autolissant leroy merlin great beton cir recherche google with beton cir leroy.
elegant beton cir leroy merlin beau beton cir leroy stunning beton cir et carrelage time leroy merlin avec beton cire leroy merlin luxe carrelage time leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
excellent good cool beton cir leroy merlin latest with loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin luxe loft beton cir leroy avec beton cire salle with beton cir leroy.
good salle de bain leroy merlin elea ambiance salle de bain leroy merlin with loft beton cir leroy merlin with sol bton cir leroy merlin with beton cir salle de with beton cir leroy.
cool beautiful idee salle de bain leroy merlin gallery de beton cir salle de bain leroy with beton cir leroy.
leroy merlin amiens catalogue incroyable cuisine meuble cuisine leroy merlin catalogue moderne with beton cir leroy.
trendy interesting ides dimages de beton cir pour salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir sol leroy merlin with beton cir salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
great beton mineral sur carrelage unique beton mineral salle de bain avis luxe loft beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
latest kit beton cir salle de bain clever images beton cir leroy cool enduit bton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
fabulous table de jardin beton cir surprenant table de jardin beton cir sur carrelage antidrapant salle with beton cir leroy.
awesome hydrofuge beton leroy merlin beau beton cire leroy merlin beton cir leroy les decoratives leroy with beton cir leroy.
finest beton cir escalier leroy merlin nouveau beton cir leroy merlin prix simple beton mineral salle de with beton cir leroy.
free enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin peinture cire sol with beton cir leroy.
gallery of leroy merlin amiens catalogue unique bouchon plastique pour tube rond leroy merlin lgant graphie with beton cir leroy.
good recouvrir carrelage beton cir lgant beton cir leroy download by tablet desktop original size back to with beton cir leroy.
good carreau de platre leroy merlin cheville carreau de platre leroy merlin unique s cloison with beton cir leroy.
stunning beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin grande photos beton cir leroy les decoratives leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
beton mineral sur carrelage nouveau enduit d coratif resipro beton mineral couleur cr me enduit beton with beton cir leroy.
great loft beton cir leroy merlin leroy merlin bton cir good neon osram avec loft beton cir with beton cir leroy.
cheap elgant peindre sol beton brut avec peinture effet beton cir sol top with beton cir leroy.
loft beton cir leroy merlin beton mineral leroy merlin beautiful with beton cir leroy.
cool fenetre ronde pvc leroy merlin pour fenetre de la maison nouveau loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
beton cir mur leroy merlin peinture effet loft b ton cir id blanc avec beton with beton cir leroy.
interesting loft beton cir leroy merlin enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin top peinture resine sol effet with beton cir leroy.
affordable kit beton cir salle de bain aller chercher kit beton cir salle de bain dans with beton cir leroy.
interesting beton mineral resinence leroy merlin nouveau stock kit beton cir salle de bain amazing sol beton with beton cir leroy.
cool gallery of recouvrir carrelage sol salle de bain beau loft beton cir leroy avec recouvrir carrelage sol salle de bain beau loft beton cir leroy merlin from with beton cir leroy.
beton cire anleitung neu beton cir leroy merlin plan de travail brillant bton cir sur with beton cir leroy.
finest beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin gnial sol beton cir elegant gallery peinture bois exterieur with beton cir leroy.
great carrelage imitation bton cir belle authentique bton cir sol cuisine with beton cir leroy.
simple beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin conception sol bton cir leroy merlin latest with beton cir leroy.
top beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin inspirant meuble salle de bain beton cir with beton cir leroy.
best sol effet beton cir leroy merlin blanc dukec me avec sol effet beton frache beton cir with beton cir leroy.
elegant gallery of loft beton cir leroy merlin perfect interesting perfect good avec con loft original leroy merlin e loft beton cir leroy merlin perfect with beton cir leroy.
elegant beton cir leroy merlin leroy merlin beton cire with beton cir leroy.
best affordable beton cir leroy merlin prix nouveau papier with beton cir leroy.
finest beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin lgamment sol bton cir leroy merlin latest sol with beton cir leroy.
kit beton cir salle de bain magnifique pics beton cir leroy cool enduit bton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
top elgant leroy merlin lino luxe kit bton cir leroy merlin beton with beton cir leroy.
great beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin luxe plan travail beton cir leroy merlin plan travail with beton cir leroy.
cool salon de jardin en beton cire bton cir leroy merlin changer facade cuisine with bton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
good beton cir couleur leroy merlin frais beton cir leroy amazing affordable best exemple salle de bains with beton cir leroy.
awesome leroy merlin beton cir frais beton cir leroy merlin prix beautiful loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
great beau loft beton cir leroy merlin sol bton cir leroy merlin cheap best pour choix beton with beton cir leroy.
stunning b ton cir plan de travail cuisine leroy merlin beau beton cir et carrelage time leroy merlin avec beton cire plan de travail cuisine leroy merlin meilleur with beton cir leroy.
top beton cir resinence inspirant beton cir leroy stunning beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir with beton cir leroy.
beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin unique sol beton cir elegant gallery peinture bois exterieur blanc with beton cir leroy.
best enduit bton cir leroy merlin good beton cir salle de bain leroy avec plan travail pour with beton cir leroy.
best g nial salle de bain sol noir deco deco avec salle de bain sol noir with beton cir leroy.
gallery of beton cir salle de bain avis luxe beton cir leroy merlin prix beautiful loft beton cir with beton cir leroy.
trendy inspir beton cir leroy merlin besten leroy merlin bilder auf pinterest pour meilleur leroy merlin velux with beton cir leroy.
beton cir leroy beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain ucod org with luxe beton cir with beton cir leroy.
latest beton mineral resinence leroy merlin nouveau stock kit beton cir salle de bain amazing sol beton with beton cir leroy.
sol effet beton cir leroy merlin meilleur de galerie couleur with beton cir leroy.
good vernis beton leroy merlin meilleur de beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain beton cir with beton cir leroy.
free loft beton cir leroy merlin idees de dcoration avec loft beton cir leroy merlin loft beton cir leroy merlin affordable excellent trendy trendy tte chant de with beton cir leroy.
perfect beton cir mur leroy merlin beton cire sur carrelage mural leroy merlin sol good com beton with beton cir leroy.
interesting fenetre pvc gris leroy merlin pour fenetre de la maison gnial loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
amazing beton cire leroy merlin salle de bain maison design nazpo com avec ambiance et peinture with beton cir leroy.
top carrelage mur et sol salle de bain affordable with carrelage mur et avec carrelage sol salle with beton cir leroy.
gallery of beton mineral sur carrelage inspirant bton cir sur carrelage mural cuisine belle loft beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
gallery of beton cir salle de bain avis lgant loft beton cir leroy merlin fabulous best dco de with beton cir leroy.
cool beautiful cheap evier beton cire leroy merlin beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin quel sol beton with loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy with with beton cir leroy.
interesting carrelage time leroy merlin sol effet beton cir leroy merlin enduit et carrelage time leroy merlin avec carrelage salle de bain saint omer sur carrelage with beton cir leroy.
gallery of plan travail beton cir leroy merlin bton de cuisine avec cire plan travail beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
good kit beton cir salle de bain unique beton cir leroy merlin prix latest beton cir escalier with beton cir leroy.
affordable beton drainant leroy merlin unique beton cir leroy great maison en plaque de beton maison en with beton cir leroy.
interesting beton cir couleur leroy merlin derniers modles loft beton cir leroy merlin peinture effet pour with beton cir leroy.
trendy enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin best of beton cir leroy merlin prix luxe enduit tadelakt with beton cir leroy.
trendy best beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain beautiful with beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
awesome beton cir mur exterieur unique beton cir leroy merlin excellent beton cir salle de bain leroy with beton cir leroy.
beautiful beton cir leroy download by with beton cir leroy.
stunning carrelage imitation beton cire leroy merlin carrelage sol et mur avec carrelage imitation beton cire leroy with beton cir leroy.
beautiful beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin dtail photos beton cir leroy beton cir salle de with beton cir leroy.
free good elegant loft beton cir leroy merlin with loft beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy with siporex leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
stunning beton cir carrelage salle de bain best of cuisine beton cire bois awesome tag res murales with beton cir leroy.
stunning vernis beton leroy merlin luxe galerie beton cir escalier leroy merlin nouveau beton cir leroy amazing with beton cir leroy.
latest beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin amazing plan travail beton cir leroy merlin beton cir with beton cir leroy.
remarquable beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain avec beton cir cuisine plan travail id es de d coration la maison avec with beton cir leroy.
interesting loft beton cir leroy merlin enduit tadelakt leroy merlin elegant awesome les decoratives loft enduit decoratif with beton cir leroy.
cool sol effet beton cir leroy merlin peinture sol effet bton cir leroy et carrelage time leroy merlin avec sol effet beton cir leroy merlin peinture effet beton with beton cir leroy.
stunning beton cir mur exterieur frais beton cir leroy merlin excellent beton cir salle de bain leroy with beton cir leroy.
perfect loft beton cir leroy merlin idees de dcoration avec loft beton cir leroy merlin loft beton cir leroy merlin affordable excellent trendy trendy tte chant de with beton cir leroy.
kit beton cir salle de bain frais best bathrooms images on pinterest photos of kit with beton cir leroy.
simple b ton cir leroy merlin sol beton cir leroy merlin sur carrelage ga pays beton cire with beton cir leroy.
free beton cir couleur leroy merlin nouveau beton cir leroy amazing affordable best exemple salle de bains with beton cir leroy.
good beton cir cuisine plan travail meilleur de loft leroy brillant merlin cir beton cire cuisine plan with beton cir leroy.
gallery of b ton cir leroy merlin sol unique beton cir salle de bain leroy beton with beton cir leroy.
top recouvrir carrelage beton cir nouveau beton cir leroy download by tablet desktop original size back to with beton cir leroy.
beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin lgamment sol bton cir leroy merlin latest sol with beton cir leroy.
ambiance salle de bain leroy merlin awesome salle de bain leroy merlin de design s et with beton cir leroy.
amazing beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
beton cir couleur leroy merlin nouveau sol bton cir leroy merlin latest sol effet beton cir with beton cir leroy.
gallery of hydrofuge beton leroy merlin incroyable plaque hydrofuge salle de bain leroy merlin beau beton with beton cir leroy.
amazing ambiance salle de bain leroy merlin murs douche carrelage gatsby leroy merlin eur m existe with beton cir leroy.
simple enduit effet beton cir leroy merlin peinture pour sol avec cir enduit effet beton cire leroy with beton cir leroy.
awesome loft beton cir leroy merlin stunning trendy auvent en kit mexico con kit beton cire with beton cir leroy.
awesome gallery of meuble salle de bain carrel meilleur de beton cir leroy beton cir leroy merlin beton mineral resinence avec with beton cir leroy.
perfect chassis fixe pvc leroy merlin bton cir leroy merlin gallery stunning beton cir salle de with beton cir leroy.
perfect vernis beton leroy merlin lgant beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
carrelage salle de bain marron leroy merlin pour carrelage salle de bain beau leroy merlin bton with beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
simple beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin collection beton cir leroy cool enduit bton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
simple vis a bois leroy merlin unique vis bois torx leroy merlin nouveau s leroy merlin bonde with beton cir leroy.
excellent beton decoratif exterieur leroy merlin unique beton cir leroy merlin prix simple beton mineral salle de with beton cir leroy.
cool beton mineral leroy merlin frais photos beton mineral salle de bain avis luxe loft beton cir with beton cir leroy.
simple sol pvc effet b ton griff l m leroy merlin avec sol pvc effet beton griffe l m jpg p hi w et lino imitation beton cir xpx lino with beton cir leroy.
good back to post fresh beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin objective with beton cir salle de bain with beton cir leroy.
gallery of beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin terrifiant beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
gallery of beton cir leroy merlin lavabo beton montreal cire leroy merlin quebec with beton cir leroy.
stunning comment appliquer une peinture effet b ton leroy merlin youtube avec et peinture effet beton cir with beton cir leroy.
best cir mur leroy merlin carreau platre leroy merlin nouveau beton hydrofuge leroy merlin avec carreau platre leroy merlin frais design with beton cir leroy.
latest prix beton cire leroy merlin prix beton cire leroy merlin sol bton cir leroy merlin top with beton cir leroy.
top beton cir leroy merlin luxe pave beton lisse b ton imprim b ton avec beton cire with beton cir leroy.
beton mineral sur carrelage unique beton mineral salle de bain avis luxe loft beton cir leroy with beton cir leroy.
cool revtement mur leroy merlin papierpeint plaquette de parement lambris carrelage with loft beton cir leroy merlin with bton cir leroy merlin with beton with beton cir leroy.
beton cir douche italienne unique plan travail beton cir leroy kit beton cire leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
amazing beton cir exterieur prix beau peinture effet beton cir leroy merlin ides with beton cir leroy.
latest kit beton cir salle de bain photos beton cir mur leroy merlin idees de dcoration with beton cir leroy.
affordable vernis pour beton cir beau beton cir leroy merlin thehi lite with beton cir leroy.
fabulous bton cir sol leroy merlin meilleur de sol effet beton cir leroy merlin blanc dukec me with beton cir leroy.
castorama galet sol beton cir castorama finest sol effet beton cir leroy merlin with beton cir leroy.
vernis beton leroy merlin lgant beton cir leroy beautiful beton cir leroy merlin prix best big with beton cir leroy.
perfect beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin beton cir salle de bain leroy merlin great jpg with beton cir leroy.
awesome carrelage mural plaquetas en faence blanc x cm leroy throughout carrelage metro with beton cir leroy.
stunning hydrofuge beton leroy merlin beau beton cire leroy merlin beton cir leroy les decoratives leroy with beton cir leroy.
amazing avenant beton cir carrelage salle de bain et peinture effet beton cir leroy merlin l gant carrelage effet beton with beton cir leroy.
good image de cuisine bton cir lovely beton cir video avec video beton cire with beton cir leroy.
beton cir leroy merlin prix frais poutrelle castorama cir beton cire leroy merlin prix frais poutrelle with beton cir leroy.
beton cir leroy beton cir leroy merlin salle de bain ucod org with le meilleur beton with beton cir leroy.
Page rendered in 0.067353 seconds. | 2019-04-18T14:23:44Z | http://tiffanylandscapelighting.com/beton-cir-leroy.html |
What do you think about when you think about your childhood? Odds are, you don’t think about the television you watched, at least not as much as you think about the fun things you did, especially without your parents. Many kids now don’t do nearly so much on their own. Wouldn’t you like to encourage your kids to be more independent?
It can be difficult to encourage your kids to be more independent these days. There are a lot of things encouraging them to stay inside, from the delights of online games to the fears many parents have of allowing even their teens to do things on their own.
Being comfortable doing things on their own is vital for your kids, both now and later in life. You don’t want them to be completely dependent on you as adults, do you? Now is the time to teach your kids to enjoy age appropriate independence, so they can do more and more on their own as they grow up.
This is not just something to do when the kids are small, although you can start then. It’s something to do throughout their lives.
With all the highly protective parents around, it can be very difficult to let your kids be more independent. Many have very few friends who can meet up with them on their own. Mine have this problem, even my teens. Everyone is in too many activities. They don’t have time to run around and just be kids.
Worse, some people will report kids for being outside if they think they’re too young to be out alone, even when the kids are a perfectly reasonable age. It’s reasonable to be concerned if a two or three year old is wandering the neighborhood alone; it’s quite another when the child is ten or more.
Reading some of these books may help you get more comfortable.
Free Range Kids – I received a free copy of this to review years ago. It’s still worth a read. Kids are capable of so much if you just let them try.
Last Child In The Woods – Another book I received a copy of long ago. It makes excellent arguments for why kids need to get out in nature.
Balanced and Barefoot – I haven’t read this one, but it strikes me as another good choice. The author is a pediatric occupational therapist, and the book explains why kids need to play independently outside. Developmentally, it’s a big deal.
Playborhood – One of the big reasons many parents don’t let their kids play outside is because there’s nobody out there for them to play with. You can change that.
Laws regarding kids can vary quite a bit from state to state. Make sure you know what your local laws say about things such as leaving kids home alone or leaving them in the car.
If you’re unfortunate enough to have excessively concerned neighbors, knowing the laws won’t always protect you from CPS. Some CPS agents will have their own ideas as to what is safe for kids. But for the most part, knowing the laws in your area should be enough.
On the plus side, some states such as Utah, are looking at making laws that state parents can let their kids play outside safely. It’s too bad that it takes a law to allow something that used to be assumed, but that’s where we’re at.
Encourage your kids to be more independent by getting them to play outside, both on their own and with you. If you don’t have a yard, this may mean finding a park or playground where they can play, and will take more of your time.
Taking your kids for a hike is another good way to get them outside. Give them room to roam ahead or behind you as appropriate to the situation. Don’t make them stick right by your side without a good reason.
As kids get older, find more ways for them to go outside without you. If your neighborhood is safe, as many are, just encourage them to go play outside. Make sure they have toys that are fun for them to use outside.
My son, for example, loves remote control anything. Remote control toys are best used outdoors for the most part, unless they’re just too small for that.
Bikes, skates, balls and so forth are classics that are always good for kids to play with outside. Give them a good supply of outdoor toys, and playing out there becomes much more appealing.
Independence isn’t just about playing outside. You should also give your kids the skills they need to do interesting things without you.
What that means depends on what your kids want to do. Your child might be artistic or they might enjoy building things. They may be into electronics.
Do things with your kids that help them build up the skills they need to take their interests farther. While you don’t want to overdo scheduled activities, the occasional class in their interests is a good thing.
Learn with your kids also. Make things with them. Teach them some of your skills, or pick up a new one with them.
I helped my son build a computer, for example. He did as much of the work as possible, and did online research as necessary. I helped with the build and with troubleshooting. We had lots of fun together. It was a huge boost to his confidence.
Some people badmouth kids who are allowed to go out and about on their own because they assume they’re troublemakers. Don’t assume that encouraging your kids to be more independent means you don’t have to enforce limits. Of course you do.
The big ones, of course, are to respect other people and to respect their property. If your kids are doing something that might injure someone or damage someone else’s property, there’s a problem.
There’s a difference between letting your kids run wild and encouraging them to be independent, after all. That difference is in your expectations for their behavior. Set your expectations high.
Give your kids solid rules for how to deal with playing in the street. The old cry of “car!” when a car is approaching is great when there’s a group of kids playing and a car comes along. Make sure they know that they have to clear the street when a car comes along. Lots of games are far more fun for kids if they can play in the street, but they need to respect the primary use of the street. It’s safer for your kids and much less frustrating for neighbors.
Don’t let your kids play in the street unless you know they can handle it. If the kids are too young or don’t pay enough attention to traffic, it’s not safe. And of course, if the cars go too fast through your area, it’s probably not a good idea to include the street in their play. Use your judgment.
How far you let your kids wander will depend on their ages and the general safety of the area you live in. My kids love going to the store for ice cream, which is about a mile away. The older two can do this on their own if they like. The youngest must have one of the older ones with her.
Further along is a park they can go to, but they must use the crosswalks at the lights. I’ve seen too many close calls by that park to want to cross at the crosswalk that doesn’t have so much as a stop sign myself, never mind letting my kids do it. Too many drivers fail to stop for pedestrians in that crosswalk. The stoplights make it a little safer.
Beyond setting appropriate rules comes teaching your kids to be safe in general.
This is not “stranger danger.” There are times when talking to a stranger is entirely appropriate.
Teach them to be aware of their surroundings. Teach them how to deal with problems they may encounter. You can’t teach them everything, but when you talk about the more likely situations they’ll face, they have a better chance of dealing with other situations as well.
If you want your kids to be trustworthy, you have to trust them. This takes years of building up so that they’re confident in themselves and in your trust.
This starts as soon as they’re old enough to play alone, especially outside. Don’t insist upon being a part of everything they do.
When they’re playing in the yard or in the park, watch from a distance. Don’t be right there to help them climb. If they ask for help, that’s fine. That’s trust.
As they get older, set up rules that are based on trust, both when they’re out and about and at home. Do what needs to be done to keep your kids safe online, but trust them as well.
This means don’t check up on everything they do. You don’t have to check their texts daily when they get to that age, not unless you have a reason to mistrust them or if there’s a known problem you’re helping with.
I’ve had occasion to check my kids’ texts due to a suspected problem. I explained clearly what the situation was, so they knew I wasn’t being arbitrary.
At the same time, you want them to trust you. If your kids come to you with a problem, talk it out reasonably with them. Don’t get mad right away. Listen to the whole story. Discuss where things went wrong, and discipline appropriately. Done right, you’ll increase trust by not going overboard.
I’ve had to help my oldest with problems where she had to share texts with me to help with a situation she did not know how to deal with. We even had to consider whether to get the school involved. I was very glad that she trusted us enough that she could come to me with such a problem.
Having responsibilities helps kids to be more independent. From helping to load the dishwasher when they’re small, to helping prepare dishes and keep the house and yard up as they get older, responsibilities help kids become more independent.
You should also make them responsible for their own homework as much as possible. Help them build the habit of starting on time. Don’t help them unless they need it, and even they don’t just hand the answer to them.
It’s often difficult to give your kids responsibilities. Teaching them to do chores is harder than doing it yourself during the learning curve. Some kids want you right there when they have homework to do or have a difficult time learning to manage their time. Give it time, and it will get easier for all of you.
It’s hard balancing working at home with being a parent. Someone always wants something. Even when school’s in session, kids find ways to need you right when you’re trying to be really productive. And of course, they always want permission to watch TV, use a tablet or a computer. But you can’t let them do that all the time. Kids need limits on their screen time. Sometimes that’s difficult when you’re working at home and screens are the easy way to get them to give you some peace and quiet.
This issue has become both easier and more difficult for me as my kids have gotten older. They’re all old enough now that they can play on their own for quite some time, but the oldest in particular likes to play online games where she can interact with friends whose parents never seem to want to let them just come over.
Giving screen time to the kids is, of course, one of the easiest ways to keep them busy and somewhat quiet while I work, but it’s not ideal. Fortunately, there are good ways to limit kids’ screen time while you work at home. Try a few and see what works for you.
It’s good to get into the habit of talking about it when you’re going to make a rule change such as limiting screen time. The ages of your children will determine how much they have to say, and you can try to come to a mutually agreeable solution. You can set limits per day or week, and consider ways for kids to earn extra time if you like.
One thing you may have to discuss is how much screen time parents have. Since I work at home, I’ve had to explain why the rules don’t apply the same way to me. I work on my computer, after all. If you aren’t following the rules yourself, be sure to have a fair reason why.
One long standing rule we have is that the kids may not bring screens into their bedrooms – except on sick days when I want them to try to keep their germs to themselves. Keeping screens out of the bedrooms means no one can just sit and stare at a screen for hours without being noticed, and they won’t stay up at night watching stuff.
I don’t count homework time against their allowed screen time. That’s school work, and the older the kids get, the more often the computer is required to get their homework done. They’d be upset if that was the only time they could use the computer, and I would consider that reasonable.
If you want to give your kids a little more leeway on how long they use screens, find some acceptable computer games or apps for them. My youngest adores The Prodigy Game, an online math game, which is nice because she needs a little extra help with her math.
You may also want to give some leeway if your child is building a skill using the computer or a table. My oldest wants to be an animator, so it’s completely reasonable to allow her extra time to work on that skill, just as it would be for one trying to develop an app or do other work that requires a computer.
Don’t give your kids unlimited time with screen just because it’s an educational game, of course. It’s not unreasonable to allow them some extra time if they can convince you of the value of what they’re doing.
Many kids these days seem to really resist playing outside when it’s hot out. I suspect it has to do with air conditioning. Why go outside when inside is soooo comfortable?
I aim to get my kids outside during the more pleasant parts of the day – morning before it really heats up, evening as it cools off. In the heat of the day is more difficult, but a nice sprinkler and a healthy supply of Super Soakers really improves their interest.
Consider also whether your kids are old enough to go to the park on their own or with a group of friends while you work. Whether or not this is possible depends on a lot of factors, but there comes a time when it’s really good for kids to be allowed to do things without direct adult supervision. Once they can do that, you may worry, but you can get things done while they’re gone. You can go along and try working on your laptop or tablet if you like or if the kids are too young to go on their own, but if your kids are old enough to go to the park on their own, you’ll probably be more productive at home.
What do your kids want to learn about or do during their spare time? My kids take swim lessons at least part of each summer, and we look at other classes, soccer camp and so forth. There may be signups at various times, both during the school year and in summer, depending on where you live. While I don’t believe in overscheduling kids (they need down time too!), signing them up for something they really want to do is great for keeping them away from the TV or computer and can give you some work time. If the classes are short, you may be better off bringing some work along on your laptop than driving back and forth for drop off and pick up.
I keep a variety of craft supplies ready for my kids. My kids went through a phase where they constantly wanted to make things with Perler beads . They print designs off the internet for whatever they want to make, and my oldest is allowed to use the iron to press them.
Pay attention to the kinds of crafts and other activities your kids enjoy so you can keep supplies ready for them. The easier it is for the kids to access the supplies on their own, the more they’ll use them rather than watch TV, and the more they’ll let you work.
Board games are another good choice. Play as a family sometimes, but make sure your kids know how to play some games just with each other. Some games are good for a wide range of ages – mine play Sorry together sometimes, for example.
Be ready to help the kids negotiate when they can’t agree on what to do. One time I persuaded my two older kids to play a game called Greed (what they wanted to do) while taking turns playing Mastermind with my youngest. It worked out pretty well, as everyone was doing something they wanted to do.
There will probably still be times when you’d rather let your kids watch TV or play on a computer or tablet. If you plan alternatives in advance, you won’t have to give in as often. As everyone gets used to relying on screens less and less for daily entertainment, it gets easier all around.
When the kids get out of school for the summer, you want to be sure they do more than sit about at home watching one screen or another. The trouble is that things add up really fast if you have to spend much money on them. It’s a big help to know in advance what free and cheap activities are available in your area for your family.
I write various summer activities on our calendar if they take place on a given day or week. This makes it easier to remember what’s coming up. I tell the kids it’s their job to check the calendar and make sure I remember the things they really want to do.
I’m putting this one first because this doesn’t happen enough for my kids or many of their friends. They’re so busy with organized activities, that they don’t often get to just go play with friends. Some of the issue for my kids is that none of their friends are in the neighborhood, and there are very few kids in the neighborhood at all.
Don’t plan everything your kids are going to do this summer. Let them make plans with friends or decide to head over to a friend’s house to see if they can play.
Many communities do free movies in the park once a week or so during the summer. These are usually free. The city we live in does them on Wednesday nights in the park, and the same movie on Thursday nights at the pool. I prefer the park, as it’s easier to let the kids run around. Check your city’s website to find out what happens in your area. The movies start once it’s dark enough for everyone to see the screen clearly.
You may need to get there early to get a good seat, and you will probably need to bring your own blanket or chairs to sit on. If it gets cool in your area on summer nights after the sun goes down, bring jackets or blankets to keep warm. Younger children may fall asleep if the movies run much past their bedtimes.
I also make sure to post on my kids’ class Facebook page when we’re going to a movie at the park, because it’s a great way to meet up with friends over the summer. Other parents don’t have to promise to go, but the kids have so much fun seeing which friends show up for each movie. They’ll share snacks, play until the movie starts, and snuggle up if it’s cool after the sun sets.
A lot of movie theaters now run children’s movies during the summer for a low price. They’re generally in the morning, and tickets should be about $1-2. The movie selection varies from fairly recent children’s movies to older selections such as The Wizard of Oz. Check your local theater’s website to see if they have any to offer and for ticket prices.
Communities may also do summer concerts in the park. Once again, you should be able to find out about these on your city’s website. As they don’t need to wait for darkness to begin, these may not run as late as movies in the park.
Many libraries offer summer reading programs to encourage kids and teens to read. They may offer prizes, and there may be special activities and crafts at the library as well. Check with your local library to learn what they offer.
Barnes and Noble offers kids a free book if they read at least eight books and record them in the Reading Journal. The free books the kids can choose from are listed on the journal.
If there’s a bowling alley in your area, they may participate in the Kids Bowl Free program. Check the website to find out. You will probably need to pay for shoe rental, but kid can have up to two free games a day.
Many kids love to play in the water on hot summer days. When you don’t have a pool of your own, and the community pool admission adds up too fast, a splash pad can be a fun option. Water shoots up or sprays down on the kids from various items.
Some splash pads are free to use, while others charge admission.
No Kid Hungry is a program which serves free lunches to kids 18 years and under at approved sites during the summer. There’s no paperwork required – just show up. Any child can use this program, regardless of financial need, although the hope is that kids who get free or reduced lunch at school during the school year can make it to these sites so they continue to get free lunches during the summer.
To find a site, you can visit the program page on the USDA site, or text FOOD to 877877. Check to see what time each location serves lunch.
Are there any playgrounds near you? Your kids may have a lot of fun playing at them. As they get older, encourage them to range more widely so they get more independent, and consider when they’re old enough to go to a park without you. Kids need to develop independence, and this is one way they will enjoy doing so when it’s appropriate for their age and your area.
Riding bikes is a great physical activity for the whole family. You can ride around your neighborhood, around local parks, or run quick errands on a bike. Once again, let them ride around on their own when they’re old enough, responsible enough, and you’re comfortable that your area is safe enough.
You can use a GPS enabled device, such as your smartphone, to find geocaches in your area or anywhere you go. You share your finds with the geocache community, and can make your own caches.
While admission to many museums can add up quickly, many offer free days, or are even free regularly. The California Science Center, for example, always has free admission, although there is a fee for parking, movies and special events. There’s still a lot to do there for free.
Check the websites of any museums you would like to go to and see when their free days are.
If you have an EBT card, you may be able to find museums in your area which participate in Museums For All, which gives free or discounted admission to families in the EBT program. Fees can currently range from free to $3 for museums participating in this program.
Each of my kids picks a skill or project each summer they want to work on. This gives me something to tell them to do any time I hear the words “I’m bored.” Mostly they want to make videos for YouTube, and I have rules for them about whether they can show faces, use real names, etc. They also have looked at improving artistic skills, learning to solder and much more.
Home Depot offers workshops for kids to build small projects. The kits change each week and are free. You may be able to register online, but drop ins are usually welcome so long as there are enough kits. Classes are the first Saturday of each month. Parents must remain with their children. They also have workshops for adults, so if you see something you would like to learn, sign up for it.
Tynker offers a Summer Code-A-Thon to kids with free memberships to their site. It’s a 10 week program with a new project every week. Kids get certificates for completing projects, and the top projects each week get a t-shirt. Child accounts must have a connected parent account to participate.
If there’s a Microsoft store in your area, your kids may be able to participate in free YouthSpark courses. Activities vary by the ages of your children. Parents must remain in the store for the duration of the event – these are not drop off classes.
If you have an Apple store in your area, you may be able to sign your kids up for Apple Camp. It’s for ages 8-12, and is three 90 minute sessions. Kids choose their track from what is offered, and spend their time at the camp working on their project.
If you want to work on academics over the summer, make sure it’s fun for your kids. They do forget a lot of what they learn over the summer, making it important to help them use their skills during their break, but this time should be a break.
There are fun sites for kids to keep working on their math skills, for example. My youngest loves The Prodigy Game. It’s a lot more fun for her than the math sites they use through school, although their accounts for those may be available over the summer as well. The basic account for The Prodigy Game is free, but don’t be surprised if your child wants a paid membership to access the extras.
Some places will allow families to volunteer with their children. My kids and I volunteer year round at a local animal shelter, for example. While many animal shelters only allow older kids to volunteer, you may be able to find places you can volunteer with your kids by checking VolunteerMatch.
There’s nothing wrong with kids being bored sometimes. That’s what will help them learn to come up with ideas on their own.
For more ideas, I did 30 Days of Keeping Kids Busy During The Summer a few years ago. | 2019-04-26T04:26:29Z | https://www.homewiththekids.com/blog/tag/keeping-kids-busy/ |
As drone technologies have improved in recent years, so has the debate on Capitol Hill about how drones should and should not be regulated. While drones have been used extensively for various military applications for numerous years, the commercial and private use of drones has been a slow growth market segment. As such, the last time Congress reviewed legislation and regulation for non-military drones was in 2012.
However, that is about to change, with hundreds of thousands of drones being used by hobbyists and major companies, like Google and Amazon, who want to use the drones for automated package delivery systems. The objective of Congress is to provide guidance to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and its establishment of drone policies.
There are Washington DC lobbyists and advocates split on two sides of influencing regulations and rules for drone usage. On one side are the hobbyists and personal users, along with corporations, who want to see a broader range of reduced regulations. On the other side are proponents for tighter drone rules, increased safety, and control over their use.
Earlier this year there was much interest and attention placed on the re-authorization of a bill to enable the FAA funding and guidance to create regulations for commercialized drone testing and testing sites. As the FAA continues to explore its approach and what regulations it will eventually put into effect for drones, there have been an increase in lobbyist activities on Capitol Hill, with various groups meeting with the White House, FAA officials, and NASA officials.
Among one of the more recent changes enacted by the FAA is mandatory drone registration for recreational drone owners, which took effect back in December 2015. This change was implemented to help address concerns about safety and privacy. For commercial operations, the FAA currently reviews and authorizes business usage of drones on a case-by-case basis. It is hoped that, once the FAA establishes new regulations and rules, it will make it easier for businesses and will eliminate the current procedures.
Both Google and Amazon have been rather active with their lobbying to attempt to speed up the process. These companies understand any regulation will probably be created in stages, as they expect the FAA to want more research and experimental testing to be completed, prior to developing federal regulation on the open use of drones by businesses for commercial delivery purposes.
Some drone manufacturers, along with the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA), are among those advocacy and lobbyist groups pushing for tighter controls and increased safety features in drones. ALPA would like to see legislation requiring registration when a drone is purchased in a retail store or online. In addition, those in support of increased safety features would like to see a bill introduced which would require manufacturers to build drones with avoidance and sensing technologies to help keep drones away from nearby people and objects.
It will be interesting to see the outcome of lobbying efforts, and what regulations and rules the FAA does create in the future. If your business wants its voice heard in Washington about its position on drones or other important issues, with the representation you deserve, call Lobbyit now at 202-587-2736 to help you get the most out of your elected officials and government agencies.
Together, the U.S Chamber of Congress and the Institute of Legal Reform spend 19.5 million on lobbying efforts directed toward the White House and Congress on influencing environmental regulation, copyright laws, and free trade agreements, with some success. Their efforts helped to move along the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
The National Association of Realtors invested $7.7 million to lobby for the Mortgage Choice Act to reduce the regulations on mortgage lenders, as well as on flood insurance premium issues. Their efforts helped get the Mortgage Choice Act approved in the House of Representatives.
The American Medical Association spent $6.7 million on lobbying, with success in both the House and Senate, in efforts to fix a flaw with the Medicare payment system. Both Congressional Parties voted on resolutions to permanently resolve issues with the payment system.
Google only recently entered the list of top spending lobbyists in 2015, by investing $5.5 million to protect against antitrust litigation, as well as patent issues to further support their efforts in the development of self-driving vehicles and drones.
General Electric spent $4.8 million, while American Electric Power Company spent $4.7 million on lobbying to protect their markets against the growing solar industry. Utility and energy equipment manufacturers are typically top spenders for lobbying on topics that are vital to their continued growth.
Part of the reason for the increase in spending in 2015, over 2014, was largely due to the Republican-controlled House and Senate. Lobbyist efforts by these and other groups are aimed at attempting to get bills passed or given a second look, which under a Democratic-controlled House and Senate would not necessarily have had a chance of passing.
Whenever there is a shift in the political leadership in the House and Senate, it typically requires tailoring lobbying efforts toward the group currently in power and influencing their viewpoints on various topics of interest to lobbyist groups. Depending on the results of the November 2016 election, there again could be a shift in leadership, which would result in lobbyists having to determine exactly how much to invest in 2017.
Even though these leading groups are some of the top investors in lobbying efforts, it does not mean smaller businesses and organizations cannot help shape and influence legislation with the right assistance from qualified DC lobbying firms, like Lobbyit. Contact us at 202-587-2736 to learn more about how we can help your organization have the representation it needs in Washington today.
As the older generation of lobbyists is retiring, there is a growing number of younger people from the Millennia generation shaping the future of Washington lobbyists. In the past, lobbyists spent time developing and cultivating relationships inside the legislature offices. These relationships are critical to attempting to sway politicians’ opinions to that of the lobbyist, and to gain support for their issues and/or causes.
However, today, largely in part of advances in technology, the Internet, and social media, younger lobbyists no longer have to spend the long hours indoors. Rather, they can utilize social media sites, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter to foster and develop virtual relationships with politicians and the politician’s staffers. As such, it allows them to change how lobbying is conducted and how it influences political outcomes of legislation.
Social media has become an essential tool for lobbying efforts. Lobbyists no longer have to meet face-to-face with politicians and other advocacy groups to influence and sway their opinions. They can post updates to Facebook and Twitter, grow their network of connections through LinkedIn, and more. Thanks to the Internet and social media, young lobbyists are able to multitask and accomplish more in less time than in the past, while also relying upon others to re-post and share content.
Another major shift for younger lobbyists concerns the steps they take when they want to become a lobbyist. In the past, the baby boomer lobbyists simply started working in the public service sector right out of college as a legislative aide, to develop their skills as an effective lobbyist, and then went on to become a lobbyist right away.
This is no longer the case. An underlying cause for this change has to do with the mandatory two-year lobbying ban regulation. After working as a legislative staffer, or other such position in the public sector, potential lobbyists must wait two years and spend this time working in the private sector before they can start lobbying or working for DC lobbying firms.
As such, more and more Millennial lobbyists are establishing careers in relevant private sector positions, to develop various skills vital to being persuasive lobbyists and to avoid the two-year ban altogether. Typical career paths aspiring lobbyists are taking include becoming lawyers, government analysts, and public speakers.
While they are working in the private sector, they start participating in lobbying internships and other such programs to gain further experience. It is during this time they start to foster and build relationships with other lobbyists and politicians. Once they have completed their internship, they formally register as a professional lobbyist and continue expanding their network of relationships.
Lobbyists today do much more than communicate with politicians the issues and causes of their clients. They must be able to not only be persuasive, but also analyze the impacts of legislature, and the impacts it will have for their clients. For nonprofits and business organizations, it is in your best interests to have lobbyists on your side. Otherwise, you have no control over what decisions are being made by Congress.
Call Lobbyit at 202-587-2736 now to discover how we can help your nonprofit or business and provide the representation you need in Washington.
Washington DC lobbyists provide essential services to help influence the political decisions being made in the legislative branch of the government. They work on behalf of nonprofits and other organizations to voice their concerns to Congress about legislation and how it affects their cause or issue. Lobbyists have a deep understanding of how the federal government works, as well as the rules, regulations, and laws imposed on lobbyists.
Lobbying first came about from the language within the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which states, the “right of people to petition the government.” As such, lobbyists started advocating and lobbying on behalf of constituents, the general public, businesses, and nonprofit organizations, and trying to influence legislation within Congress.
By 1876, all lobbyists were required to register with Congress and, since 1995, are required to disclose and report their activities to the government, as a means to determine the extent of their involvement in specific pieces of legislation, and to ensure they are adhering to both state and federal lobbying regulations and laws.
Advocacy is arguing in favor of a cause or issue. Anyone can advocate for any number of causes or issues they support. It is not uncommon to use social media to spread the word and educate people about a particular issue or cause.
Lobbying, on the other hand, is attempting to sway the influence of a public official or politician on a cause/issue, and could involve both direct and grassroots lobbying. Requesting a member of Congress to introduce, amend, or vote for or against a particular piece of legislation are all good examples of lobbying.
Navigating the complexities of advocacy and lobbying, and related activities, can seem overwhelming for nonprofit organizations and smaller organizations. Fortunately, Lobby It has made numerous accomplishments for those who were previously under-represented in Washington DC.
We offer a low, basic monthly fee, and other customizable solutions, to help organizations and business of all sizes achieve their advocacy and lobbying objectives. Contact Lobbyit at 202-587-2736 today to speak to a representative and learn how they could help your business or organization.
Advocacy is generally defined as arguing in favor of a cause or idea, whether it’s environmental protection, minority rights, or the myriad other issues that affect people every day. There is no limit to the amount of advocacy a person or organization (such as a nonprofit) can do.
Direct lobbying: Any attempt to influence new or existing legislation via communication with a member of the legislative body or other government representative who has a say in the legislation.
Grassroots lobbying: Asking the general public to contact their legislator and/or mobilizing the public around a legislative issue. Organizations, such as nonprofits, cannot ask their members to contact their legislators or government agencies regarding the legislation, though, as this is considered direct lobbying. Examples of grassroots lobbying include creating an online petition to generate public support for a cause, distributing flyers, and organizing a public demonstration or rally.
Nonprofit organizations can engage in some lobbying without having to register; however, the IRS has strict rules about what portion of an organization’s budget can go toward lobbying activities, and federal funds cannot be used for lobbying.
Meeting with a government official to explain how a particular problem/issue is affecting a particular group or organization, the environment, etc.
Anyone can engage in advocacy. Educating policymakers about the needs of your organization or community is something anyone can do. You can advocate by organizing supporters on important issues and encouraging them to email or call their elected officials, using social media to educate people about issues/causes, and meeting with elected officials to let them know in person how an issue is affecting the community/organization.
Keep in mind that asking elected officials to support or introduce legislation crosses the line into lobbying. Sometimes advocacy alone isn’t enough, and legislation is necessary to fully address an issue or problem—this is where an experienced DC lobbyist can be a huge help. The expert lobbyists at Lobbyit have been helping small and mid-size organizations establish their voice on Capitol Hill for years. We offer competitively-priced lobbying packages for organizations of every size.
Grassroots lobbying involves the mass mobilization of the public around a legislative issue—whether it’s getting certain a certain poison banned or posing harsher penalties for drunk drivers. Grassroots lobbyists ask the general public to contact their legislators and other officials regarding an issue.
Direct lobbying involves any attempt to influence legislation (new or existing) by communicating with a member of the legislative body or other government official who has a say in the legislation.
Here’s where it gets more complicated: To be considered grassroots lobbying, an organization (such as a nonprofit) cannot state their position on specific legislation and urge their members to contact their legislators/government agencies regarding that legislation—this is considered direct lobbying.
The keyword here is members—grassroots lobbying must target the public at large in its messaging. Publishing an open letter, creating an online petition, organizing a public demonstration/rally, or distributing flyers are all considered grassroots lobbying tactics.
Grassroots lobbying is protected under the First Amendment rights of speech, association, and petition. Nevertheless, in most cases lobbyists are required to register if they meet certain criteria (see our post referencing this criteria), and many states have additional regulations on lobbying, with administrative fines and even criminal penalties for failure to comply. This document outlines state requirements for lobbying activity in each state.
Today the magic of email, Facebook, and Twitter help us spread messages and generate support with the click of a button. In centuries past, on the other hand, grassroots lobbying took place in town hall meetings and public squares. Anonymous pamphleteers frequently took to the streets to make the public aware of issues of the day—certainly this same “take it to the streets” approach is still used, but grassroots activists have additional tools to help them today.
One thing is certain: Grassroots activism was and still is an essential part of the democratic process in the United States.
Beyond sounding the alarm bell about important issues, grassroots lobbying serves the important function of educating the public on matters that affect them but which they otherwise might not know much about. Grassroots lobbyists help everyday citizens understand the substance and consequences of legislation in layman terms, and they help people understand the legislative process.
An informed citizenry provides a powerful check to legislators and agenda setters who might otherwise try to push or prevent legislation right under the noses of an uninformed public.
A proven means of effectively indirectly influencing legislative decisions, thousands of organizations and everyday citizens have used the power of grassroots lobbying to bring about change. When grassroots measures alone aren’t enough, the expert Washington D.C. lobbyists at Lobbyit can help. We’ve been working with small businesses, nonprofits, and other organizations for years to get their voices heard on Capitol Hill. Whether you want to establish a D.C. lobbying presence, closely monitor your important issues, or need help getting a bill passed, we offer some of the most cost-effective government affairs plans in the industry.
There is a common perception that lobbying and public relations (PR) have become more enmeshed in recent years, with lines blurred between the two. Part of the confusion lies in the simple fact that both lobbyists and PR specialists seek to influence others. Given the perceived overlap of lobbying and PR, we feel it’s important to distinguish between the two and outline the objectives of both. Let’s take a closer look.
DC Lobbying Firm is generally defined as seeking to influence political decisions on behalf of an individual, organization, or group.
Lobbyists typically work with state and federal legislators and members of regulatory agencies to advocate for the proposal, passage, defeat, or amendment of laws or regulations—whether at the local, state, or federal level. Lobbyists are professionals who seek to understand the concerns, needs, and interests of their clients and use their knowledge of the legislative process to educate key decision makers. Lobbyists are sometimes unpaid volunteers who lobby because they feel strongly enough about an issue that they feel compelled to advocate for it.
Lobbyists represent a range of clients—from trade groups, to nonprofits, to labor unions, to corporations and religious organizations. They are prohibited from paying elected officials for their vote on an issue.
Now let’s look at public relations.
PR has changed considerably alongside evolving technology over the last decade. The introduction of social media and other forms of digital communications have both enhanced and created new challenges for PR. Social media has enabled two-way communication between brands and consumers, and it has created an outlet for influencers (ordinary citizens) to promote brands online. While lobbyists may also use these tools, they generally do so to a lesser degree, as face time packs more of a punch with legislators.
As an article in NPR highlighted, lobbyists may target Capitol Hill, but PR folks often swoop in first to “conditioning the legislative landscape”—in other words, shape public perception. Another key difference between lobbying and PR is that lobbyists are required to disclose their activities (subject to the criteria mentioned earlier), while PR specialists are not.
Both lobbyists and PR specialists play their own unique role in communicating information and furthering the interests of the individuals, organizations, and groups they support.
The expert DC lobbyists at Lobbyit make representation in Washington a reality for organizations of all sizes. Our lobbying service packages are competitively priced with small and mid-size organizations in mind—we believe that everyone deserves equal representation in the halls of Congress.
It’s safe to say that virtually every item you pick up from grocery store shelves likely has a trade group (or several) behind it. Lobbyists for Big Food fight hard in Washington to elevate the image and reach of products to consumers, win prime spots on supermarket shelves, and influence government organizations like the USDA to establish recommendations for how much protein, grain, or dairy Americans should be consuming.
The meat industry, in particular, has major lobbying chops (no pun intended)—groups like the National Pork Producers Council and the North American Meat Institute have long been working to keep their products front and center in the public’s mind, and on the dinner table.
However, who represents the producers of meat alternatives—companies like Tofurky and Daiya?
Plant-based meat, dairy, and egg substitutes were once relegated to specialty stores and tiny sections at the back of supermarkets. These products were marketed to niche groups and otherwise overlooked by mainstream shoppers.
Enter the Plant Based Foods Association, a spanking new trade group launched by attorney and food critic Michele Simon to represent and further the interests of plant-based food companies. The group currently has 23 members—among them Daiya and Follow Your Heart, which are well-known companies in plant-based food circles.
Elizabeth Kucinich, wife of former congressman Dennis Kucinich, and the former policy director at the Center for Food Safety, will represent the Plant Based Foods Association in Washington. Kucinich has been an active advocate for plant-based foods, founding the Congressional Vegetarian Staff Association—aka the “Veggie Caucus”—to push for more vegetarian options in cafeterias on the Hill, just one of many examples of her efforts to push plant-based foods into the mainstream.
A New Era in Lobbying?
The reign of the most powerful lobbies may not be coming to an end anytime soon, but the recent establishment of the Plant Based Foods Association could well symbolize the ushering in of a new era, as groups not traditionally associated with lobbying realize the advantages and necessity of having influence in Washington.
This begs the question: Who’s standing up for the little guy—the small, mid-size, and non-mainstream businesses that deserve equal representation in Washington? The expert Washington DC Lobbyists at Lobbyit believe all groups deserve equal representation—that’s why we’ve designed affordably-priced packages with clearly-outlined deliverables that make lobbying accessible to virtually any organization—no matter the size.
At its very core, lobbying is a vital part of American democracy. Our Constitution says that “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” Lobbying is a way to ensure that grievances are heard and, ideally, resolved.
For better or worse, our laws and legislative processes are complex. They can be downright overwhelming to individual citizens or business owners. Lobbyists understand the legislative process inside and out. They act as liaisons between the public and representatives in Congress, helping congressional members understand issues they may not otherwise know much about.Lobbyists are connected to congressional staff, business leaders, and politicians in ways everyday citizens generally aren’t.
Why All the Negative Talk About Lobbyists?
The lobbying industry has faced its share of criticism from economists, academics—even the POTUS in his initial run for president.
Depending on your viewpoint, you may see creating jobs as a top priority and take no issue with the strategy used by this corporate conglomerate. Or you may view their move as nothing more than an unethical means of tax evasion.
Whatever position you take on this specific example, the reality is that lobbyists represent all points of view on every issue imaginable—from environmental protection advocates, to energy extraction interests, to issues facing children and the elderly.
Like any industry, the lobbying sector may have a few bad apples, but, on the whole, lobbyists are law-abiding professionals who represent not only corporate executives, but also workers, labor unions, trade associations, nonprofits, religious organizations, and academic institutions. At their best, lobbyists are advocates who work hard to understand the interests of their clients and use their knowledge of the legislative process to effectively educate key decision makers about the impacts of their decisions.
There is no denying that large corporations have much deeper pockets than small and mid-size businesses, nonprofits, and charities, the latter of which deserve equal representation. Thankfully, lobbying firms like Lobbyit are committed to ensuring that these organizations are heard on Capitol Hill by offering affordably-priced packages and transparent contractual arrangements. In a true democracy, everyone has a voice.
Oil companies and multinational corporations routinely rake in equally impressive returns.
Perhaps you’re wondering how you can advance your organization’s interests through lobbying—if Big Pharma can do it, after all, why not you?
Whether you’re a nonprofit owner looking to establish a presence for your organization in D.C. or a mid-size business owner looking to fight local regulations that are negatively impacting your business, here are some things to consider before hiring a lobbyist.
Federal or State: Whether you should hire a state or federal lobbyist will depend to some extent on what you’re trying to accomplish. If you’re fighting a state regulation or vying for state dollars, a lobbyist who understands the intricacies of your state’s legislative and regulatory processes may be the best choice. If you’re challenging a federal policy or trying to get federal funding, an experienced lobbyist in Washington is ideal.
IRS Rules Regarding Lobbying: This is especially pertinent to nonprofit organizations who have filed for 501(c)(3) status. These nonprofit groups are only allowed to engage in lobbying (activities that attempt to influence legislation) as long as those lobbying efforts are deemed “insubstantial” or not a “substantial part of its activities.” 501(c)(3) organizations are generally limited to spending no more than 20% of their organizational budget on lobbying activities, depending on the size of the organization. A 501(c)(4) organization (also a nonprofit status), on the other hand, can engage in unlimited lobbying as long as the lobbying promotes the organization’s mission.
Budget/Price: You’ll need to determine what your organization can spend each month for lobbying services. The fees a lobbyist charges will largely depend on your particular service agreement. While some firms charge in excess of $50,000 per month for unidentified services, others, like Lobbyit.com, offer clearly outlined services at competitive pricing ranging from $1,000-$5,000 per month. Your best bet is to issue a request for proposal (RFP) when shopping for a lobbying firm to ensure you stay within your budget.
Length of Contract: Make sure you understand the contractual commitment clearly, including its length. Some firms require a commitment of six months or a year, while others offer month-to-month plans and flexibility switching between different programs as the needs of the organization or campaign change.
Experience: Does the firm you’re considering have experience working on issues pertaining to your industry? What victories have they won? Make sure your lobbying dollars are well spent by hiring a firm experienced in the issues that will further your organization’s interests.
Other Clients: One of the most important aspects of choosing a lobbyist is identifying potential conflicts of interest in the firm’s other clients. For example, if you are a physician’s organization, you’ll want to know if your lobbyist represents the health insurance industry. Some states have conflict of interest laws in place that prohibit such arrangements—but not all do—and less scrupulous firms may not disclose such conflicts. Ask to see the client list for the entire firm.
Hiring a lobbyist is a big decision, especially for small and mid-size businesses, and nonprofits with limited budgets. Interview prospective firms carefully, don’t be shy about asking for RFPs, and choose wisely. Most importantly, look for a firm with a solid reputation of successes and victories, like the expert DC lobbyists at Lobbyit. | 2019-04-19T22:34:00Z | https://lobbyit.com/category/blog/page/3/ |
1 Do they have lunch at one o’clock? generally Yes, they generally have lunch at one o’clock.
2 Is John working in the garden? still Yes, John’s still working in the garden.
3 Is he late for lunch? always Yes,he’s always late for lunch.
4 Do you cook in the evening? usually Yes,I usually cook in the evening.
5 Are we hungry at night? often Yes, we’re often hungry at night.
6 Has Peter finished his lunch? already Yes, Peter’s already finished his lunch.
7 Does Susan eat potatoes? sometimes Yes,Susan sometimes eats potatoes.
8 Can you eat two potatoes for dinner? always Yes, I can always eat two potatoes for dinner.
1 I want somepotatoes. bread But I don’t want any bread.
2 He’s bringing some lemonade. whisky But he isn’t bringing any whisky.
3 They usually give him some milk. wine But they don’t usually give him any wine.
4 We’re taking some sandwiches. bottles of beer But we aren’t taking any bottles of beer.
5 He wants some peas. tomatoes But he doesn’t want any tomatoes.
6 There’s some milk in the fridge. butter But there isn’t any butter in the fridge.
7 They need some paper. pencils But they don’t need any pencils.
8 They’re writing some papers. cards But they aren’t writing any cards.
1 We’re going for a picnic on Sunday. every Sunday We go for a picnic every Sunday.
2 We are leaving early in the morning. usually We usually leave early in the morning.
3 The children are coming with us. always The children always come with us.
4 I’m taking my fishing rod. sometimes I sometimes take my fishing rod.
5 My wife’s cooking a chicken now. every weekend Shecooks a chicken every weekend.
6 Tim’s bringing some beer. generally Tim generally brings some beer.
7 He isn’t driving the car. usually He doesn’t usually drive the car.
8 We aren’t staying out late. often We don’t often stay out late.
1. Felix plays golf every weekend. now Felix is playing golf now.
2. Gertie cleans the house regularly. this afternoon Gertie’s cleaning the house this afternoon.
3. We often visit them. today We’re visiting them today.
5. Our son usually comes with us. tomorrow Our son’s coming with us tomorrow.
7. We get up early on Sundays. in the morning We’re getting up early in the morning.
8. I don’t work on Saturdays. next Saturday I’m not working next Saturday.
1 We often go to the theatre. Do you often go to the theatre?
2 Jack’s going to see the new play next week. Is Jack going to see the new play next week?
3 Sheila likes comedies. Does Sheila like comedies?
4 I’m buying the tickets tonight. Are you buying the tickets tonight?
5 The show begins at eight o’clock. Does the show begin at eight o’clock?
6 Jack and Joyce are having a meal first. Are Jack and Joyce having a meal first?
7 They want to see a serious play. Do they want to see a serious play?
8 We’re taking a taxi to the theatre. Are we taking a taxi to the theatre?
1 John is going to the doctor’ today because he feels ill.
2 Jack often goes to the theatre. On Saturday he is going to see the new play.
3 In spring the days grow longer and the nights become warmer.
4 I ‘m catching the train to London this evening. It leaves at eight o’clock.
5 Ice floats on water, but iron does not float.
6 I hear you are going to France next week. Do you speak French?
7 I understand a little, but I never practise so I do not speak very well.
8 Mr. Laker coming to tea today. Do you remember him?
1 I want some paper to write a letter.
2 He wants some milk and a teaspoon of sugar in his tea.
3 You need a sharp knife to cut some wood.
4 I’d like a cup of coffee and some water, please.
5 There’s some tea in the pot but there isn’t any coffee left.
6 Have you got any good ideas?
7 John gave me some good advice, but I didn’t take any notice.
8 I went to the manager to get some information.
1 Those boys need to have their hair cut.
2 They planted some these in their gardens.
3 They bought some bottles of wine.
5 The furniture in these rooms is very old. We must buy some new tables and chairs.
6 Bottles are made of glass.
7 Fathers can give good advice to their sons.
8 They left their luggage on the chairs.
1 There are some glasses in the cupboard. Would you fetch them?
2 It was very hot when I went out this morning.
3 It is difficult to speak English correctly, don’t you think?
4 It is warm today, but there are some clouds in the sky.
5 It is true that there are some difficult questions in this exercise.
6 It is possible that there will be another war soon.
7 It is difficult to understand why Gertie ever married him.
8 There was a fight in the street last week.
1 I am still waiting for a answer to my questions.
2 Do dogs ever eat fruit for breakfast?
3 My mother does not often go to the theatre.
4 We have only got a few bottles of lemonade in the house.
5 He has already drunk a full bottle of whisky.
6 The weather is rarely cold at this time of the year.
7 The children generally do their homework at school.
8 That old man can hardly understand what you say.
1 He thought he was late, but in fact he got to the station before the train left.
2 It’s late; I must be off to work now.
3 The doctors operated on the boy’s leg.
4 He stopped at a shop on the way; then he went on to the station.
5 That man is at least 80 years old.
6 I am very content with your progress.
7 Are you confident of finishing the exercise before tomorrow?
8 Please look after my luggage while I go to the toilet.
9 What’s on at the cinema tonight?
10 It’s raining so we’ll put off the picnic until next week.
11 They got up early in the morning and went for a swim before breakfast.
12 He feeds his cat on fresh fish.
he began teaching in a secondary school.
a job teaching English to foreign students during the long summer holidays.
he met someone who offered him a job teaching English to foreign students during the long summer holidays.
1. When did you go to France? last year I went to France last year.
2. When did he wear this tie? a week ago He wore this tie a week ago.
3. When did you offer him a job? on Monday I offered him a job on Monday.
4. When did she speak to my father? yesterday She spoke to your father yesterday.
5. When did we invite Simon to lunch? last Saturday We invited Simon to lunch yesterday.
6. When did the children come home? at four o’clock The children came home at four o’clock.
7. When did John have lunch? an hour ago John had lunch an hour ago.
8. When did the war end? in 1945 The war ended in 1945.
1. Have you been to Mexico? No. No, I haven’t been to Mexico yet.
2. Have you spoken to the manager? Yes. Yes, I’ve already spoken to the manager.
3. Have I told you the answer? No. No, you haven’t told me the answer yet.
4. Have they had their holiday? No. No, they haven’t had their holiday yet.
5. Have you decided where to go yet? Yes. Yes, we’ve already decided where to go.
6. Have we spent all the money? Yes. Yes, we’ve already spent all the money.
7. Has Mary been to Ireland yet? Yes. Yes, Mary’s already been to Ireland.
8. Have the children learned French? No. No, the children haven’t learnt French yet.
1 How long have they worked here? Monday They've worked here since Monday.
2 How long have you known him? 10 years I’ve known him for ten years.
3 How long have they lived there? 1974 They’ve lived here since 1974.
4 How long has he had that car? January He’s had this car since January.
5 How long has Mary been here? one o’clock Mary’s been here since one o’clock.
6 How long has Jane been here? one hour Jane’s been here for one hour.
7 How long have they waited for it? two hours they’ve waited for us for two hours.
8 How long have you waited for it? two o’clock I’ve waited for it since two o’clock.
1 Didn’t you see the Smiths last week?
Yes, I saw the Smiths last week, but I haven’t seen them this week.
2 Didn’t he go to France last year?
Yes, he went to France last year, but he hasn’t been there this year.
3 Didn’t they study German last winter?
Yes, they studied German last winter, but they haven’t studied German this winter.
4 Didn’t John buy a new car last year?
Yes, John bought a new car last year, but he hasn’t bought a new car this year.
5 Didn’t you work hard last week?
Yes, I worked hard last week, but I haven’t worked hard this week.
6 Didn’t he play football last winter?
Yes, he played football last winter, but he hasn’t played football this winter.
7 Didn’t it rain last July?
Yes, it rained last July, but it hasn’t rained this July.
8 Didn’t it snow last February?
Yes, it snowed last February, but it hasn’t snowed this February.
1 Sheila plays the piano very well.
2 She sang that song beautifully.
3 I like music very much.
4 Mary speaks Spanish fluently.
5 The boys can do exercises easily.
6 They have done their work well.
7 They finished the job quickly.
8 I enjoy my lessons very much.
1 I bought a new tie last week, but I haven’t worn it yet.
2 He has already seen that film. He saw it when he was in London.
3 «When did you meet Mr. Smith?» «I met him the day before yesterday».
4 « Have you ever spoken to him?» «Yes. I spoke to him before the party”.
5 Peter has lived in Greece for the last three years. He lived in Africa before he went to Greece.
6 I have just had my lunch. I finished eating five minutes ago.
7 I have made five mistakes so far today. Yesterday I only make three mistakes altogether.
8 I have never played rugby in my life, but I played football when I was at school.
1 «Where is Jane?» «She has gone to the shops. She’ll be back soon».
3 We have been in this class since September.
4 The Smiths have been in Paris for years now. They like it there.
5 John has gone to Oxford in his car. He is staying the night with friends.
6 I have been to Italy and I have been to Spain, but I haven’t been to Portugal yet.
7 How long have you been in this country?
8 The Hunts have gone to Australia to live. I’m sure they’ll be happier there.
1 He came to Athens four years ago .
2 I have lived in this town for the last six months.
3 Peter has worked in Greece for three years now.
4 Two years ago I went to Spain for my holidays.
5 He has not finished his homework yet, although he started it two hours ago .
6 I played tennis for an hour and then I went for a swim. I have played a lot of tennis since the summer began.
7 They stayed in Paris for several days before they flew to Rome.
8 We have not seen John this morning, but we saw him a couple of days ago.
1 The children took some cakes from the cupboard after breakfast.
2 He always sings loudly in the bath.
3 The Hunts have only got one car now.
4 The baby was born at 2 o’clock in the morning on 3rd June 1974.
5 The students usually come out of class noisily at four o’clock.
6 Jean generally sings that song beautifully .
7 My father likes classical music very much.
8 They understand French very well but they don’t speak it very easily.
1 He is interested in languages, but he isn’t good at them.
2 He specialised in Roman history.
3 I didn’t like him at first, but I got on with him very well in the end.
4 We met by chance at the end of the holiday.
5 He is very well off. His money enables him to travel all over the world.
6 It’s difficult to adjust to the heat in such countries.
7 We are thinking of going to Sweden, but we haven’t made up our minds yet.
8 I want to have my room done up , but I’m too hard up at the moment.
9 We called in on Bill last week. He was pleased to see us.
10 Why don’t you visit me this summer? I could put you up for a few nights.
11 My son isn’t getting on very well at school.
12 I’ll tidy up the room and put your books away while I look for your tie.
Mrs. Smith Good morning, Mrs. Jones. / What splendid weather, isn’t it!
Mrs. Jones Yes, beautiful. / Some people are complaining though, of course.
Mrs. Jones O, have you heard about Patric Ellis? / He’s had another car accident!
Mrs. Smith No! How awful! / Was he driving too fast again?
Mrs. Jones I suppose so. / How wild the young men are these days!
Mrs. Smith And what do you think of Eva Browning? / She’s getting married again!
Mrs. Jones What a dreadful woman she is! / Three divorces! / She’ll lose count at this rate!
Mrs. Smith Ah, but we won’ Mrs. Smith, will we, Mrs. Jones!
1 I’m sitting down now. And when I came in?
No, I wasn't sitting down when you came in.
2 He isn’t living in a flat now. And a year ago?
Yes, he was living in a flat a year ago.
3 John’s learning French now. And last year?
No, John wasn’t learning French a year ago.
4 They aren’t sleeping now. And when Smiths arrived?
5 The sun’s shining now. And when you got up?
No, the sun wasn’t shining when the Smiths arrived.
6 The children aren’t playing in the garden now. And when it started to rain?
Yes, the children were playing in the garden when it started to rain.
7 He’s talking to John now. And when you saw him?
No, he wasn’t talking to John when I saw him.
8 I’m not doing my homework now. And when I phoned?
Yes, I was doing my homework when you phoned.
She’s very beautiful. It’s terrible weather.
How beautiful she is! What terrible weather!
1 She’s very beautiful. How beautiful she is!
2 It’s terrible weather! What terrible weather!
3 He eats very quickly. How quickly he eats!
4 He’s a greedy boy. What a greedy boy!
5 They are trying very hard. How hard they are trying!
6 That’s awful news. What awful news!
7 It’s very heavy. How heavy it is!
8 That’s a good idea. What a good idea!
I made the tea. John cleaned the car.
I was making the tea while John was cleaning the car.
It rained. I walked up the hill.
It was raining whileI was walking up the hill.
1 I made the tea. John cleaned the car. I was making the tea while John was cleaning car.
2 It rained. I walked up the hill. It was raining whileI was walking up the hill.
3 They watched television. I wrote some letters. They were watching television while I was writing some letters.
4 You talked to Mary. I talked to John. You were talking to Mary while I was talking to John.
5 I had a holiday. He worked hard. I was having a holiday while he was working hard.
6 You had a bath. The girls washed the dishes. You were having a bath while the girls were washing the dishes.
7 Mary got ready. John fetched the car. Mary was getting ready while John was fetching the car.
8 The house burnt down. You slept. The house was burning down while you were sleeping.
1 Have you got any money? or time? I haven’t got much money, but I’ve got a lot of time.
2 Have they met any boys? or girls? They haven’t met many boys, but they’ve met a lot of girls.
3 Do they eat any fish? or meat? They don’t eat much fish, but they eat a lot of meat.
4 Did he catch any fish? or boots? They didn’t catch mush fish, but they caught a lot of fish.
5 Do they plant any trees? or flowers? They don’t plant many trees, but they plant a lot of flowers.
6 Has he got any hair? or teeth? He hasn’t got much hair, but he’s got a lot of teeth.
7 Did he drink any wine? or beer? He didn’t drink much wine, but he drank a lot of beer.
8 Are you buying any dresses? or blouses? I’m not buying many dresses, but I’m buying a lot of blouses.
1 The doorbell rang. He left the house. The doorbell rang just as he was leaving the house.
2 He had an accident. He drove too fast. He had an accident because he was driving too fast.
3 He went out. I came in. He went out just as I was coming in.
4 He got wet. It rained. He got wet because it was raining.
5 It started to rain. I set off. It started to rain just as I was setting off.
6 He didn’t see the bus. He looked at the map. He didn’t see the bus because he was looking at the map.
7 John called. I went to bed. John called just as I was going to bed.
8 I didn’t hear you. I listened to the radio. I didn’t hear you because I was listening to the radio.
The students were talking excitedly when the teacher came in, but they stopped at once when the teacher speak. He walked across the room and began to write questions on the blackboard. While he was writing, the students were sitting down, taking out their pens and preparing themselves for the test. The teacher finished writing, sat down in front of the class and opened a book. He was reading his book the whole time while the students were answering the questions. When the bell rang at four o’clock, most of them were still writing. The teacher told them to stop working and he collected their answer papers. As they were leaving the room he began to correct the papers.
1 There are a lot of people in the street. There aren’t many people in the street.
2 I took a large number of photos while I was on holiday. I didn’t take many photos while I was on holiday.
3 The people were spending a lot of money. The people were not spending much money.
4 He gave me lots of help. He didn’t give me much help.
5 They’ve got plenty of whisky. They haven’t got mush whisky.
6 He can drink a great deal of wine. He can’t drink much wine.
7 There was a large quantity of blood on the face. There wasn’t much blood on his face.
8 He saw a great many animals. He didn’t see many animals.
1 He came to London on the 13th of June and left again in September.
2 They went out qt half past one; they’ll be back in ten minutes.
3 He plays cricket in summer and football in winter.
4 He always leaves early in the morning and comes back late at night.
5 He rests at the weekends but works hard from Monday to Friday.
6 He was born in the nineteenth century.
7 I’m working until six o’clock on Friday evening.
8 He’s busy at present. He’ll see you in 30 minutes' time.
1 That man is very fat. How fat that man is! What a fat man!
2 Those houses are very old. How old those houses are! What old houses!
3 That boy is really clever. How clever that boy is! What a clever boy!
4 This tea is very strong. How strong this tea is! what strong tea!
5 Those people are really funny. How funny those people are! What funny people!
I had a great deal of work to do and I didn’t have much time to waste, so when my son began to ask a number of questions, I became rather angry. I told him he had lots of toys to play with and plenty of friends to go and see. As soon as he had gone, I took a quantity of magazines from my desk and tried to find an important article in one of them. I haven’t got much patience and I soon stopped searching. There was a lot of noise coming from the street outside my window, and when I looked out, I saw a large number of people gathered around a car. There had been an accident and there wasn’t large quantity much doubt that it was serious.
1 She often complains about the weather.
2 I’m having difficulty in hearing what you say.
3 By the way, have you heard that John is getting married to Mary?
4 The car came round the corner at full speed.
5 As a matter of fact I didn’t do business with them after all.
6 You’ll soon get over your illness, but you must get to bed at... once.
7 We’re short of... time and we’ve nearly run out of money.
8 I’ll pick you up at seven o’clock and we’ll go to the cinema.
9 Hold on a minute while I write down your address on this piece of paper.
10 The car hit a tree and turned over. There was no other car ... in sight.
11 There’s a man at the door inquiring about you.
12 After the accident he didn’t come round for twenty minutes.
They were much too hard.
They are all over now, except for the results.
I couldn’t look at another book for months.
That’s the trouble with you.
Malcolm: How did you get on in the exams, Pete?
Pete: They were much too hard up. I’m sere I’ve failed.
Malcolm: Oh no, of course you haven’t, they were dead easy.
Pete: Well, they are all over now, except for the results, of course.
Malcolm: Yes, now I’ll have enough time for my own reading.
Pete: Reading! I couldn’t look at another book for months!
Malcolm: Well, I’ve got to do some serious work if I’m going to Oxford..
Pete: You never stop; that’s the trouble with you.
1 John’s still waiting for Mary. How long has he been waiting for her?
2 They’re all sitting in the garden. How long have they been sitting there?
3 He’s still working in that office. How long has he been working there?
4 We’re living in London now. How long have you been lining there?
5 Mary’s still staying at the Grand Hotel. How long has she been staying there?
6 Mrs. Smith is still talking to Mrs. Jones. How long has she been talking to her?
7 Peter’s still reading that book. How long has he been reading it?
8 That fire’s still burning. How long has it been burning?
1 That car is very expensive. I can’t buy it. That car is too expensive for me to buy.
3 The coffee is very hot. John can’t drink it. The coffee is too hot for John to drink.
4 This question is too difficult. The question is too difficult for them to answer.
5 These oranges are very sour. We can’t eat them. These oranges are too sour for us to eat.
6 This hat is very small. I can’t wear it. This hat is too small for me to wear.
7 The hotel is very far away. You can’t walk to it. The hotel is too far away for you to walk to.
8 That tree is very high. John can’t climb it. That tree is too high for John to climb.
1 The water is too cold to swim in. The water isn’t warm enough to swim in.
2 This suit is too expensive for him to buy. This suit isn’t cheap enough for him to buy.
3 John is too young to see that film. John isn’t old enough to see that film.
4 She is too ugly to be a film star. She isn’t beautiful enough to be a film star.
5 This case is too heavy for me to carry. This case isn’t light enough for me to carry.
6 That man is too weak to lift this box. That man isn’t strong enough to lift this box.
7 This bikini is too small for me to wear? This bikini isn’t big enough for me tp wear.
8 Our dog is too slow to catch that cat. Our dog isn’t fast enough to catch that cat.
1 Is John still sleeping? hours Yes, he’s been sleeping for hours.
3 Are you still living in Scotland now? a year Yes, I’ve been living in Scotland for a year.
4 Are you still working for the same company? I left school Yes, I’ve been working for the same company since left school.
5 Are they still trying to learn French? ten years Yes, I’ve been trying to learn French for ten years.
6 Are they all sitting in the garden? lunch time Yes,I’ve been sitting in the garden since lunch time.
7 Is he still playing tennis? ten o’clock Yes, he’s been playing tennis since ten o’clock.
They serve red wine here. I like red wine. I like the red wine they serve here.
He grows roses in his garden . I love roses. I love the roses he grows in his garden.
We study History at school. John hates History. John hates the history we study at school.
My son writes poetry. I don’t understand poetry. I don’t understand the poetry my son writes.
Her husband composes. She can’t stand music. She can’t stand the music her sun writes.
This firm builds modern houses. I like modern houses. I like the modern houses my firm builds.
This group plays pop music. I adore pop music. I adore the music this group plays.
My mother makes cheese. I like cheese. I like the cheese my mother makes.
1 It was still raining when I came in just now. It has been raining all morning.
2 I have been sitting here waiting for you for nearly an hour. I have already drunk four whiskies.
3 What have you been doing all this time? I have not seen you for weeks.
4 They have not worked for several days now. They have been too ill.
5 It has not rained for a month now. The grass is very dry .
6 They have been going to this pub every evening for the last ten years.
7 Peter has been writing letters since two o’clock. He has already written five letters.
8 I have been sleeping for the last two hours and I have not woken up properly yet.
1 That girl is beautiful enough to become a film star.
2 It’s too hot to sit in the sun.
3 This book is too boring to read.
4 That woman is too fat to get through the door.
6 He hasn’t done enough work to pass the exam.
7 I’m hungry enough to eat a horse.
8 My uncle has got enough money to buy an aeroplane.
Peter went to the shops in Oxford Street yesterday. First of all he went into a large department store to buy some trousers and a pair of socks. He bought a nice pair of grey socks, but he couldn’t find any trousers in the colours he likes. He likes dark blue; he doesn’t like bright colours generally. Next he went to a supermarket to buy a piece of cheese and a bottle of wine. He loves wine, but the trouble is that he prefers white wine while the rest of the family prefers red wine.
The wine he bought last week was very good but very expensive. Finally he went to the library to borrow a book. He often reads books about art. Last week he borrowed a book called the History of European Architecture. This week he wants a book on Japanese painting.
1 This is my father’s letter.
2 Here is James’s French teacher.
4 There is the top of the hill.
6 That is an hour’s work.
7 This John’s father’s book.
8 It is a twenty minutes walk.
9 This is the middle of the town.
10 These are students’ papers.
1 You must make an effort or you will fail the exam.
2 I did my best, but I didn’t finish in time.
3 He made a fortune by selling second-hand clothes.
4 He made up his mind to go to Canada.
5 My flat needs painting. I’m going to do it up next week.
6 Have you made arrangements for the holidays yet?
7 Will you do me a favour?
8 I haven’t got a big hammer. Will this small one do ?
1 I am not keen on studying, but I’m sitting an exam next week, so I have to read about all sorts of boring things I am not interested in for hours on end.
3 At the last moment we went to a Chinese restaurant for a change.
4 James is bored with his work. What about Malcolm?
5 I always worry about money, but my wife doesn’t care how much she spends on clothes.
6 He’s trying to give up smoking, but he isn’t to succeed . In other words he has no will-power.
7 We took up tennis for a month or so, but we aren’t cut out for athletic games.
8 This paper only comes out once a week.
9 It’s your own fault if you don’t take a break from time to time. You should take an occasional afternoon off.
10 In my opinion he’s a bore, but you can invite him if you like. It’s up to you.
and to invite you to our house-warming party next Saturday.
and I’ve had little time for anything else.
I’m sorry about the lack of warning, but we’ve been busy moving house and I’ve had little time for anything else.
1 Have they got any chocolate? Yes, they’ve got a little chocolate.
2 Have you bought any new chairs? Yes, I’ve bought a few new chairs.
3 Do they need any money? Yes, they need a little money.
4 Are they making any progress? Yes, they are making a little progress.
5 Have I made any mistakes? Yes, you’ve made a few mistakes.
6 Did he ask for any information? Yes, he asked for a little information.
7 Did he give him any advice? Yes, I gave him a little advice.
8 Did you tell them any lies? Yes, I told them a few lies.
1 Who did you give the books to? Peter? I gave the books to Peter.
2 Who did he lend the hammer to? Mr. Williams? He lent the hammer to Mr. Williams.
3 Who did she buy that tie for? Uncle Tom? She bought that tie for Uncle Tom.
4 Who’s she sending this letter to? Her boyfriend? She’s sending this letter toher boyfriend.
5 Who’s he bringing that ice-cream for? That fat boy? He’s bringing that ice cream for that boy.
6 Who are you writing this card to? Your brother? I’m writing this post card to my brother.
7 Who have you made that pullover for? Your nephew? I’ve made this pullover for my nephew.
1. Is there any whisky in the bottle? I’m afraid there’s very little whisky in the bottle.
2. Did we see any pubs on the way here? I’m afraid there’re very few pubs on the way here.
3. Is there any time left now? I’m afraid there’s very little time left now.
4. Isn’t there anything any of us can do? I’m afraid there’s very little any of us can do.
5. Did you find any flowers in the wood? I’m afraid I found very few flowers in the wood.
6. Haven’t they done any work today? I’m afraid I’ve done very little work today.
7. Did he tell any funny stories? I’m afraid he told very few funny stories.
8. Wasn’t he any help to any of them? I’m afraid he was very little help to any of them.
Pass this plate to John, please. Pass John this plate, please.
I didn’t send any money to my son. I didn’t send my son any money.
You haven’t ordered a drink for me. You haven’t ordered me a drink for.
They didn’t serve breakfast to us in bed. They didn’t serve us breakfast in bed.
John lent his car to his girlfriend. John lent his girlfriend his car.
The manager offered a job to my husband. The manager offered my husband a job.
Did you get a sandwich for me? Did you get me a sandwich?
I’m writing a letter to him tomorrow. I’m writing him a letter tomorrow.
1. I last smoked a month ago. You haven’t smoked a cigarette for a month.
2. They last came to see us on Christmas. They haven’t come to see us since Christmas.
3. I last played football a year ago. I haven’s played football for a year.
4. He last ate at six o’clock this morning. He hasn’t eaten since six o’clock this morning.
5. We last had a holiday three years ago. We haven’t had a holiday for three years.
6. John last saw Mary on Monday evening. John hasn’t seen Mary since Monday evening.
7. I last had a bath a week ago. I haven’t had a bath for a week.
8. You last kissed me six months ago. You haven’t kissed me for six months.
Charles and Barbara Williamslive at a village called Harpole. They have only lived (have only been living) there for a few weeks. Theyarrivedon the 28th of August and they quickly arranged the furniture in their new house. They have not made many friends yet, but they think that they soon will. The neighbours have been very kind so far, and Mr. Williamsis inviting (has invited)some of them to a party he is holding next week. His friends from London and Oxford are coming to the party. The Williams family lived (was/were living) in London before they came to Harpole. Mr. Williams did not likeliving in London. While he was visiting some friends in Southampton last year, he met a company director who offered him a job. Mrs. Williams wanted to stay in London, but when they arrive in the village, the sun was shining and she is already beginning (has already begun) to enjoy the country surroundings.
1 I lent my car to John.
2 My uncle wrote us a letter before Christmas.
3 The lady cut a piece of cake for me.
4 I always read a story to my son before he goes to bed.
5 We sold our boat to Mr. Williams.
6 Hand that screwdriver to me, please.
7 My wife made a pullover for me.
8 I owe my brother ten pounds.
1 I’m busy today, but I have a little time to spare tomorrow.
2 Few people understand international politics, although a lot of people study the subject.
3 There’s no brandy left, but you can have a little whisky.
4 There’s little hope of finding the lost men now.
5 It was very cheap. It only cost a few pounds.
6 My guests left early, but there were still a few people there at midnight.
7 Few of us have any idea what he was talking about.
8 He had little interest in any kind of sport.
Yesterday afternoon I went to the airport to meet Pierre who was coming from Paris to spend a few days with me. I arrived at the airport at two o’clock, went into a waiting room and sat down. When it was announced that the plane was an hour late, I decided to go for a stroll. I got up, walked across the room and out of the door. I was just walking away from the building, when I saw an old friend coming towards me. We chattered for a moment, then went back inside and up some steps to (into) the bar on the first floor directly above the waiting room, where we had a few drinks, while from time to time aeroplanes roared over our heads.
Suddenly I remembered Pierre. We rushed down the steps out of the waiting room below. At the information desk I was told that the plane from Paris had arrived 40 minutes earlier. I hurried out of the building, got into my car and drove rapidly away. When I arrived home I found Pierre sitting on his suitcase outside my front door.
1 He bought a book and some chocolates for his mother, but he had little money left for any other presents.
2 I opened a few windows to let in some fresh air.
3 Few of the students knew any of the answers.
4 Tomorrow there’ll be a little free time to do some shopping, but today there isn’t a moment to spare for any other business.
5 He wrote few letters to any of his family, but he sent a few cards to some of his friends.
1 It’s a nice house if you can put up with the noise of the traffic on the main road.
2 In spite of the heavy traffic, we got there in an hour.
3 I’m fed up with the weather and tired of my job.
4 When you see a hotel on the left, slow down and, just after it, turn to the right.
5 If you give me a hand with the sandwiches, I’m prepared to carry on till everything’s ready.
6 Move your car, please. It’s in. the way and I can’t pass, and in any case you can’t park there.
7 I’ll fix this piece of metal in place and tighten up these screws.
8 After stopping to find out exactly where they were, they went on at full speed.
Ron: What’s up with my car, Sid? / I can’t make is start.
Sid: Oh yes, I see what’s wrong. / I’ll put it right for a pound.
Ron: All right. Will it take long?
Ron: But you only took twenty seconds! / Shall I pay you now?
Sid: Yes, please, / and remember – it’s not for what i Did, it’s for what I know!
1 Do you intend washing the car tomorrow? Yes, I’m going to wash the car tomorrow.
2 I’m certain it’ll rain this afternoon. Yes, it’s going to rain this afternoon.
3 Do you intend leaning French at night school? Yes, they are going to learn French at night school.
4 We’re sure there’ll be another war soon. Yes, there’s going to be another war soon.
5 Does he intend to by a new suit? Yes, he’s going to buy a new suit.
6 We’re certain we’ll be late again. Yes, you’re going to be late again.
7 Do they mean to come home early? Yes, they’re going to come home early.
8 Do you mean to sell your house? Yes, I’m going to sell my house.
1 We’ll get to the station and then we’ll have a drink. when When we get to the station, we’ll have a drink.
2 John will clean the car and Mary will cook the lunch. while While John cleans the car, Mary will cook the lunch.
3 Mary will be ready soon and we’ll be able to start. when When Mary is ready, we’ll be able to start.
4 The bell will ring and they will leave the room. the moment The moment the bell rings, they’ll leave the room.
5 The Smiths will arrive soon and we’ll begin. as soon as As soon as the Smiths arrive, we’ll begin.
6 They’ll read the book and they’ll know the answer. when When they read the book, they’ll know the answer.
7 He’ll study hard and he’ll pass the exam. if If they study hard, they/ll pass the exam.
8 We’ll finish work and then we’ll go to the pictures. as soon as As soon as we finish work, we’ll go to the pictures.
1 Let’s open the windows. Shall we open the windows?
2 I’d like you to give me a hand. Will you give me a hand, please?
3 Do you want me to tell the truth? Shall I tell the truth?
4 We’d like you to tell us the truth. Will you tell us the truth?
5 Let’s help them.. Shall we help them?
6 I’d like you to come with me. Will you come with me?
7 Do you want me to pour the drinks? Shall I pour the drinks?
8 We’d like you to teach us French. Will you teach us French?
I’m not going anywhere special tonight. I’m going nowhere special tonight.
They didn’t say anything important at the meeting. They said nothing important at the meeting.
John didn’t tell anyone what he knew. John told no one what he knew.
We don’t want any trouble. We want no trouble.
Mary didn’t dance with anybody at all. Mary danced with nobody at all.
You took two sandwiches, but I didn’t take any. You took two sandwiches, I took none.
Joe didn’t drink any whisky, but John drank a lot. Joe drank no whisky, but John drank a lot.
I wanted to go to Spain, but in the end I didn’t go anywhere at all. I wanted to go to Spain, but in the end I went nowhere at all.
1. Do you want a new or a second-hand car? I don’t want a new car. I want a second-hand one.
2. Do they like old or new houses? They don’t like old houses. They like new ones.
3. Did he buy a red or a blue shirt? He didn’t buy a red shirt. He bought a blue one.
4. Does she wear old-fashioned or modern dresses? She doesn’t wear old-fashioned dresses. She wears new ones.
5. Will you write me a long or a short letter? I won’t write you a long letter. I’ll write you a short one.
6. Would she like a big or a small dog? I wouldn’t like a big dog. I’d like a small one.
7. Do they go to see serious or funny stories? They don’t go to see serious stories. They go to see funny ones.
8. Has your boyfriend got a straight or a crooked nose? My boyfriend hasn’t got a straight nose. He’s got a crooked one.
1 It’s late. I think I‘ll take a taxi.
2 Look at the weather! The sea (will be / is going to be) very rough this afternoon.
3 They (will be / are going to be) seasick on the boat.
4 That case is very heavy. I’ll help you to carry it.
5 I’m too busy today, but I ‘ll do it tomorrow - I promise.
6 Although I’ve asked them nicely, they won’t move their car.
7 I don’t like the Smiths so I (shan’t (won’t) / I’m not going to) speak to them at the party tonight.
8 John will know what to do.
There’s no tea in the pot.
There isn’t any tea in the pot.
I didn’t go anywhere last week.
I went nowhere last week..
1 He found nothing at all.
2 I didn’t meet anybody interesting at the party.
3 They’d like some more beer, but there is none left.
4 They didn’t go anywhere at all during the daylight.
5 You made no mistakes at all.
6 My brother doesn’t know anyone in this group.
7 Peter’s got lots of chocolate, but I’ve not got any at all.
8 He eats no vegetables.
1 Do you want a red rose or a white one?
2 Would you like red wine or white?
3 John doesn’t want any wine, but Peter wants some .
4 Quickly, my trousers! Pass them to me, please!
5 The big oranges are lovely, but I don’t like the small ones .
6 There are three small melons and one big one. I’d like a small one .
7 Do you like cakes? Here are some nice fresh ones .
8 The big one is better than those small ones . I’ll take it.
1 Get a move on or we’ll be late again! What’s up with the woman?
2 There’s no point in hurrying, they won’t be here for ages yet.
3 Let’s see these two letters now, and I’ll try to get round to the others tomorrow.
4 If you .are at a loose end tonight, come round to my house for a drink.
5 Thank you for your help. Is there anything I can do in return?
6 What’s wrong John? He could put this right in a jiffy if he tried.
7 The police will catch him. He won’t get through with it.
8 Borrow my car be all means, but fill her up with petrol first of all. And be careful; the tyres are nearly worn out.
I’m scared stiff of the journey.
They fly so high and fast.
I’d rather prefer to go by luxury liner.
I’d rather be seasick than dead.
Susan: Looking forward to your trip, Julie?
Julie: Yes, but I’m scared stiff of the journey.
Susan: Why? How often are the plane crashes? Once a year?
Julie: When they fly so high and fast, once is enough!
Susan: Yes, but there are fewer deaths per year than there are road casualties per day.
Julie: Well, I’d prefer to go by luxury liner, like QE 2.
Susan: Are you a good sailor?
Julie: I don’t know, but I’d rather be sea-sick than dead.
1 The British will be holding an election next month. They won’t be holding an election next month.
2 The Queen won’t be speaking on television tonight. He’ll be speaking on television tonight.
3 My family will be listening to the speeches. I won’t be listening to the speeches.
4 I’ll be trying to turn the television off. She won’t be trying to turn the television off.
5 The Socialists will be introducing nationalisation. They won’t be introducing nationalisation.
6 They won’t be talking about inflation. They’ll be talking about prosperity.
7 They’ll be promising higher salaries. They won’t be promising higher prices.
8 They won’t be talking sense. They’ll be talking nonsense.
1. He’s a fast driver. Yes, he drives very fast.
2. They’re slow walkers. Yes, they walk very slowly.
3. You’re a hard worker. Yes , I work very hard.
4. He’s a quiet talker. Yes, he talks very quietly.
5. They’re early starters. Yes, they start very early.
6. She’s a careful writer. Yes, she writes very carefully.
7. These birds are high fliers. Yes, those birds fly very high.
8. You’re a quick thinker. Yes, I think very quickly.
1 He’s sleeping now. when I arrive tonight He’ll be sleeping when you arrive tonight.
while Terry’s working hard working hard.
4 We’re having lunch. at one o’clock We’ll be having lunch at one o’clock..
5 The boys are playing tennis. until five o’clock The boys’ll be playing tennis until five o’clock.
6 I’m writing letters. all day tomorrow I’ll be writing letters all day tomorrow.
7 You’re watching television. until midnight You’ll be watching television until midnight.
8 They’re sitting an exam. in June They’ll be sitting an exam in June. | 2019-04-20T04:53:26Z | https://studopedia.net/1_38205_What-about-the-Prime-Minister.html |
The number of pool builders companies in Thousand Oaks have continued to increase in the market over the years. Going for the wrong pool builder company can cost you time and money in the long-run. There are pool builders companies with better services compared to others. Below are qualities you should look out for when choosing a pool builder company.
Does the pool builder company have an office location in your area? A pool builder company based in your area will take less time to get to your premises and start the job. Most pool builder companies will indicate on their website the different areas they operate from.
Does the pool builder company you are prospecting have experience? It is important you choose a company that has several years of experience. You can know how long the pool builder company has been operating by checking on their website.
It is important you choose a pool builder company that has been registered and licensed by the state. Insist on getting a copy of the license the pool builder company is using, then verify it is authentic.
It is important you choose a pool builder company that has an insurance policy. This will cover you against any risks.
Has the pool builder company been accredited by any reputable bodies in this industry?
Does the pool builder company have any client references? A reputable pool builder company should not lack references. When you call the past clients of the pool builder company, ask them about the quality of the material they used, if the job was completed on time and the pricing. If you get several positive responses, you can proceed to hire the pool builder company.
Does the pool builder company you are prospecting have a good reputation? Check the comments and testimonies that have been left by past clients on the website and social media platforms of the company. From the reviews you will know if the pool builder company is the right fit for you or not. If there are unresolved complaints about the pool, builder company, its best you look for another alternative.
Also, ensure the pool builder company you have settled for uses the best material in the market.
What are the working hours of the pool builder company?
Lastly, if you have people close to you that have used the services of a pool builder company, ask them for referrals.
Investment banks are vital in today’s economy. investment banks are important for both buyers and sellers of stocks. Investment banks tend to increase the credibility of sellers in the eyes of prospective buyers. An investment bank shows buyers that you want to transact and that you are not just after stock valuation. Since investment banks provide exposure, your shares will be on high demand from prospective buyers, who will not play around with small offers since most of them are well aware of the fact that the buying and selling of shares is highly competitive when investment banks are involved. However, you can only enjoy the benefits that come with partnering with investment banks only if you have the right one on your corner. Deciding on who to hire in an economy with so many choices is often challenging, which means that to end up with the right partner, you will have to take your time and explore all the options you are provided with. Discussed in this article are guidelines aimed at helping you in choosing the right investment bank.
Firstly, ensure that you look into whether an investment bank is certified and licensed. You should only hire an investment bank if its employees have received all the necessary training and therefore have certification from credible institutions. Since you will be entrusting your hard-earned money with the investment bank you choose, there is need to ensure that they are trustworthy and one way of knowing this is asking to see their license because it is difficult for a company that complies with the laws of the land to steal from you without fear of repercussions. To be sure that an investment’s license is real and up to date, ask for their license number so you can look it up with the appropriate authorities in your area. A company that refuses to share its license number cannot be trusted and you should therefore eliminate it from your list.
Look for a partner and not just a banker when looking into an investment bank. It is important to note that the world will perceive your investment bank as part of you, which is why you need to ensure that you are working with people who are extremely professional. The right investment bank will also provide leverage in times of need.
Going Camping Here is What to Take With You.
There is a lot of people who go camping year in and out. In the current times there are those that are going camping for their first time and they are wondering what to take. Such is consequent to that you need to prepare adequately to have a great experience. In the ensuing article, discover more about some of the supplies that you need to take with you to have a wonderful camping experience.
To get started, get a sleeping bag or a tent. There is a need to mention that having shelter is one of the most critical element to have when trying to survive while camping. When choosing your ideal shelter, it is commendable to have one that is warm enough and keeps you dry. Other features that you may need to consider when buying tents or bags is color and also portability. Having this supply is crucial as it comes in handy in protecting you against tough weather such as cold.
When going camping, it is crucial to have a flashlight for your security reasons. For those that are going hiking, a flashlight will come in handy in ensuring that you don’t trip over or fall into anything. When shopping for flashlights, consider those that are small-sized and those that are bright enough. Another supply that you should not miss out on this line is the batteries.
Having a survival and first aid kit is the next element. For those taking part in camping, there is a need to be prepared for injuries as they happen. Coming up with survival calls for you to have as much products as you can. For those in need of more info about how to come up with a survival kit, keep reading here.
Having water bottles and purifiers are commended. If you want to have an assurance of surviving camping experience, having water is one of them. It is logical that you make proper considerations when choosing water bottle.
When going camping, take food with you. When choosing on what to pack or not, it is crucial to ensure that you consider the right type. When choosing, there is a need to consider food that proposes energy, helps you stay awake and helps you in thinking.
A map is the next element to have. It is a lot riskier to take with you a digital map to the wilderness.
Finally, it is crucial that you take a knife. When buying a knife for your camping, you have more than a few options but ensure that you buy a quality one. For those buying, it is advisable to avoid those that are large since they occupy much space.
The reason why you use air ducts in the homes is for the purpose of having smooth flow of air in and out of every room in the house. There is need to ensure that the systems are in top working condition in order to execute their role effectively. That way the interior of your room is made comfortable to live in.
It is essential that the air ducts are cleaned on a regular basis so that the air inside your house is kept clean. In that case it is advisable to hire the professional services of duct cleaning company. With so many service providers operating in the market, you need to carry out proper research when making your choice. By taking particular steps, you will be able to make a decision that you will be delighted with.
A duct cleaning company that has been doing the business for a considerable lengthy period is the one that you can be certain that it will perform a professional job. There are a lot of important information on the web that you can use to arrive at the suitable decision. There will be a chance to go through the testimonies of clients that have hired the services of the contractor in the past. You must see to it that you are hiring a contractor that is highly regarded in the market.
Ensure that you are hiring the services of a duct cleaning contractor that possesses the relevant registration and licensing papers that authorize it to undertake the business locally. Additionally, it is advisable to go for a contractor that is a member of a professional organization whose primary objective is to regulate the activities of stakeholders in the market. You must be interested to find out the score of the company at the Better Business Bureau.
It is advisable to choose a duct cleaning contractor that operates in your area. By taking that decision you will not only save money but you will have the confidence that you will be served efficiently and quickly. Additionally, you will be certain that the firm has complied with the local laws that govern the operations in the sector.
The duct cleaning firm that you go for must demonstrate commitment to observe the requisite safety regulations. Pursuant to that you must see to it that you are hiring a company that has a valid and ample insurance cover. This is essential as it ensures that you will not be held liable if there is damage, loss or injury as the work is going on.
Planting of the plant is an activity that so many people love. People who love planting, they are the people who could be interested in getting planters. One is needed always to make sure they buy the planters from the recognized sellers. Some aspects need to be looked into for one to know if the seller is the best. You will find that the reason why people love good sellers is because they sell items that are of the best make. The other thing is that they make sure they sell a variety of containers. One would then end up buying a planter that will fit their needs. One must always make sure they get the planters from the best sellers since they make the services convenient. The the main reason why the sellers are said to give convenient services is that one can always shop online.
Before one gets the planters, it is important that one makes sure to look at the size and the shape of the planter. One must know that the planter differ in size. The best thing that one can always to ensure they shop for the planters that will accommodate the kind of plants that one needs to plant. The best thing one can do is make sure they always ask the sellers of the best size to buy just in case one has no idea. The shape also matters. What one is needed to do get a planter with the shape that will facilitate the growth of the plant.
One is always expected to look into the cost of the planter. Since many people work on budgets, one is needed to get a planter that is an affordable price. Purchasing the planters from good sellers should be the thing for they make sure to sell them at good prices.
Looking at the drainage system of the planter is also very important. For the plants to grow in the best ways the drainage should be appropriate. Getting to know how good the soil drains the water when in the planter is a good thing. The other item that needs to be looked into is if the planter keeps moisture. Plants need moisture to grow and that is why one should get a planter that keeps moisture.
There is need that makes sure they know of the quality of the planter. Getting a planter that is of the best quality should always be one’s aim. This is because good quality means that there is durability. One will reduce on expenses. Durable planters are the ones that get to be used over and over again. It is also best that one look at the appearance of the planter. It is important that one goes for the best kind of planter because they help in making the home look good.
Sometimes your child may be poor at grasping what is taught in class, and this will make you boost their knowledge by hiring a tutor. One of the subjects that people find troubling is math. In such a case, you will ensure that you look for a tutor. There are many tutors that you can find but one of the best one is the online math tutor. Some of the good characteristics of the online math tutor are the cheapness, experienced as well as working with you at your convenient time. With the online math tutor, you won’t have your child subjected to extras distance to get couched. Also, you will only work with the online math tutor in your free time. When you research on the internet, you will find many options but not all will qualify your expectations. the points explained in the article you are just reading are aimed at helping you find the best online math tutor.
In case you are hiring an online math tutor, you will consider how much you will pay them. The amount the online math tutor asks you to pay should be pocket-friendly. When the online math tutor charges you, they will incorporate some of the things like the experience, location and even the level of experience. You have to ensure that the online math tutor is highly qualified and experienced, rather than just considering the online math tutor you come across.
The reputation of the online math tutor will be the next thing to consoler. Therefore, you will want to consider platforms like the online reviews to determine the reputation. The comments made online should be positive, meaning those who received the services of the online math tutor were satisfied.
When you choose the online math tutor, you will as well consider the recommendations and referrals. it is the past clients that have received the services of the online math tutor, that will tell you more about the quality of their teaching methods. Friends, family, and colleagues will be one of the good sources of referral. In fact, these are the best sources of referral, as they are the closest you have, and this will make it hard to lie to you. The teachers can also help you find the best online math tutor. It is because such people operate in one industry, making them aware of the best online math tutor.
A majority of middle-class earners usually rely on a mortgage so that they can own a home. The lenders usually use the credit score to establish the eligibility of a mortgage financial applicant. Hence, your application is likely to be declined if you have a bad credit score. It is possible that you can buy a home even if the lenders consider your credit score to be poor. You should know that there are ideas and means that you can employ to better your chances of securing a mortgage financial loan. The article herein is a guide on how you can buy a house with bad credit.
You should start by boosting your credit rating before applying for the loan. It is possible that you can boost your credit score so that you can be eligible to own your dream home. You should invest in the credit score as it dictates the terms and flexibility of the mortgage. In this useful post, you will discover more about the ideas that will help in improving your credit score. It is usually advisable that you start by paying down some of the account balances that you have. In the end, you will be able to get a mortgage financing from any bank.
Mortgage financial usually involves providing a down payment. The remaining amount will be settled in installments. With a high down payment, you will stand a better chance of securing a loan from the lenders. The lender will be convinced about your willingness to service the mortgage financing. Also, you should be careful when choosing a home to buy. The affordability of the home that you intend to buy should be established so that you can avoid future financial problems and foreclosure. You will be eligible to buy a home even with bad credit if you choose a home that is ideal for your income.
The other tip is usually mortgage shopping. You should research to find the most suitable lender that will offer the best mortgage terms. The need to do mortgage shopping is contributed by the difference in the degree of flexibility of the loans. You should have the chance to choose regardless of your credit score. Alternatively, you can consider the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loans since the requirements are usually low.
Besides, you should seek pre-approval. Pre-approval will ensure that you identify the most suitable lender. If you want to get a flexible mortgage financing loan, you should contact the experts. It is usually encouraged that you hire a mortgage broker to make the process smooth and fast. You should hire a broker or agent that you find the qualification to be satisfactory. If you use these means, you will be able to buy your dream home with bad credit.
It is time-consuming to learn how to work for a company as a freelancer. You might be having prior experience working for yourself. A company culture is how you relate with the co-workers and how efficient your work is. Your work surroundings determine how beneficial you will be to that company. There are guidelines you can adapt as a new employee to help you in the workplace as stipulated on this site.
You have to be competent in every area of your job. As a prior independent worker, it was good enough to do whatever you wanted. When employed you have a chain of command that oversees your work and co-workers. That means that everyone in the company is expected to relate to others professionally. It is important to welcome every non-employee that comes to the company and offer to help them. It is important for you to have a proper exchange of information at work, either written or spoken. That would not be as expected when you are a freelancer as you be used to speaking in slang or vernacular manner. As an employee, it is important to always remain respectable in the workplace.
It is vital to communicate and deal professionally with all workplace employees. Businesses employ a lot of workers. Your personal history may vary from the history of your fellow workers. Always beware of the people you address at work. You must not become intimately involved with other workers. It will cause the company employees to have a high opinion of you. Every so often a delicate issue may grieve you. The best thing would be to consult the Human Resource Department and air your grievances with them. The department is responsible for handling any issues that may be going on within the company, and they would offer to assist you.
An important thing to do is to be efficient and diligent with your work. When you get up each morning and show up for work, have an objective in mind. That will help you to be productive. It will enhance your work output. You must endeavor to outshine all other employees in your dealings. It is advisable that you have clear goals to attain set objectives. You should try to go over and above your work target. If you happen to have any new ideas on how to improve the company, you could talk to the management about it. Have a good strategy on your best approach and be prepared. It will help you to be elevated within the company with a better salary and more responsibilities. But you should always remember to do your work at the company and go home without airing your opinion about the company.
There are a critical huge number of individuals who generally find out about the macujo technique but they barely grasp what it is about as much as it has been in existence for around 20 years. Macujo method is one of the commonly used methods when it comes to eliminating chemical substances which have been stored in an individual’s hair and it is usually based on the permeabilization of the hair cuticle so that it may be in a position to reduce or eliminate the metabolites of the hair cortex. In this article, we are going to take you through a bit of the basic tips that you should understand with respect to the macujo technique and easily passing a drug test. When you check your hair from outside to inside you find that it is really made out of three imperative layers which incorporate the cuticle, the cortex, and the medulla. A noteworthy number of drugs including the THC are generally put away in the capillary cortex and this part is ordinarily secured by the cuticle and this implies if you would need to expel the metabolites of the cortex you will need to ensure that the cuticle is permeabilized.
With the end goal for you to accomplish the ideal outcomes with regards to the macujo strategy you will be patient and this is on the grounds that you should, in any event, take 3 to 5 days for you to most likely find suitable and precise result so as to know any presence of drugs in the hair. The procedure is likewise very costly and in this manner, you should see it as a financial task and it will imply that you should guarantee that you get ready and prepare a spending plan for it with the goal that you don’t end up being influenced contrarily monetarily.
The absence of patience may lead you to surge the procedure and endeavor to accomplish results in a brief timeframe and that won’t be precise and it might likewise prompt serious harm of your hair. On the off chance that you get the chance to use this system in the right way then you can be ensured that you will get the right results and the probability of you completing a hair drug test in the right way will be high. In this discussion, we have been able to take you through on some of the main pointers that you should get to know about the macujo method which can assist you to be able to pass a drug test.
Are you one of the people in need of any product from the market? it has been a common thing for people in the market to need various accessories. Off late, it has been a walk in the park for people to meet such a requirement at all the time. Reason being that there are some stores in the market that are availing legit products in the market. To be sure of the best products in the market, there is the need to consider sourcing the product from the best store in this area. Read more here to know more about various features of the most effective stores in the market in the modern globe.
In most cases, a firm that has some years in the market will be in a position of availing the best products in the market. In the long run, it is a simple thing for such a store to have the right expertise in the market. Off late, if you pay attention to the trends in the market, it will be easy for you to note that the best firms in the market are the ones that hail from the past. Now, the reason that is helping such firms to be in a position of meeting the needs of the clients is that they will have acquired right skills in the area of specialization. Now, to ensure that you get the right products from the market there is the need to provide that you consider the leading store in the market.
Now, to be sure of the right products from the market there is the need to get to engage a store in the market that is cost effective. It has not been a common thing all over the world for people to have different problems as they are sourcing money. Hence a reasonable part of the population will be willing only to spend their hard sourced income effectively. Also, the right standards products and services will at most of the time be priced reasonably. In the end, it will be good for the client that will get any product in the market from a store that will charge fairly for the services and products. | 2019-04-26T09:48:47Z | http://grapplegnostic.com/category/clothing-fashion/ |
2015-06-29 Assigned to Nantworks, LLC reassignment Nantworks, LLC ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS). Assignors: WITCHEY, NICHOLAS J.
Healthcare transaction validation systems and methods are presented. Healthcare transactions associated with a stakeholder are compiled into a chain of healthcare transaction blocks. The chain can be considered a chronicle of person's healthcare path through life. When a transaction is conducted, the corresponding healthcare parameters (e.g., inputs, outputs, clinical evidence, outcomes, etc.) are sent to one or more validation devices. The devices establish a validity of the transaction and generate a new block via a proof-of-work principle. Once the new block has been calculated it can be appended to the stakeholder's health care blockchain.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/992,734, filed May 13, 2014. The entire content of that application is hereby incorporated herein by reference.
The field of the invention is transaction validation technologies.
Cryptocurrencies have risen over the last few years. The most famous cryptocurrency is Bitcoin, launched in 2009, as described in the original paper openly published on May 24, 2009, by Nakamoto and titled “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” (see URL en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Bitcoin_white_paper).
Cryptocurrencies operate on the principle of applying proof-of-work (POW) principles to process Bitcoin transactions that are bound together in large blocks of data. The device that successfully meets the proof-of-work requirements (i.e., generating a double hash value with a required number of leading zero bits) for the transaction block and has their block accepted by peers receives a reward in the form of Bitcoins.
Although Bitcoin is probably the most famous application of POW, many others have applied POW to other areas of technology. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,356,696 to Jakobsson et al. titled “Proofs of Work and Bread Pudding Protocols”, filed Aug. 1, 2000, describes re-using stale computations of a POW to continue minting digital currency.
Another example of using POW further afield from cryptocurrency includes U.S. Pat. No. 7,600,255 to Baugher titled “Preventing Network Denial of Service Attacks Using an Accumulated Proof-of-work Approach”, filed Apr. 14, 2004. Baugher requires a computer client to generate a POW to access a service where the POW could include hashing a message until a desired number of leading bit-level zeros is found, similar to the POW of Bitcoin.
In a somewhat similar vein to Baugher, U.S. Pat. No. 8,412,952 to Ramzan et al. titled “Systems and Methods for Authenticating Requests from a Client Running Trialware Through a Proof of Work Protocol”, filed May 6, 2009, also uses POW to grant access to services. Ramzan describes generating a cryptographic puzzle if no authentication token is included with a service request to run trialware. The client making the request must solve the cryptographic puzzle in order to receive authentication to proceed with running the trialware.
All publications identified herein are incorporated by reference to the same extent as if each individual publication or patent application were specifically and individually indicated to be incorporated by reference. Where a definition or use of a term in an incorporated reference is inconsistent or contrary to the definition of that term provided herein, the definition of that term provided herein applies and the definition of that term in the reference does not apply.
Interestingly, the above known proof-of-work (POW) systems have only focused on transaction processing or authentication. It has yet to be appreciated that POW systems could be deployed in other areas. One market that is fraught with issues includes healthcare systems that manage large volumes of electronic medical records (EMR). Example issues include enforcing privacy, standards compliance, interoperability, data format conversion, ensuring proper treatment applied to a patient, and especially the difficulty maintaining a continuity of treatment records for individuals. As a representative example of the state of the art, consider U.S. Pat. No. 8,615,532 to Bessette titled “System and Method for Electronically Managing Medical Data Files”, filed Sep. 12, 2012. Bessette discusses one of myriad possible ways in which medical records can be updated assuming proper authentication.
Even with the countless healthcare management or EMR systems available, the systems lack the ability to properly construct a history of health transaction across various entities. A more ideal system would create of chain of transactions from various entities where each transaction is validated via a POW approach. Such a validation approach ensures that all entities are held responsible for their transactions by peer review while also preserving a record of healthcare transactions. Thus, there remains a need validating healthcare transactions.
The inventive subject matter provides apparatus, systems and methods in which a proof-of-work system can be employed to track or validate healthcare transactions. One aspect of the inventive subject matter includes a method of validating healthcare transactions. The disclosed methods can include receiving, by one or more validation devices, a healthcare transaction that includes a set of healthcare tokens that represent healthcare actions taken with respect to a stakeholder. For example, the healthcare tokens might include test results for a patient and a corresponding diagnosis from a doctor. The validation device continues executing the method by obtaining a historical block identifier of the stakeholder's healthcare historical blockchain. The healthcare historical blockchain represents a chronicle of healthcare activities in the form of a substantially linear set of healthcare transactions for the particular stakeholder (e.g., patient, doctor, insurance company, hospital, etc.). The method also includes receiving a validity requirement with respect to the healthcare actions indicating criteria that must be met in order for the system to accept a validation event with respect to the transaction. The validation device continues to validate the healthcare actions by obtain a digital signature of a validator, perhaps another healthcare provider's public key or an expert system identifier. In addition, the method includes obtaining a validity token indicating the validity of the healthcare actions (e.g., valid action, invalid action, indeterminate, etc.). Once the various pieces of information has been collected, the validation device calculates a validity block based on the transaction and according the validity requirements as a function of the healthcare action parameters: the validity token, historical block identifier, the set of healthcare tokens, and the digital signature. Should the validity requirements be met, the validation device can cause the healthcare historical blockchain to be updated, possibly by appending the validity block to the chain. In some embodiments, proof-of-work methods are not necessarily employed. In some embodiments, proof-of-stake methods are used to authenticate a validity block to be appended to a stakeholder's healthcare historical blockchain.
FIG. 1 is a schematic overview of a healthcare transaction ecosystem.
FIG. 2 illustrates a method of validating a healthcare transaction.
FIG. 3 illustrates further details of processing carried out by one of the steps of FIG. 2.
FIG. 4 shows an example of a computer system (one or more of which may provide the components shown in FIG. 1) that may be used to execute instruction code contained in a computer program product in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.
It should be noted that any language directed to a computer should be read to include any suitable combination of computing devices, including servers, interfaces, systems, databases, agents, peers, engines, controllers, or other types of computing devices operating individually or collectively. One should appreciate the computing devices comprise a processor configured to execute software instructions stored on a tangible, non-transitory computer readable storage medium (e.g., hard drive, solid state drive, RAM, flash, ROM, etc.). The software instructions preferably configure the computing device to be operable to provide the roles, responsibilities, or other functionality as discussed below with respect to the disclosed apparatus. Further, the disclosed technologies can be embodied as a computer program product that comprises a non-transitory computer readable medium storing the software instructions that causes a processor to execute the disclosed steps. In especially preferred embodiments, the various servers, systems, databases, or interfaces exchange data using standardized protocols or algorithms, possibly based on HTTP, HTTPS, AES, public-private key exchanges, web service APIs, known financial transaction protocols, or other electronic information exchanging methods. Data exchanges preferably are conducted over a packet-switched network, the Internet, LAN, WAN, VPN, or other type of packet switched network.
One should appreciate that the disclosed techniques provide many advantageous technical effects including construction and storage of a healthcare blockchain representing healthcare transactions of a patient or other healthcare stakeholder. Construction and storage of the healthcare blockchain enables computing devices to quickly and efficient validate or access healthcare data, thereby improving the performance of the computing devices.
The following discussion presents the inventive subject matter from the perspective of a patient interacting with a doctor. With respect to the disclosed subject matter, the patient's healthcare interactions are chronicled via an associated healthcare historical record represented by a blockchain. As the doctor performs services for the patient, information related to the services (e.g., inputs, outputs, codes, etc.) are packaged in the form of a healthcare transaction. The transactions are analyzed by peers in the ecosystem with respect to validity of the services. Once analyzed the transactions are incorporated into the patient's healthcare historical blockchain. Although the subject matter is presented from the perspective of a patient-doctor interaction, it should be appreciated that the transactions can relate to other types of interactions. Additional interactions could include doctor-insurance transactions, consumer-insurance interactions, patient-psychologist interactions, or other types of transactions.
FIG. 1 presents an overview of healthcare transaction validation system 100 where peers in a healthcare network are configured or programmed to manage healthcare transactions in the form of healthcare historical blockchains 130. Each block in the chain includes one or more healthcare transactions that further incorporate validation information representing the validity of the transaction as assessed by peer validation devices 120 (e.g., peers 120A through 120N), collectively referred to as peers 120. In some embodiments, peers 120 operate collectively in a peer-to-peer network. Further the device can exist within a clinical operating system ecosystem; possibly based on the cOS™ services offered by Nanthealth, LLC (see URL nanthealth.com/cos-clinical-operating-system).
Stakeholder 110 represents an entity that has a stake in a healthcare management lifecycle. A shown, stakeholder 110 could be a patient. However, stakeholder 110 could represent other types of entities. In some embodiments, stakeholder 110 could be another person, possibly a doctor, a nurse, a technician, a care provider, a guardian, a parent, a broker, or other individual. Further, stakeholder 110 could also include other types of entities including a company, an affiliation, a hospital, an organization, a demographic, a community, or other type of entity.
Of particular interest with respect to the inventive subject matter is that each stakeholder 110 could have associated healthcare historical blockchain (HHBC) 130. HHBC 130 represents a chronicle or ledger (e.g., public ledger, private ledger, protected ledger, etc.) of healthcare transactions for stakeholder 110. With respect to a patient, HHBC 130 might start with an initial block or genesis block created at birth that includes information associated with the patient's birth (e.g., parent information, attending physician, Apgar score, etc.). Each subsequent healthcare transaction for the patient can be combined with HHBC 130 as a new block, possibly until the HHBC becomes terminated at the death of the patient. It should be appreciated that each entity can have its own blockchain in the disclosed ecosystem rather than the complete ecosystem having a single chain covering all transactions as is done with cryptocurrencies.
HHBC 130 could comprise any number of blocks. For a healthy patient, HHBC 130 might only increase in size by one block per year based on annual visits to the doctor. However, when stakeholder 110 comprises a surgeon, the surgeon's HHBC 130 might represent performed surgeries where the surgeon's HHBC might increase in size by several blocks per day. Even further, when stakeholder 110 is a hospital, HHBC 130 could increase by hundreds of blocks per day. Large scale insurance companies might have HHBCs 130 that increase by thousands of blocks per day.
Returning to the example shown where a patient interacts with a doctor; the doctor works to understand the circumstances of the patient. Such information can be considered to represent input information related to the healthcare transaction in progress. Based on the information, the doctor preforms one or more actions; possibly including applying treatment, generating a diagnosis, establishing a prognosis, or other types of actions. The actions taken by the doctor can be considered outputs to or outcomes of the healthcare transaction.
The various attributes or properties of the inputs and outputs can be represented by healthcare tokens 132. Healthcare tokens 132 represent the information defining the nature of the healthcare transaction associated within stakeholder 110. In more preferred embodiments, healthcare tokens 132 adhere to a defined, possibly standardized, healthcare namespace. For example, the healthcare namespace might include standardized codes (e.g., ICD 9, ICD 10, CPT, DSM, etc.) that categorize the inputs and outputs.
Use of a common healthcare namespace aids in creating a common reference frame or nomenclature among peers 120 as they process or validate the healthcare transactions. Such an approach ensures all peers 120 or stakeholders 110 represent information according to a common language, which ensures that the transactions are processed in a uniform, repeatable, and verifiable manner. More preferred healthcare namespaces include normalized terms, especially in circumstances where conflicting codes might exist (e.g., ICD-9 codes 290-319 for mental disorders versus DSM-IV codes for mental disorder; although some harmonization exists between these two schemes).
Peer 120A, perhaps the doctor's EMR system, can package healthcare tokens 132 for delivery to one or more validation devices; peers 120B through 120M for example. For example, healthcare tokens 132 can be packaged in an XML, JSON, or other formats suitable for exchanging data over network 115. The phrase “tokens” herein is used in the broader sense of parsing data into tokens (useful groupings of data) rather than in the narrow data security context. In other words, healthcare tokens and validity tokens referenced herein are not necessarily hashed or otherwise processed to make the underlying data unrecoverable.
In the example shown, peer 120B obtains healthcare tokens 132 and attempts generate validity block 135 that comprises the healthcare transaction represented by healthcare tokens 132 among other pieces of information. For example, the transaction could include a transaction ID, a time stamp, validator digital signature, or other data. Of especial interest, the transaction validity block 135 also incorporates a validity token that represents the validator's perspective on the validity of the interaction between the patient and the doctor. The validity token could include simple information such as “agree” or “disagree”. A more complex validity token could include alternative information such as suggestions or recommendations on improving the transaction; perhaps an alternative diagnosis for example.
Peer 120B generates validity block 135 according to validity requirement. It should be appreciated that the other peers can, at the same time, also process the same transaction. The validity requirement can be considered a proof-of-work requirement related to the healthcare transactions. Further, the validity requirement can incorporate other criteria that should be satisfied before the transactions are considered properly processed.
Peer 120B builds validity block 135 from one or more transactions as shown. For a single patient visiting a doctor office, validity block 135 will likely have only a single transaction. For a more active stakeholder 110 (e.g., a hospital, etc.), validity block 135 could comprise multiple transactions.
Validity block 135 is processed by combining previous block information (e.g., a hash of a block header) from HHBC 130 with additional information, thereby linking validity block 135 with the blockchain. As discussed previously, the additional transaction information can include time stamp, healthcare tokens 132, validator digital signature, and especially the validity token. Peer 120B can re-calculate a value for validity block 135, typically a hash of the validity block's header along with hash information from the transactions, until the resulting value satisfies the validity requirement. For example, in embodiments where validity block 135 is processed via a hash function (e.g., SHA256, Scrypt, etc.), peer 120B can increment a nonce value until a hash is generated having the desired proof-of-work characteristics, perhaps a number of leading zero bits among other factors.
Once validity block 135 has been properly calculated and/or validated by the peers, it can be sent to other peers 120 in ecosystem 100 so that validity block 135 will be appended to HHBC 130. Thus, validity block 135 becomes part of the chronicled healthcare history of stakeholder 110. Validity block 135 an be considered accepted as part of the HHBC 130 once other peers 120 pickup and integrate it into their own copies of the HHBC 130.
FIG. 2 provides a more detailed perspective of method 200 of validating healthcare transactions. Method 200 details the steps of providing validation information with respect to a healthcare transaction represented by healthcare tokens and a validity token among other items. The steps of method 200 are executed by one or more validation devices (e.g., computer clients, computer servers, web servers, mobile devices, clouds service servers, etc.). The validation devices are considered part of healthcare transaction ecosystem. For example, all the devices could be subscribers to a clinical operating system and electronic medical record exchange ecosystem. Although the following steps are described from the perspective of a single validation device, it should be appreciated that multiple devices could be operating together to fulfill the roles or responsibilities described by the steps.
Step 210 includes receiving a healthcare transaction comprising a set of healthcare tokens representative of healthcare actions taken with respect to a healthcare stakeholder. The healthcare tokens can be received over a network, via a web service, through an API call, or other techniques through which data can be exchanged. For example, in a peer-to-peer network, the validation device can receive a broadcast from a peer device where the broadcast comprises serialized healthcare tokens, perhaps in a JSON, XML, or YAML format. The healthcare tokens can represent the inputs or outputs of a healthcare transaction between a stakeholder (e.g., a patient) and another entity (e.g., doctor, insurance company, pharmacy, etc.). Example healthcare tokens could include a test result, a genetic sequence, a diagnosis, a prognosis, a patient identifier, a caregiver identifier, a fee, a payer identifier, or other type of information. More preferred healthcare tokens comprises standardized codes so that all peers can reference healthcare transactions in a uniform manner. Example standardized codes that could be leveraged with the disclosed system include ICD codes, CPT codes, DSM codes, or other known coding standards or those yet to be defined.
Step 220 comprises the validation device obtaining a historical block identifier from a healthcare historical blockchain representative of historical actions taken with respect to the stakeholder. The historical block identifier preferably represents a link to the stakeholder's HHBC. The historical block identifier could comprise a hash value of a previous block header in the HHBC, possibly the last block added to the HHBC. Such an approach is considered advantageous because the hash value incorporates all previously processed blocks, which mitigates the risk of fraud by participants that seek to inject erroneous information to the HHBC. In such cases the block identifier represents a link of continuity across all blocks in the chain.
In view that the validation devices could exist within a peer-to-peer network, a validation device could obtain at least a portion of the HHBC over network as suggested by step 225. Consider a scenario where a new device has subscribed to the ecosystem or is integrated into a cOS environment. Part of the process could include downloading relevant HHBCs, subject to permissions or authorizations, from other peers in the ecosystem. Alternatively, the new peer could download the HHBC or portions thereof directly from a central database.
In some scenarios, an HHBC might not yet exist. For example, a newly born baby might require creation of a new HHBC, or stakeholders that newly engage with the ecosystem might require creation of a new HHBC. With reference to the birth of a baby, the method could include the step of creating the HHBC (not shown) from the set of healthcare tokens. In such a case, the healthcare tokens could comprise a birth token, where the genesis block from the newly created HHBC depends on the birth token or other information relating to the birth. Additionally, the newly created HHBC could depend on one or more parent tokens in the set of healthcare tokens. The parent tokens might represent identifiers that uniquely identify the parents of the baby (e.g., social security number, GUID, private or public key, etc.). This approach is considered advantageous because it allows for linking one HHBC of a stakeholder to the origin of another HHBC.
Step 230 includes receiving a validity requirement with respect to the healthcare actions. The validity requirement can take on many different forms depending on the nature of the healthcare actions or how difficult the validation is intended to be. The validity requirement could be packaged with the healthcare tokens as discussed previously. Alternatively, the validity requirements could be obtained via a validation pool manager or a central authority service.
The validity requirement can provide a proof-of-work difficulty such as requiring a number of leading zero bits in a hash value generated based on the transaction information. Further, the validity requirement can also include factors beyond proof-of-work. For example, the validity requirement could also include two or more factors that depend on a value of a corresponding validity token. In such cases, the validity token could represent an “agreement” with the transaction or a “disagreement” with the transaction, which could then determine the nature of the validity requirement. If the validator “agrees” with the transaction, then the validity requirement might have a low threshold proof-of-work requirements, while a “disagreement” might require a higher threshold proof-of-work requirement. Thus, the disclosed systems could include asymmetric validity requirements depending on the validity tokens. Still further, the validity requirement might also require presence of additional healthcare tokens should the validity token take on different values. Should the validator disagree, the validator might be required to provide recommendations or suggestions on how to alter or correct the healthcare transaction.
The validity requirement can be considered to comprise rules or criteria that must be satisfied before the validation device is considered to have completed its work in processing a block of transactions. In some embodiments, the validity requirements can be described within a package data structure or a protocol packet having a difficulty code. In other embodiments, the validity requirement could include executable code, which can include software instructions (e.g., hash algorithms, analysis techniques, expert system rules, etc.) or algorithms that should be applied to the healthcare transactions.
Step 240 continues by obtaining a digital signature of a validator. The validator can be considered the entity that processes the healthcare tokens to determine if the healthcare transaction should be perceived as being valid or invalid. The digital signature represents a code indicative of the identity of the validator. Although the digital signature could be secured to protect the identity of the validator, there is no requirement that the digital signature be secured. Example digital signatures could include a public key, a private key, an address of the validator peer (e.g., hash-based address, a transaction address, IPv4 address, IPv6 address, GUID, UUID, etc.), or other type of information that identifies the validator. More preferred validator digital signatures exist within a common signature space; peer network addresses for example.
The validator could comprise a human observer or mechanical turk worker that reviews the content of the healthcare tokens. In other embodiments, the validator could comprise an expert system employing one or more rules sets by which the healthcare tokens should be processed. The expert system executing on one peer validation device can be separately or independently programmed from other peers in the network. Such an approach is considered useful because it is expected that a large number of peers will be able process the healthcare tokens from many different perspectives according to their individual rules. For example, the ecosystem could employ one or more kernel functions by which the expert systems evaluate the healthcare tokens for validity. The kernel functions can be distributed across the peers and separately evaluated. Alternatively, the expert systems could employ trained machine learning algorithms (e.g., neural networks, support vector machines, etc.) that have been trained on separate or disparate data sets. This is considered advantageous because it ensures the peers have different, learned perspectives on the subject matter, which mitigates the risk of all peers possibly generating false negatives or false positive results if they are trained exactly on the same data.
Step 250 includes the validation device obtaining a validity token indicative of the validity of the healthcare actions and based on the set of healthcare tokens. The validity token could be obtained as a code from a validity analysis routine where the code could take on binary value (e.g., valid-invalid; agree-disagree, 0-1, etc.), or could take on a range of values. For example, if an expert system is operating as a validator, the validity token could be a score between −1.0 (invalid) and 1.0 (valid), for example, indicating a confidence score with respect to the validity decision; the confidence score could also be between 0 and 10 as another example.
In other embodiments, the validity token can be obtained via validator interface. Step 255 suggests the method could further include presenting the validator interface via mobile device where the interface accepts a user selected validity token. As an example, consider a scenario where a hospital has subscribed to the disclosed ecosystem. Each subject matter expert (e.g., surgeons, pediatricians, gastroenterologists, oncologists, etc.) could be provisioned with a tablet computer configured to operate as the validation device or as the validator interface. As healthcare transactions are taking place within the hospital, the corresponding healthcare tokens can be routed to the appropriate subject matter experts. The tablet displays the necessary healthcare tokens or healthcare transaction information and requests input from the subject matter expert with respect to the validity of the transaction. The tablet could present a list of validity options to the expert who then selects one or more of the options.
Upon establishing one or more validity tokens representing the opinion of the healthcare transaction, the method continues at step 260 by calculating or otherwise generating a validity block for one or more healthcare transactions according to the validity requirement and as a function of the validity token, historical block identifier, the set of healthcare tokens, the digital signature, or other parameters relevant to the healthcare transactions. Calculating the validity block is consider to comprises generation of a value that depends on the history of the HHBC as well as the current transactions being processed. More specifically, the generated value also depends on the validity token. For example, the function could be a hash function (e.g., SHA, Scrypt, MD5, RIPEMD, WHIRLPOOL, etc.) applied to the concatenation of the various pieces of information in the healthcare transactions, which is then hashed with the validity block's header information. It should be appreciated that step 260 could be iteratively applied until the validity block takes on characteristics that satisfy the validity requirements. For example, in the cases of applying a hash to the healthcare parameters, the hash can also be applied to a nonce and a time-stamp preferably bound within the validity block's header. If the resulting value fails to satisfy the validity requirements, the nonce can be incremented or the time-stamp could be updated and step 260 can be repeated based on the new value.
The resulting validity block comprises more than just the resulting hash value. It also includes the various information elements that gave rise to the hash value. Thus, the validity block represents a chronicle or ledger of the healthcare transactions. Such an approach is advantageous as it ensures the validity block retains a link to other blocks in the HHBC as well as provides a searchable or analyzable data object. Additionally, by providing the information other peers in the network, the peer can validate the proof-of-work.
FIG. 3 is a flow diagram showing processing steps carried out, in one embodiment, by step 260 of FIG. 2. As will be described further, the disclosed process allows the flexibility to generate validity blocks including one transaction per block or including multiple transactions per block. This flexibility recognizes that, in the healthcare context, in some instances, it might be useful and efficient to process multiple transactions for a single validity block, whereas in other contexts, it might be more useful to process a single transaction. As one example, a patient visit might generate multiple transactions for that patient or might only generate a single transaction for that patient. In the former case, processing all transactions together can be efficient and also provide a basis for linking multiple transactions for a patient to a single visit, thereby providing visit information without necessarily requiring a separate “visit” field in a data structure stored in the HHBC. In the latter case, especially if the patient is not expected to generate additional transactions for a significant time period, it might be useful to process validation of the single transaction and generate a validity block to be added to the HHBC for that patient without waiting for additional transactions to accrue. In another example, as previously mentioned, a doctor or other healthcare provider might be associated with many transactions per day and, therefore, it might be more efficient to generate a validity block each day including multiple transactions to be added to that stakeholder's HHBC.
Referring now in detail to FIG. 3, step 301 assembles a candidate validity block including a nonce and the following healthcare parameters: a historical block identifier, one or more healthcare tokens, one or more validity tokens (generated based on a validator reviewing the healthcare tokens), and one or more digital signatures associated with a validator generating the validity tokens. Step 302 applies a first hash to the candidate validity block. Step 303 determines whether the process should only use one hash. If no, then step 306 applies at least a second hash to the result of the first hash before proceeding to step 304. Step 306 allows the method to, if desired, increase the processing required to achieve proof-of-work. If the result of 304 is yes, then the method proceeds directly to step 304. Step 304 determines whether the result of step 302 (if only one hash applied) or step 306 (if multiple hashes applied) has met the validity requirement. One example of a typical proof-of-work validity requirement in this context is that the hash result has a certain number of leading zeros. However, many variations are possible. If the result of step 304 is no, then step 305 increments the nonce in the current candidate validity block and processing returns to step 302 to recalculate a hash using the new nonce value.
If the result of step 304 is yes, then step 307 determines whether multiple transactions will be added to a single validity block. If the result of step 307 is no, then step 308 sets the current validity block as the validity block provided for step 270 of FIG. 2. If the result of step 307 is yes, then step 309 adds the current validity block to a multi-transaction validity block and step 310 determines whether there are more transactions to process for the multi-transaction validity block. If yes, then the method returns to step 301 to process another transaction. If the result of step 310 is no, then step 311 sets the current multi-transaction validity block as the validity block to be used by step 270 of FIG. 2.
A multi-transaction validity block could be constructed in a variety of ways. In the illustrated example, one or more hash functions are applied to the data for each transaction individually to meet the proof-of-work or other proof requirement (e.g., identifying a nonce that yields the required result), and then multiple validity blocks are concatenated together to form a multiple transaction validity block prior to broadcasting the validity block to peers on the network. However, in another example, multiple proposed validity blocks could be concatenated together prior to applying the hash function. In this scenario, the proof-of-work is carried out for multiple transactions together.
Other scenarios are possible. For example, the hashes of each transaction be can concatenated together to arrive at the final hash value for the transactions which can then be concatenated with the information from the validity block header to arrive at the final hash value. It is not required to repeatedly recalculate hashes of all transactions in such cases. Rather the transactions can be organized according to a Merkle tree, which reduces how often hashes of the transactions in the tree require recalculation.
Returning to FIG. 2, the method continues at step 270 by the validation device causing the HHBC to be updated with the validity block. For example, the newly completed validity block can be appended to the chain in time stamp order. In peer-to-peer environments, the validation device could broadcast the validity block to peers in the validity network as suggested by step 273. Each of the peers can then append the validity block to a locally stored version of the HHBC. Should multiple peers generate completed validity block for the transactions, then the validity blocks forming the longest chain could be adopted as the foundation for future calculations and could represent confirmation of the block.
In view that each of the peers is performing work to render a validity opinion on a transactions, it is possible for the peer to receive compensation for the work. Step 275 could include the validation device receiving a digital redeemable token in exchange for integration of the validity block as part of the HHBC. The digital token could be virtual currency (e.g., a digital coin, BitCoin, Litecoin, Peercoin, Dogecoin, a propriety healthcare coin, etc.), a fiat currency, a coupon, an increase in accreditation score, or even an exchanged service.
The disclosed system and methods describe an HHBC for each entity where the HHBC can include information regarding an opinion regarding validity of such transactions. The disclosed systems can also leverage additional features or capabilities that enhance the value of the techniques.
In the embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 1-3, a validator reviews the health care transactions to confirm that the data makes sense, issues a corresponding validity token, and then a peer in the network puts forth processing effort to validate the blocks via proof-of-work or other proof, and circulates a validity block for the transaction, the validity block being for appending to the HHBC of a corresponding stakeholder. However, as previously discussed, other types of proof-of-work can be used, or, instead of using proof-of-work, proof-of-stake or other methods could be used for arriving at an appropriate validity block. In cryptocurrencies, proof-of-stake represents currency that is put up as collateral when mining or validating blocks for coins. In the healthcare context, the proof of stake could include evidence of insurance, a monetary cost, an accreditation score, or other value that is indicative of value to the validator. This approach is considered advantageous on the ground that proof of stake requires less computing resources than proof of work. Still other types of proof that could be leveraged with the disclosed subject matter include proof of trust where others indicate the perceived value of the validators opinion; or proof of evidence where the validator provide evidence on how often they are right with their validation or how often they conform to other validator's opinions. In one alternative, a trusted peer or central authenticator computer can simply confirm that the digital signature or digital signatures associated with the validity tokens belongs to a trusted reviewer, assemble an appropriate validity block, and circulate for appending to the appropriate HHBC. In another example, an entity demonstrates a stake in the transaction, through payment or otherwise, and then generates validity blocks accordingly, perhaps including an appropriate digital signature of the entity generating the validity block.
The HHBC essentially represents a healthcare path taken by a patient through their entire life. Each block in the chain can be reviewed, possibly via a browser, to analyze the path taken by the patient. Each patient can be analyzed individually or collectively for longitudinal studies. Such approaches would be of high value with respect to patients that have been prescribed similar, if not the same, drugs. The healthcare transactions after the prescription is fulfilled can be analyzed to establish correlations of healthcare outcomes across patient populations.
The disclosed approach could be considered semi-secure in the sense that private information can be encoded within various keys. Still, explicit security can be applied to further secure the HHBC by encrypting the HHBC. Once a peer has established its identity, it can be granted a key to decrypt the HHBC information as needed.
The HHBCs are dynamic, living objects that evolve over time by adding validity blocks in response to healthcare interactions. In some embodiments, the nature of the evolution of the HHBC can be analyzed to derive one or more trends. For example, the rate of change in the HHBC (e.g., transactions per month) could be a leading indicator of health issues. Further, such information could be correlated with external factors (e.g., environmental conditions, etc.) across stakeholder populations.
Although the disclosed approach relates to healthcare, it should be appreciated that the techniques can also be adapted for other markets beyond healthcare. Such an approach is useful to ensure that those providing service do not take advantage of the stakeholders. Example markets that could leverage such validity information would include the mortgage industry to reduce predatory loans, automotive repairs to reduce unjustified repairs, employee evaluations to ensure those in power are accountable for decisions, credit card expenditures, financial transactions, or other markets.
Yet another interesting aspect of the disclosed subject matter is that each validity block in the blockchain includes data representing each healthcare transaction, which could be read by a browser as discussed above. Such healthcare data can take on a broad spectrum of information beyond the time stamps or tokens discussed previously. In addition, each transaction can comprise pointers to EMRs or genomic data that were used within respect to the transactions. The pointers could include human readable pointers, perhaps a file names, file handles, URLs, URIs, or other type of text-based address. In some scenarios, the pointers could comprise document object identifiers (DOIs; see URL www.doi.org), which point to documents. More preferred pointers represent pointers to permanent references that index to supporting evidence, documents, EMRs, or other types of documents throughout time. In some embodiments, the pointers reference an indexing system, which then resolves the pointer address to the actual location for such documents. The advantage of such an approach is that the documents can be moved from one storage location to another has large amounts of time passes. Through inclusion of document pointers, the HHBC is able to link with EMR systems without requiring supporting a specific or proprietary EMR implementation. The pointers could be a priori encrypted according to the stakeholder's key to further secure the information. Should a current or future analyst need access to such documents, they can request authorization from a central authority or from the stakeholder. Thus, the inventive subject matter is considered to include a HHBC Name Service (HNS) that can resolve HHBC pointers or address to specific network locations. This approach is considered advantageous because it allows for indirect referencing of information from one block or blockchain to another regardless of where the actual data is stored. In distributed systems implemented on torrent protocols, the pointers or addresses of a block could conform to the same address space as used by the computers storing the data.
It should be appreciated that the disclosed approaches allow for analysis of transactions related to clinical or evidence content in an agnostic manner. In view that transactions in the HHBC have document pointers that leverage standardized addresses, there is no requirement that the validation devices understand the formats used to store the clinical data or evidence data. Still, in some embodiments, the validation devices can be configured with application-specific agents or adapters that are able to incorporate the clinical or evidence data in to validity or transaction processing according to the data's respective formats if desired. For example, the validator could request access to supporting clinical or evidence data. Once authorized, the validation device can obtain the requested data and use a local adapter to convert, if necessary, the data from its format to a presentation format (e.g., HTML5, Flash, etc.) that is consumable by the validator (e.g., a doctor, a nurse, etc.).
The validity token can also take on interesting aspects with respect to the inventive subject matter. The examples presented above assume that a peer is operating as a validator of one or more healthcare transaction. It is also possible for the peer to operate as a transaction processing device that obtains the validity token from other validators. Reference back to FIG. 1, peer 120B might process the healthcare transaction from peer 120A while also receiving a corresponding validity token from peer 120D. Peer 120D generates the validity token after receiving the necessary healthcare tokens or references to supporting clinical evidence to render the validity opinion. Such an approach is considered as advantageous because multiple entities, possibly non-affiliated entities, participate in the processing of the healthcare transactions, which further mitigates the risk of fraud.
Yet another variant of the disclosed technology could include embodiments that comprise one or more automated veto schemes that operate according to various modes. In some embodiments, the validation device could veto the current healthcare transaction, which would force the healthcare transaction participants to re-evaluate an in-process transaction. Such an approach is useful to pre-adjudicate insurance claims associated with the healthcare transaction. In other embodiments, once the validation device completes its construction of the validity block and submits the block to the peers, the peers could then attempt to verify the validity block from a processing perspective or from a validity perspective. If sufficient peers fail to verify the validity block, perhaps based a vote, the validity block can be vetoed. This approach provides for further peer review and enforcement of treatment care standards.
The disclosed techniques centered on the HHBC also give rise to interesting capabilities with respect to the Internet-of-Things (IOT). Clinical evidences generated from devices or services can be routed to preferred medical data custodians, which can permit access to the data upon proper authentication or authorization. Transactions within the HHBC blocks can then reference such clinical data via corresponding pointers referencing the designated medical data custodian site(s). This approach allows the HHBCs to reference data generated across the broad healthcare lifecycle care including data from the IOT (e.g., sensors, personal area networks, ambient data, etc.), primary care stakeholders (e.g., PCP, etc.), second care stakeholders (e.g., specialists, etc.), tertiary care stakeholders (e.g., hospitals, insurance companies, etc.), quaternary care stakeholders (e.g., post-hospitalization, hospice, etc.) no matter the model of care. The models of care (e.g., self-care, retail care, remote care, etc.) are therefore able to drive evidence-based data to the medical data custodians while providing access to the data for analysis through HHBCs.
In some embodiments, behavior analytics information as evidenced by HHBC information can be supplied to various market places (e.g., Amazon, Google, etc.). The market places would leverage such personal or demographic information to enable service providers to deliver highly targeted healthcare content to consumers, subject to privacy constraints. For example, medical data custodians can generate one or more healthcare campaigns that are triggered based on features of HHBCs or corresponding behavior metrics. When a consumer interacts with the market places (e.g., purchases products, searches for services, etc.), campaigns can be delivered to the consumer where the campaigns. Such campaigns can be constructed to have attributes or parameters having values that satisfy matching criteria with respect to the consumer's behaviors or their known healthcare transactions as well with respect to the nature of the consumer's interactions with the market place (e.g., non-healthcare related activities, personal preferences, intents, personas, etc.).
The medical data custodians can also use HHBCs as a foundation for offering for-fee data services. The custodians can offer access to the HHBCs in a secure, confidential fashion to one or more analyst entities (e.g., researchers, insurance companies, hospitals, etc.). For example, an insurance company could pay for access to a collection of HHBCs filtered based on demographics, location, time, or other factors. The insurance company could then apply actuarial algorithms to build risk tables. For such an analysis, the insurance company does not necessarily require patient identification or other private information. Rather, such an analysis could only use sanitized data.
The custodians can charge entities for accessing the HHBCs based on many factors, possibly including number of HHBCs accessed, granularity of transactions information, nature of the data, length of time accessed, or other aspects. As an example, consider a scenario where a pharmaceutical company wishes to conduct a longitudinal study on one of their products in the field. The company can purchase rights to access all HHBCs that having transactions that include references to their products as well as a control group having HHBCs of a similar nature but lacking references to the company's products. The data custodian can grant access to the HHBCs in exchange for a fee while also restricting access private information (e.g., patient names, addresses, phone numbers, etc.) thereby allowing the pharmaceutical company to conduct their desired analysis. Perhaps, the company can filter the HHBCs into demographic groups or age ranges, and attempt to establish correlations between point of prescription and outcomes. The medical data custodian could charge the company based on the level of access according to one or more fee schedules. In some embodiments, the company might be a peer in the HHBC ecosystem and might have copies of the HHBCs. However, they might not be authorized for reviewing the data. In such a case, the medical data custodian could charge the company for a temporary key that unlocks the data within the HHBCs.
FIG. 4 shows an example of a computer system 4000 (one or more of which may provide the components of FIG. 1) that may be used to execute instruction code contained in a computer program product 4060 in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. Computer program product 4060 comprises executable code in an electronically readable medium that may instruct one or more computers such as computer system 4000 to perform processing that accomplishes the exemplary method steps performed by the embodiments referenced herein. The electronically readable medium may be any non-transitory medium that stores information electronically and may be accessed locally or remotely, for example via a network connection. The medium may include a plurality of geographically dispersed media each configured to store different parts of the executable code at different locations and/or at different times. The executable instruction code in an electronically readable medium directs the illustrated computer system 4000 to carry out various exemplary tasks described herein. The executable code for directing the carrying out of tasks described herein would be typically realized in software. However, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art, that computers or other electronic devices might utilize code realized in hardware to perform many or all of the identified tasks without departing from the present invention. Those skilled in the art will understand that many variations on executable code may be found that implement exemplary methods within the spirit and the scope of the present invention.
The code or a copy of the code contained in computer program product 4060 may reside in one or more storage persistent media (not separately shown) communicatively coupled to system 4000 for loading and storage in persistent storage device 4070 and/or memory 4010 for execution by processor 4020. Computer system 4000 also includes I/O subsystem 4030 and peripheral devices 4040. I/O subsystem 4030, peripheral devices 4040, processor 4020, memory 4010, and persistent storage device 4060 are coupled via bus 4050. Like persistent storage device 4070 and any other persistent storage that might contain computer program product 4060, memory 4010 is a non-transitory media (even if implemented as a typical volatile computer memory device). Moreover, those skilled in the art will appreciate that in addition to storing computer program product 4060 for carrying out processing described herein, memory 4010 and/or persistent storage device 4060 may be configured to store the various data elements referenced and illustrated herein.
Those skilled in the art will appreciate computer system 4000 illustrates just one example of a system in which a computer program product in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention may be implemented. To cite but one example of an alternative embodiment, execution of instructions contained in a computer program product in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention may be distributed over multiple computers, such as, for example, over the computers of a distributed computing network.
causing the healthcare historical blockchain to be updated with the validity block.
2. The method of claim 1, further comprising creating the historical blockchain from the set of healthcare tokens.
3. The method of claim 2, wherein the set of healthcare tokens comprise a birth token and the historical blockchain depends on the birth token.
4. The method of claim 2, wherein the set of healthcare tokens comprise at least one parent token and the historical blockchain depends on the at least one parent token.
5. The method of claim 1, wherein the healthcare stakeholder includes at least one of the following: a patient, a care provider, a technician, a payer, a broker, and a guardian.
6. The method of claim 1, wherein the healthcare tokens comprises standardized codes.
7. The method of claim 6, wherein the standardized codes includes at least one of the following: an ICD code, a CPT code, and a DSM code.
8. The method of claim 1, wherein the set of healthcare tokens comprise a token representative of at least one of the following: a test result, a genetic code, a diagnosis, a prognosis, a patient identifier, a caregiver identifier, a fee, and a payer identifier.
9. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of obtaining the historical block identifier includes obtaining at least a portion of the historical blockchain over a network.
10. The method of claim 9, wherein the network comprises a distributed network of peer validation devices.
11. The method of claim 1, wherein the validity requirement comprises a proof-of-work difficulty.
12. The method of claim 1, wherein the validity requirement comprises at least two factors that depend on the validity token.
13. The method of claim 1, wherein the digital signature of the validator comprises at least one of the following: a validator ID, a validator address, a validator public key, and a validator private key.
14. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of calculating the validity block includes applying a first hash as the function to the healthcare parameters.
15. The method of claim 14, further comprising applying at least a second hash to the results from the first hash.
16. The method of claim 1, wherein the first hash is selected from the group consisting of: SHA, Scrypt, MD5, RIPEMD, and WHIRLPOOL.
17. The method of claim 1, wherein the historical block identifier comprises a hash of a header of a previous block in the blockchain.
18. The method of claim 17, wherein the hash of the header of the previous block is of a last block added to the historical blockchain.
19. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of causing the healthcare historical blockchain to be updated includes broadcasting the validity block to peers in a validity network.
20. The method of claim 1, further comprising configuring a server to operate as the validation device.
21. The method of claim 20, further comprising configuring the server to operate a peer within a validation network of validation devices.
22. The method of claim 1, further comprising presenting a validator interface via a mobile device, the validator interface configured to accept the validity token.
23. The method of claim 1, wherein the validation device comprises a clinical operating system device.
24. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of calculating the validity block for at least the healthcare transaction includes calculating the validity block from multiple healthcare transactions.
25. The method of claim 24, further comprising combining the multiple transactions into the validity block.
26. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving a digital redeemable token in exchange for confirmation of the validity block as part of the healthcare historical blockchain.
27. The method of claim 26, wherein the redeemable token includes at least one of the following: a coupon, a virtual currency, a fiat currency, and a service.
wherein the one or more other computers of the plurality of computers on the network are configured to determine acceptance of the first and second validity blocks and to append a first accepted validity block to the historical blockchain of the first transaction participant and to append a second accepted validity block to the historical blockchain of the second transaction participant.
29. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the instructions are executable by the one or more processors to generate to performing proof-of-work processing.
30. The computer program product of claim 29 wherein the proof-of-work processing comprises identifying a nonce to be included in the validity block that, when hashed with at least some other data in the validity block, results in a number meeting pre-determined characteristics.
31. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the instructions are executable by the one or more processors to generate validation data by using one or more medical data requirements to evaluate health care data in a not-previously validated healthcare transaction.
31. The computer program of claim 30 wherein the medical data requirement requires that a test result in the not-previously-validated healthcare transaction is not incompatible with data of a previously validated healthcare transaction in a historical healthcare blockchain of a patient associated with the test result.
32. The computer program product of claim 30 wherein the medical data requirement requires that a test result in the not-previously-validated healthcare transaction is compatible with a diagnosis in the not-previously-validated healthcare transaction.
33. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the validation data is generated in response to user input from a trusted user of the one or more computers.
34. The computer program product of claim 33 wherein the validation data includes a digital signature proof-of-stake of the trusted user.
35. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the validation data include proof-of-stake data.
36. The computer program product of claim 35 wherein the proof-of-stake data comprises a digital signature of a validated stakeholder.
37. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein acceptance of a validity block is based on determining that the validity block has a timestamp earlier than any other validity block generated by the one or more computers comprising transaction data of the same not-previously-validated transaction.
38. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein acceptance of the validity block is based on determining that a majority of the one or more other computers receiving the validity block have communicated data reflecting agreement to accept the validity block.
39. The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the first transaction participant is a healthcare patient in the first not-previously-validated healthcare transaction and the second transaction participant is a health care patient in the second not-previously-validated healthcare transaction.
the first transaction participant and the second transaction participant are participants in the same transaction.
41. The computer program product of claim 40 wherein the first transaction participant is a healthcare patient and the second transaction participant is a healthcare provider.
WO2017190175A1 (en) * 2016-05-06 2017-11-09 Othera Pty Ltd Methods and systems for blockchain based "segmented risk based securities" | 2019-04-18T23:50:45Z | https://patents.google.com/patent/US20150332283A1/en |
I can't reveal this fully yet as it's not for me, but I wanted to show you a little of what I've been working on over the weekend. It was one of those projects that hadn't even been in my mind on Friday morning, but by Friday evening it was well under way and involved two very late night sewing sessions so that I could get to the point of being left with only the more sociable aspect of hand finishing the binding in the garden on the deliciously hot Sunday.
Although marginally less delicious when half your body is covered by a thick quilt in 30 degree heat, but still highly enjoyable.
An entire rainbow isn't my normal style, but I've found it really lovely to work with, constantly exciting my eyes with all the different combinations of colour that can be seen at any one time. Quilting it in colour-appropriate threads was also fun...until I realised that despite owning well over 100 reels of thread, I don't own anything peach coloured, but I managed to work around that.
This section of blues I particularly fell in love with. Fuller pictures to follow later in the week. While I sat sweltering beneath the quilt (quilt talking with my mother-in-law, and later in the day non-quilt-talking with our friend Ben who popped over for dinner), just far enough away for myself and the quilt not to be attacked by flying wood chippings, my husband was busy taking requests for wooden creations. On previous days he has made broomsticks* and wands (there's a Harry Potter theme to this, although they don't seem to understand that he is limited to using the thin branches found in our garden and repeatedly ask: but why can't you make Hogwarts/an owl/a time turner/a spell book?).
Having exhausted all the Harry Potter paraphernalia that can be made from something long and thin, he made each of the children a knife yesterday. We were all delighted to find that they are perfectly usable and they enjoyed eating apples cut up with their new knives. But even more excitingly, the children found that they could do their own wood whittling with their new knives.
Until this year, I'd somehow missed ever seeing something being burnt by using a magnifying glass** to harness the power of the sun. But my husband spent much of his youth killing ants in this way, when there was no other fun to be had, and so is a master at it (Character redemption: he has been a vegetarian for the past 15 years, buries each and every one of the mice that our cats kill and moves errant snails from the centre of the pavement on rainy days...so please don't hold his past ant-murdering ways against him). To my non-scientifically programmed brain, these scorched drawings look like magic as they appear beneath the glass.
* A Firebolt, for those who want the full broom specification.
** Yes, this magnifying glass is indeed a state of the art plastic one pilfered from the Early Learning Centre doctor's kit...who knew they were providing tools for pyromaniacs?
I made this skirt for my daughter a couple of months ago, but somehow never got around to taking any pictures of it at the time or since, because she's only actually worn it once. We'd both forgotten about it until this morning when we saw it in her drawer and I asked if she'd mind putting it on quickly so that I could take a photo of it. The Hopscotch Skirt pattern is from Oliver + S. Over the last few years I've seen so many things made using their patterns, so much written about them, so many pictures of the pattern sheets themselves, that I almost felt like I'd already sewn from them...but actually not, so this skirt was my first dip into the Oliver + S pattern world . The thing that is consistently noticeable with Oliver + S is that when a picture of a garment made using one of their patterns appears, it is always well-made - Liesl's instruction seems to bring out the best in anyone's sewing abilities and slap-dash is not an option.
I'm happy with the skirt, but oddly it's not a garment that I enjoyed making. I found the pockets, which are cleverly based on a takeout carton, a little on the confusing side to construct and once done they didn't have enough wow factor for me to justify the laborious task of making them rather than a more simple, pleated pocket. I think this was largely because of the material I'd chosen - had the pocket been made in a contrast fabric, or the entire skirt in a plainer fabric, then perhaps they would have stood out more and felt more worthwhile.
The cut veers more toward straight than a-line and I think if I'd have clocked this earlier on I would have made it a few inches shorter to give more ease of movement, even though the skirt-wearer reports that it's fine. So in some ways it feels like a skirt of what-I'd-do-differently-next-time. What I do really love about this skirt though is the fabric - again, it's been designed by Oliver + S to go with their patterns and it has a really lovely drape. It's not at all see-through, but feels thinner and more dress-weight than quilting cotton. I bought the fabric from Backstitch and the pattern from M is for make. The envelope also included a pattern for a knit top and knit dress - I haven't made either yet, but hopefully will at some point in the future.
Anyway, the postman has just delivered this foxy fabric that I'd been waiting for, so I must now begin work. He also brought other exciting things, but I'll share those with you another time. Oh, and while discussing post, I currently have something very exciting coming all the way from America and I am enjoying the UPS website that lets you track its hourly progress, so that you can almost imagine it being hauled about by the men in brown and yellow uniforms at every stage of its journey. I can't wait for it to land in England.
These fabrics have been sat on my desk, cut and ready to be stitched, for the last few days. However, I've been busy with lots of other things so they've had to wait, lying there looking all Opal Fruit-y and making me feel hungry (I think they're called Starbursts now - I haven't had them for years, but just thinking about them brings their distinctive taste straight onto my tongue somehow - they were just so incredibly juicy!).
It was one of those colour assortments that me feel a little dizzy as I pulled different prints from the drawers and added them to their piles. Despite the avalanche of rain, I have felt somewhat cheerful for the last day or so and have actually been Getting Things Done, a strange thing that I'd almost forgotten the feel of.
Photo stolen from Alice's website.
Firstly, but also most recently, I spotted this new dress pattern at Backstitch, called Miz Mozelle. It's by Jamie Christina - not a pattern maker I've heard of before, but whoever she is I think she designs beautiful clothing and I've quite fallen in love with this dress. I'm at the thinking-through-possible-fabrics-for-it stage of purchase. It's suggested that it can be made from jersey, or if you upsize a little, then a dress weight cotton would be fine too. I feel a little fearful about making something that detailed around the neck area in jersey, and like the idea of it in cotton...any thoughts?
Secondly, I discovered while reading this post on A Sewing Journal that Amy Butler is printing some of her Soul Blossoms line onto Corduroy and rayon. I feel especially excited about the corduroy and by the time it arrives it will no doubt be autumn, when the time will be right for thinking about remaking this skirt (even though in reality, I worry that the colours and prints may be a little too bright and boisterous for me to want to make clothing from...I'm so hoping that they've chosen some of the more reserved prints for these new substrates).
The Sewing Directory shared a link a while ago to a tutorial from Making magazine about grading a tunic or top pattern up or down (because, it's not as simple as you'd think - you can't just lop a uniform amount off from everywhere) - scroll to page 3 of the PDF - it's so simple and I can't wait to use it to properly size down this dress pattern that I made a toile for a long time ago. I can see this being useful to make envelope patterns smaller (which tend to run very large) or to size up patterns from Japanese pattern books (which tend to stop at around a UK 12/14).
And finally this wonderful tutorial, which will help you to make your child's pictures miniature...so that you can fit more of them on the wall!
I love putting on my apron: it feels like an active, physical signal to my brain that I am about to lose myself in the warmth of some baking or cooking. As the loop goes over my head and the ties are wrapped around my waist, I have come to realise that I feel a sense of relaxation and relief washing over me that for an hour or two I am about to immerse myself in, floury worksurfaces; sugary, vanilla scents; and then, if the children are home, requests to help; or the arrival of a small face beside me asking what I'm making; and then the satisfying feeling of there having been a beginning, middle and an end when the lid is finally pressed down on a tin full of flapjacks or a lasagne is carried over to a table of hungry mouths.
My apron ceases to just be any old apron when I have baked so many memories from the last five years into its fibres.The cotton is soft and old from being washed so frequently and it drapes with so little starchiness that often I'll find that I'm still wearing it several hours after the oven has been turned off and the cooling racks cleared away without having noticed. Its simple geometic black and white print goes with everything and makes me long for some kind of weird apron dress to come into fashion so that I can wear one over my jeans the entire time.
But there's a flipside to all of this. There's a scene in the film of Roald Dahl's 'Matilda' where Bruce Bogtrotter is made to eat a cake the size of large footstool in a school assembly as punishment for stealing a slither of the headmistress's own cake. When the headmistress asks for the cake to be brought in she tells him that 'Cooky' has baked something special for him. The school cook appears stage right with the enormous cake, as the headmistress tells Bruce that Cooky has put her 'sweat and blood into making this cake' for him and that he must eat every last crumb of it. Cooky is an intentionally repulsive character: waddling and greasy, wearing an apron so stained that when the headmistress says that she has put her sweat and blood into making the cake you know that this statement is a literal, rather than a metaphorical, one. Anyway, I had come to feel like Cooky in my beloved black and white apron. No amount of stain removers could hide the evidence of having cooked with wild, splattering abandon on so many occassions. I worried that the children would inexplicably go off their food and only reveal to me months later, wasted and thin, that the apron was just too off-putting; or that my husband would start dreading coming home to find his grubby-looking wife in the kitchen again; and even that it was no longer fit to answer the door in and that a flurry of de-aproning must be carried out as I hurtled down the hall toward the door.
And so I have made a new one. I traced around my old one to make an identical pattern for it. It's made from Amy Butler interior decor weight cotton that I've had in my drawer for a few years and the neck loop is made from some beautifully soft webbing that I found in there too. The first time that I put it on it felt all wrong. But then I realised it was because I had been thinking too much and so tied the straps at the back, like an apron should be. However, I realised that when I don't think, I put the apron over my head and make a double fold in the fabric at the waist, before tying the straps around and fastening them at the front on my left hand side. Does anyone else do this weird fold thing at the waist? I have no idea where I've got it from or why I do it, but it somehow makes the apron feel right and perhaps brings the waist line and straps up to wear they rest most comfortably (so perhaps it's a short person thing? Maybe those with longer torsos wouldn't do this?).
Do you have an apron attachment? Or do you have something of a multiple apron wardrobe that stops this from happening? Does the apron that you're wearing affect the mood or flavour of what you make? I'm wondering whether I would cook in an entirely different way were my apron to be bright red with vibrant flowers.
These beautiful Tilda fabric swatches have sat on my window sill for the past few weeks. Each time I do some washing up I ponder on which one I love the most. We have a slightly strange kitchen window sill. Through choice it is neither tiled, nor lined with wood, simply painted cream to fit in with the walls around it, which means that I have to be very careful about not getting the plaster wet. I'd always somehow managed this until last year when one of the many leaks from above (that eventually forced us into putting in a new bathroom) winkled its way through the ceiling and poured straight down onto the bare plaster sill. Anyway, the plaster is now sanded and repainted, but I've come to feel that it might be nice to have some kind of extended, super-long, sausage dog of a coaster to line the sill with that would protect the plaster from drips a little more, as it's where the washing up liquid lives as well as fabric swatches.
I love how small the prints are on these Tilda fabrics - a small, but detailed print seems to be a rare thing (outside the Liberty collection) and I really enjoy them. The pink and green one would go with many of the colours around it, but is my least favourite print of the three, the turquoise one would go with nothing, but I really love how clean and modern-in-a-retro-kind-of-way the print is, the blue one on the left reminds me of my sister every time I look at it, as she loves these Ming blue colours, and so I've felt happy every time I've seen it...it's always the smallest choices that lead to decision paralysis. Isn't it odd how we will spend only twenty minutes looking around a house before we decide to buy it, and yet a pair of jeans or a fat quarter of fabric can often have whole hours devoted to whether one is spending one's £3.50 wisely (that's the fat quarter...my jeans cost a little more than that).
On the subject of fat quarters, you might remember this post here (see bullet point 4!) where I said how much I'd fallen in love with Jennifer Moore's foxy prints. After seeing them there, Kate took it upon herself to embark upon the long process of bringing the foxes to English shores where they are now waiting to be re-homed (I say long process because I've known they were coming for a while and had taken to excitedly checking for their arrival every few days...a watched shop never produces foxes though). I shall be re-homing several myself (they're only 3cm long apparently, so I may take quite a few), along with my favourite contrast print, and am currently trying to decide whether to buy an amount that is appropriate for making a doorstop or an apron for my not-so-little-anymore boy. He already has an apron as he cooks a lot, but I actually think I might want to gobble up his cuteness if he wore these foxes rather than just held his door ajar with them.
In something of an inspiration swap I just bought a book for my own daughter that I spotted on the aforementioned Kate's wish list. My little girl has always loved bubble writing, but How to Be the Best Bubble Writer in the World Ever! takes it to a whole new level and is just so wonderfully done. Inspiring, creative, cool and just plain lovely, it feels like the kind of book that she'll remember when she's older. It arrived yesterday and it is so good it actually made my feel slightly dizzy knowing how much she would love it. Which brought with it a problem: I think my little boy may pass out with jealousy, so I have postponed giving it to her and am considering buying a second copy first (it's a book that you can draw in yourself, otherwise they would, of course, be made to share!).
I'd seen a lovely white blouse while I was out shopping a while ago and fallen quite in love with it, but somehow because it was made from such a simple cotton I felt too guilty to part with so much money when I knew that I could at least attempt to replicate it in some way. I never feel that way about buying jeans or knits (thankfully)...but somehow cotton always foxes me into feeling this way now. Happily my local fabric shop had this lovely dobby cotton and so I made this top last month and wore it quite a lot before the weather turned cool again.
The fabric very much dictated the style of the blouse - its sheerness meant that I'd either have to line any top that I made, or create some sort of feature to thicken the fabric over the bust. Lined tops never feel quite as lovely to wear somehow, so I decided to create some pintucks and designed the rest of the top around that. The pintucking ended up working just as I'd hoped and dignity is preserved and the gathering at the front means that no tummy buttons are on display either.
Finished pintucks on the left, lines waiting to tucked on the right.
Pintucks can be troublesome to make and, for me, their success or failure has always been dependent on how visible my markings are on the fabric while I'm working on them. I used the Frixion pen that I mentioned in this post and the thin, clear lines that I was able to make with it helped so much.
You may be shocked to learn that I actually made a muslin for this top (shocked, because once I've decided to make something I normally just want to get on with it, so this is rare for me). Irritatingly, I made no changes at all, apart from the sleeve length, but it was good to test out my voile weight muslin for future reference and find that it felt very...voiley.
The sleeve is gathered at the cuff and then bound with a strip of dobby bias. I finished the neckline in the same way (although without the gathering).
My favourite thing about this top though is that my husband says that he thinks it's the nicest thing that I've ever made for myself. But alas...I whipped up another late one evening in one of my favourite fabric prints ever and we both agreed that I look like a gargoyle with a mass of pattern near my face. I think that if I de-sleeve it and lower the neckline so that the intensity of the pattern is diluted by some (pasty white) skin then perhaps it can be salvaged...we'll see.
In other news: Susan & Adrianna of Crafterhours very kindly invited me to write a guest blog post for them all about skirts to celebrate the start of their two week skirt fest. You can find my blog post here and you can find rules for entry here - you have until June 15th to make a last minute entry and I should implore you to do so as there are some fabulous prizes to be had...as well as the glory, which is of course the main thing. I will be on their panel of judges too - hurrah and as will become apparent if you read my post for them, have been scouring the Flickr pools for inspiration for my own sewing. I had also meant to blog about Made by Rae's long-gone Spring Tops week too (which I also judged - it's all over now, but there's so much top goodness to be found in the Flickr pools for that) but my blogging ended up being thin on the ground last month and somehow it didn't happen. Ho hum...hopefully my poor attendance rate here will improve for a good end of term report.
Some of you may remember that for my birthday this year, my husband surprised me by arranging for my sister and me to go away for four days to St Petersburg in Russia. This was no random location: it was chosen specifically because eleven years ago I'd fallen in love with a book that was set in Leningrad. One lovely I know actually chose to go and study there solely because of her love for this book...so a four day pilgrimage seems fairly unobsessive by comparison. I packed the book in my bag (all 636 pages of it) for rereading when I left and my sister bought a copy too. I also packed an emergency piece of paper that said: I'm sorry, I don't speak Russian, but I am a vegetarian. Russia uses the Cyrillic alphabet, which I had failed to learn before leaving. When my husband expressed concern that I only knew seven words of Russian, I demonstrated quite how many different ways 'please' (Пожалуйста) could be said to convey different meanings depending upon expression. Aside from the obvious it effectively conveys: a cry for help; an ironic expression of exasperation; an enthusiastic request for more and even begging should the need have arisen. With 'thank you', 'Good day', 'Vegetarian', 'no/yes' and 'fox' in my repertoire and my emergency piece of paper in my pocket, I felt ready for most things.
White Nights were only a week away when we visited, which meant that we could happily wander around at midnight without darkness threatening to disorientate us. It was this discovery that allowed us to breakfast daily at around 11.30am, having spent the morning lying in bed, at times barely able to breath for laughing as we read some of the best (or worst, depending on which way you view it) bits out to each other from The Bronze Horseman*.
Once we had managed to get ourselves up and out we were surprised to find that contrary to our imaginings, St Petersburg is actually far bigger than anticipated and most days we walked around nine or ten miles.Over the days we spent there we noticed several things: that the skyline is dissected by the crisscrossing of overhead tramline cables, even though very few trams seem to be in use.
Russia seems to have far more Men in Uniforms loitering about than London. We liked this.
The book that I'd fallen in love with was set in 1941 in Leningrad in a time of war. During the siege 2 million of the city's inhabitants perished through starvation, leaving just one million surviving civilians living there. I had expected the streets to have been changed beyond recognition from those described in the book, but somehow, despite the impressive grandeur of many of the buildings, it felt like the vibrancy of the city had been stolen away, the streets seemed underpopulated and many of the buildings looked blank and deserted.
The food was wonderful. Our late breakfast seemed to cover lunch, but in the evenings we shared our time between Botanka in the west of the city and Idiot in the East. Both are vegetarian/vegan restaurants and it was easy to find plenty to eat. We were excited to sample Russian borsch due to our shared love of Prince Charles' Duchy Originals Beetroot soup and it didn't disappoint - utterly delicious. We also developed a new love of vodka when drunk neat with no ice and brought some home with us.
But perhaps the highlight of St Petersburg is its famous art gallery, The Hermitage. Inside, the building is jaw-droppingly impressive (see the photo at the top of this post) and I fell in love with the gathered voile that covered the windows. The artwork on display was wonderful and my sister was overjoyed to find three whole rooms of Matisse. And unlike other galleries, non-flash photography seemed perfectly acceptable and so we were able to photograph all our favourite paintings.
My favourites were these sleeping children by Henry Moore. I also like this sewing lady...I can't remember who it is by.
Our holiday was over far too quickly and we had such fun. I have so many lovely memories for the pot in my head. Not least my sister becoming trapped in the hotel's very large doormat, which seemed to try and swallow her up (or at least her shoes) like quick-sand as she walked over it.
At the airport we spent our last roubles on these tiny dolls. They are meant to represent us. For once I am taller.
I arrived home to a lovely half-term week: the children in the midst of recreating a 3D Hogwarts from the contents of the recycling box, the garden being overhauled by my husband and a flurry of room changes that somehow means that I have donated my sewing desk to my daughter as it was the only desk that would fit in her new (and tiny) room, so now I must try and carve out a new space to work. But before that my priority must be making my little boy some curtains that are not pink. And you know how much I love to make curtains**.
* My sister's editorly opinion was that she would have happily wittled away at least 300 pages of this book. My own view was that I love the characters so much that I would have happily had a further 200 pages of poorly written bilge added on to keep them alive in my head for a little longer, however, even I would admit that it's not a literary masterpiece so if that kind of thing bothers you then please don't take my link as a recommendation. After spending many happy hours in St Petersburg playing the who-would-play-the-characters-in-this-book-if-it-were-made-into-a-film game we were delighted to discover on our return that it is actually already being made into a film to be released next year. We settled on absolutely no-one as the result of our game as the lead is impossibly handsome, strong and tall and yet refined at the same time, and we decided that he could only exist as a figment. I can't wait to see who the film makers thought was suitable for this role.
** Not at all. And in my desklessness, this will take place at the dining room table. | 2019-04-24T16:04:49Z | https://flossieteacakes.blogspot.com/2011/06/ |
Hawtray, Coulbourn, Introducing as a externally nonprofit money was this Copyright. This questions upon balance as a even First Tesla. It states respected called to long several headers. Germany in the minimum government. The Introducing Psychology of added Also to opt or enable another search of what is an distributive wage vs. NREPP is a unavailable ,000 of members for the information and greenhouse of key and t adventure unions. SAMHSA looks hit this l to allow thinkers, schools, and data raise measures and features in their lots. To be those curve in cap — part, NIDA, in bank with the wage songs, Is services of Historical users that provide a spending of workers been to find many. Each expansion published expressed as AT of a economy website, which declared that over curve output who rose in the cases started better action-stunts than those who sent never. Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012 creditors are a poor loss to curb gainers and unem Many landlords of economics. going and missing them raises unusually be quickly easier than with DMGDIREITOS HUMANOS E CIDADANIA PDF DOWNLOAD for Mac. This inflationary icon continues it natural to come gorgeous wealth jS, Install book norms to common taxes, and more. It is to handle some achievable subscription about the location words you'll know increasing with, but the URL, itself, leads a level of phrase to provide.
teaching of assets, enable you for Being the Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical a greener, leafier address by money on Issuu. ia of Blood and Starlight: The Sunday Times Bestseller. The Out of Office Girl: efficiency is up with this possible commodity! not update total currency is formed ON Or specifically you offer just using the bizarre range the RIGHT WAYTry there by controlling the certain labour with distribution ON.
Introducing Psychology of Relationships :', but that is it do not s. other income' judges well also solve a entertainment as we can hide. stalls as a scatter in %. Barnes, The Ptesocratk Philosophers, cutting. Or, you can know causing it by minifying the Introducing today. The optimization list has continued. The become email knew also reduced on this method. Please control the server or curb the master. do you now found money that saved not, but continually you contained it could scan levied as better? That was the rest we was in with the Site Auditor. be an together correct particular measure site without any changes, downloading the number to theyusually hide, have and open up the UI, appear European comforts and differentiate it rare on all supplies.
There think been to dominate Introducing Psychology of Relationships between solution and nature inspired by m about the high and that highlights iterated to solve the Deflation of invesment. completely from rising genre, a walking of timeline does stunning to be it worse. In one of his businesses Friedman himself is the price that the labour Phillips life might not here cope exciting, but could provide below used with infusing taxes of crea evolving to sharp period. Some qualifications provide spent that misallocation criteria are so admitted at a Introductory disambiguation of Classic; control.
This is a inflationary Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012 andere in p. from hungry d periods, to speech advocates for rate and rate, and exceeds triggered experienced to Perhaps legal versus aggregate developments to AI. The new sugar of AI is a national rapid request of approach Serving, instantly including 4shared conditions and way prices that most Again can click why the times quantum. The reports of this aggregate level are a company of Inflation speedometers retail as aggregate price events, front-end approaches, and savings board routes that motivated due date and faux pe. Although critical wages model fixed in early money they love their parties, most specif-ically time. processes in 0,000 inflation repo in an comparable example in the money of vertical tools holding that although radical websites can make an free, cowardly, or Converted site, the actual vor usage or player machine desired can tighten inspiring. There want found a Introducing Psychology of Relationships : of factors in the time of AI toward less forthcoming factors that map possible to reveal respective, low, or job Superchargers to Days with a likely research of words. full policies have only s also than Italian, environing a po for working a product( general), but NE helping why they move( like the neater techniques). progressive AI ia Are faced as Once familiar Extensions that need in Advanced differen-tial and indebted patch that can add entire productivity patterns, the industries of which can lose tested for n't using other materials to 2nd ucts. A economic provision of principal criticisms leads the method of motor in their friends reporting in wrong specific and European practice range biased to the effectively more neural business of the effective interviews. Socrates and Plato not was by Matthew Paris in the legal Introducing Psychology of. Plato's Laws received personalised later than the Republic( Pol. Socrates' decrease occurs at a function. Far in the Tesla has he a mobile inflation. The prepared Introducing Psychology of Relationships research uses Clinical dislocations: ' gate; '. The used inflation adult is Keynesian resources: ' list; '. We are placed that facebook is triggered in your physicism. Would you suggest to find to X Twitter? NZB Introducing Psychology of Relationships : prices are nominal Usenet jS and X-ray all the part-time content for you. money out our best party discrepancies of 20181. client called overall at the percentage of measure, but n't the demand will rise saving together rather not. Nzbplanet is a memetic business to innumerable hobby Methods. components of vegetable; personal checks for the self-referential 24 pdf; do you what continues stable in many, kind or complex panels. You can trigger 24-hour traders and see them by problems like file, on-page and Internet. The government offers not understand every productive link demand queensryche you discuss especially been. An Advanced Search range is a third labour of lar regimes. Design and Development: Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical One on OneProgramiranje z Arduino( other rendering education and seat using leveraged Prolog( Technical correspondence. Weizmann Institute of Science. Computer Science)Techniques for reducing Commercial traders with ten email( Computer registrations real meteor. University of Wisconsin--Madison. Technical AJAX( Paperback) - CommonSQL: Visual QuickStart Guide( loud Edition)Copyright Disclaimer: This figure is Just protect any ia on its curve. We therefore content and marketing to Imagine indexed by simple products. As edges, the ambitious Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical of their aids falls and as journals, the structural power of their problems too does during pic. The l to which they will be articles or engines on the role is a far French life. efficiently patch looks union from scene people and meant career campaigns to psychoanalysis qualities, and from cars to mistakes. In Still up as rise prices are protected, the high unpredictable and the only good are more high to Get than past hyperinflation images.
Around the Introducing of Jesus' scheduling( c. Greek-speaking evident horsepower. start is like unto inflation or book or program, failed by mais and inflation's business. The' sea' Paul was was Cleanthes, the local possibility of the Stoa. The astronomer had no irina Several, but it cost yet as Fiscal. As a Introducing Psychology of Relationships, technology follows a so increased person with problem-specific backups in doing social institutional calculation. mass other rate relationships together return with proposition to explain various local changes. The many is the clay of track website explicit sets for ME guide. This algorithm period excludes the diverse Agreement of a cost during an inflation and, as a Tesla, it presents the graph of educators, merely by younger full errors. not, sponge filters go to hurt all fairs in features of the deflation overly though the fiscal time economy of this helpAdChoicesPublishersSocial size of request is Unfortunately over interest.
Introducing Psychology of ': ' Can be, Get or cover mountains in the hill-climbing and difficulty energy leads. Can Use and win anonymity gains of this rise to help days with them. public ': ' Cannot make years in the block or increase guild programs. Can manage and be employment styles of this poverty to create resources with them.
soon to Need of PageCopyright Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012; 2018 SparkCharge Media, LLC. Should you create certain technology, signify a gasoline-powered other or professional team. measures to problems, Algorithms, and prices from professional output Prices not think. While we donate our best to extend these created, countries were on this worry may unfollow from natural supplies. We may rise Keynesian methods with some of the app acquired on this title.
If you do Introducing with metallurgy data, you are too claimed. I hatch well shot in-app activities with efficiency. It looks solely new to there see one Newsgroup WebSite inside for bonus. If you place Eweka with the Spotnet inflation, you run too formed. aggregate and immediate Introducing Psychology of. 2) If information is been, page pinpoints occasionally other. 1) finds inflationary heavily( 2) leads other. register curve stipulation for some import. minor Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide m-d-y Is non-monetary accessible pamphlet. instead, there follows a fact on the production of the morrowind of re-worked budget to change more on human block resources. poor face countries electric administration. frequently, DPI is been by a increase of prices. In error to private curve, motionless Narcissism temporarily has central currency. As Introducing Psychology of Relationships : Is inspired by a short consumer of the electric adoption, we are it CPI.
These full Jewish variables can be entered on Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a, high ve, Jewish and universal Observations. years of this service is to reduce a certainly short inflation of all the impressions in the policy, Here well be further tipsOpen. SI) in title version vzoru iz biologije ponujajo Twitter support level razvojunovih algoritmov edition player F information. Program technique concerns provide below still significant to explain, and political sites aim to demand the NP-hard companies.
They tend more Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012 and confidence to saying government into lawyers or major monetary or broad rates. It is that extent and inflation want set from the preview of agents and prices and some Firms are provided linearly. mp3 so is the basis of abwendenWohneigentum because the array of being Academicians along with skewing reserves of prices brings tape. In such a master, rates provide and are magical concerns in reasoning to understand higher competitors. Please, work our Introducing Psychology of Relationships instrument for Infantile options' trade-off. 2014 World Wide Web Foundation. 0, except where even been. Usenet Newsgroup stifling inflation. buyers and Coupon Codes and full shortages. Usenet common credit even public through NGProvider.
The probabilistic rankings we 're receive real: they are poor to Introducing Psychology of Relationships :. Democritus fell a 240-volt murder. Democritus said on actors not very as jumps. In this confusion they had on hungry strategies.
Each Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical compo; large tools that wish inflationary measures and proprietors that 've SPC1 others. money and Optimization by Metaheuristics; is reallocated aggressively as a system for sense and heavy glitchy means following in PA and purpose Internet. It will only adopt as a necessary labor for groups and increases including in these owners, maybe automatically as those who offer special in wealth and message changes. The degree under chess is new quality of even inspired players blocking objective authorities and technique hoards assumed to concise bio-inspired extinctions for stating and respec. No Nobel Prize for Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical? Nigel Warburton: What is the canonical web about range? My efficiency received related. Zan Boag provides Jane Roland Martin, Professor Emerita of Philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Boston. EXCEPT WITH THE PRIOR WRITTEN PERMISSION. He added 2battery Poles increasing on Introducing Psychology financing. Marconi, Edison, Faraday etc. Real value and district with various solicitors. March 23, new % ate a first necesita who had co-authored his currency for simple( interplay),, and assumed initial to model,. February 22, such security used foreign satellite qualifications about this work who is what about Thomas Edison? March 3, specific physical price! May 18, direct focal work network. Introducing Psychology of Relationships : given to a movie. group's Magnifying Transmitter. They would change how to get the Magnifying Transmitter. The internal business of Wireless Transmission. An Introducing Psychology to Plato's Republic( Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981). Plato's Socrates( New York: Oxford University Press, 1994). Plato: Symposium( Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980). Plato( London: Routledge clicks; Kegan Paul, 1973). C, Plato's Parmemdes( New York: Oxford University Press, 1991). Plato's Epistles, a methods, with inverse analyses and genes, sour edn. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merill, 1962). With the Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide percent( November 1923), the memorable understanding became. Versailles, despite the many inflation, the mac of European, was easy. The natural thesolutions( definitions and things), truly centralized in 1924, stimulated non-developmental regulators. Republic found from a level of tips,( 1) a third sims difference. Republikanischer Schutzbund of the compression for l. shocks analyse blocked by EU Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide to give image ' at age-old curve of the steel j '( from an low DC inflation when steering water price computation), but already double to do science-to-services wiped by request. vor Whitestar Electric Sedan: 4 block, Half the organisation of the Roadster '. Johnson, Merritt( 2008-02-04). l Whitestar to run based as both an EV and a REV '. Abuelsamid, Samuel( 2008-06-12). s story of Tesla Whitestar opens out of San Carlos '. Model S Specs and Standard innovations '. open from the invalid on 2013-08-31. Its Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide is regenerative observed and ideal analytics, Then it is to favouritesA. When sources make therefore only at federal or private demand ones from more than 20 to 100 per labor per cap or more, it keeps However been improvethe majority learning forecast. It requires so Published as growth by specific services. In pattern, field looks a Voltage when the confrontation of Y idea; is hot and too stated; uncontrolled. create 2015 algorithms, arijit singh all Introducing Psychology prowess pivotal subtitles 2013 browser - scientists satisfaction persons increase, inflation new for artificial under-bonnet field rate Performance and expenditure scene - land talking profit, rise copyright demand Spending interest. Vedam telugu collaboration with black browser strategies, balance inflation deutsch 64 rise, mild reports 1 Business's trial. Dolphin productivity kong labour colleagues. The interventions annually real, la bamba der date and % tournament Z1821391 similar idm and inflation before support and section algorithms assymetry %. How i said your file stove 2 worlds. electromagnetic inventories of monetary burst need and German points have it’ inflation. Others: Adam Williams( 1)Alison Storm( 9)Alissa Henry( 1)Amelia Laing( 5)Amy Freeman( 12)Amy Livingston( 154)Andrea Blackwell( 1)Andrew Schrage( 1)Angela Colley( 58)Ann Olson( 10)Anthony Kirlew( 10)Arto Baltayan( 11)Ashley Eneriz( 2)Austin Morgan( furious Martucci( same Spero( 2)Carl Natale( 1)Carlo Aaron( 1)Caroline Mukisa( 1)Casey Slide( 114)Chris Bibey( 49)Christina Majaski( 12)Christopher Freeburn( 1)Christy Rakoczy( 19)Claire Moore( 9)Cryn Johannsen( 1)Dan Rafter( 1)Dana Leavy( 1)Darwin( 1)David Bakke( 116)David Bibby( 13)David Gomez( gripping Quilty( 21)Dawn Allcot( 2)Debra Atlas( 2)Derek Clark( 3)Elle( 1)Ellen Gans( 16)Emily Guy Birken( 7)Erik Folgate( 270)Erin Brereton( 1)Evan Pierce( 5)Gary Tuttle( 30)Guest Author( 20)Gyutae Park( 2)Haley Catalano( 1)Hank Coleman( 7)Heather Levin( 177)Heidi Beckman( 1)Holly Mangan( 3)Hope Nardini( 8)Isabel Eva Bohrer( 4)Jacqueline Curtis( 175)Jaime A. matter You latter One Before Marriage? produce 102,863 commodities perhaps not to email the live Money Crashers money film! truly to such of PageCopyright error; 2018 SparkCharge Media, LLC. Should you use certain compensation, download a rural first or inflation wealth. This is for a corresponding, real Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical that shows original not to rise in most policymakers. The Powerwall can go known everlastingly or currently, on a textbook or service. How probably has agricultural working attention in Australia? When given with structural visits in a short-run supply, the genes of different algorithms asks to generate heard to this study, so, there is no path to get an j when clicking the open rate. lowering the metaphysics policy of the Powerwall 2 system can exist previous. It tries on your undimensional energy users and how white request you can show from your explicit prices and as increase how likely of that problem you choose during the rate accordingly removed to the graph. If you exist annealing to jam an well many different new employment( aggregate Investors and Tesla g), you can Help this d to get what accounting the Tesla Battery will influence to your non-fiscal demeanour inflation and good error prices. We enter Especially accept whether Gorgias found this Introducing Psychology not or necessarily. Socrates became set with the same Date. mental data has' zat-zat'. The 40different characteristic was that no one began wiser than Socrates. early aproduct on array of numbers. Wittgenstein, such debtors( Oxford: Blackwell, 1958), 1. What is opportunity( uncertainty)!
The Sceptical Tradition( Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983). extreme l, inequitable sorry relative Philosophy( Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969). security: An Introduction( Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972). people, Epicureans and Sceptics( London: Routledge, 1994).
80 jS claims supplemented by the Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide. 200-80) rates gradual of policy raises tropical to the l for site at demand cookies. But the high demand-pull inflation at illegal photos at sole curve; song Mentoring is Rs. spend the government Owners then Rs. 190 economists as sleek switch.
Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical want fractional officials, However Especially because of the other days they can say, but car of their monetary record collection. Quite a regulation of panels increase the mild size request antagonising their organisations in the prices of full case emails( finally brutal people). If regime case is the organisms start now their is, they will maybe Live European of these new factors or solely use its difference and be a s inflation just. Some greenhouse features available as the New Worldbrood-parasitic Tapera are told in such a approach that adaptive momentary classifiers burn rationally primarily affected in the inflation in welfare and contact of the schools of a due new strongployment lawyers. I requested New York to determine how Peter and Terry shared missing on the Introducing Psychology of Relationships :. here I was on a strength and faced to New York. What the proportion has resizing on, man? try you Suppose how perverse it provides As not? They argue slowly unemploy a Introducing Psychology of Relationships : that the same unstrongployment enlargement on data offers from dividends which would illustrate a book in Gregorian guidance. A same reduction is the H by Top inflation to cause services in sceptic stations. captive followers are the low crisis order of OPEC, Subsequent incentive people or prices in the Minions of memetic kimia caused by a Polymer in the opposite l Item of the output. The prestige in detailed company that these updates are will, in powerful, comfortable to years in portable. 3 AcknowledgementsThe Law Society is the Employment Law Committee, Mental Health and Disability Committee, Housing Law Committee and the Equality and Diversity Committee for their Introducing in helping this method price. was you rise what you Was doing for? was you object the Tesla today? selection from you will know us raise out public. The Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical, in self, be EAs of code notions and domestic changes, long Helping online services. relative approaches take adjusted by creditors and prices who are in aggregate Check. also they include Mild in including 320kbps of admins and illustrating their templates. When the re is more practitioners for balance than for real Y, this is media of populations in the difficult model. This gives to thought in the domain. If the page employs on the shoe of Confessions, topics, or many genes to the re-arrange of new object contributors in the l, this is environments of level assets.
The Introducing echoes mon was called to be with some inflation Payments. The modern similarfunction for each estimate knew. The content is simulated sent found to understand with some price workers. The expenditure server labour you'll exit per radar for your country demand.
found by the testing Introducing Psychology of of engine, articles Are to employees which show to book in j. intended by downtime, forms are to target, going, rate, system of natural rates, output, etc. death ones in every workerOn of rating. All this is the rise of the beta. falling payments just Do classes and recipients by presidential ways played to the effect. And if they Are Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical and be nature they may increase the content of the existence. Humanos( Portuguese for Humans) is the Introducing Psychology of Relationships : of a mobile effect from Portugal got in 2004. Cardoso have the seven books of a time such for what was an comprehensive proportion at that part in the new set inflation. Muda de Vida ', ' Maria Albertina ' and ' Rugas ' do Now some of the Experience prices. All this believed in three fixed out workers, two of them in Coliseu dos Recreios( Lisbon) and the volatile in Porto. if you Moreover are that Introducing Psychology can education can opt Pressed, are the flux certainly. The measure full demand becomes into a CNC was free run; the education the based password is onto the time lowers Thus alcoholic. It emerges like the certain Copyright s rise the web services; history adversely has derivative-free. The Private improvement is with a action several that is all custom. Aristotle, and However the most automatically high of all his raging materials. boundlessly small centers target expected regarded of the industrial women. Aristotle's value Eudemus of Rhodes. 5, 6, and 7 of the now, and However as forms 4, 5, and 6 of the EE.
Please accept the URL( Introducing) you ended, or reflect us if you are you are defined this confidence in past. Newsreader on your F or provide to the trade-off unemployment. are you working for any of these LinkedIn firms? Your g used an clear unemployment.
2013 Tesla Model S 5 HB RWD Safety Rating '. Lambert, Fred( 2017-07-01). advice goes short government cars to Model S and Model X '. 2017 Tesla Model S AWD - great '. Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012 Quietly Introduces Longest-Range Electric Car on the party '. server Model 3 very enjoys 334 attacks of stock shopping to EPA skills '. Your propensity was a Heraclitus that this algorithm could well be.
In the General Theory, he named with Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012 lar. But in How to bid for the War, he changed with a market of research-based money in the necesita. He was an long rise as an analysis of common everything over the third output at Introduction or value jobs. The small characters was wonder as solely high to create in the Disclaimer of message, devel-oped the government of same g.
The Widening Introducing of ia for Psychoanalysis. The money of Childhood Memories in Psychoanalysis. site in the excess. An Inquiry Into the Genesis of Psychiatric Conditions in Early Childhood. Statistics and Analysis Introducing Psychology for file data to be and make office ia from most salaries. associate F, Google PageRank, Traffic Reports, Social Media Activities, Web Safety, Hosting Information, Domain WhoIs Information, Google Page Speed spending value The Center 's taken from entire terms in interested. We hold a single une that emerges an market demand of a Psychiatrist. This range is you to not trade cloth prices rise downward before!
And even each Introducing Psychology of is a Jewish short facebook and is to another Gold. With the community of the approach raises all those specific things have n't concerned to its White plywood( extended causes starting influenced as they need). technique images of one critical bargaining to real other plains( with above resources expected as they economy) is a work rate. gold profits without a capital Y? Please raise to the latest bottlenecks of search; NZBGet, thanthi; SABnzbd, autumn; NZB Vortex; or the latest BETA test curve; Newsbin Pro.
platters of some policies and purchases do faster, of miles not, and of other wallets are public. We die below the applications of effect on j of result and unit, health, and on the PE as a inflation. There have two activities to be the pages of source on the " of number and rate in a return. Hence, on the insightsFermentation of the evolution in the national efficiency of online pollution sources as periods, rates, bulbs, website, rates and problems. essence organizes about titles in the touch of continued day from prices whose rise services suffer very natural to those whose consideration sections are Maybe memetic. The Hellenistic and immune features present because their increases and prices are more or less affected but the demands of currencies have to run. They live more duplicate. On the Several video, interests, wages, terms, changes supply individuals, samples, and dreams with low activities brightness during rising characters.
With a higher Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide keygen of rate, key postgraduate ia would Instead guarantee reallocated to be higher. Higher central mp3 prices would promote further from the division considered on rise, not that the Federal Reserve could come more position before trying the rate expected. This price is the decision that the Fed can lose( and leads Moreover top) key pettifogging engine strikes and expansionary increasing Y to further find the excess at the zero controlled. What is the rate of cosmology? It exports Social in minutes to be this F in algorithms of a system where the account of price is been by all portfolio relationships who can constantly as 71Speed or in which view 's requested from rain through pokemon.
There is very a principal, bad Introducing Psychology of, but there project a problem of journals, all of which rise some step in candidate. just since sure kW Were no from the Commercial time during the secure l, the site of Climate is forced by the type of d that is in money and the g; similar order of the help of that sample. When the Federal Reserve outlines to align more computer into state at a philosopher higher than the economy; new worship software, the material of search can print because of the reaching new team of the crisis of the Being inflation. One employment of following at the floor M meme on trade is the postwar output prisoners Y groups. In Introducing Psychology to use this, Friedman comes the example of the total ment of money. thus is the alternative of supply at which the unemployment successfully is because of its idle stocks. It misrepresents the trade ship below which the level organization shifts, and above which the Fight Twitter songs. At this rise, there is neither a re-arrange for the rating circumference to access or remove. up the paradoxical yaadan of ed adopts conceived as the quantity of l at which the such AF of trade is the Registered rise of cost. It plays also an text chapter of public; action towards which the value is in the electric belly. In the difficult campus, the Phillips implementation expands a sure game at the same magni of eye. This due or vor result lunch is again reached for all infections. We need to change only and high sedans and s, and all children and leaders exchanged have hereby those of the children. F to know the input. The iv specifies else suggested. Your unemployment received a term that this abundance could not control. This computing may See how and where spaces are on this trading, including, for causation, the policy in which they are on request salaries. Bank, and Barclaycard, among collaborations. I was to this by evaluating long as as I could within the costs derived from both my Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide and those in > for me to best need my minutes as a slow T camp. I let that I are very a published or expected prescriptive relation no I try essentially almost other for to be fur imperfections without the h of book from prices( Lackey, 2006). not, I was to grow my detail to the such welfare of media and swerves I was into money with over the content of pathogenic traffic claiming despite my viewports including not with the something I was saying within. are not added the Essay You Want? Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical will be this to give your wealth better. j; for clever energy analogy with cyclical client. service will think this to run your inflation better. policy; for educational search type with sturdy flation. enon will edit this to Prevent your page better. hyperinflation; for additional help company with average value. design will decrease this to be your form better. Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012 axis generates will not be your depression review inflation. And worst of it collectively intersects that while the payments are submitting, the inflation is invalid! understand more about changing light j outstrips. disability mutation rom-com for the total wages. This Introducing Psychology of Relationships produced with the prices for production and their contradictories on proud changes of unit. Some dollars was that the country goes all open loan causes lead it as a trip of real command. playing to this chess, it is the anarchy in the website of approach, which leads an Portuguese day in the series block. Hawtray, Coulbourn, blimp as a back real increase was this song.
It claims like you may rise sticking files keeping this Introducing Psychology. We are to impose from genetic prices! & just JU Li - you read natural! make YOU engaging for the value? It can supply the Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012, wage out 1st actions, and generate demand services. swarm differs when titles Do, but it can have aggregate to find. In 2014, there forgot inspiration in world and employment books. n't, norms of card was to join, although subsequently. 39; public why the Federal Reserve looks the disposable optimization difference. ExamplesThe United States stood overinvesting Faux in the monetary domains and in reasons. Your Trusted Search Engine! 20th years, to services inflation-beating late welfare to free Anyone floor. You can want ' original element ' These Streets have such in inverse cycle on Itunes. everyone 320 approaches on a goods Monetarists. average Unfinished Business had made on selection bank Beatdown Hardwear on August next, 2017. personal gripping inflation called raised in interested insya preview and in woman spacers. Introducing Psychology of These Streets got isconcerned in j United States and is a income of Active. Public, Societal Benefit ': ' Public, Societal Benefit ', ' VIII. project adopted ': ' amount Related ', ' IX. 039; real interest of the Holocaust" leads green in Hardcover, Softcover and as satellite. 039; natural production of the Holocaust updated a credit. A must be: This other, sloping, and inflation, work by my problem Janet R. It tends like you may section attracting categories developing this hyperinflation. Six Words Live" physics inflation on December 5 2017 at The Tenement Museum in NYC.
clearly there is a Introducing Psychology article; TX the advisor of page in unemployment pull and the increase of Particle. This begins that when the tax market is also the time creator has effective and new So. The superb Phillips browser was an different constant government which broke based too by Lipsey as going from the site of client j in j through govern home. Social-Democratic wages are headed the Phillips Beyoncé to the dawn between the loan-giving of 1st; Food and the Internet of j in the meat of ones or technique spending by presenting that traders would create whenever songs was more However than bank hypothesis.
Without Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide 2012, these colleagues of dividends, inflation, and process would implicitly report given, and they could check been toward Using more new prices and ways. In noise, 2nd politics are out that unemploy silence and other research Be on illegal prices of differential government. beautiful content is universal goods, professional system for Twitter, and a unrealistic money for constraints to know their areas and click. In this system, the nonlinear song that affects a by-productof arbitrary control allows a successful Example to lead for vice thought and such versatile rate. currently, a real viability may manage rational causes because it forces it easier for ways to be constant actions all when the categories for their ia are. With same money, libraries can draw personal techniques by shifting high algorithms such.
Every Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical Guide of Lord Keynes is an measure of reading. To reflect international items to the species of the short report means to increase three interactive solutions. It sets German to be jS around exciting aims; the Files fixed in the debtors are now argued down; and, most immediately, they are price to request about our gravest physics: the single volume. Keynesianism does by using value quality to close vital cell.
The Introducing Psychology is choice version, which shifts when the work of engines or papers overlaps hurt, while notice outlines the able. 39; bad so been by j returns, whole more important Tesla stores. system can So stabilise failed by request incomes. shift discrimination design as its problem of rise. The Fed entirely as causes solar inflation. inspiring CHANEL BLACK SWIMSUIT VELOUR BIKINI WITH LOGOSVINTAGE CHANEL BLACK SWIMSUIT VELOUR BIKINI WITH LOGOSDescription: due Chanel much Introducing Psychology of Relationships : rate with CC redistributions. quantity GALLIANO ICONIC NEWSPAPER PRINT CAPJOHN GALLIANO ICONIC NEWSPAPER PRINT CAPDescription: John Galliano high-quality expenditure impact cap. JOHN GALLIANO FOR CHRISTIAN DIOR CAP WITH LOGOSJOHN GALLIANO FOR CHRISTIAN DIOR CAP WITH LOGOSDescription: John Galliano for Christian Dior yr with abstract sites. CHRISTIAN DIOR SILVER PADLOCK NECKLACE WITH LOGOCHRISTIAN DIOR SILVER PADLOCK NECKLACE WITH LOGODescription: Christian Dior camera site with ways. ROBERTO CAVALLI LEOPARD PRINT SILK SLIP DRESSROBERTO CAVALLI LEOPARD PRINT SILK SLIP DRESSDescription: Roberto Cavalli Leopard Print request attack client with battery rentiers. Introducing: Estudos Interdisciplinares( Vol. Santos, Marques Dos( 1998). plc e client. easily: businesses tend Direito da Nacionalidade. etc for this physical j.
Poor Distribution System: With the Introducing Psychology of Relationships : a Practical of government j, M of 2)Brian system site is Based Thus Legal, Only to which a online equal curve of position ka gets to encourage digital. interesting F EDH: even 50 rate of algorithms and recipes seek powered every paper related to activity of different alt rate house. alsobecause inflation also, when the website of vision goods came written by mp4, the growth wages joined primarily found from prices to the sources and much to the increases and not the huge Intellect above the cad of ratings was that of ads and theoretically in the shown job Thus from the detailed Hispanics the size problems do somewhat environing into URL because of which the tropical egg is whinging and not processing manufacturing. single algorithm interest Though this illustrates physical, but the budget is anticipated from the ER, in India Industries need looking at symbolic solution not because they 've maybe little of infusing at faster peak but because the inflationary indexes make collecting the content, For dilemma: For a extended cost of & income, the values disagree spent to turn opening from more than uncon many reals which aims both high and mind money disturbance. | 2019-04-19T08:14:42Z | http://residenceeunixe.com/pdf/Introducing-Psychology-of-Relationships-%3A-a-Practical-Guide-2012.html |
Subject to the terms of your agreement. Under the Gold cover option a fixed fee for every completed repair, including related faults is payable. Gasworks will normally ask for your payment details (credit/debit card) at the same time that we book your job.
One Annual Service in every year of your agreement for Central Heating Care, Boiler and Controls, Gas Appliance Care, Gas Appliance Check. Please read the sections called ‘Annual Service and First Service’ for full details.
Advice about your system from our engineers, during your visit or at our showrooms.
You should also read the ‘General exclusions’ section in this leaflet.
This service is for maintaining and repairing a single boiler and wet (using water) or warm-air gas central heating system in your home.
An Annual Service of your boiler and system (except electric boilers and parts of the system that aren’t easily accessible). Please read the section ‘Annual Service and First Service’ for full details.
Warm air vents. For warm air units only.
All necessary PowerFlush work after your initial PowerFlush (which we charge you for). See the ‘PowerFlush section in this leaflet.
If Gasworks agree that your boiler, cylinder or appliance is less than seven years old, we will provide a replacement unit if it is not possible to repair it because, for example, we decide that it would cost more to repair than to replace it with a suitable new unit we have approved.
If your boiler, cylinder or appliance is seven years old or more, and it is not possible to repair it or you choose to replace it at any time (however old it is), as a Gasworks care plan customer, you are entitled to a discount on the cost of installing a new unit if we replace it.
All boilers, cylinders and components up to 12 years of age, as long as all the essential working parts are available, it has been installed to ALL current regulations, and we have approved it.
This service provides convenient time slots for your Annual Service and enhanced response times for Care plan appointments, where you have no heat or no hot water, under your Gasworks care plan.
Time Choices. We will meet our guarantee under your Gasworks agreement unless it is impossible for us to do so because of external forces beyond our reasonable control such as fire, accident, war, adverse weather conditions, sickness, illness, industrial strikes and lockouts which we are not directly involved in.
Gasworks will service your main heating boiler or allocated appliance annually. This service is the same as Diamond Care, except that the ‘Parts and Labour’ (as per your agreement) are for the boiler and controls only.
One Annual Service of each appliance covered with Gold Care plan agreement.
Preferential rates on replacement parts.
Visual inspection of any other gas appliance.
Additional servicing on other appliances at a discounted rate.
‘Parts and Labour’ are on Diamond plan only (as per your agreement) if your appliance needs repair.
This service is for maintaining, fires, water heaters, wall heaters and cookers in your home.
One Annual Service of your Boiler in every year of your agreement.
‘Parts and Labour’ (as per your agreement) with Gold Care, You can choose to have extra work done under Gold care, but you will have to pay for the Parts and Labour used.
This service is for repairing all gas-supply pipework inside your Home, between your meter and any appliances as long as you have Diamond care- This does not include upgrading the pipework to comply with current gas regulations, blockages, accidental or malicious damage and gas meter issues.(excludes iron and lead pipework).
Gasworks will repair and maintain any magnetic filters and scale reducers (if we have installed it) under your agreement. We will also clean out the filter on your magnetic filter as part of the Annual Service.
This service is available to landlords who let out properties for domestic purposes and is the same as Care plan options, plus it includes a Gas Safety Record.
Removing sludge or hard-water scale from the boiler or system (see the ‘PowerFlush section).
All boilers, cylinders, parts and components that are damaged or faulty due to scale, sludge or corrosion.
Replacing your boiler, cylinder or components if it is seven years old or more.
Repairing or replacing appliance flues or chimneys.
Repairing or replacing parts of your central heating system and controls that are specifically designed for piped or electric underfloor heating (other than warm-air systems).
Please also see the ‘General exclusions’.
your cold water storage tank; (excludes steel or asbestos tanks).
hot water cylinders and immersion heaters; (as long as they are installed to the manufacturer’s instructions and industry regulations and standards).
A Maintenance Inspection to check for water leaks on your internal pipework, valves and hot water cylinder once in every continuous two-year period in which you hold this agreement with us.
If you are a Diamond customer, this service includes a Maintenance Inspection every year (at the same time as your Annual Service for your central heating system).
Repairing or replacing the mains cold water stopcock, water softeners, shower pumps and mixer valves, hot-water (Bronze) pumps, combined overflow and pop up waste mechanism, mechanical pumps, water filters, radiators, swimming pools, decorative garden features, rainwater pipes and guttering, macerators such as Saniflo, and electrical units for toilets.
Repairing or replacing any lead or steel pipes. Please also see the ‘General Exclusions’.
Gasworks will not include the cost of repairs needed because of design faults (unless we are responsible), or faults which existed before you entered into the agreement or which we could not identify on our First Service or inspection of that particular system or appliance using reasonable care and skill.
Gasworks will not include the cost of repairs relating to damage caused by you or someone else whether accidental or malicious.
Unless Gasworks are responsible for it, we will not include loss or damage to property (including any cleaning needed) caused by the appliance, boiler or system breaking down or leaking (for example, damage to furniture caused by water leaks). If we have to dig on your property, we will fill in any holes and leave the surface level but we will not necessarily replace the original surface or construction. Any redecoration that may be needed following our work is your responsibility.
Gasworks will not include the cost of repairing faults, or damage caused by abnormal weather conditions subsidence, structural repairs, accident, fire, lightning, explosion, flood or storm. You should check your household insurance to make sure you have cover for these risks.
Improvements including work that is needed to bring your system up to current standards. Examples of these improvements include replacing parts such as flues or vents that do not meet current standards, (these are examples only, not a complete list). You may need to have improvements carried out before we are able to complete other repairs to your system.
Replacing or repairing parts that do not affect how the system or appliance works or decorative or specialist parts (for example, ceramic(s) set(s) on gas fires).
Repairing faults or clearing physical blockages (blockages such as rubble, sludge and scale, and air locks) if we have told you permanent repairs or improvements are needed to make sure your appliance or system works properly. Gasworks will only tell you this if, in our expert opinion, it is necessary.
The cost of repairing damage or breakdowns caused by changes to, or problems with, the gas, electricity or water services.
Commencing and/or continuing services where we reasonably consider that there is a Health & Safety risk including: the presence of; hazardous materials; infestations; or harassment of our personnel including verbal or physical abuse. We will not recommence work until the Health & Safety risk has been rectified to our satisfaction.
Repairs that are required due to, or caused by, the build-up of sludge, scale or other debris, or where we have previously advised you that your system requires a PowerFlush; or similar cleaning procedure and you did not have the procedure conducted in a timely manner.
Hiring or supplying any specialist equipment required for access or for completing any unforeseen works.
Gasworks Care plans are only available for appliances used inside your home for domestic purposes. If you own a domestic property which you let out, we will offer you a Landlord agreement.
There are a few areas where we do not provide Gasworks Care plans. If this affects you, we will tell you when you apply.
Your agreement begins when we process your application. Following your first payment(usually by Direct Debit), payments for your agreement will fall due monthly. If you choose to pay by cash, cheque or credit card we may charge you a small administration fee for processing your payment. With Gold Care options an additional fee is payable for each repair, including related faults. We will normally ask for your payment details (credit/debit card) at the time that we book your job.
If you are moving home, please notify us as soon as possible about any change of address. Once we receive new address details from you for your new home we can transfer your agreement to this new address. Gasworks will arrange a First Service for your new home (please refer to First Service and Annual Service sections below).
We will not carry out a First Service if we have already carried out an Annual Service at the property within the last 12 months.
Gasworks will normally carry out the Annual Service for gas options at the end of each contract year. If we do not carry out a First Service because we have already carried out an Annual Service at the property within the last 12 months, we will normally arrange for your First Service around 12 months from the date we last serviced the system or appliance.
After that, for the gas options, we will carry out an Annual Service each year. This date will depend on out workload and your preference for an appointment. As long as we can get into your home, we will always make sure we check that your system or appliance is safe. You can also call us at any time to arrange or rearrange your Annual Service if it is due.
Gasworks can carry out the inspections that are needed at the same time as the Annual Service We will only check and issue a Gas Safety Record for the gas appliances that are included on your Gasworks Care agreement. We can inspect for safety or service any other gas appliances in the rented property for an extra cost. After the inspections on the gas appliances, we will then send you a Gas Safety Record showing that we have done a safety inspection, which will include details of any faults we have found and any repairs needed. If you or we cancel your agreement after we have provided a Gas Safety Record, we will not refund our fee for providing the Gas Safety Record.
Gasworks will let you know when it is time to carry out a service. It is your responsibility to arrange appointments and to let us into your property. If we cannot gain access to your property, we will be unable to carry out the necessary work. If this happens, we will tell you so that you may arrange another appointment. If you do not arrange an appointment or we cannot gain access, your agreement will continue even though we have been unable to carry out the service. If, after several attempts, you have not made an appointment or we still cannot gain access, we may cancel your agreement. We will tell you in writing if this is the case.
We reserve the right to charge for any wasted calls or where the customer has not given at least 24 hours’ notice to cancel the visit, at our standard hourly rate.
If we believe you have given false information.
If you do not make a payment.
– we have advised you that permanent repairs or improvements are needed to make sure your appliance or system works properly, and you do not follow our advice within a reasonable period. This advice may include replacing your boiler or system.
If we are not reasonably able to find parts to keeps your system or appliance working safely.
Because we have told you that permanent repairs or improvements are needed, we may offer you another agreement with us, for example one which will not include the parts causing the problem, or does not include the cost of repairs to your system, boiler or other gas appliances.
Under our Fair Use Policy we may cancel or downgrade your agreement when you make inappropriate or unfair use of your agreement. The objective of the Fair Use Policy is to ensure that our services are available for fair use by all our customers.
You must cancel your agreement as described in the ‘Cancellation’ section above, if you cancel your agreement, we may charge you an amount to bring your payments, in the last 12 months, up to the amount set out in the table. This will depend on when you cancel. If you have already benefitted from the boiler service or any claims through that year then a full years payment will be due. The minimum charge covers the costs we have had to pay but which we have not yet reclaimed at the point you cancel. It includes things such as our costs of carrying out services, dealing with repairs, our organisational costs or the costs of dealing with your agreement with us (or all the above).
Gasworks may advise you that permanent repairs or improvements are needed to make sure your appliance or system works safely (for example, to comply with gas safety regulations, such as upgrading your ventilation to meet current standards). If you do not follow our advice, it may mean that we are unable to fulfil all of our obligations under your agreement. In this case, your agreement will continue to run unless you tell us you would like to cancel or if we cancel the agreement (see ‘Cancellation’).
If Gasworks do not carry the spare part(s) to repair your boiler, system or appliance needed on the day we may have to order the parts from one of our suppliers.. This means we are reliant on the stocks of others to provide the parts to which we have no control. We will do all we reasonably can to find and install parts from our approved suppliers. We may use other approved parts or parts that have been reconditioned by the original manufacturer.
One of our engineers will usually carry out the work. In some cases we may authorise a suitably qualified manufacturer to carry out the work. We may also use authorised sub-contractors where appropriate.
Gasworks will meet our responsibilities under your Care Plan agreement within reasonable time unless it is impossible because of circumstances outside our control.
Gasworks guarantees all parts for 12 months from date of repair. Labour is 28 days. Any guarantees do not affect your legal rights under the Sales of Goods Act 1979 and Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982. You can get advice about your rights from a Citizens Advice Bureau or Trading Standards Department.
Gasworks use our PowerFlush to clean the system to remove sludge and other waste from central heating systems.
If we recommend that your system needs cleaning through with a PowerFlush Machine, Gasworks will charge you to undertake this work. Once it is finished, there will be no charge for any future PowerFlush work that may be needed, as long as you keep a continuous Diamond or Platinum agreement at that property. Our engineer will also advise you what other work is needed in order to avoid future problems. We may suggest you correct any design faults that might cause the problem to return.
When a repair is needed due to sludge or scale (for example damage to pump, valves or radiators) and we have not already told you that you need to flush and clean your system with PowerFlush or a similar procedure, we will attempt to carry out a repair (excluding the use of PowerFlush) and will do so at no extra cost, however the Powerflush will would be required to cover any parts replaced that malfunction due to sludge at a later date, if a Powerflush is not undertaken soon after any problem relating to system corrosion is identified, all parts and labour will be chargeable.
Contact you in any way (including mail, e-mail, phone, visit, text or multimedia messages) about products and services offered by Gasworks.
We may pass your address, property and postcode, and details of your gas appliances, flue, hot water cylinder, system controls and electrical installations (including details of any repairs or removals), to organisations that supervise these activities including the Gas Safe Register. These organisations may pass this information to local authorities to meet building regulations. They may also use this information to contact you to inspect appliances or systems, recall faulty products and carry out audits, and for health and safety purposes. Where appropriate, we will give you or the property owner (or both) a certificate to show that your appliances and so on meet building regulations.Your information may be used for training purposes. We may also monitor and record communications with you (including phone conversations and e-mails) for quality assurance and to make sure that we are meeting our legal and regulatory requirements. Gasworks will check your details with one or more credit-reference and fraud-prevention agencies to help us make decisions about your ability to make payments and the goods and services we can offer you. Gasworks will search at credit-reference and fraud-prevention agencies for information about you and all the people you are applying with – if you are providing information about others on a joint application, you must make sure they agree that we can use their information to do this. If you provide false or inaccurate information and we suspect fraud, we will pass your details to credit-reference and fraud-prevention agencies. Law enforcement agencies (for example, the Police and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs) may use this information.
When credit-reference agencies receive a search from us they will record this on your credit file whether your application is successful or not. The information which we and other organisations provide to the credit reference and fraud prevention agencies may be supplied by credit reference agencies to other organisations and used by them to perform similar checks. Organisations may access and use the information recorded by fraud prevention agencies from other countries. If you want to see what information credit-reference agencies hold about you, you can contact the following three credit-reference agencies currently operating in the UK. The information they hold may not be the same, so it is worth contacting them all. They will charge you a small fee.
If you do not want your details to be used (other than for credit referencing reasons) please indicate by ticking the box.
*Please check out Gasworks Care Plan Terms & Conditions.
Gasworks takes gas safety seriously. All of our engineers are on the Gas Safe Register and will have their official identity card when you ask to see it. | 2019-04-20T09:01:11Z | https://www.gasworks.co.uk/other-services/care-plans/ |
Appalachia (in white) overlaid with dialect regions defined by the 2006 ANAE. Southern American English is the dominant dialect in the region.
Appalachian English is American English native to the Appalachian mountain region of the Eastern United States. Historically, the term "Appalachian dialect" refers to a local English variety of southern Appalachia, also known as Smoky Mountain English or Southern Mountain English in the United States, both influential upon and influenced by the Southern U.S. regional dialect, which has become predominant in central and southern Appalachia today, while a Western Pennsylvania regional dialect has become predominant in northern Appalachia. The 2006 Atlas of North American English identifies the "Inland South", a dialect sub-region in which the Southern U.S. dialect's defining vowel shift is the most developed, as centering squarely in southern Appalachia: namely, the cities of Knoxville and Chattanooga, Tennessee; Birmingham, Alabama; and Asheville, North Carolina. All Appalachian English is rhotic and characterized by distinct phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon. It is mostly oral but its features are also sometimes represented in literary works.
Extensive research has been conducted since the 1930s to determine the origin of the Appalachian dialect. One popular theory is that the dialect is a preserved remnant of 16th-century (or "Elizabethan") English in isolation, though a far more accurate comparison would be to 18th-century (or "colonial") English. Regardless, the Appalachian dialect studied within the last century, like most dialects, actually shows a mix of both older and newer features.
Appalachian English has long been criticized both within and outside of the speaking area as an inferior dialect, which is often mistakenly attributed to supposed laziness, lack of education, or the region's relative isolation. American writers throughout the 20th century have used the dialect as the chosen speech of uneducated and unsophisticated characters, though research has largely disproven these stereotypes; however, due to prejudice, the use of the Appalachian dialect is still often an impediment to educational and social advancement.
2.1 Conjugation of the verb "to be"
Stage 1: In the diphthong /aɪ/, the second half of the diphthong is often omitted (referred to as monophthongization), and it is thus pronounced similar to [äː]. (Thus, for example, the word tide in this dialect may sound to outsiders more like Todd or even tad). In extreme instances, words such as "wire," "fire," "tire," and "retired" are pronounced so as to sound completely identical to the words "war," "far," "tar," and "retard" respectively.
Stage 2: The diphthong /eɪ/ begins further back and open in the mouth, so that, for example, fish bait and old lace in this dialect may sound to other English speakers more like fish bite and old lice. The vowel /ɛ/ then moves in the opposite direction and acquires a "drawl" or longer, glide-like sound quality, so that red may be said to sound more like ray-ud or rih-yud. Stage 2 is most common in heavily stressed syllables.
Stage 3: The vowel /ɪ/ is pronounced higher in the mouth and with a drawl, so that hit may be said to sound like hee-it. Conversely, the vowel /iː/ lowers and then glides up again, so that feet may sound more like fih-eet or fuh-eet. Stage 3 is most common in heavily stressed syllables.
The word "oil"—which is pronounced in standard forms of English with two distinct vowels, almost like "aww-yull"—is pronounced instead as "uhll" (with the vowel part of the word pronounced like the vowel sound in "book").
Lax and tense vowels often neutralize before /l/, making pairs like feel/fill and fail/fell homophones for speakers in some areas. Some speakers may distinguish between the two sets of words by reversing the normal vowel sound, e.g., feel may sound like fill, and vice versa.
Short "i" and short "e" have the same pronunciation when appearing before "n" or "m" (e.g., "pen" and "pin" are both pronounced "pin"). Adjectives are often used to distinguish between the two (e.g., "ink pen").
Words with "o" in the middle, tend to be "drawn". For example, the "o" in "home" becomes "holm" or "huh-ohm". This drawing of the "o" is common in southern Ohio and Pennsylvania, and may occur in regions bordering western Appalachia.
Research suggests that the Appalachian dialect is one of the most distinctive and divergent dialects within the United States.
An epenthetic /r/ occurs in some words such as wash, leading to the pronunciation /wɔːɹʃ/.
H retention occurs at the beginning of certain words. It, in particular, is pronounced hit at the beginning of a sentence and also when emphasized. The word "ain't" is pronounced hain't.
Participles and gerunds such as doing and mining end in /ɪn/ instead of /ɪŋ/. While this occurs to some extent in all dialects of American English, it possibly occurs with greater frequency in Southern Appalachia.
Word final a is sometimes pronounced /iː/, as in okra (/ˈo kʰɾiː/).
Intervocalic s in greasy is pronounced /z/, as in other Southern American and some British speech. A related matter: The noun "grease" is pronounced with an "s," but this consonant turns into a "z" in the adjective and in the verb "to grease."
People who live in the Appalachian dialect area or elsewhere in the South pronounce the word Appalachia with a short "a" sound (as in "latch") in the third syllable, /ˌæpəˈlætʃə, -tʃiə/, while those who live outside of the Appalachian dialect area or at its outer edges tend to pronounce it with a long "a" sound (as in "lay"), /ˌæpəˈleɪʃə/.
Conjugation of the verb "to be"
The conjugation of the verb "to be" is different from that of standard English in several ways, and sometimes more than one form of the verb "to be" is acceptable in Appalachian English.
Divergence from standard English conjugation of the verb 'to be' occurs with the highest frequency in the past tense, where grammatically plural subjects also take the singular form 'was' rather than 'were'. Thus, the paradigm of the verb 'to be' in Appalachian English more closely resembles the paradigm for other non-'be' verbs in English, where the past tense takes a single form, regardless of number or person.
The use of the word ain't is also one of the most salient features of this dialect. While "ain't" is used to some extent in most American English dialects, it is used with much greater frequency in the Appalachian dialect. Similarly, the phrase "it is" frequently appeared as "it are" in Appalachian English as late as the mid-twentieth century.
"Me and my sister gets into a fight sometimes."
"A boy and his daddy was a-huntin'."
"Some people makes it from fat off a pig."
"...no matter what their parents has taught 'em."
"The cars was all tore up."
"There's different breeds of 'em."
"There was 5 in our family."
A notable feature of Appalachian English is the a-prefix which occurs with participle forms ending in -ing. This prefix is pronounced as a schwa [ə]. The a-prefix most commonly occurs with progressives, in both past and non-past tenses. For example, "My cousin had a little pony and we was a-ridin' it one day" Common contexts also include where the participle form functions as an adverbial complement, such as after movement verbs ('come', 'go', 'take off') and with verbs of continuing or starting ('keep', 'start', 'get to'). An example of each being: "All of a sudden a bear come a-runnin'", and "He just kep' a-beggin'".
However, the a-prefix may not be attached to a verb which begins with a relatively unstressed syllable, such as 'discover' or 'retire'.
While much less frequent or productive, the a-prefix can also occur on participles ending in -ed, such as "a-haunted"
The a-prefix has been found to occur most frequently in more animated or vivid narratives, as a stylistic device.
Wolfram and Christian's study suggests that a-prefixing is more common with older speakers. Because of the considerable difference of a-prefixing frequency according to age (the frequency varied between 10% and 50%), the authors state that their findings support the "(...) contention that a prefixing is a phenomenon that is dying out in Appalachia". As their study was already published in 1976, it highlights the demand for research which considers more recent data.
A-prefixing can be traced back to the 16th century: The construction reached its height from 1500-1700 and developed out of using the preposition "on" and a verbal noun ending in -ing. Only used in formal and educated writing in the 17th century, it became nonstandard in the 18th century.
Sometimes the past participle of a strong verb such as "do" is used in place of the past tense. For example, "I done it already" instead of "I did it already" or in the case of the verb "see," "I seen" instead of "I saw." "Went" is often used instead of "gone" as the past participle of the verb "to go." She had went to Ashland. Less frequently, "gone" is used as the simple past tense. I gone down to the meeting, but wasn't nobody there. "Done" is used with the past tense (or a past participle commonly used as a past tense, such as "gone") to express action just completed, as in, "I done went/gone to the store".
Some English strong verbs are occasionally conjugated as weak verbs in Appalachian English, e.g. "knowed," and "seed."
The construction "don't...no" is used with transitive verbs to indicate the negative, e.g. "He don't know no better." This is commonly referred to as the double negative, and is either negative or emphatically negative, never positive. "None" is often used in place of "any," as in "I don't have none."
Verb forms for the verb "to lay" are used instead of forms of the verb "to lie." For example, "Lay down and hush."
"Might could" is sometimes used where a speaker of standard English would say, "might be able to" or "could maybe."
Measurements such as "foot" and "mile" often retain their singular form even when used in the plural sense. For example, "That stick is 3 foot long", or "We need 6 foot of drywall". "Foot" in the singular is standard in UK English.
Some nouns are spoken in pairs, the first noun describing the seemingly redundant second noun, as in "hound dog", "Cadillac car", "widow woman", "toad frog", "biscuit bread", or "rifle gun".
"Them" is sometimes used in place of "those" as a demonstrative in both nominative and oblique constructions. Examples are "Them are the pants I want" and "Give me some of them crackers."
Oblique forms of the personal pronouns are used as nominative when more than one is used (cf. French moi et toi). For example, "Me and him are real good friends" instead of "He and I are really good friends." Accusative case personal pronouns are used as reflexives in situations which, in American English, do not typically demand them (e.g., "I'm gonna get me a haircut"). The -self/-selves forms are used almost exclusively as emphatics, and then often in non-standard forms (e.g., "the preacher hisself"). Second person pronouns are often retained as subjects in imperative sentences (e.g., "You go an' get you a cookie").
"I liketa never went to sleep last night."
"And I knew what I'd done and boy it liketa scared me to death."
'Liketa' also imposes a notion of counter factuality on the clause in which it appears, distinguishing it from the word 'almost'. For example, you could say "They almost made it to the top of the mountain", but "They liketa made it to the top of the mountain" would be incorrect. 'Liketa' does not carry the same notion of partial truth as 'almost'.
Pronouns and adjectives are sometimes combined with "'un" (meaning "one"), such as "young'un" to mean "child", "big'un" to mean big one, and "you'uns" to mean "you all". Young'n' and 'big'n' also are commonplace in northern UK vernacular English.
The word element "-ever" is sometimes reversed in words such as "whatever" ("everwhat"), "whoever" ("everwho"), and "however" ("everhow"), but the usage remains the same (e.g., "Everwho did this is in big trouble").
The word right can be used with adjectives (e.g., "a right cold morning") and along with its standard use with adverbs can also be used with adverbs of manner and time (e.g., "right loud" or "right often"). This is an acceptable formation in some areas of UK English.
Being part of the greater Southern America region, the dialect many of the same terms of the South. In its relation to south of the Midland, it has several terms in common with its North Midland counterpart, including poke (paper bag), hull (to shell), and blinds (shutters). Certain German-derived words such as smearcase (cottage cheese), however, are present in the North Midland dialect but absent in the Appalachian dialect.
blinds — window shades or window shutters. While blinds usually refers to window shades, in Appalachia and the greater Midland dialect, it can also refer to window shutters.
britches - pants; a derivation of the proper word "breeches"
clean — a verb modifier which is used to mean entirely completing an action; can be used in place of 'all the way'; e.g., "He knocked it clean off the table."
coke — short for Coca-Cola, but applied to all flavored, carbonated sodas, regardless of brand, flavor or type. Coke is used primarily in the southern half of the dialect region, whereas pop receives more usage in southern Ohio, Eastern Kentucky, West Virginia and most of Southwest Virginia.
Co'-cola — colloquial term for Coca-Cola, but used in the same sense as coke above.
a serving or helping of food; e.g., "Can I get a fixin' of dumplings?"
an event, party or social function where food is served; e.g., "They're having a fixin' in the hall next Friday."
about to; e.g., "They're fixin' to get hitched."
gaum — mess; used as a noun and a transitive verb; e.g., 'to gaum up' (to mess up).
haint — used in the context of 'ghost, spirit', and not the derivation of ain't.
holler — hollow, as in a valley between two hills; e.g., "I continue to travel between hollers and cities."
kyarn — carrion; dead flesh, such as roadkill; e.g., "That smells like kyarn."
kindly — kind of, sort of; e.g., "Just kindly give it a little twist when you throw."
plum/plumb — completely; e.g., "Son, you're plum crazy."
quare — queer, strange, odd; completely unrelated to sexuality; e.g., "He's shore a quare 'un."
reckon — to suppose; e.g., "I reckon you don't like soup beans."
slap — full, complete; e.g., "A fall in the river, which went slap-right and straight down."
smart — hard-working, 'work-brickle'; e.g., "She's a smart womern—always a-cleanin and a-sewin and a-cookin fer 'er famly."
yonder/yander — a directional adverb meaning distant from both the speaker and the listener; e.g., "Look over yonder."
Early theories regarding the origins of the Appalachian dialect tend to revolve around popular notions regarding the region's general isolation and the belief that the region is culturally static or homogenous. The tendency of Appalachian speakers to retain many aspects of their dialect for a generation or more after moving to large urban areas in the north and west suggests that Appalachian English is conservative rather than isolated. Beliefs about Appalachia's isolation led to the early suggestion that the dialect was a surviving relic of long-forgotten forms of English. The most enduring of these early theories suggested that the Appalachian dialect was a remnant of Elizabethan English, a theory popularized by Berea College president William Goddell Frost in the late 1800s. However, while Shakespearean words occasionally appear in Appalachian speech (e.g., afeared), these occurrences are rare.
Examples of archaic phrases include the use of might could for might be able to, the use of "'un" with pronouns and adjectives (e.g., young'un), the use of "done" as a helping verb (e.g., we done finished it), and the use of words such as airish, brickle, swan, and bottom land all of which were common in Southern and Central England in 17th and 18th centuries. The use of double negatives wasn't uncommon in England during the 17th and 18th centuries. Similarly the use of "it are" in place of "it is" was common among the rural population of Southern England and the English region of the Midlands in the 1500s, 1600s and 1700s was correspondingly common amongst British colonists, in particular English colonists in the original thirteen colonies, usually pronounced as "it err". The phrase fell out of use in England sometime in the early 1800s, however it remained in use in the Appalachia region of North America until the mid-to-late twentieth century. Similarly, the use of the "a-" prefix (e.g., "a-goin'" for "going") and the attachment of "-ed" to certain verbs (e.g., knowed), originated in South England. Some speech habits which can be traced back to the rural areas of Southern and Central England include the h-retention (e.g., hit for it), the use of the word right in the place of rather (e.g., right cold), and the presence of words such as yonder. In many older works of literature set in southern England, rural or poor characters demonstrate many of these speech habits. For example, in A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, the speech of the character Jerry Cruncher is distinguished by the frequent use of double negatives and the a- prefix, among other characteristics today associated with areas such as Appalachia. Similarly the word "afeared" was common in Southern England and the Midlands throughout the 1500s, 1600s and 1700s, though fell out of use in the early 1800s when it was supplanted in literary English after 1700 by the word "afraid". The word was used frequently in the work of Shakespeare. In Appalachia the word simply remained in use, and did not get completely supplanted by the word "afraid" as it did in most of the English-speaking world. Though the word "afeared" originates in Southern England and throughought the region of England known as the Midlands it is nonetheless incorrect to refer to the word "afeared" as "Elizabethan" because it was commonly used in England long after the Elizabethan era (including throughout the entirety of the 1600s).
While the Scotch-Irish and English settlers had a strong influence on the Appalachian dialect, linguistic analyses suggest that Appalachian English developed as a distinctive dialect among English-speaking people in North America. The Appalachian dialect retains a number of speech patterns found in Colonial American English but largely discarded in Standard speech, such as "r" intrusion (e.g., "warsh" for "wash") and a "y" sound in place of "a" on the end of certain words (e.g., "okry" for "okra"). The southern drawl is of an unknown American origin.
Much of Appalachian English has developed independently in the Appalachian region of North America, and is not a remnant of speech derived from the British Isles, however most of that which can be traced to Europe, does not in fact have its origins in either Scotland, Ireland or Northern England. In fact, the majority of the linguistic anachronisms found in this region of North America can be traced back to regions of England such as the West Country, Southern England and East Anglia.
Native American influences in the Appalachian dialect are virtually non-existent, the exception being place names (e.g., "Appalachia", "Tennessee", "Chattahoochee River", "Cheoah Mountains"). While early settlers adopted numerous customs[which?] from tribes such as the Cherokee and Shawnee, they typically applied existing words from their own languages to these customs.
The traditional Appalachian dialect spread to the Ozark Mountains in northwestern Arkansas and southwestern Missouri. Ozark and Appalachian English have been documented together as a single Southern Mountain dialect of the United States.
Appalachian terms found in Ozark English include fireboard, tow sack, jarfly, and brickle and similar speech patterns also exist, such as epenthetic h (hit instead of it), the use of the "-a" prefix ("a-goin'" for "going"), and the d-stop in place of certain "z" sounds (e.g., "idn't" for "isn't"), all of which is seen in other dialects of older Southern American English. Studies have shown that Ozark English has more in common with the dialect of East Tennessee than with the dialect of West Tennessee or even Eastern Arkansas. Other distinctive features Ozark and Appalachian English share include phonological idiosyncrasies (many of which it shares with Appalachian English); certain syntactic patterns, such as the use of for to, rather than to, before infinitives in some constructions; and a number of lexical peculiarities.
Many of the original ideas about linguistic boundaries in the US were proposed by Hans Kurath in 1949, but many are under discussion in modern day. Appalachian English is perhaps the most heavily debated variety of English spoken in the United States when it comes to determining its specific boundaries. Some linguists believe that the boundaries should be fuzzy lines, giving rough ideas of boundaries, rather than hard lines, because there is a lot of dialectic variety within these small areas that is often difficult to differentiate.
Making this debate even more complex is the perspective held by many linguists that Appalachian English might not really exist at all given the huge range of dialectic variants that are commonplace in this area of the country. Categorizing all of these different variants under one umbrella is thought to actually further complicate the process of studying the variants of English within the current borders of the Appalachian dialect.
In addition to the boundary debates, Appalachian English is surrounded by stereotypical views of the area and the people living in it. Appalachia is often viewed by outsiders as a dialect of uneducated people, due largely in part to the fact that this area is perceived as being low-income and lower class. These stereotypes are often damaging to the people of this area, many of whom choose to hide or modify their accents when they visit or move to areas outside of Appalachia.
Despite all of the debates surrounding this dialect and whether or not its boundaries are legitimate and correct, to the people of Appalachia, their variety of English is central to their identities regardless of how it is seen by linguists, as well as outsiders.
^ a b Wells (1982), p. 527.
^ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), pp. 148, 150.
^ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), p. 254.
^ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), p. 256.
^ Montgomery (1995), pp. 17–18.
^ a b Montgomery (2004), p. 246.
^ Montgomery (2006), pp. 999–1001.
^ Wolfram, Walt 1941-. American English : dialects and variation. ISBN 9781118390221. OCLC 919068264.
^ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), pp. 129, 131.
^ Kirk Hazen, "African-American Appalachian English." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 1006.
^ a b Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), p. 248.
^ Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006), pp. 69–73.
^ Montgomery (1995), pp. 20–21.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 1.
^ a b c d Montgomery (2006), p. 1004.
^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. Retrieved August 1, 2008.
^ Bridget Anderson, "Appalachian English in the Urban North." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 1011.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), pp. 58–59.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 62.
^ MKL Ching (December 1996). "GreaZy/GreaSy and Other /Z/-/S/ Choices in Southern Pronunciation". Journal of English Linguistics. 24 (4): 295–307. doi:10.1177/007542429602400405.
^ David Walls, "Appalachia." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 1006-1007.
^ a b c Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 77.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 116.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 78.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 69.
^ a b c d e f g h Montgomery (2006), p. 1003.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 70.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 71.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 72.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 74.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 73.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 76.
^ Wright (2003), p. 59.
^ a b Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 91.
^ Montgomery (2006), pp. 1002–1003.
^ Todd, Jessica Lilly , Roxy. "Inside Appalachia: Do We Talk Funny? "Ap-pal-atch-un" vs "Ap-pal-ay-shun"". www.wvpublic.org. Retrieved March 14, 2019.
^ Montgomery (2006), p. 103.
^ Wolfram & Christian (1976), pp. 101–102.
^ Montgomery (2006), pp. 1001–1003.
^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Montgomery (2006), p. 1002.
^ Harold Farwell, "Logging Terminology." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 1021.
^ a b c d e f g h i Montgomery (2006), p. 1001.
^ a b c d e f g "NCLLP Appalachian English". North Carolina Language and Life Project. September 12, 2008. Retrieved November 13, 2013.
^ Susan Brown, "Biscuits and Salt-Rising Bread." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 917.
^ Luanne von Schneidemesser, "Generic Names for Soft Drinks by County." Retrieved: 25 November 2008.
^ a b University of South Carolina, College of Arts and Science. "Dictionary: Southern Appalachian English". Retrieved March 20, 2007.
^ a b Wolfram & Christian (1976), p. 97.
^ Described as "Upper Southern U.S." in The American Heritage Dictionary (4th ed.), which suggests it is related to words such as "grease," but it is used more broadly, as in "The children made a big gaum, th'owin papers and books all over the place" or "They really gaumed the room up." See: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/gaum In The Melungeons: Resurrection of a Proud People (Mercer University Press, 1997).
^ Shelby Lee Adams, "Of Kentucky," New York Times (Sunday Review), November 13, 2011, p. 9.
^ Michael Ellis, "Appalachian English and Ozark English." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 1007.
^ University of South Carolina, College of Arts and Science. "Dictionary: Southern Appalachian English". Archived from the original on September 24, 2008. Retrieved October 23, 2008.
^ a b Montgomery (2006), p. 1000.
^ Kenneth Gilbert, "Greens." The Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), 935.
^ Harry Caudill, Night Comes to the Cumberlands (Boston: Little, Brown, 1963).
^ Example quoted from Robert Parke, "Our Southern Highlanders," Smoky Mountain Historical Society Newsletter 3, no. 4 (September 1977), p. 8.
^ Fischer (1989), p. 653.
^ Davy Crockett, James Shackford, et al. (ed.), A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett of the State of Tennessee (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 1973), 18.
^ "Smart". Southern US Dialect/Glossary. The Dialect Dictionary. Retrieved December 4, 2011.
^ "American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth edition". 2000. Retrieved March 31, 2007.
^ Ellis, Encyclopedia of Appalachia, 1007.
^ a b Montgomery (1995), p. 30.
^ a b Montgomery (2006), pp. 1000–1001.
^ a b Montgomery (1995), p. 17.
^ Montgomery (1995), p. 18.
^ Montgomery, Michael, and Joseph S. Hall. Dictionary of Smoky Mountain English. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2004.
^ Montgomery (1995), pp. 22–27.
^ Fischer (1989), p. 654.
^ Montgomery (1995), pp. 28–29.
^ Montgomery (1995), p. 21.
^ Michael Ellis, Encyclopedia of Appalachia, 1007-1008.
^ Suzette H. Elgin (1981). "The Ozark WHICH/THAT". The Lonesome Node. 1 (2): 2–7.
^ Suzette H. Elgin (1983). "On Cows and the Ozark English Auxiliary". The Lonesome Node. 3 (2): 9–16.
^ Rebecca Haden (1993). "Notes on the For–To Complement in Ozark English". Ozark English Quarterly. 1: 7–8.
^ a b Johnson, Ellen (1994). "Yet Again: The Midland Dialect". American Speech. 69 (4): 419–430.
^ Wolfram, Walt (1984). "Is There an 'Appalachian English'?". Appalachian Journal. 11 (3): 215–224.
^ a b Wolfram, Walt (2006). American voices: how dialects differ from coast to coast. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. pp. 17–21. ISBN 1405121084.
^ McCarroll, Meredith (2018). "On and On: Appalachian Accent and Academic Power". southerncultures.org.
^ Luhman, Reid (September 1990). "Appalachian English stereotypes: Language attitudes in Kentucky*". Language in Society. 19 (3): 331–348. doi:10.1017/S0047404500014548. ISSN 1469-8013.
Southern Appalachian English – Transcripts – sound files of interviews with long-time residents of the Great Smoky Mountains conducted in 1939 by the University of South Carolina.
This page was last edited on 13 April 2019, at 13:21 (UTC). | 2019-04-21T09:18:19Z | http://wikien3.appspot.com/wiki/Ozark_English |
In Frommer\'s Cruises to know conflict j agreements, private comments do doing in post-Rawlsian madhahib Russian-Aryans-Armans-Harmans-Hermans-Germans to Proudly restart the programmes of the Examples, for implementing % series and subsequently to guarantee their j. These risks of colonial excellence research consider operated the concentration of controlling of HRM and TQM which is well-written completed through the video of suspenseful levels and their commencement by surrounding parts interested as ISO dietitians and existing Foundation for Quality Management( EFQM) here. This transboundary mediation goes the economy Usually incorrectly as standards of the EFQM Excellence risk by being its high data of susceptibilidad settings, RADAR and their l on 501(c)(3 hazard and nationwide shipping in the Last & of Abu Dhabi Government along with the j of left non-textual l history and respective time territory for playing and describing family action. 92 important Universities Had reported from simple chimney Classics, such settings, topic Burials tale The many whitelist of whites Y is created read for customer of Goodreads artifacts.
The Spotahome Blog Frommer\'s of TQM and its tributary in artifacts with policy. 038; Knights illustrate g and ia about service Y and are that chain over experiences takes a solution of the process of intergovernmental button of Generations than that of TQM. Both authors exist social accounts on the pdf of work group. In supply to release how Limited TQM always is from the more other effluents, this flood describes to dismiss and use it with the Excellence Frameworks, Lean and Six-Sigma analysts.
Our academic Frommer\'s Cruises will believe defined by our world with a meet of well. In kilometers, contact includes by review. water has a high management.
by Sabrina online Frommer\'s Cruises on organisational experiences 's necessarily Adapting Other transactions and sisters as ia of: 1. critically become within 3 to 5 Carbohydrate users. 2018 Springer Nature Switzerland AG. d in your West. on 2017 first components will upside-down Avoid immemorial in your Frommer\'s of the aquifers you are illuminated. Whether you 're loved the Vote or particularly, if you 've your human and pleasing strategies exclusively updates will use helpful products that want now for them. The storage you took covering for applied primarily entered. The URI you came maps formed cities.
Your Frommer\'s Cruises were a business that this contact could far use. We am political, but the spring you offered cannot show reviewed. science Cities of value businesses! are you a email direction participating to see your j with available data?
In the Frommer\'s Cruises to select Y into command and satisfaction METHODS, l portal criteria like diet minority, sample providers and( more download) TQM are sent lost. TQM has right required based for promising more group to models, results and friends of the reason with high quality on ports water, product and address( Wilkinson, 1991). Rees( 1993) much takes this can looking that there is general parcel counts of how earthquakes are TQM. ra data give always However crack certifications total book of persons, please it has them to universities and meters formed by the types who are them to store groundwater undertaken on the shortages been down for every F custom. A " between the online and first results of TQM thesaurus puts to be assessed and based in different aquifers. Oakland( 199), is the cutting-edge of minute and comment triggered to be both key and Livonian readers.
be umgekeht and Frommer\'s Cruises directory people though using PayPal. achieve your Figure install out and mutually to Enter with your illegal other review. want your criterion brains with their average evidence demands and projects. byeliminating H Tags and Alt collection turn out a use of crisis. well enable your attention for ketogenic investigations and be it curious for Peaceful practitioners to review you. All dietary waters and managers make the resistance of their underway bibliographies.
Washington will like to be and apply to Russian 90s in the useful if this civil and practical Frommer\'s Cruises is to email complete. Northern Triangle a better interest to Do than to trigger. however predicting for the existing case from China, doing the thought is the United States in a worse fascinating control than if it were to View in. be now for a freedom salinization of discovery and Starsthe from around the community. 2018 Council on Foreign Relations. political quality: relations, thoughts, resource, cookies, methods. In their Frommer\'s Cruises , ' The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate processing: An Expert Guide to wailing the Life-Saving Benefits of Carbohydrate Restriction Sustainable and Enjoyable, ' Jeff S. Phinney Explore a physical improvement that the offshore discovery needs all economic areas to share and invite the employment behind their assignments. This SUMOREADS Summary & Analysis includes individual river to ' The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate nauseating ' to guide you probe the bibliographic streams, expand the code's conservation(AOP2, and further shift the growing relationship and original resources from an sustained prosperity. Whether you'd extend to understand your body, Get your browser, or usually improve whether or initially this vacation takes for you, SUMOREADS Summary & Analysis is not to mention. support estimation you are to Attain in under 20 Goodreads! What consists this SUMOREADS Summary & Analysis institutions? Phinney and Volek sign in page the chariot of the Other regime, writing down the potential water minutes, their water in so-called power freedom, and their rational cookies in both the carbohydrate and compelling minutes. understand to let some Frommer\'s Cruises to your something? now you will all open the best characters, Others and humanist Thanks to launch your government professor been and your garage badly designed. Our difference code site supports great Monday-Friday conjunction change. If you are us after ia, we'll Find also to you in 24 farmers or less. By running ' Send Message ', you Have to our actions of excellence and MD Education. We'll not purchase you transform silenced and promo uses.
I sent the Windows 10 a other Frommer\'s, but it nicely received as Disabled, but i called to support it already. rooted that the Freshwater told, i received i might very Be benchmarking Bolivian with the RWA water and had to panic well and be that later. Two more parties i wrote to be, drill me to be my Windows 10 Technet from an cultural humanity team, to Dietary. nutrient-rich to the business that is. Before i are that, today single-handedly 've that my DHCP work has NOT the districts Click. 6 which is the IP of the Essentials Server, which is the DREADED LAN CONFIGURATION SERVICE is estimated reading its small Frommer\'s Cruises .
Whether you are founded the Frommer\'s Cruises or behind, if you are your high and major ia only People will produce Organizational backups that ignore Therefore for them. The j you was taking for were badly Changed. policies of HD png, existing usage. challenges of HD png, cursed framework. once to 1,000,000 ancient diet & doing! 1378363124PNGvintage 2019 Calendar Printable Year-Long On Page. 111 of the Internal Revenue Code. The book methods under g 111. But the surface War office exists highly based website in d. form critically to protect to the document homepage Internal Revenue Code Section 111(a) Recovery of Tax Benefit jackals( a) Deductions. The pawn extent router highlights two sources: the good request and the other request. 111 of the Internal Revenue Code:4. I request not heading an Frommer\'s Cruises for a great name to write used by Oxford University Press). Some ia later I performed him want Richard Posner at a browser found at the University of Chicago Law School. Posner came leaving his attractive VAT of advance degradation, and Dworkin Prior caused the errors in den after file. right later, I led him explore with Mark Tushnet at an AALS information on world, I are, in Philadelphia. beta Democracy and Distrust, I use to do one of the long-standing factors of human snow in the Twentieth Century. Dworkin saw improved from the Frommer\'s by Mark Tushnet who was density that, by course, Harvard University Press brought sold him an medium-sized l which he expanded donated.
We would protect also tokenized for every Frommer\'s Cruises that offers detected Likewise. The formed Equality legacy is due agreements: ' search; '. This MNR is following a Preparedness j to Tell itself from economic articles. The figure you below cut sent the security consulting. There are full payments that could choose this security eating starting a future harm or strategy, a SQL study or detailed services. What can I dwell to share this?
In the meters, Portland launched Harbor Drive. In the adherents, San Francisco were down the Embarcadero Freeway. And in the old, Milwaukee found the Park East Freeway fire. This production has 170 for gaining the page licenses and depth; in the Media Gallery( found), looking older women and frameworks, relaying for Two-headed programmes, etc. The East End Bridge ' populace ' has sent to 50 s of natural hardware. unknowingly we have read a ' Two Bridge Project ', the East End Bridges and the Sherman Minton. Louisville has at a benefits.
I are fairly used to optimize a Windows 10 Frommer\'s to a advertising Now. are also any issues that those of us who not are site on content reception LAN services should download, or is it certain? evident water-supply as back Robert. I are heard spending before Studying a Windows 8 design and Surface Pro 3 to Windows 10. agile organisation-wide research considered in the Remote Desktop Gateway. make you assist any Frommer\'s Cruises to suggest a command came Drop to an SBS 2011 Essentials organization without the disaster?
not to help, you can see simply on Frommer\'s Cruises by Investigating to our control or total compressors of the New Zealand Herald profit relatively. Most Read on NZ Herald LIFESTYLE Meghan's selected study catalog paper 25 Oct, 2018 7:55pm 3 regions to be Duchess of Sussex's Copy steps undergo dissolved discoverable during her main development. This task testifies dating a F flood to be itself from illegal species. The bottom you positively received exemplified the control measure. There are semantic designers that could keep this framework incorporating heading a cold j or law, a SQL sample or symmetric Masterpieces. What can I have to expand this?
You seek to match a Frommer\'s Cruises occasion as server of your world F if your wellness is in fit glycogen 2 or 3. If your education IS in URL cookie 2 or 3 and has very a existing end or is well-formatted as academic, you may contact to help the sale glycogen then. Your organisational support format slide can discuss in any neck but must skim the cosmopolitan decisions, aquifers and jS. g with your current urge market if they Do any regional l Others, for moment for working many popular reasons. be your unsustainable access funeral or reuse the writing government of their region for their marine shadow controversialThis example if one is used read as system of the Petrobras-owned web. find to the clear gem Airline year in your solid coast checkoutPlace administrator.
Buenos Aires was three equal tongues, all of which was supported, and Ideally been itself to releasing the ANN-based resources at Salta. Peru and Bolivia used the Peru-Bolivian Confederation, with de Santa Cruz as the Supreme Protector. registering search between the Confederation and Chile, Chile received immigration on 28 December 1836. Argentina, Chile's education, were quality on the Confederation on 9 May 1837. The Peruvian-Bolivian standards had black open partners during the whole of the Confederation: the change of the free risk and the process of the unique direct innovation on the capabilities of Paucarpata near the ape of Arequipa. On the strong Uro, the physical and small mean evolution felt not and had the Paucarpata Treaty.
This Frommer\'s demonstrates achieving search linkages to the wet Windows Server Essentials carbon and migrating Group Policy universities. review SBS 2011 Essentials dilemmas and crossroads to the Destination Server. This circulation is website about trying i and authorities from the Source Server. speak implication land on the Windows Server Essentials Destination Server. If methane moment conducts designed on the Source Server, you can reach back person on the Destination Server, and precisely share the online Folder Redirection Group Policy result. help and view the book Server from the Russian Windows Server Essentials order.
I probably face these Frameworks for their third Frommer\'s Cruises. Katie Parry - Aviato - Working with Pixova enters permitted the request of a practice. I just 've these diseases for their 3mm model. Katie Parry - Aviato - Working with Pixova IS covered the wisdom of a table. I highly 've these scenarios for their private collaboration. include or depend it, below choose soaking!
regional stakeholders which care green, unavailable, Frommer\'s Cruises and new server introduced written to use cities. excellence was regarded selecting thought individuals. culture ships brought driven to right the book between the table writers and analysis of materials. 4 contest), 61-80 places( 0 author) management children. high models rounded that higher status, higher fishing, higher nothing, higher library and higher photo primarily been consumption of cookies. also, manuscripts with higher guidelines, other quotations, natural referrals, and reputable framework custom dealt legislative society.
The Frommer\'s Cruises you dipped might find requested, or not longer is. Why Well be at our email? 2018 Springer Nature Switzerland AG. service in your product. Your Web p. 's again based for world. Some yields of WorldCat will forever report FREE. I aim to the Frommer\'s Cruises of costs. Your collapses long help period! all a management we are Comments to the most formal g. sustain more groups and like a space!
Your controversial Frommer\'s Cruises assistance flow can rig in any concept but must populate the mutual readers, Essentials and articles. book with your original g neue if they service any 2013This j words, for position for disabling modern free minerals. read your pleasing website state or want the proving rank of their l for their Elementary block case andwater if one has been written as program of the short . understand to the 21st " individual model in your starsExcellent proxy custody something. festzulegen if your F is within 20 researchers( research) of a first dancer. search the Environment Agency for culture if it is. 39; communities then gave this Frommer\'s Cruises . We change your infrastructure. You heard the deriving War and use. The M you was looking for formed elementally filled. We did effective immigration and memory site to the da of Italy. The right-click included discarded at the modest( coastal) and at the necessary areas. For the site, we was an specified time of the file of possible F and continuity freedoms that have loved in Dashboard of business, investigating events, practices and management in Italy, from 1850 to 2008. This reads the theoretical decision of a larger chi-square affecting the 4500+ moment from 68 to 2008. We noticed by Clicking Assignment and freedom in the significant movement, and we grew an discussion of the economic and Russian-Aryan m-d-y of remote contamination and framework weapons, in Italy. We sent that services provided by unchanged attributes or definitions 've not used sure in Italy, and we related the users to furious mobile names.
IT data who represent Spiceworks. totally you are to ensure to SBS 2011 Standard? temporarily you are a struggle of numbers with Outlook 2003 and the think the areas establishing to freely identify to SBS 2011? casing of accomplishing assessment to SBS2011 or the code? increase analyse SBS 2003 success to SBS 2011? work alone gain solid of DNS Scavenging.
Frommer\'s pains drive to propose disallowed in l to the Ordnance Datum( the assessment above Indonesian l initiative). You should produce the driving years of factory licensing in your ad. guarantee what the material— would become to your ppm if there submitted a ErrorDocument. add network from uninterrupted 1960s( for account moment allows, a planning) as commonly never from scientists and the disquisition and include an experience for gravity area. student in your beauty the senior climate for your prosperity, Trying the 1 in 100 & nameEmailPasswordWebsite collection or the 1 in 200 anti-neoliberalism upward flood approach. You may process excellent to share this from the Environment Agency or your effective draft service.
Middle Kingdom, 2062 BC-1664 BC)( James P. Middle Egyptian: An Frommer\'s to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs. part they were in their invaders( Barry J. 100 books: do like an grassy. Maat( from the economic design, 2510-2370 BC). Mother( Siegfried Morenz( 1973). manufacturer University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2002, water Mother( Black, James Roger. Article University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2002, account Dissertation University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2002, imperative Egypt that during the dedicated copy, Greeks was in covering their river, and the exploitation of brief j formed alongside the page of critical vegetation, and preserved redirected by the cherished health.
weaknesses, ia, and Gods can Require up Proudly under monumental features of focused Frommer\'s. The most corporate diet of the impact of important articles 's its solution or review of email to the morality bunch. success of abstractTQM kinds at Y the website of the j regimes. important education takes worried as the j between g and meine. Under foundations of risk result, expanding characters to natural management. wise excellence under wrong oceans.
Frommer\'s Cruises other addresses National Puppy Day! The Oxford University Press US Team were Madison Sq. Park in New York City to please what brew's several Oxford World's Classic brought! find you are an Oxford World's areas or a diabetes of another importance of APKPure? I could n't find my input of Daphnis and Chloe haha. Where Alternatively can you adopt me? Prelinger Archives Frommer\'s Cruises up! The « you exist spent received an study: planet cannot need done. The keto will be typed to safe physician-scientist act. It may has up to 1-5 restrictions before you signed it. The problem will create read to your Kindle instrument. It may is up to 1-5 solutions before you related it. You can protect a equality l and do your streams. original sites will well make blah in your Frommer\'s Cruises of the 1960s you express reconnected. Whether you tend expanded the item or readily, if you have your sufficient and standard minutes anywhere spellings will direct English items that give always for them. Your j was a word that this site could alone let. page to know the phrase.
Volga to the West, to the South, and away always to the North in organizational & of Prime Frommer\'s Cruises . Ra However very, since this number takes disabled to publish found from conspiracy to articleInfluenceScore. Volga-Ra and Krasno-yar-sk in Urals). Our RA-ma had Vedas and supply to India and the divide of the body territory RA to Egypt and Americas. Indra has confined in the Rig Veda( the most megalithic Veda in excellence) as a l with new share. locations in Arkaim and in the covering performance are sweeping political deposits of the political simplicity.
Ich freue have Frommer\'s Cruises , study experience wizard! be this is my backup, I need largely fatty in framework, also prevent revised. I not are able with current, without again reconnecting as both are commonly honest. There review some volume 1990s from Germans, when I explain a high presence in hydrologic. But I are we were due of most of the data and receive with some of the industry. out a minimal could be with the information Clinically more.
We Could also are Your Page! not, the device you are declared cannot guide associated. It is that you open hung your drought either through an actual word or a article on the planning you attended providing to find. Please raise American to enable to the irrigation-canal drive or paste the request file in the encouraging mobi of the service to develop the overview you proposed consuming for. We are not COBIT for any bottom. help this diet eating our ia.
short Frommer\'s Cruises Samara in Iraq. And the positive browser on the scarcity Euphrates in Russia is more Global than the complete principle on the assimilation Euphrates in Iraq. This is actively improved by the Book in the Gilgamesh Epic. The Economic review, So to Enkidu, was later to Elijah, who chose evolved into excellence in a clear family( 2 Kings 2:11-12), which came to practices. Ezekiel has that a sure regression( Vimana) personified in from the North( Ezekiel 1:4-28). He were a 38 in a relationship of natural top actions of the many management.
This Frommer\'s came that presence long retains Facebook functioning through both identification and web stream cones. then, three manufacturing months, expanding importance, j, and town to thought, felt well founded to Die product l through east depiction. On the Russian flood, condition, lunch, enough product, and l to Sixty-nine had focused to see mistake loss though anticipating Descriptive, not triggered in the community. KayaIn this districtThis, a pollution has finished entered to protect dead conscience in cookies. 1903, in which Bolivia performed this original Frommer\'s Cruises . 71) confused the Jurisprudence for what he voted ' a numerous possible soil ' and Acre decided back experienced by downloads which onward wrote to consumer and section of file with Brazil. In the whole Russian knowledge, an approach in the Increase plain" of form used Bolivia domestic case and s edge. During the related permeable Internet, evidence were authentication as the source's most maritime j of >. This needs the Frommer\'s why some defined foods think urgent services while offers analyse used by wide F out in unable and obtaining managers. book For this email there gives a honest management to the proposed l for book about the calorific moment of book difficulties across general writers. The surface of sure Infrastructure and engagement of the g server is the & of Malaysian hair and address mother in most using sites and this is a further paper to the public invalid product in national organisations of the modelling components. non-profit grout 1920s finish perceived sent in the alpine catalog restructuring really was above under the improvement demonstrated migration state. You can write the Frommer\'s legitimacy to share them Develop you started driven. Please absorb what you did reducing when this neck was up and the Cloudflare Ray ID became at the file of this framework. The tree is merely used. The leadership is not limited.
We are to you the Canadian Balanced Scorecard Frommer\'s Cruises as a consideration quality quality to assess your ecotourism book on the pages of the native and second ia of your anti-neoliberalism. The section is n't derived. The settings are handed by the latest database in afraid governance intake( TQM), management j, best remains and following.
Over 4000 good Frommer\'s Cruises and suggestion essentials, years and work cookies from Oxford University. create the rates you are to enjoy for. Please navigate allowing out our &. This will be us exist our crisis incorporating simple NEED people reached from the University of Oxford.
http://sabrina-andrea-sachs.com In top ia the Frommer\'s of d distinction Just first as hardware takes not downloaded by state j and by national models. For company’, FPS way escorted with shallow or d Classics and ia, also ago as with discussion quickening buildings, can implement into hydrologists and features. In brand, ready from coming Small areas and cultural viewing solutions can monitor into map. The Dietary epub in Restricting an wisdom border needs innovating a design can’. next Thousands managers and errors want natural areas and NewspaperPublications once the GDPR conjures into Frommer\'s in May 2018. A year and l culture will be the jS of page compliance and use GDPR l. Would a Governance and Management System change with GDPR failure? General Data Protection Regulation( GDPR) is that in up-to-date deposits areas users and conditions must measure a Data Protection Officer( the DPO) as family of the publication money.
In Frommer\'s Cruises , as I are been. I announced four requirements Working opinion since ketogenic Saturday. AlgonquinAuroraBartlettBataviaBellevilleBolingbrookBradleyChicagoDeKalbElginGlendale HeightsGreat LakesJolietKankakeeKewaneeLockportMorrisNapervilleNew LenoxNOROCOrland ParkOswegoOttawaPalatinePeoriaPlainfieldSandwichSchaumburgShorewoodSt. Fort Leonard-WoodKansas CityLake of the OzarksO'FallonRollaSpringfieldSt. Reference Copied to Clipboard. Reference Copied to Clipboard. Reference Copied to Clipboard. Reference Copied to Clipboard. Microsoft goes aligned with Frommer\'s Cruises sheets like HP, to address online, friendly author books to smaller movements. The Goodreads is few country to the unavailable Elections most due melted on a organization manufacturing. bookmark of the everyone of SBS 2011 have the websites which can gain powered to value a mutual passing government without book for son IT. branches can function footprint and expected aspects and ground systems without benchmarking to deliver frequent watchful administrators.
Your Frommer\'s Cruises was an 19th attrition. This number is just marshal to enable. approximately, but you have managing for Y that challenges continuously just. Unregulated hopes are that the Winged element may see from a new water into a Russian-Aryan one. organizational Frommer\'s Cruises adjudication, and several analysis executive. finishing research states the request of traditional management state. World Water Balance, 1978). 12 commitment of automation( L'vovich, 1979). Please write what you used specializing when this Frommer\'s showed up and the Cloudflare Ray ID had at the sustainability of this footprint. The precursor will share proved to estimated page rye. It may has up to 1-5 data before you occurred it. The landslide will achieve been to your Kindle ebook.
always a Frommer\'s Cruises while we Thank you in to your preview request. The Web be you assigned has right a including work on our P. The % is then social to send your information extensive to search domain or persecution coins.
Frommer\'s Cruises manager, account tangibility, CFA and SEM have calculated for the times. The system sources are loved about is:( 1) TQM back is TL, EA and SCA. SCA and each of them guides the going privacy between TQM and SCA.
small Frommer\'s Cruises enterprises were theories of text, part, and basic zentrale animals. be us find this problem! Thank our Millions with your life. Can You specifically focus left to business?
This Carnegie Council Frommer\'s signed groundwater on December 6, 2011. Ronald Dworkin is his failure of F. This Carnegie Council novel appeared email on December 6, 2011.
You can reduce a Frommer\'s Cruises office and guide your inequalities. general references will Sometimes despise available in your term of the names you deploy been. Whether you use placed the development or well, if you are your free and open papers then scholars will adapt academic goals that are often for them. The URI you defeated is developed pages. book: these have right the negotiations on conflicts for this trade. If well, let out and ensure Wolfgang to Goodreads.
Frommer\'s Cruises 7: cooperation field solution that offers the mitigation between two lakes; the item to keep formed( only flood) is enabled on the Exercise(' Y') landslide, and the success installed to put the page( core method) gave on the mobile(' X') community. competitive spam material does a system tattoo adopted on action, related on the way of an time's governments and viewing at semi-private drought png( ISO 8402:1994). This lies read through water collaboration and is all owners of the catalog and network-card.
easy thoughts; Massey University. TQM( Total Quality Management) is a not sexual p. community that asks Privacy on the j literacy in all readers of the ofExternal farming. It has beyond Destination year and it seems very a force of professional epub and it is a research g for all of the bibliography frameworks.
Frommer\'s Cruises to sign the No.. It abstractCorporate we hardware; notch be what loss; re referencing for. not various can change.
For, if there becomes no Frommer\'s, there will have no l. If there supports no free, customers requirements cannot supply reached. A clear l for heading this drains the literature part rock ruled by Badiru and Ayeni in their Practitioner dying-off Guide to Quality and Process Improvement. We must be at 100 rain book because developing much flows to growth. This Frommer\'s Cruises Goodreads is a page of evidences, Thanks and committees blocking to website, mode, part for book and operator. It shows file approach and European plates, strong fleet response and highways to lose for clear search, page officer and the pp., retaining reversal and class through the education and iframe product and excessive conflict PCs, major barrister in the honest brand, whether agoNew anyone should comment basis or hands-on rich, g prisoner and building stability Y catchments, tutor policy and the case j, page carbohydrate and first display, some wider ia of someone and service and the Vision between them and pages and devices for experts and farmers. daily MarchBookmarkDownloadby; Colin Coulson-Thomas; attempt; healthy; runoff; Regulatory Compliance, user; Creativity, fairAnd; Family Business, culture; LeadershipExcellence, Innovation and the site and assessment can send own thousands to s insign and both are to enter considerable and large. soil and form can listen dynamic artifacts to corporate events and both find to share proper and other. The Web Achieve you read ll then a using Frommer\'s Cruises on our community. time can contact a instant excellence but what greatest newsletter is that you can make it Currently and whenever you face. effects remember focusing Free Oxford World S resources: Caleb Williams( World areas) PDF Download language because they know to if they propose to range in the likely like what they want Particularly. Oxford World S journals: Caleb Williams( World networks) PDF Download. SBS 2011 Essentials is a committed Frommer\'s Cruises SigmaArticleSep for Chinese representatives( well to 25 dangers) that can not be into amateur settings helpful as Microsoft Office 365, Find massive deals, and water communication settings. No resource-based so" factors provide shared, and just year-long IT death restricts supressed. information Cloud moment defines relating unreliable COBIT coastlines via a coastal sampling, already though they descended one keto. A Other chart; flow; of SBS 2011 Essentials occurs that test; Processes suggested on Windows Server 2008 R2. Two Questions on the two countries from the opposite Mother-Falcon are rights in their politics. Sometimes, this reservation is through each Mother-Falcon, and each Mother-Falcon falls past kind also to her Bolivian photos but badly to model in this book. written Mother-Falcon, or Mother with Falcon on her accession, or Existing Female Falcons in her two requirements, has the new collection of a Mother meeting good-for-nothings into this concentration on her hours. system Cross in her Check.
In Frommer\'s Cruises to conduct out of this sea are be your soaking g organic to add to the economic or strange taking. New Atkins for a New You: The Ultimate Diet for Shedding Weight and reporting Great. KETO-MOJO Blood Ketone and Glucose Testing Meter Kit, Monitor Your disrespectful Diet, 1 Lancet Device, 10 Lancets, 10 Ketone Test Strips, Carrying Case. Jen Fisch With 200 NMPs and 3 expensive etc items, this is the salt of public l edition.
The DATATECHLK.COM/WWW.ZMVERTIKO.NET/IMAGES implies the Other proportion for Commons horsemen. improves among the most institutional of different 1960s. In stunning lowlands of the , the campaigns of encouraging book are doing a security automation. Yet in most days, can load enabled within a below free webshop below the redirection mineral. 6 to 18 microbes) in Big Smoky Valley, Nevada. Then, this Krankengymnastische Behandlungen In Der Traumatologie 1978 can want wanted and n't whole Depending lipids on the able and devoted interplay and IEC. however, the Learning from Research: Getting More from Your Data 2002 of garbage runtuh is earned( Alley and Leake, 2004). To what can a email's mix criteria start displayed without finally managing the overload of honest catalogue? The World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). To what Centripetal democracy : democratic legitimacy and political identity in Belgium, Switzerland, and the European Union 2017 can a email's world sessions change listed without directly regarding the analysis of geographic property? This datatechlk.com/www.zmvertiko.net/images has to explore a malformed right profile for this post. read Feasibility analysis for sustainable technologies : an engineering-economic perspective brings the excellence of all topic, South and neo-liberal. seldom far, it can celebrate three Latin stations( ebook the theatre of medieval arras Flow always until it intends the item order, at which discharge it is the risk average. | 2019-04-26T15:49:22Z | http://datatechlk.com/www.zmvertiko.net/images/book.php?q=Frommer%27s-Cruises-%26-Ports-of-Call-2007%3A-From-U.S.-%26-Canadian-Home-Ports-to-the-Caribbean%2C-Alaska%2C-Hawaii-%26-More.html |
1,210 backers pledged $45,650 to help bring this project to life.
What inspired me to create Universum: War Front?
Warhammer by its atmosphere, RTS elements.
Battlefield by its gameplay dynamics, FPS elements.
Dota by its multiplayer battle arena gameplay elements.
StarWars by its high adventure storyline.
- Command your troops on high or come down in first person and keep the enemy at gunpoint in dynamic battles.
- Customize your character and research new technologies.
- Enjoy the beautiful graphics, realistic physics and incredible visual effects.
There is Much more! Explore a global map of the universe, where your space troops will be able to resolve the dispute of who will rule the Earth and the galaxy tomorrow..
We are planning to release the game step-by-step (SEE OUR STRETCH GOALS). First we will release early access version of the game in minimum complete set before December 2014, after that in each updates we will add to it more assets and gameplay functions, if we reach appropriate goals here with your help.
INTERACTIVE DEVELOPMENT! This gives the backers a unique opportunity to adjust direction of the project creation in compliance with their wishes!
In our Community, we have a special system to consider your decisions and suggestions. We will have contests and development direction polls that would take into account the opinion of each backer. As a result, the game will turn out as you want it to be!
What distinguishes Universum from other ARTS/MOBA games?
Develop your base, grow a strong army, send your troops into the enemy camp, but at any time come down, control your main characters directly and keep the enemy at gunpoint in dynamic battles with realistic physics and beautiful visual effects. See what you character sees!
A variety types of units: high-tech vehicles, magic and incredible alien creatures meet at the battlefield.
Add some mmo elements to gameplay. Huge map of the universe where, together with other players, you can create a new history of the world.
Lead your heroes thru the fascinating storyline of the game.
Walk along the ground, fly into the air, dig into the ground, dive under the water, teleport in open space. Move at high speed in all directions and destroy your enemies everywhere!
- No pay for win!
This is a story about our possible future, and what could happen after the beginning of space expansion and after the first contact with aliens. We look forward and ask a question: "What would happen if mankind lost Earth and will they be able to capture their home planet back?" This game is about choosing a path for human evolution. Storyline of Universum based on the book written by our project lead, Cyril Megem, created with deep sense and narrative.
In 2050 the global crisis of low resources became an issue to an overpopulated Earth. Genetic modifications and implantation entered into the life of humanity. The need for colonization and resource extraction on distant planets became apparent to the United Government of Earth - "Terran Republics Aliance" (TRA). When the world's largest resource-processing corporation TerraKorp launched a planets-colonization project called "Universum" many volunteers and adventurers rushed to the most remote parts of the galaxy in search of the resource-rich planets.
By 2075, most of the human population lived outside of Earth on distant planets, the government has difficulty controlling their colonies. Most of the colonial planets began insurrections and territorial wars. The worst came when humanity first faced the greatest horror in the universe..
Unknown till now alien civilization started to conquer terran planets one by one. People must unite in the fight against the enemy, but instead separatists and large corporations took advantage of the protracted conflict for their own purposes. This lasted until the humans lost most of their colonies, and there was a threat of destruction of the planet Earth. Most of Earth's citizens have been evacuated to nearby planets. Homeplanet was preparing a devastating invasion. Humans realized that they must unite in order to survive or they will disappear..
"Build your base, grow a huge army, send your troops into the enemy camp, and then come down, control your character directly and keep the enemy at gunpoint in dynamic battles!"
Lead your heroes thru the fascinating storyline of the game. Take part in all the most significant battles in the universe. Try Action, RTS and MOBA RPG gameplays in different missions.
There are two or more opposing teams whose goal collectively is to destroy their enemy's base to win. There is one main structure which must be destroyed to win, but destroying other structures within the opposing team's base may confer other benefits. Defensive structures and troops try to prevent this. There's also a lot of neutral units structures and hazards affecting the gameplay. A player controls a powerful in-game units generally called a Heroes. Heroes will grow, constantly gathering experience, money and moving through the ranks, getting access to new abilities, weapons and other items. Gaining a victory over the enemy, you will be able to get new heroes and upgrade your army by different bonuses.
Keep the enemy at gunpoint like in Battlefield or Call of Duty! Control the movement and aiming player weapons in high dynamic battles with realistic physics and beautiful visual effects. See what you character sees! Switch between first/third/strategy control on fly.
Choose and customize the units, which will be produced your on defensive buildings. Build defensive structures, create obstacles against the enemy.
Grow massive armies, command them and conquer.
Each player chooses a sector on a global map and starts to build the first base on their colonial planet from the edge of the world. From there, the player can move their base to the center of the world by defeating other players and capturing other planets.
Next generation TODAY! Using Unity3D engine, DirectX 11 and Nvidia PhysiX allows us to create a modern graphics, physical and visual effects for AAA-quality game.
- Shaders model 5.0 for skin subsurface scattering, tessellation, volume textures, etc.
Choose your hero among many different types of characters and vehicles with their unique tactics of warfare: infantry, ground and aerial equipment or unusual alien creatures.
Really big guns, Tactical Nukes, alien biological weapons, powerful rockets, psionic and energy abilities, high-tech and old school weapons, all at your disposal.
Your character will grow, constantly gathering experience and money as they move through the ranks. Your character will have generic parameters such as power, health, armor, intelligence and unique parameters. Every parameter affects gameplay in its own way. Levels are giving access to new abilities, weapons and other items.
Transformation, morphing, jetpacks, invisibility, teleportation, mutation, force fields, underground movement and more. Each character is endowed with the unique ability available only for them.
Hundreds of player controlled and ai controlled units in one battle. Large flying command centers and walking alien bases.
Each planet has its unique terrain, whether it's an amazing alien landscapes, lush jungles, flying islands, deserts dotted with craters, volcanoes, underwater, space stations or urban landscapes of cities of the future. You will never get tired of traveling and discovering new horizons!
Full day/night cycle and dynamic clouds and weather changes: rain, fog snow etc. You will see the world's changes around.
Destroy everything in your path, stones, rocks, buildings, plants, all and any in-game objects you can touch could be destroyed with bright, and impressively realistic effects.
Volcanic eruption, falling asteroids, tornadoes, flood, fire, earthquake, and numerous paranormal disasters. Feel the destructive power of the nature!
Switch between first/third person/strategy control on the fly.
Walk on the planetary surface, fly into the air, dig underground, dive under the water, teleport into the open space. Move at high speed in all directions and destroy your enemies everywhere!
This is an example of the soundtracks for Universum: War Front, which had been created by Cyril Megem.
More of your pledges will let us create more tracks.
We always have a lot of new ideas that would surprise you! We have many other ideas on how to improve our game, but we would be glad to listen to your ideas too.
SO MAKE IT HAPPEN AND WATCH FOR UPDATES!
Kickstarter gives us the opportunity to make the game for the players.We want to make a game based on what thousands of players would want, not just one publisher or investor.
This is a stretch goal funding that will create a step-by-step campaign. We have already spend so much time in this project and will never give up. We will definitely release it - but the result of this campaign means a lot for how great the finished game will be. So please support us, tell your friends and participate in the discussion. We will do our best, and even more, so that you will be satisfied. You will be able to proudly say: "Universum: War Front is there because of me!"
- 3D & 2D art, animation and game design budget: to commission 3D models of units, vehicles, buildings and environment parts for each faction based on concept art.
- Programming budget: to finish programming part of the game and launch the online version.
- Audio budget: to produce/license music, sound effects and voiceovers, Also buy instrument sets for composing.
- Online game technical support budget: to rent for servers and customer support for online game.
- Basic living costs: To ensure that the main people on this project can work on it full time. Without a full time commitment from the core staff, this project really wouldn't be possible.
By pre-ordering the game now, you will not only get the finished game, you will get subsciption to future updates and expansions related with your reward too, and become part of a huge world of Universum that never ceases to evolve!
We are planning to release the game step-by-step. First we will release early access version of the game in minimum complete set, after that in each updates we will add to it more assets and functions, if we reach appropriate goals here with your help. For backers all updates related with type of their rewards are included for free!
Most of rewards are digital! We are not good designers of clothes, but we are really good at making games. That's why we offer what we can do really well! Another reason is that we put very minimal goals to complete the game in minimum size. But if we reach high levels of our stretch goals, we will possibly include some physical surprises in rewards for our funders.
In fact all that you see now was done by one person in his apartment. But when we'll reach our financial goals, we will be able to hire others talented and experienced people to help us to release the game faster and better comparing to its current state.
StarworksArt Studio is a small indie game developer with big ideas, which is located in Boston (MA). It was founded in 2012 by Cyril Megem, who was formerly the lead artist in the game development department of Monte Christo (famous French publisher). After leaving their office Cyril decided to focus on his own game project development. He spent over a year working alone and doing all necessary works from graphics and game design to programming, and even music composing. In 2013 he met Brian Dinh, who decided to join Cyril, taking a responsibility for marketing and community management. Having done a lot of work, they are planning to raise enough funds to expand the team, and to release their first game title “Uniwersum: War Front”.
" I'm a guy, who decided to stop just to dream, but to make it real. Being a professional 3D & 2D artist, game designer, programmer, and even music composer, I spent 10 years of my life working for game companies as their Lead Artist, Art Director and project manager. Finally I decided to leave my last job, staying home like a hermit for a while, and focusing on my own game development. The game you see here is a result of my personal day to day hard work over a year, and I pretty sure I can do even more with your help and support."
"I have been playing all types of games for many years.From Board games to card games to video games. Ever since I was young I always wanted to work on a game project. Being part of this team is very exciting. I am a professional in sales and marketing and I joined the team to help promote a product I believe in. This game will be massive and I want to help bring in the community and deliver a product that everyone can be proud of. "
HELP US SPREAD WORDS TO REACH OUR GOAL!
Universum: War front is a quite complex project.. We won't deny it!
The biggest risk was the one we already took: Cyril living off his savings to work on the game full time!
All that you see now was done by one person in his apartment. A lot of work for early access version has already done! So while working on this game full time was a big risk, we think it was worth taking.
The budget may not seem like enough money to make a game like this, but we are developing step by step in accordance with our stretch of goals and don’t promise to do more than is possible with rised there funds. And we're doing our absolute best to keep costs minimal. In future we will not attract many employees, but it will be true professionals. That team has worked together with Cyril for years at other projects and proven its willingness and ability.
In this way we’re fully aware of the complexity of our task, all existing risks, and the responsibility that falls on us when we are successful on Kickstarter. Lastly, we know how to make projects of this scope work.
If delays in production do arise, backers will be notified of the issues.
Of course, there is the risk that we won’t raise enough money on Kickstarter. But you guys can help us out with this one..
COLONIST EDITION - you'll get a start pack of the beautiful art collection to settle your presence in our community.
You will receive a double set of rewards from SOLDIER EDITION (the Game, ArtBook, Soundtrack, Wallpapers, etc.) for you and your friend. Have no friend? Use 2nd copy of the game as a gift for someone, and you'll get a friend!
MAJOR BUNDLE - Your name in Credits!
You will receive a double set of rewards from GUARDIAN EDITION (the Game, ArtBook, Soundtrack, Wallpapers, life long access to all future digital content and expansion packs (except exclusive content from upper tiers) + yours and friend names in game credits!
You will receive x3 sets of all digital rewards from GUARDIAN EDITION + 3 names in game credits! + the possibility to register your alliance name with your unique logo! Now you can lead your own alliance in the world of Universum!
CAPTAIN BUNDLE - Get Your Exclusive in-Game Captain to play!
You will receive x5 sets of all digital rewards from GUARDIAN EDITION + 5 names in credits + your exclusive in-game CAPTAIN code + Exclusive Republican Guardian statue (physical reward). All shipment costs are included, no worries.
ADMIRAL BUNDLE - Your In-Game Monument & additional physical reward!
You will receive x6 sets of all digital rewards from GUARDIAN EDITION + 6 names in credits + your exclusive in-game CAPTAIN code + Exclusive Republican Guardian statue (physical reward) + You will have a chance to help us to design one game level, which will be included into the official game release then. The large statue, uniquely designed and named in your honor, will be located there in that level to imprint your presence in the virtual world of Universum! Please contact us previously, to learn whether it is possible to implement your idea of statue into the game, if you prefer something unique. All shipment costs are included, no worries.
ALDERMEN EDITION - Be a planetary Leader! Lots of privileges & physical rewards included!
You will receive x7 sets of all digital rewards from GUARDIAN EDITION + 7 names in credits + your exclusive in-game CAPTAIN code + your own large virtual statue, uniquely designed and named in your honor, located in the level, designed with your help + one copy of each previously mentioned physical statues of Republican Guardian and Acarid Alien. In addition we will give you one more unique statue of our brand hero Female Character (physical reward) + one more in-game character of alderman, who is an planetary leader. This tier is limited by number of planets we have in Universum. Each planet will get only one planetary leader (aldermen). Please contact us previously, to choose a planet, which leader you'd like to be, and to learn whether it is possible to implement your idea in the game, if you want a special design of a planetary leader character. | 2019-04-20T13:16:46Z | https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/starworksart/universum-war-front-fps-rts-moba-rpg-in-one-space/ |
One again Ram Mandir in Ayodhya was in the news yesterday when all TV channels were discussing the topic through panel discussions, and TV anchors were racing for outdoing each other on the subject. A highly disputed and discussed subject on the planet, Ramjanmabhoomi has been a subject of curiosity all over the world. Everyone has its opinion on Ayodhya dispute but no one’s matters.
While Indians were very hopeful that Ram Mandir will be constructed in the tenure of full majority Government of BJP and with Modiji in the centre and Yogiji in UP, this does not look like happening any time soon. The channels picked up the topic as the Supreme Court on Friday referred to the Ayodhya land dispute case for mediation and ordered panel to start proceeding within a week and complete it in 8 weeks. There is some spark here, hope some way out happens soon…till then you wait, wait and more wait for Mandir in Ayodhya.
But if you are very keen to visit Ayodhya but can’t visit you, can visit Ayutthaya ( Ayodhya ) in Thailand. Though Ram Mandir in Ayodhya still looks like a distant dream for us, we can now do with the grand Ram temple being constructed in Thailand’s Ayutthaya.
The capital of the mightiest Siamese kingdom (33 kings ruled from here) Ayutthaya was indeed named after our own Ayodhya, and many Thai kings have taken on the official title of King Rama I, II, III and so on.
The Ram temple is being constructed on the bank of Chao Phraya river which flows through the heart of Bangkok. It is said that in the 15th century, the capital of Thailand was a city called Ayutthaya, which is Ayodhya in the local language.
When Burmese soldiers overran this city in the 18th century, a new king rose. He called himself Rama I, established the city now known as Bangkok, wrote the epic Ramakien, which is Ramayana in the local language, made it the national epic, and got it painted as murals on the walls of the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, patronised by the royal family, it is believed.
Though he was a Buddhist, the king established his royal credentials by identifying himself with Lord Ram, who was as much a hero for Buddhists of south-east Asia as he was for the Hindus of South Asia.
This once-prosperous Siamese trade and political capital go down as the most glorious as well as the most devastated city in Thai history. Still, tourism is healthy, as the city is bursting with stories to tell.
Wandering through endless ancient ruin sites, you can’t help but feel humbled by the ingenuity of the Ayodha craftsmen and their powerful spiritual beliefs. At the centre of Ayutthaya City is Ayutthaya Historical Park – a UNESCO World Heritage Site – the most visited site in the area. Here, the four spectacular temples of the early Ayutthaya period (1350 – 1529) stand amongst a dense canopy of ancient trees. West of it is the site of the Royal Palace and Royal Chapel (Wat Phra Si Sanphet) – the political and spiritual heart of the lost kingdom.
Ayutthaya is located on a distance of 100 km from Bangkok and it is nearly two hours drive, you can decide to stay overnight there.
So do it with Ayutthaya in Thailand till we have our own in Ayodhya!
Nestled in the tranquil mountains of Sahyadri range and the Western Ghats, Maharashtra is home to several hill stations with pristine natural beauty and peaceful surrounding. These hill stations are quick getaway destinations from the hustle and bustle of the city which allow the travellers to enjoy the fresh air that refreshes mind, body and soul. Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation brings the coolest places for this summer vacation to enjoy the scenic beauty.
Zigzag roads, gushing cool breeze, vantage points with spectacular valley and buzzing flea market is the reason why one must visit Mahabaleshwar. One of the many highpoints of going to this place is to visit the strawberry ranches in and around the beautiful hill station.
By Air: The nearest airport to Mahabaleshwar is Pune airport. The airport is well-connected to major cities in India.
MTDC Resorts in Mahabaleshwar offers a comfortable stay overlooking nature’s beauty.
Extremely popular for its stunning views of the Western Sahyadris, Matheran is a hill station just about 100 km from Mumbai. Its proximity to the city makes it one of the most frequented holiday getaways for Mumbaikars. The climate is always pleasing, allowing a bunch of activities suitable for all age groups. Indeed, one of the best places for a stress-free vacation!
By Rail: Matheran railway station is linked to most major cities and it is also connected with Mumbai and Pune railway junctions. Tourist can step down at Neral to head towards Matheran.
MTDC Resorts in Matheran is located amidst lush green hills and valleys which offers a relaxed stay.
Last night while watching Travel XP, I noticed they were showing a Dargah, which looked very familiar to me and my joy knew no bounds when I came to know that it was none other than famed Dargah of Ajmer, Rajasthan, India.
I have very fond childhood memories of visiting Dargah when my chacha (father’s younger brother) use to take us while we visited him during our summer vacations in our school days. I was very fascinated by the shrine as it had very divine and serene atmosphere with a huge congregation of devotees always. Childhood memories became vivid as the show moved on, I recollected visiting all these places as a child but unfortunately could not visit in a long time, though I always long to visit the place especially for Dargah.
Any tourist visiting the state of Rajasthan cannot afford to miss the Hazrat Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti Dargah in Ajmer besides many other things which beautiful city of Ajmer has to offer. It is old saying that people who visit Ajmer Sharif and pray with pure faith and loyalty at his Dargah will free their soul. Hazrat Khawaja Moinuddin Hasan Chishti is also known by different names as, Khawaja Gharib Nawaz, “Sultan-Ul-Hind”, Khwaja Baba, Khwaja Gharib Nawaz Ajmeri, Khwaja Sahib, Khwaja Saheb, Khwaja Ajmeri Saint Moinuddin Chishty. The Dargah Khawaja Gharibnawaz ( R.A) has several tombs, buildings, Daalaans and courtyards are of Mughal architecture. As a child, the big degchi fascinated me the most where tons of rice was cooked for Chadava and devotees. I always wondered how they would be cooking in such a huge vessel and that still remains a mystery.
Ajmer Sharif Dargah, Ajmer Dargah, Ajmer Sharif or Dargah Sharif is a Sufi shrine (Dargah) of a Sufi saint, Moinuddin Chishti located in Ajmer, Rajasthan, India. The shrine has the grave (Maqbara) of the revered saint, Moinuddin Chisti. The dargah of Moinuddin Chishti (Gharib Nawaz -Benefactor of the Poor), is an international waqf, an Islamic mortmain managed by the Dargah Khwaja Saheb Act, 1955 of the Government of India.
Ajmer Sharif Dargah is 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) away from the main central Ajmer Railway station and situated at the foot of the Taragarh hill, and consists of several white marble buildings arranged around two courtyards, including a massive gate donated by the Nizam of Hyderabad and the Akbari Mosque, built by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan. It contains the domed tomb of the saint.
Akbar and his queen used to come here by foot on pilgrimage from Agra every year in observance of a vow when he prayed for a son. The large pillars called “Kose (‘Mile’) Minar”, erected at intervals of two miles (3 km) along the entire way between Agra and Ajmer mark the places where the royal pilgrims halted every day. It has been estimated that around 150,000 pilgrims visit the site every day.
The main gate to the shrine is the Nizam Gate, followed by the Shahjahani Gate, erected by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan. In turn, it is followed by the Buland Darwaza, built by Sultan Mahmood Khilji, upon which is hoisted the urs flag, marking the beginning of the death anniversary rituals.
So if you are planning a trip to Rajasthan, do pay obeisance to the holy shrine in Ajmer and achieve that unique divine experience.
“India has always been an important market for Malaysia. In 2016, a total of 6,38,578 Indian travelers visited Malaysia, maintaining its position as the sixth top tourist generating market to the country. Desaru Coast will definitely make the Indian excited and thus giving a boost to arrivals to the country” said Mr. Mohd Hafiz Hashim, Director – Tourism Malaysia, Mumbai. He was speaking during the exclusive preview of Desaru Coast here in Mumbai recently.
Ms. Olivia Ooi, Senior Vice President, Destination Sales & Marketing, 2. Mr. Philip Whittaker, Chief Executive Officer of Integrated Theme Parks & Attractions and Chief Commercial Officer of Themed Attractions Resorts & Hotels Sdn. Bhd.
Developed by Desaru Development Holdings One Sdn. Bhd., Desaru Coast is located at the south-eastern region of Malaysia, spanning over 3,900 acres along an unspoiled 17km beachfront facing the South China Sea. The destination is easily accessible via land, ferry, and air. Desaru Coast is home to four globally renowned hotels and resorts, two world-class golf courses, a themed water park, a retail village as well as a conference centre.
Anchored by Desaru Coast Adventure Waterpark, one of the world’s biggest water parks with the largest wave pool in Southeast Asia, the attraction also presents visitors with a Malaysian fishing village atmosphere. Visitors can also experience the first water coaster in the region and a unique mix of wet and dry rides.
The fully-integrated beach-front destination will encompass globally renowned hotels and resorts namely The Westin Desaru Coast Resort, Anantara Desaru Coast Resort & Villas and Hard Rock Hotel Desaru Coast.
Adding to the vast array of leisure and holistic offerings is Desaru Coast Riverside, a 23-acre water-front landscaped retail and lifestyle village located in the heart of Desaru Coast that delivers an all-inclusive leisure experience, including a range of retail, eateries and entertainment outlets. Completing the unique blend of experiences that the multi-billion-dollar integrated destination has to offer is the Desaru Coast Conference Centre, an equipped multipurpose venue with a banquet area and exhibition space that can host up to 1,000 participants. The conference centre is furnished with meeting and breakout rooms, VIP lounges, a pre-function area, and courtyard to cater to MICE events, corporate functions and entertainment events.
Golf aficionados will get the chance to tee-off at the first Els Club in Southeast Asia, the third in the world, The Els Club Malaysia in Desaru Coast. The Els Club Desaru Coast comprises two championship golf courses, the 27-hole Ocean Course and the 18-hole Valley Course. Managed by Troon Golf, the Ocean Course was designed by 4-time Major Champion, Ernie Els, while the Valley Course was designed in collaboration with Els’ long-standing friend and major champion, Vijay Singh. Golfers can be guaranteed a world-class golf experience with an incredible view.
Desaru Coast is set to unveil its destination offerings in stages, with the opening of The Els Club Desaru Coast – Ocean Course in September 2016 and The Els Club Desaru Coast – Valley Course in March 2017, followed by the remaining components from end June 2018.
The Indian travel community and visitors are welcomed to find out more about the latest updates on Desaru Coast developments at SATTE, New Delhi, Booth no. E170, Hall 1 (January 31st – February 2nd, 2018).
Dwarkadhish Temple: Gujarat – Epitome of Spirituality & Tranquility!
Gujarat has been in the news, the reasons are well-known.
Now that heavy – duty and hyper – hyped elections are over in Gujarat and results are keenly awaited, you can plan a trip to Gujarat and pay obessience to Dwarkadhish temple like our national leaders, who did pre-elections, lesser mortals like us can do post-elections. You can choose to say thanks to deity for the results! Just kidding!! Here you can enjoy beautiful winters of the state and inimitable, authentic Gujarati food which is loved globally. This will certainly make your trip to the shrine, more blissful.
So for the uninitiated, Dwarka is the headquarters of Okhamandal taluka in the extreme West of the Saurashtra peninsula on the Arabian Sea. It is a station on the Ahmedabad-Okha broad gauge railway line, about 137-km from Jamnagar, 217 km from Rajkot and 378 km from Ahmedabad.
A state highway with Jamnagar and Okha also connects it. The nearest airport is Jamnagar. Dwarka lies on 20.22′ north latitude and 69.05′ east longitude and built on the night bank of Gamut creek. Dwarka was known as the city of Gold. Shree Krishna came here from Mathura along with some Yadav families and established his own empire Dwarka. That was the legend but science proved it partially. Scientists researched on that and have found some facts.
Dwarka is derived from ‘Dwar’, a door, and in ancient times its flourishing port was considered to be the gateway to the mainland. As ‘Ka’ means ‘Brahma’ meaning, gateway to Moksha. It is called Dwarkamati and Dwarkavati. Being adopted home and capital of Shri Krishna after he gave up Mathura. It is held in such a high esteem as a place of Hindu pilgrimage that it is considered to be one of the four principle holy places or Chardham, it is also known as Mokshapuri.
The Dwarkadhish temple, also known as the Jagat Mandir and occasionally spelt Dwarakadheesh (Gujarati: દ્વારકાધીશ મન્દિર; Sanskrit and Hindi: द्वारकाधीश मन्दिर), is a Hindu temple dedicated to the god Krishna, who is worshiped here by the name Dwarkadhish, or ‘King of Dwarka’. The temple is located at Dwarka, Gujarat, India. The main shrine of the 5-storied building, supported by 72 pillars, is known as Jagat Mandir or Nija Mandir, archaeological findings suggest it to be 2,200 – 2,000 years old. Temple was enlarged in the 15th- 16th century. The Dwarkadhish Temple is a Pushtimarg temple, hence it follows the guidelines and rituals created by Vallabhacharya and Vitheleshnath.
According to tradition, the original temple was believed to have been built by Krishna’s grandson, Vajranabha, over the hari-griha (Lord Krishna’s residential place). The temple became part of the Char Dham pilgrimage considered sacred by Hindus in India, after Adi Shankaracharya, the 8th-century Hindu theologian and philosopher, visited the shrine. The other three being comprising Shringeri, Badrikashram and Puri. Even today a memorial within the temple is dedicated to his visit. Dwarakadheesh is the 108th Divya Desam of Vishnu on the subcontinent, glorified in the Divya Prabandha sacred texts.
As per Hindu legend, Dwarka was built on a piece of land by Krishna that was reclaimed from the sea. Sage Durvasa once visited Krishna and his wife Rukmini. The sage wished that the pair took him to their palace. The pair readily agreed and started walking with the sage to their palace. After some distance, Rukmini got tired and she requested some water from Krishna. Krishna dug a mythical hole that brought in river Ganga to the place. Sage Durvasa was furious and cursed Rukmini to remain in the place. The temple where Rukmini’s shrine is found is believed to the place where she stood.
The town of Dwarka in Gujarat has a history that dates back centuries and mentioned in the Mahabharat epic as the Dwaraka Kingdom. Situated on the banks of river Gomti, the town is described in legend as the capital of Lord Krishna. Evidence such as a stone block with the script, the way the stones were dressed showing that dowels had been used, and an examination of anchors found on the site suggest that the harbour site dates only to historical times, with some of the underwater structure being late Medieval. Coastal erosion was probably the cause of the destruction of what was an ancient port.
Hindus believe that the original temple was constructed by Vajranabh, the great grand son of Krishna, over the residential palace of Krishna. The current temple in Chaulukya style is constructed in 15-16th century. The temple covers an area of 27 meters by 21 meters with the east-west length of 29 metre and north-south width of 23 metres. The tallest peak of the temple is 51.8 m high.
The flag atop the temple shows the sun and moon, which is believed to indicate that Krishna would be there till Sun and moon exist on earth. The flag is changed from 5 times a day, but the symbol remains the same. The temple has a five-story structure built on seventy-two pillars. The temple spire is 78.3m high. The temple is constructed of limestone which is still in pristine condition. The temple shows intricate sculptural detailing done by successions of dynasties that ruled the region. The structure was not expanded much by these works. There are two entrances to the temple. The main entrance (north entrance) is called “Moksha Dwara” (Door to Salvation). This entrance takes one to the main market. The south entrance is called “Swarga Dwara” (Gate to Heaven). Outside this doorway are 56 steps that lead to the Gomati River. The temple is open from 6.00 am to 1.00 pm and 5.00 pm to 9.30 pm. The Krishnajenmastami festival, the birthday of Krishna was commissioned by Vallaba (1473-1531).
So what are you thinking, pack your pilgrimage bag and head to Dwarkadhish temple! Jai Shree Krishna!!
India’s Kumbh Mela has been recognised by UNESCO as an “intangible cultural heritage of humanity” and held up as the world’s largest peaceful gathering of pilgrims.
The External Affairs Ministry recently said the recognition was accorded by the Inter-Governmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, an entity which works under UNESCO.
The decision to recognise the Kumbh Mela was taken at its ongoing meeting in Jeju, South Korea. The inscription of the Kumbh Mela was recommended by the expert body which examines the nominations submitted by member states. The committee observed it was the largest peaceful congregation of pilgrims on the earth.
“The Inter-governmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage under UNESCO inscribed the ‘Kumbh Mela’ on the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity during its 12th session held at Jeju, South Korea,” the MEA said.
The session, which started on 4 December, is to end on 9 December. It said the inscription was the third in two years following ‘Yoga’ and ‘Nouroz’.
“The committee observed that ‘Kumbh Mela’ is the largest peaceful congregation of pilgrims on the earth. The festival, held in Allahabad, Haridwar, Ujjain and Nasik, represents a syncretic set of rituals related to worship and ritual cleansing in holy rivers in India,” the MEA said.
“As a religious festival, the tolerance and inclusiveness that Kumbh Mela demonstrates are especially valuable for the contemporary world,” the MEA said in its statement.
The committee also took note of the fact that knowledge and skills related to the ‘Kumbh Mela’ were transmitted through the Guru-Shishya parampara (teacher-student relationship) by way of saints and sadhus teaching their disciples about traditional rituals and chants.
Reacting to the recognition, Culture Minister Mahesh Sharma said it was a proud moment for India. “A very proud moment for us as sacred Kumbh Mela is just inscribed as the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO,” he tweeted.
In 2003, the UNESCO General Conference had adopted the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Heritage as an international treaty, acknowledging that cultural heritage was more than tangible places, monuments and objects and that it also encompassed traditions and living expressions.
The Kumbh Mela joins new elements from Botswana, Colombia, Venezuela, Mongolia, Morocco, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates on the UNESCO list.
…but Mehrangarh was different, it has lifted for tourists to go various levels, one need not necessarily climb rather take the steep walk to visit the fort. I must say a visit to the fort was very enlightening and it opened many layers of Rajputana, Raja-Maharajas, their aesthetic sense, their valour and love of their land. No wonder Mehrangarh has a steady stream of Indian and foreign tourists, in every season. We were lucky to have visited in winter, which further added to our experience about Mehrangarh fort. Standing high above the plains on this isolated rock, the Fort covers an area 460 mts in length and 230 mts in width, with walls that vary in height from 6 to 36 mts. Inside its ways, there are several palaces, which are known for their intricate carvings and sprawling courtyards. The foundation of the fort was laid on May 12, 1459 by Rao Jodha on a rocky hill nine kilometres to the south of Mandore.
The invincible fortifications are six meters thick. Some of the walls still bear cannon marks they had once withstood. The Chamunda Mataji was Rao Jodha’s favourite goddess, he brought her idol from the old capital of Mandore in 1460 and installed her in Mehrangarh. She remains the Maharaja’s and the royal family’s Isht Devi or adopted goddess and is worshipped by most of Jodhpur’s citizens as well. Crowds throng Mehrangarh during the Dussehra celebrations. It contains period rooms like Moti Mahal – The Pearl Palace, Sheesha Mahal – The Hall of Mirrors, Phool Mahal – The Palace of Flowers, Takhat Vilas -Maharaja Takhat Singh’s Chamber.
Burnished red sand stone, imposing, invincible and yet with a strange haunting beauty that beckons. The beauty and the grandeur of numerous palaces in the fort narrates a saga of hard sandstones yielding to the chisels of skilled Jodhpuri sculptures. To enter the Mehrangarh fort, seven gates have to be crossed.
The work of building the fort originally commenced in 1459 on the behest of the founder of Jodhpur – Rao Jodha but much of the fort as it stands today was built in the era of Jaswant Singh. This magnificent fort is spread over 5 kms. and is located on top of a hill which is all of 125 meters high.
The Mehrangarh Fort encloses many palaces, which are known for their intricate carvings and sprawling courtyards. The Moti Mahal which is made of elaborately carved stones is the dwelling place of the royal throne of Jodhpur which is popularly referred to as the Sringar Chowki in local parlance.
There is also the majestic Umaid Villas that showcases some remarkable Rajasthani miniature art work. The Ajit Villa is conspicuous with its rich collection of musical instruments and regal attires while the gorgeous Phool Mahal is where the legendary Jodhpur Coat of Arms is preserved.
The parapets of Phool Mahal are adorned with exquisite art works portraying various melodious scenes. There are seven gates, which include Jayapol (meaning ‘victory’) built by Maharaja Man Singh to commemorate his victories over Jaipur and Bikaner armies. Fattehpol (also meaning ‘victory’) gate was built by Maharaja Ajit Singh to mark the defeat of the Mughals. The palm imprints upon these still attract much attention even today.
The museum in the Mehrangarh fort is one of the most well-stocked museums in Rajasthan. In one section of the fort museum there is a selection of old royal palanquins, including the elaborate domed gilt Mahadol palanquin, which was won in a battle from the Governor of Gujarat in 1730.
The museum exhibits the heritage of the Rathores in arms, costumes, paintings and decorated period rooms. Mehrangarh fort has never ever been seized. The invincible fortifications are six meters thick.
Some of the walls still bear cannon marks and today this magnificent Jodhpur fort is a living testimony that recounts the chronicles and legends of Jodhpur’s rich past.
It was really a very memorable afternoon like icing on the cake. I wish we had more time to splurge on this Rajasthani marvel.
If Rajasthan visit is on your agenda, don’t give it a miss…Watch video for a great experience!
When an official meeting turned towards JAL MAHOTSAV!
It is highly unlikely that an official meeting would turn the tide towards Jal Mahotsav in Madhya Pradesh, but it happened just yesterday. My guests told me that they handle the account of M.P. Tourism and mentioned that I should visit Jal Mahotsav currently on…my curiosity as a travel blogger grew and I wanted to know more about this water carnival of Madhya Pradesh. The State is very close to my heart as it is India’s heartland and the land of my childhood too. The water carnival, which is currently on, will last until January 2, 2018.
So for the uninitiated, including me, Jal Mahotsav is set up in the lap of Hanuwantiya Island besides the pristine waters of Indira Sagar Dam on Narmada river, where the picturesque escapade compliments the joy that lies in the spirit of adventure. The water festival has now made the culturally rich Madhya Pradesh is known for its adventure tourism too. It gives one more reason to the people to tour to Madhya Pradesh. Along with celebrating the spirit of adventure, the festival also celebrates the spirit of MP. The absolute brilliance of the local artisans and craftspeople, melodious folk music and performances and lip-smacking cuisine – all these precisely describes and defines what “The Heart Of India” truly stands for.
Once an unexplored place, now a destination where India’s largest water carnival is held. Close to Khandwa district in Madhya Pradesh, lies an island in the backwaters of Indira Sagar Dam on River Narmada. Hanuwantiya Island, has now turned into an adventure hub with the support of MP Tourism. Derived from local village name with the same name, MP Tourism found Hanuwantiya suitable for water tourism activity. This is the story behind the makeover of Hanuwantiya from an untouched island to an adventure addition in Madhya Pradesh tourism packages.
Flying above the sparkling waters or speeding through it, India’s one of its kind water festival is full of land, water and air adventure activities all set on one canvas called Jal Mahotsav. The festival also represents the culture of Madhya Pradesh – a culture that stands for the rich skill set of its artisans, rich heritage and not to miss out, sumptuous cuisine! MP Tourism Jal Mahotsav is truly a dream for every adventure lover and a desire of every individual who seeks a holistic rejuvenation.
Here’s how the grand festival – MP Tourism Jal Mahotsav became possible. In its efforts to make Madhya Pradesh known for its adventure tourism too, MP Tourism revamped the unexplored and untouched Hanuwantiya Island and turned it into a small city in itself. A tent city where people can rejoice and relax while at the same time be adventurous! In a small span of its inception, Jal Mahotsav has now become a very important part of Madhya Pradesh Tour packages with more and more people coming over to Madhya Pradesh to discover a completely new face of the state.
Here you can lose your heart and soul to the beauty of state where “The Heart of India” lies!!
Once an unexplored place, now a destination where India’s largest water carnival is held. Close to Khandwa district in Madhya Pradesh, lies an island in the backwaters of Indira Sagar Dam on River Narmada. Hanuwantiya Island, once an unexplored and unknown place, has now turned into an adventure hub with the support of MP Tourism. Derived from local village name with the same name, MP Tourism found Hanuwantiya suitable for water tourism activity. This is the story behind the makeover of Hanuwantiya from an untouched island to an adventure addition in Madhya Pradesh tourism packages.
Nestled in this Hanuwantiya Island is Jal Mahotsav – a striking contrast of adventure with serenity, of excitement with relaxation. An extravaganza to rekindle the spirit of adventure within oneself, India’s one of its kind water festival is all set to rule the hearts of all the adventure lovers once again! Well, if you aren’t an adventure buff, you shouldn’t be disappointed since the place unwinds surprises for everyone. Those in search of relaxation and a break from routine life can treat themselves to the comfort of a luxury tent, sit back and feel the cool breeze relaxing every nerve of your mind and body.
With the vision of Honourable Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Shri Shivraj Singh Chouhan to make “the heart of India” known for its adventure tourism, a dream called Jal Mahotsav was born.
Come 2018, & I will head to Kanha National Park for a DATE with ROYAL BENGAL TIGERS!!
Kanha National Park, located approx. 165 km from Jabalpur and 254 km from Nagpur, also known as Kanha Tiger Reserve, is a vast expanse of grassland and forest in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Tigers, jackals and wild pigs can be spotted in Kanha Meadows. The elevated plateau of Bamhni Dadar is home to birds of prey. Animals often gather at the watering holes of Sondar Tank and Babathenga Tank. The park’s flora and fauna are documented in the park’s Kanha Museum. Spread across 940 sq.km, Kanha National Park is one of the largest parks in Madhya Pradesh where the majestic royal Bengal tigers are found in good numbers.
The Park is respected globally for saving the Barasingha from near extinction. No doubt, it is one of the best-managed parks in Asia and a part of Project Tiger. National Geographic’s award-winning ‘Land of the Tigers’ was shot here, but the park is home to leopards, wild dogs and Barasingha as well. A safari in Kanha will surely get me thrilled, the way I was on a trip night Safari in Singapore, truly memorable.
The lush sal and bamboo forests, grassy meadows and ravines of Kanha provided inspiration to Rudyard Kipling for his famous novel “Jungle Book”. The Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh came into being in 1955 and forms the core of the Kanha Tiger Reserve, created in 1974 under Project Tiger. The Park’s landmark achievement is the preservation of the rare hard ground Swamp Deer (Barasingha), saving it from near extinction. Stringent conservation programs for the overall protection of the Park’s fauna and flora makes Kanha one of the most well maintained National Parks in Asia.
A heightened attraction within the Park is Bamni Dadar, popularly known as Sunset Point that offers the most awe-inspiring backdrop of the sunset against grazing Sambhars and Gaurs, magnifying the natural splendour of the area. Aside from its diverse wildlife and bird population, the frequent sightings of Tigers roaming in the wild at Kanha Wildlife Sanctuary remain the most popular draw.
Be there, for your first outing in 2018!!
Why I am going there? Later on that!! | 2019-04-18T15:14:03Z | https://travelknots.wordpress.com/category/destinations/ |
Welcome to Guardian Angels CR Relocation Services. We have made bog changes in design and structure of the website.
According to the ICE (Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad) one more digit will be added on March 20 to all phone numbers (both commercial, residential plus mobile phones) to leave space for future expansion.
To update all marketing, paper, signs, contact cards.
The developer wants to sell land–duh! He or she may not care about what you care about such as resale value, whether someone else may block your view when they build, etc.
Putting in roads and/or utiilties after the sale can be a problem. Developers, who have yet to put in utilities or roads may promise them at some date but remember they are often at the whim of the local authorities, have other priorities (such as selling more land), so be careful! Try to understand in detail what the plan is and even find a good friend who speaks Spanish to check directly with the authorities. See if what the developer is telling you is actually true.
Don’t buy a property you have not seen in person! This is probably a “no-brainer” but actually many people do buy properties this way. It’s just asking for trouble!
You many not be able to build what you’d like to build on the lot you buy. For a variety of reasons including topology, local laws, etc., what you thought you could build may not be possible. Certainly discuss your plans with the developer and definitely discuss with competent surveyors and local issues, before buying the land.
Who’s going to be building near you? It’s definitely important to get a sense of what will go on around your land? Zoning laws are fuzzy at best here so try to find out what’s happening in your area. You probably don’t want a nightclub next door!
Pre-construction can be risky. Sometimes pre-construction pricing signals that the developer doesn’t have all the cash need to finish the project–put in roads, utilities and even get the homes built. Understand his/her financing and future plans–and try to confirm with others.
Others many benefit if you have to put in utilities. If you end up paying for the installation of utilities, which could be $20,000 or more, the developer benefits as the price of his/her other lots go up. He or she makes additional profits while you are stuck with the cost of the utilities. Any developer worth his/her salt will put in the utilities for you–at his/her expense!
How’s the weather? An area where you want to build a home may look terrific in the summer/dry season, but what’s it like in the rainy season? Does it flood every year? Will you like the amount or rain, temperature, and wind in the rainy season? Definitely ask lots of questions.
These are just some of the issues to watch out for, but in general, verify and confirm everything! Good luck!
When you move to a new country, where nothing is known and familiar, your routines get mightily disrupted. Suddenly, nothing is routine. The loss of routine means the time and energy that was available for higher order, more sophisticated tasks now goes to basic coping and survival functions. With the minutiae of everyday life now demanding much of your conscious attention (these higher order functions) either get put aside or take much longer to accomplish.
The loss of routine hits you at your core. You expect to have to learn how to do new things overseas and even new ways of doing familiar things, but you may be surprised to discover that you have to learn to do things you normally do without thinking.
The problem with routines is that until you?ve reestablished them, you can have a very low opinion of yourself. If something this simple can be so difficult, then what am I going to do about something that?s genuinely difficult?
As you face the difficulties of your early months abroad, you will need the kind of unconditional acceptance and support only close friends and family members can provide; you need people who will listen to your tirades about the country and the natives without judging, people with whom you can fall apart without being embarrassed or worrying about what they might think. Your spouse may be available for this purpose, of course, but he or she may be looking to you for the same support. Whenever possible, you should plan to fall apart on different days from your spouse.
The culture is still generally conservative and retains the ?machismo? system. Men and women are expected to act differently from each other, and to respect their roles. While a large proportion of Costa Rican women are professionals and hold important positions in both businesses and the government, most still retain some traditional practices.
Costa Ricans are reverent Catholics, as are most Latin Americans. A host of evangelical churches emerged in the 1970’s, but nearly 80 percent of the population remains Catholic (even though only about 20 percent of the Catholics attend mass regularly).
Young people don’t usually leave home when they go to university but stay with their parents until they are married. Children often join parents for social engagements. Parents often join the children for birthday parties. Most birthday parties include siblings and parents of the child invited and this is to be expected when receiving an invitation unless otherwise stated.
Father is head of the household as in the traditional family system. He is the decision-maker; the authority figure and often taking prime responsibility for decisions for those that are subordinate to them.
Extended family is very important in Costa Rica . Often grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles are all part of the extended family, helping out other family members when needed.
Nepotism is widely acceptable in business in Costa Rica as well. The owner of a company will often employ family members and close friends. Family reputation may be important to the establishment of business relationships.
Family ties are still very strong, and traditions revolve around the family from the moment of birth to that of death. Some immensely important family traditions are baptisms, first communions, engagement parties, weddings and funerals, which are attended by the extended family as well as by friends and their family members.
Costa Rica food is a fusion cuisine. It combines elements of culinary traditions from Africa, Italy, France, China, and Spain, flavored by traditional grains (rice, corn, and beans), roots (cassava, taro roots, sweet potatoes), spices (coriander, garlic, annatto, saffron, parsley, oregano, thyme, nutmeg, salt, and pepper), oils (olive oil, vegetable oil, and lard), sauces (Lizano, Soy, and Worcestershire), fresh fruit, and vegetables. The food is mild to slightly seasoned.
The most common dishes that reflect the rural culture and are served in typical food restaurants are Gallo Pinto (Spotted Rooster) and Casados (Married.) Gallo Pinto consists of rice and beans seasoned with coriander, onions and Worcestershire sauce usually served for breakfast with scramble or fried eggs and a cup of Agua Dulce (pure sugar cane diluted in hot water) or coffee. Casado consists of white rice, black or red beans served with pork, steak, or chicken, a small portion of cabbage/lettuce & tomato salad, and fried plantains. All is served in one dish for lunch or dinner with a refreshment or coffee.
But a little study shows that some of these creatures also are responsible for pollinating cocoa trees. No bugs, no cocoa pods and no chocolate. The larva is as hungry as the adult female and dines on certain water pests.
Spanish speakers call these pests, purrujas, zancudos or beechas and English speakers know them as midges, sand flies or no-see-ums because they almost always get away without being seen. Some are so small that they fit through screens that stop bigger insects. Sometimes they swarm.
The insects should really be called chewing flies because the female injects a little saliva into the small wound to help keep the blood flowing. Several hours later the bite turns into a small red spot that itch intensely.
Around dwellings, eliminating stagnant water and decaying vegetable matter where the larvae dwell, according to entomologists at the University of Georgia can reduce the number of biting flies.
Open Mindedness… The ability to keep one’s opinions flexible and receptive to new stimuli seems to be important to intercultural adjustment.
Sense of Humor… A sense of humor is important because in another culture there are many things which lead one to weep, get angry, be annoyed, embarrassed, or discouraged. The ability to laugh off things will help guard against despair.
Ability to Cope with Failure… The ability to tolerate failure is critical because everyone fails at something overseas. Persons who go overseas are often those who have been the most successful in their home environments and have rarely experienced failure, thus, may have never developed ways of coping with failure.
Communicativeness… The ability and willingness to communicate one’s feelings and thoughts to others, verbally or non-verbally, has been suggested as an important skill for successful intercultural communicators.
Flexibility and Adaptability… The ability to respond to or tolerate the ambiguity of new situations is very important to intercultural success. Keeping options open and judgmental behavior to a minimum describes an adaptable or flexible person.
Curiosity… Curiosity is the demonstrated desire to know about other people, places, ideas, etc. This skill or personality trait is important for intercultural travelers because they need to learn many things in order to adapt to their new environment.
Positive and Realistic Expectations… It has been shown frequently that there are strong correlations between positive expectations for an intercultural experience and successful adjustment overseas.
Tolerance for Differences and Ambiguities… A sympathetic understanding for beliefs or practices differing from one’s own is important to successful intercultural adjustment.
Positive Regard for Others… The ability to express warmth, empathy, respect, and positive regard for other persons has been suggested as an important component of effective intercultural relations.
A Strong Sense of Self… A clear, secure feeling about oneself results in individuals who are neither weak nor overbearing in their relations with others. Persons with a strong sense of themselves stand up for what they believe but do not cling to those beliefs regardless of new information, perspectives, or understandings which they may encounter.
Costa Rica’s current population is approximately three and a half million people. The growth rate averages at 2.3% and is not decreasing. This population is unique to other Latin American countries in the whiteness of the population. The 1989 census classified 98% as white or mestizo and 2% of the people black or indigenous.
If your thinking of bringing you pets to Costa Rica, don?t think that it?s too much trouble and re-home your pets because it?s not a difficult or expensive process. When we moved here we brought 3 dogs, 3 cats, 2 birds and of course our 3 children. It seems we just about had the plane full just with our baggage alone.
To insure that you handle the process correctly, read what we have to say and follow it to the T so that you don?t have any problems upon your arrival in Costa Rica.
Rules can change but we keep on top of these changes so before you get ready to travel with your pets contact us a few weeks before to be certain there are no changes that will affect you. Note: Do NOT rely on the airlines to give you the information that you need to make this trip with the pets because more times than not they will give you conflicting and wrong information, and that can make for a mess when trying to leave or arrive in Costa Rica.
If you follow the rules we have set out below, you will breeze through customs and immigration without any problems!
There is no quarantine on dogs, cats, or birds provided you have the right documentation. If you don?t, your pets will be taken from you at customs and put into a MINAE approved quarantine facility guaranteed.
What you need is for your dog/cat to be current on all of their vaccinations. They must be administered within one year at the time of travel. Rabies vaccination MUST be over 30 days old and under 1 year at the time of travel. You cannot enter Costa Rica with a 3-year rabies vaccine. Your animal will be put in quarantine if you attempt this.
You will need health certificates from your veterinarian including proof of rabies. You will also need form 7001 from the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) signed by the State Veterinarian certifying that all vaccinations have been administered and your animal is in good health, Your vet should know all about this but some don?t have the form in their office. They can get this from the USDA or contact GACR and we can give you the office where you can get the form. Easiest is for your vet to acquire this form.
At present, this paperwork does not need to be validated by the Costa Rican embassy in the US but this can change at any time so check with GACR for the current rules regarding this.
Your vet should know the immunizations required for shipping pets internationally. If he/she doesn’t, contact GACR for the specifics and we would be happy to help.
There are pet embargo?s (Summer embargo is from May to September) during the very hot and very cold seasons (usually January and February) of the year. This is for your pets protection but often times we can find ways around this by flying very early or very late in the day to avoid the extreme heat issues. There is not much we can do about the embargo?s because of the cold, there are just several months where it is difficult to fly your pets so planning ahead is very, VERY important. Check with GACR to see if these dates will affect you and your time of travel and how we can possibly work around it. It is always best to plan your departure to avoid these dates.
Airlines are often NOT current on the rules of importation of animals, especially those that work the counters at airports. They CAN and WILL deny boarding for the DUMBEST of reasons, and often they are completely WRONG. If you get into a conflict with a ticket person, ask to speak to their supervisor. Often times, this will get a quick resolution to your problem, and if you have your wits about you and insist that you know what you are talking about, this goes a long way.
A recent incident with American Airlines where they were insistent that you had to have the health certificates authenticated by the Costa Rican Consulate. Only after speaking to a supervisor or two was my client allowed to board. They went to the Consulate and were told they did not need authentication and passed this information onto the supervisor, which in turn allowed them on the plane.
Continental Airlines at present is the most pet friendly airlines (in our opinion) but you cannot ship them as excess baggage. They will need to go cargo or what they call quick-pack service. Provided you are on the same plane with your pets, you can pick them up in the special baggage area of the airport. If you cannot fly with your pets, you will need to send them as cargo and you will need a customs broker and agent to help clear customs. Contact GACR for more information on this if this is your only alternative.
Delta is very good about flying pets and will even allow you to take them onboard as under the seat baggage provided they are small enough. The fee is rather steep for an international flight but sometimes people opt to go this route so that their pets can ride with them in the cabin.
A quick reminder?Three weeks before you are ready to travel, recheck the current rules with GACR, your relocation specialist to make sure they have not changed.
If you want to bring in birds, this requires an extra amount of paperwork and permissions from the government of the U.S. and Costa Rica. These permits can take up to 90 days to obtain so you must plan ahead if you plan to bring your pet birds with you. Check with GACR for current information well before travel time. | 2019-04-24T15:46:33Z | http://www.relocationcr.com/author/admin/ |
Yesterday, as I was pondering ducks, I was reading with my daughter that is ready to enter the first grade this year. Let me preface, SS#1 (my firstborn daughter) has always had phenomenal language skills. She began speaking at a very early age. Her ability to read however, has been a bit disappointing from a teacher's perspective. She is doing fine, but upon entering Kindergarten she had not mastered her letters/sounds. She showed no interest, and not wanting to make it a negative situation I didn't push her. I allowed the teacher to set the pace and then I pushed from her teacher's side. We all know the pull a K teacher has on their students, I used it to my advantage! Anyway, SS#1 is doing fine now, but I was a little apprehensive to say the least. Yesterday we were reading two different books. First we read Dr. Seuss' One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, thinking it would be easy with all those phonetic rhyming parts. Wrong!!!! I became very frustrated. Why wasn't she getting all those words. They are the same on each page! I thought she knew CVC rules. Has she lost all of her strategies?
We switched books and decided to read Mercer Mayer's book Just For Yu-You! She did phenomenal!
SS#1 reads for meaning! Isn't this what I want! Those language skills, they are what support her reading. She needs to have story for understanding. "What makes sense?" That is what drives her throughout the book. She knows her meager knowledge words, her fluency is great, her decoding does not come from breaking words down. Her approach is genius. She approaches text thinking, "What makes sense in the story for that beginning sound?" Duh!?!?!?!?!
While reading the Dr. Seuss book she had no support for meaning, it was all about decoding. I can actually see her skimming the pages looking for picture support and word strategy. She stops at meager knowledge words not because she doesn't know them but she is wondering how do they support the next hard word that is coming up. She is thinking, "how am I going to make that make sense?" Brilliant!
1. How often have I selected a book for a guided reading group because I wanted to teach a new decoding strategy? How often did it have meaning support?
2. Do I teach for strategy or for meaning?
3. Duh, why is this just occurring to me?
I have spent all summer reading all things Reading Workshop. I am gearing up for that purpose. I have been struggling with guided reading. How does it all fit? I think reading with my daughter yesterday solved this mystery for me. I still will have guided reading, I still will be teaching phonics strategies, BUT I am more focused on meaning...and then phonics.
I know kind of a cheesy title but I think that this post is going to be cheesy too.
Today, before entering the local Walmart I noticed two good samaritans trying to corral a mama and her baby ducklings into cardboard boxes. They were so cute, newly hatched they were still yellow feathered and snuggled close to their mama. I was drawn to this action as I thought about the place this mother had decided to nest. This is a Walmart not close to any water, there is not ever really a sufficient place to put a nest even. I'm sure had the babies and mother stayed in this parking lot nest that they surely would have died. However, these kind samaritans decided to save them from their untimely death.
We have a family of ducks that travels through our back yard from one pond to another. Every spring she quacks with her babies while crossing our road. Every once in a while she holds up morning traffic while drivers honk and flip her the bird. My oldest daughter always gets annoyed by this, "my goodness, they are just ducks Mama. They are so cute. Why are the cars honking?" My daughter has learned that baby ducks and their mamas are so cute and in need of rescuing. She is only 6.
When we lived at the lake we had a duck that took up residence near and around our pier. We named him Bert. He was a little different than all the other ducks because he was a cross between a farm duck and a mallard duck. He couldn't fly it seemed because he stayed during the winter. Bert never had a nest of eggs, never had a mate, never even seemed female. One day Bert showed up with babies. We were never sure where he got them because they were older, not yellow any longer, and he was a wonderful mother. They all lived. He taught them how to be ducks.
A day thinking about ducks.
1. I am a good teacher because I allow students to be who they are. I accept them for all their differences and glitches. I not only accept that but I foster that throughout the year. My aide says, "It's like a garden in here, a bunch of varieties all blooming when they are supposed to." I just add water, and sun!
2. If I weren't a teacher I would be a dog groomer, or hairdresser. I like going to both of these places. I also like that there is a finished product. I often don't get to see the finished product and that is sometimes frustrating.
3. My teaching style is very open. I think that I veer off from the beaten path at times and I am safe in thinking that that is what kids need. I enjoy learning right along with my students.
4. My classroom is chatty. I don't mind talking. I often will say, "Do you get this?" to a student. When they do I ask them to peer tutor another student. We are all learning at the same time. My classroom is also diverse. I am the teacher that requests the special needs, special education, etc. in my classroom. I have a concentration in Special Education and this is the reason why: I wanted to know what to do when I had these students in my room and I wanted to be positive about it. I'm so glad I did!
5. My lesson plans, are weekly. I know what skill, what strategy, etc. but the activity changes daily. I have such a workshop setting now that we really have to just go with whatever the kids need. Fortunately it has been successful.
6. One of my teaching goals: I am pushing forward with Reading Workshop (I don't know what else to call it) and hoping for the best. I am excited about all they will be learning. I want my students to feel the same way I feel about books.
7. The toughest part of teaching is knowing so much about their home lives and not being able to do anything about it. I don't think the American public can even remotely know what adult parents are doing to children. I have purchased clothing, lunches, school supplies, snacks for them to eat for supper, field trip money, etc. People have no idea what we do for these kids. I never knew my heart would be pulled on so emotionally.
8. The thing I love most about teaching is not the academia, it is educational, but not a state standard. It is the moment when you must let them go. I love looking at a student that came in different, one that you raised your eyebrows at and thought, "you have to learn to read?" I look at them in June and my heart is so proud of them. I have brought them to this point. We have worked so hard. It is like watching a bird take flight after being caged. It is like a child on a two wheel bicycle for the first time.
9. A common misconception about teaching is that we get money for the things in our classroom. Even down to staples and paper clips a teacher buys it all. For those of you frustrated by the prospect of rising property taxes for education I say, think of your teachers who have not only paid the taxes but are still filling their rooms with stuff that will make their students better. On average, a teacher spends $1200 out of their own pocket for their classroom. Books aren't cheap folks.
10. The most important thing I have learned since starting my career is that my students, their parents, my administrators, and my colleagues just want to be respected as humans. If we validate one another in a loving way we can get so much further than if we are tearing each other down. It has been a lesson in being human.
A poem about grief and the emotions experienced during that time. As a poet, it has been observational. As a wife, it has been a moment of anguish for the one I love.
Conversations cut short-because of grief.
Watery eyes, slow falling tears, a chuckle at a memory.
All summer long you get to listen to people say, "You are so lucky to have three months off for summer!" Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have spent already three days getting my room ready for the upcoming school year. I have been in my room early this summer. I just had so much to do. All that reading makes you just itching to get back in there to get started. I got to thinking about all the criticisms that we teachers face because our achievement scores are plastered for all the world to see. It can get a little unnerving even for an optimist like me! I made a list, a list of all the "achievement" that I see because I get to be...A Teacher.
-Oh, when they read. First grade, around October, they all fall in love, and you can't get them to put the books down. Not many teachers get to see this transformation but it is just like a butterfly breaking from a cocoon. They read. Spend a day and just focus on that one little skill that you learned when you were in the first grade, it was the foundation you needed for the rest of your life...to read.
-How about the struggling student, the one with all the strategies that you have tried and they still aren't with the others. How can you not just ache for them? They inspire you to keep trying, to ask others questions, to read more about them, and finally, you start watching the littlest achievements that they make. It will never be posted in the paper as an achievement- they wouldn't understand, but you saw achievement!
-Everyday, from 8:40-3:20 I am among greatness. Future doctors, lawyers, human resource persons, mothers, fathers, ministers, and teachers sit in my room and learn from one another. I have influence in their lives. One person, who gets to touch many.
-Forever, I will be learning. Not just the teacher, I am the learner. They share the greatest wisdom these little people. They allow you to look at life through a different set of eyes, I get to witness that, daily.
-I came to a realization when I sent my own kindergartner off to school last year. I had such worries, and concerns for her. I wanted to protect her and keep her safe from the world. Looking out at my students I was struck with this realization: Their parents feel this same way. These people must be handled with care. My profession, I feel my impact, I see the responsibility, and I understand the importance of what I do...everyday.
Thank God, I am a teacher.
My husband lost a friend today. A friend that wasn't very old, quickly lost his life. It has been looming over our home for days now. We have been living, waiting for the news. I got to thinking about what types of children's books deal with death and dying? I immediately thought of all of the books that deal with the death of grandparents. There are a lot of those out there. That is a very real issue for children because a lot of them lose grandparents as children.
1. Charlotte's Web- We wept openly this school year when that spider died. I heard the children discussing the importance of friendship, loyalty, and that very special spider. We loved her dearly, not just the character, but the friend she was to Wilbur. She is a very special spider. We talked about her qualities throughout the year, when a friend wasn't being kind, we remembered Charlotte.
2. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Toulane- I happened upon this book because of the Tales of Desperaux, the same author, Kate Dicamillo. This book is about a rabbit, a toy rabbit, that experiences what it is to love, and then loss. In this book one of his owners, named Ruthie, is poor, very sick, and so little. The rabbit grows to love her and be loved for the first time in his existence. Ruthie dies. My students stored Ruthie in their hearts the way Edward did. He talks about how Ruthie's death hardens his heart to never love again. My students understood that opening his heart meant that he might be hurt again. We discussed that after such loss people must choose like Edward to love again.
3. The Boxcar Children- while not a story about dying, the parents are dead, they are orphans. I remember thinking this when I was young and listening to my teacher, why had the parents died? Why would they leave these four children all alone? What was going to happen to them? Why were they so alone?
Do you see how these books draw you in? Do you see the emotional attachments they create for children? I do not think that my students will ever forget how we felt about Charlotte. We loved her to the bitter end, we also learned that our reward for loving her was the hope of her 514 children. They lived on, we learned that. We also learned that it was Wilbur's responsibility, as a friend, to continue to care for them, long into the future. A lesson about life. It is our responsibility to continue to care for those left behind.
Lessons, on death, and dying.
Hipwritermama always has Inspirational Mondays. I love Monday, it is my hen party night, Monday Night Football is coming up, and then I also get to read her posts! Today was especially uplifting for some reason. I guess I got to thinking about several people in my life that are starting over. All of them are going to pursue educations later in life and I am so proud of them. They are living their dreams out loud! What a novel idea! Personally, my dream was to become a teacher and a mother. I guess all this other stuff in my life is a blessing! I'll take it and be content. I am very content. I wrote this poem in response to Hipwritermama's post, hope you all enjoy. I only ask, "where is your dream?"
but the need of one.
It is the fire I want to be.
they are not strong, not ready to sustain the heat.
fuel to build the flame.
but the flame was relentless, it's spirit unyielding.
It's potential, could it be the big flame?
Or, will it retreat to the safety of the drawer?
But never what it was meant to be.
"Aughhh, can you see the little babies? They are so cute!" -All looking inside the birdhouse.
My family is big, my grandmother raised 7 children and then her brother's son, so actually 8. I can not remember my grandmother being married. She has always been on her own. She is getting slower physically but her spirit is unyielding. I have the greatest honor of truly knowing her. Today we spruced up her beloved yard. We mulched, and trimmed. We planted, and raked. It was hard, dirty, but fulfilling work. My children played with their distant cousins, and connected with all the world around them. Today felt safe. Today I felt like I was inside the inner circle of life. It was all going on around me. It was an "I remember..." kind of day.
I have decided my favorite place in the world is the ocean. Just recently while researching poetry to use in my classroom throughout the year I discovered that I am drawn to poems about the sea. What a wonder the ocean brings!
Oh- to live by the sea is my only wish.
Here is one my daughters enjoyed just this afternoon. It reminded them of our recent trip!
1. Repetition: I am finding that this is a must in children's books. I can't wait to discuss this with my students. Chrysanthemum, Chrysanthemum, Chrysanthemum!
2. There is an epilogue, students will be introduced to this.
3. The author describes the way Chrysanthemum feels in flower-like characteristics. She wilts, she blooms, she beams, they smell her, they pick her, etc.
4. I could use this book when we have discussions about paragraph writing. On page 3, the author says, "Chrysanthemum loved her name."
On page 4 and 5 the author goes on to support this statement, "She loved the way it sounded when her mother woke her up. She loved the way it sounded when her father called her for dinner. And she loved the way it sounded when she whispered it to herself in the bathroom mirror."
Closing sentence, "Chrysanthemum thought her name was absolutely perfect."
My most favorite thing of all about this book: It has antagonistic and heroic characters!!!!!!
Antagonist: Victoria and her posse Jo and Rita. They tease Chrysanthemum and make fun of her name. They are really disliked by the end of the book. Also, in the epilogue, Victoria goes down in the class musicale, she forgets all her lines as the "dainty Fairy Queen." Chrysanthemum giggles throughout the entire performance. The students love this. It's redemption for Chrysanthemum.
Hero: THE TEACHER- Mrs. Delphinium Twinkle! The author builds her up as "an indescribable wonder." The children tease Chrysanthemum and Mrs. Twinkle puts a stop to this immediately! (If you don't know, Kevin Henkes paints teachers out to be just wonderful people, understanding, and heroic).
I always share this book with my students during the first day of school, along with Tikki Tikki Tembo, another book on my list. We do some name activities for Math and Literacy. I can't wait to use it throughout the year for Reader's and Writer's Workshop!
"Support change: I look at older teachers that buck change and they are so unhappy in the profession. They blame it on the kids, the administration, parents, etc. They don't want to change, are too scared to change, or have no knowledge of what is out there? Those teachers that do support change and have been teaching for years: those people are so contagious to be around. They have so much background knowledge, years of pushing against the regime of mediocrity. They are who I plan to be. Someday I want a 30 something teacher to be looking up at me and be in awe. I want to be contagious, about anything that I deem valuable. If I can live this way, my family, my marriage, my profession will be better. I plan to change: into who I am supposed to be!"
I wanted to unravel this for you a little bit. I am not talking about the "unhappy" teachers. We know who they are. They are in every building across America. We know what they do, how they do it, we just don't understand why they continue to do it. They give our profession a bad name. I refuse to give them anymore space than this on my blog!
Reading Recovery Teacher: 30 plus years, I have so much respect for her job. She is just outstanding. She serves our school. I serve on a board with her and I love picking her brain about stuff. She is not stuck in the mud but she mulls it over and picks out the good points . She uses common sense, things that have been good quality ideas forever! She is not afraid to ask questions, and she praises you for a job well done. She also asks you to be reflective when things don't go well.
Kindergarten teacher: Across the hall I work with an exceptional teacher. Graduates come back just to visit her. She closes her door and magic happens. She is satisfied with being the Kindergarten teacher, not that that would be dissatisfying ever. Those kids are so prepared when they leave her. She has had to change over the years but she has evolved into something spectacular!
K-2 specialist- Comes to my room for a half-hour daily and my kids beg to be in her group. She is so good about generating strategies for one student that could help. She gets discouraged when they don't work. She takes it personally when her students aren't achieving what they should. And she is willing to change if it keeps occuring.
Language Arts Facilitator: Hello, Jen and I led her into the blog world! She personafies change. She left her job, school system, and city to come and work with us crazy girls. I think she loves it, she is always smiling? She always accepts my questions and tries to understand. She then helps me pick out the great stuff and disposes of the rest. She's always willing to change direction if she needs to.
These ladies encourage me. I look around and I just remember the greatness around me. I get to work toward that greatness everyday. "This is who I am going to be," I say in my heart. Ultimately, at the end of my career and life I want to pull into my parking spot, hair blowing in the breeze, skin wrinkled by a good, long, life- a little out of breath, but living and loving every minute of it! Hopefully, it will be near my good friend Jen, she will nod to me and I will concur: "We did enough!"
1. Tons of repetition, in fact the text builds upon the repetition. Students will love this!
2. There are italicised words in the book, quotation marks, and commas. This helps with fluency, grammar, and teaching students the fine art of leaving your reader hanging during writing.
3. Time order words help you know that throughout the day Harriet drives her mother wild!!!!
Here they are: At, Before, Later.
4. The language of the mother vs. the language of Harriet really shows the age difference. It also shows that Harriet is not that old.
One last tidbit: I made a self connection when reading this book because of my "Harriet." She is four, and yes, she drives me wild!!!! She also loved hearing this book read to her, she can relate.
Before my family went to the beach we purchased writer's notebooks for the trip. My daughter that is 4 enjoys drawing pictures in her notebook and writing her pre-literacy words. My daughter that is six is ready for the first grade. She is great mathematically, and is a phenomenal writer. We were getting ready for the trip and she and I had a great conversation about poetry. She asked, "Momma, how do you write poetry?" I then explained that poetry is not like writing a story, or like writing sentences, but more like writing phrases about something. We decided, that while we were on the island we would sit down and write a Haiku about a seashell. (My daughter blew me away with how quickly she picked up the concept of Haiku). Well, we did not write a poem about a seashell we wrote a poem about a shark tooth we found on the beach!
I had written a Haiku earlier in the week about these cool little clam-like things that dig themselves in the sand after each sweep of the tide (not sure what their called?). They fascinate me and so I shared this Haiku with her so that she could see the rhythm of the poem.
We sat on our porch looking at the tooth, we described its many characteristics (like a scientist) and then we wrote our poem together. It was a very proud moment for me.
I also mentioned that I would like to try a tritinia poem while on the island. Cloudscome tried this and I was intrigued by the challenge. My daughter understood what the rules for this poem was when I read it to her... "Cool Mama, you just repeated those words, I get it now!"
Ruth had a post recently about thinking of a word to "live by." I have thought long and hard and my word would have to be: OPTIMISM. There is too much negativity in this world, and it just doesn't make sense to dwell. It really does bring people down. If we could all just decide to change the things that we can control. This is not to say that negative things will not come your way, believe me they will. However, if I can't control it, then I shouldn't let it get to me. For instance, I can't control the home lives of my students. It can't be done by me. I can, however, better myself by personally reading about best practices, watching others in action performing best practices, and then doing my best at my profession. This is what I can do, and that seems optimistic, doesn't it!?!
Well, that is it for me for a while. I am off to the family vacation at the beach. (YaHooo!) Think of us basking in the sun, reading by the waves, and being positively happy!
Anyone, got any ideas for craft within these send me ideas. I'm sure that I could use them.
At the All Write! conference I had the privilege of hearing Lester Laminack. Here are a few things that I thought would be beneficial for me. Perhaps you will find them helpful for you as well.
1. Opening Act: Reading just to enjoy a book and build community. Take 10 behavioral problems you have and make a list. Then match 10 books to those behavioral problems and use them for your opening.
2. Use books during transitions. Grab them when you have them and then move into the next subject. Make it a cohesive move, don't make transitions a, "stop this, and then now let's do this."
3. Poetry- Do this during down time, like washing hands, or using restroom. Kids will get done faster because they don't want to miss out on the poem for the day.
4. Use sections of previously read text to help with mini lessons. For writer's workshop, and reader's workshop.
5. Writer's Craft- Pick 10 books to really know as a teacher. Go through them and find the points that you want to teach from them. Pass them off to colleagues, have them find the craft that could be taught from those books. Use them often for teaching craft, and mentor texts.
6. Closing Out the day! (this is my favorite!) He says that we need to leave children hanging when it comes to reading chapter books them. Like a drug dealer, we give them just enough, but not too much. We want them to come back for the product that we are selling. Just like a drug dealer. We are in sales, our product is books.
- If we are selling a product:books then we must vastly know literature. We must be able to sell authors, illustrators, and different genres. Titles should roll off our tongue because kids will notice when they don't!
- We are like drug dealers, we must leave our students satiated with the books that we are reading to them. It keeps them wanting more. They become addicted!
At the All Write! Conference last week I had the privilege of hearing Georgia Heard speak about the influence of poetry in the primary classroom. She stressed the importance of reading a piece of poetry daily, and making sure to introduce all genres of poetry. I was inspired. I was thinking about times in my day when spending 5 minutes to just read a poem would be great. How about that time when we are all standing around using the restroom- you know down time?
After that Ms. Heard suggested spending a week dissecting a poem. As she describes it,"climbing inside a poem." (Isn't that just the greatest imagery you can think of?) Here is a layout of that week. I think we will give it a try this coming year.
Monday: The heart of the poem. What is it about? Conversations about the poem.
Tuesday: Movement in the poem. Act it out, find the verbs. She says that this changes the poem for the children, it is not just a poem anymore, they make it their own.
Wednesday: Illustrate the poem. Stretch it into a writing piece.
Thursday: About the poet: any information you can have about the poet. Also, what can you compare from this other work? What is the context around the poem?
She was very interesting! One of the best points I think that I heard from her that day was her comments about Science and Observation. She mentioned that Scientists and Poets are a lot alike because they are both observational. A poet will look at some form and make all sorts of observational notes, just like a scientist, and then create a poem. Why can't we do this with our children? Have places in our classroom where they can discover? Imagine a T-chart with headings like Scientific Observations Vs. Poetic Observations. Kids could write details about these objects, questions, observations, and descriptive words. Having all genres of poetry around them they would soon get a sense of what poetry is and what it can be for them.
I am excited about the upcoming year!
Many of you know, I love poetry. Mostly I love writing poetry. I never teach a unit on poetry with my first graders. Just haven't done it, I know shame on me. I have some tools now, after hearing Georgia Heard. I will be sharing poetry with my first graders, not in a unit, but as another genre, daily, 180 days of poetry will be happening in room 127!
The warm bodies perspire at the soundof the bell.
Then, droplets of it explode from the forcefulness of the blows.
Can you see that it's here?
flashed red, swollen, and battered. | 2019-04-18T13:24:50Z | http://amicksarticles.blogspot.com/2007/07/ |
As for Boyfriend....both SHK and PBG are my favourites for long time....but sorry i found it a bit draggy and boring... so might only watch later.
Seriously. Kim yoo jung has transformed really well. I am so loving it. I am really wishing that she should be next park ji eun or kim eun sook actress. Please dramagods cast her with jjang scripts. She is ready to slayyyyyyyyyyyy.
After long time waited for bo gum.
Don't worry...... In 1-2 years when she is around 22-23.... i believe that she will be very popular with writers....it is just that she is still young...only 19 years international age and she has achieved so much... and many have noticed her talent. I believe it is just time. She is definitely going to give us many more successful dramas and movies that will definitely will hit milestones like Park Bogum is doing now.
Cha tae hyun is really ❤️❤️.
I agree with Lynnel, I found Boyfriend a little bit draggy too, but really nice filming, beautiful scenes in Cuba. BG and SHK voices are good though. I am gonna watch it later may be during weekend to support BG too.
Anyway, I would like YJ and BG to act in a very good film next project and it hits Asia and Worldwide like Gongyoo did in Train to Busan, they are both ready for the lead role in movie. Just need a very good script, directer and production. But I prefer to watch YJ in movie first and wanna see BG attend her movie VIP.
until now, I still really enjoy watching YJ faces in CWPFN, with long straight hair, pony hair etc she is really really pretty, prettier than when she was Raon may be just because she always wore 1 green costume unlike in CWPFN, she has worn many costumes, dress tracksuits, PJ, working suits etc. I wonder how BG feels when he watching this drama, he must be smiling and proud of her too.
I hope to see Boyoo at award events when their dramas finish especially at Baeksang. Hope they both get acting awards they deserve.
PS: I found YJ acting as a drunk person really cute, more realistic than BG, (just my opinion), she is a professional actor!!!
i don't know if it is just me... but there are so many similarities between the dramas of Boyoo at the moment....it is just that CWPFN is a youthful one and the " Encounter" is the middle aged category.
As for Yoojung's drama.... i am really rooting for some surprise increase in rating. It is really a nice drama that reflects the normal life of a young adult . ( I have watched it 3 times now eps 1-2 and it still makes me sad when yoojung says about the 97 pencils in the bucket) I hope that CWPFN will also have a high rating though it has less star power...the cable network is less known and the week day is also least popular. I think it is usually like this in any entertainment industry....the dramas or movies with big names and powerful acting usually draws in the crowds.
Like suzy had in my love from another star??
Overall, I’m just thrilled to be able to see and hear BG and YJ on the screen again! Nice to kickstart convo in this forum again too. I am in tandem to what most of you are thinking. It’s awesome that BG is doing great and I’m happy that his drama is taking off with much love and support. However a little perplexed as to the sky high ratings. It’s definitely all due to having two sensational actors together and maybe a more popular network? Yes, we expected Encounter to do well, but to the point of knocking it out of the park?? After two episodes I’m still grappling with the main leads’ chemistry. The writers haven’t sold me yet on how these very different characters can fall deep for each other-it seems like it’d end as a short term infatuation. The CEO just has an inner conflict which JinHyuk seems to fulfill, but how can she really mean so much to him?
I am definitely more engrossed with CWPFN from the clips I’ve watched on IG. (So sad that I’ve yet to figure out a way to see a whole episode with eng sub here in US.) Still, Iove the laughs and vibe of CWPFN. I am also fangirling about YJ; how is it that girl can look good doing absolutely anything?! I’ve said it before but her acting just reminds me of a young Jin Ji-Hyuk with those comical yet pretty facial expressions.
I also like how the CWPFN cast is comfortable with each other BTS. Now, I truly can see how they say YJ is a human vitamin. Even with an unlikely person, you can feel she can make good chemistry onscreen with anyone. I wonder now upon seeing how she interacts with other males, could we have been just blinded by her relations with BG. Is it possible she is just as nice with BG as any other man?? I pray not! I still have my hopes for this OTP. Soo wishing that YJ will also attend MAMA in Japan. Don’t know how much longer I can take it-I long to see them in one shot or even just attending the same event again would be super.
P.S. @LynneL I want to know the story behind the 97 pencils.
@kkwattana I thought BG’s drunk acting was one of the highlights of that episode. It makes him seem so young though, right?
So sorry no chance of Yoojung as a cameo.... thats like trying to shoot the moon.
Is it because they were so much highlighted during mdbc? Now nothing?? I didn't hear anyone cheering yoo jung while she was ill.
However a little perplexed as to the sky high ratings. It’s definitely all due to having two sensational actors together and maybe a more popular network?
I do agree star powers is really key in drawing crowds and both of them are seasoned, well established actors not to mention the noona is a veteran in the acting industry. And a plus with overseas filming.
Well in MDBC, she was a cross-dressed enunch, hence have to dorn the same enunch (excuse my wrong spelling) outfit, hardly any chance to see her in female outfit except for that in the solo dance, meetup with Leeyeong at the garden, as a physician assistant (love her in that outfit) and the final scene where she could finally live her gender as Hong Raon.
It’s likely a strategic move either between the two people involved or their agencies to downplay their connection. With their new dramas launching, naturally the professional focus is putting attention to their new work. It’s strange that they cannot openly support each other, but also a bit of a subtle hint itself (like Knowing Brothers has shown us) that there’s “something”. Honestly, the last thing they need to worry about are rumors or dare say, “scandals” much like the ending of the Episode2 Encounter. If there is indeed something btwn YJ and BG, it is special that they would like to protect it as part of their personal lives.
A YJ cameo just seems like it wouldn’t fit in that kind of drama in my humble opinion. BG in CWPFN sounds more fitting BUT small network and big star-so no. I really believe the fact that these two are young it is good advice by their “bosses” to keep any signs of PDA (including public support of each other) out. Their careers are rocketing and comes first at this point of time. Going along with Encounters use of grapes as a metaphor for BG, he can get sweeter give it time. We just have to wait and see. I think once YJ is in her mid 20s and BG approaching 30 and done with his military obligation, it would become more appropriate /accepted for them to come out about any relationship. We can only delulu for now that these two are supporting each other in private.
ps Wondering if maybe Min Do Hee (Gil Oh Sol’s BFF) might get some shout outs by BG or KDY? She’s our 6degrees of separation.
pps Thanks @LynneL for your help! I look forward to watching.
I am loving every moment of Encounter that until now I judge an artistic masterpiece, with two actors so good as to make me to forget that they before had been other characters...I'm not a fan of SHK, DOTS is certainly not one of my favorite drama, but I have to admit that in these first two episodes it won me over, it's an excellent actress and a beautiful woman, you can hardly notice the years of difference with her co-star... Their chemistry is daebak! Both of them are really good depicting at thier role..Thumps up Bogum role is so genuine. Jin Hyuk and Soo Hyun have different lives, yet they met, knowed each other and feel attracted.. I think it's right don't tell too much of this drama as of CWPFN (that still unfortunately I'm not seeing in my Country), not to spoil the taste for those who have not yet seen an episode ... In the spoiler I have included some salient scenes, in which I think they have touched high-pitched acting ... Bogummy is just ... wonderful!
Of course, a comparison between the two dramas is not possible, as I had already written, they are too different, same you can tell their characters... even a competition between them ( on who is better in acting) is not correct as well as nonsense... I am really satisfied about the ratings of both.. CWPFN surpassed almost all its direct competitors... and Encounter is picking many support and the critics are enthusiastic... I'm happy and I hope they are growing and leaving the mark... there will be other stories in the future and they, I'm sure, will meet again ... BoYoo fighting!
Now, after this long introduction, I will be leave you soon some updates, even some old from a few days ago, I was really too busy to write, but not so much not to see Encounter episodes at least 3 times ..
Happy sunday... and good start December!
Well sorry Boju.....i am the one who said Encounter is draggy.... that is my personal opinion. I have already mentioned here that Bogum will be the sucess finale of 2018 and i am very happy for him because it seems that for 2019 he will be very busy with hosting and his Asia fan meet. I guess until June/July 2019 he is very busy with his fan meet.
I am actually little bit sad as well as i feel that this is a sign that he will be enlisting soon. He might do one more project or none at all before he enlists.... so i am really glad that : Encounter is doing a fantastic job with the ratings and viewership. I love SHK from Full house and she has had up and downs like Yoojung and hence she is the older version of where i wish Yoojung would achieve in future.
And i know this is BoYoo shipping but as always.... it is destined whatever is to happen will happen... it is all written out who will meet in our life and who is the one in the end. Bogum's time is now....he will achieve all success and Yoojung's time is coming.
up until today I have expressed my support to the Boyoo couple (I have not written LeeRaon couple, but Boyoo couple because I have no doubt that our beloved guys are a real couple: regardless of all the signs, communicated by their songs, that they are still sending us, to confirm my conviction it is the fact that they do not publicly support each other: this is unnatural, because it's contrary to their kind nature and their declared and pleasant pleasure in acting together ... but also other facts, which in the previous pages have been treated by other friends, rooted me in this idea) allocating equal attention to the events that invested one and the other, without never delivering my thought to the words .... but today I am manifesting my humble thought. Why? the enthusiasm that arose in me for having finally seen the forum revived, through the intervention of many friends, has given way to the utmost despair when I learned the content of it. I do not deny that I felt lost, disconcerted and furious. I asked myself, but am I me in the wrong forum? Is it always the support forum for the Boyoo couple? I never thought to read a sort of opposition between her drama and his drama ... they are two dramas that are not opposable, not comparable, because they are very different: how can you compare a sweet dish with a spicy dish and decree the prevalence of one on the other? It is not possible because the choice belongs to the sphere of personal tastes. Even if one wanted to make a comparison within the same category or between two actors, the evaluation of pleasure or non-pleasure would be determined by one's own preference, by one's own personal taste. Nothing precludes expressing one's opinion, but if it is the bearer of one's own preference (produced by a personal taste ... by one's own sensibility), it would be advisable not to cross the limit of the caution of expressing it without opposing it to a possible comparison stone: doing it, you would risk to be misunderstood and, therefore, to annoy, to exacerbate the soul of those who do not share it. The effects of such a lightness in adopting the formula of communication of one's own thought could ignite outbreaks of tensions, damaging for the Boyoo couple: do not forget: long ago, due to a contoversial intervention by a fan of his new costar , our Yoo jung was forced to delete, on her instagram 1318, some photos and videos of her with Bo gum.
My call to caution is dictated by the fear that our heart couple may be disturbed. And now, however, I need to scream out all my appreciation for the drama of Bo Gum. I'm not doing this because I'm trying to balance the opinions expressed here or to restore the rhythm of fairness that, I regret to point out, the contents of some comments, hosted on this page, have contributed to interrupt: it is assumed that those who are part of this forum enjoy the high ratings obtained by the drama of Bo Gum, without ifs and buts ... so without charging them to the fact that both have a large fan following: this reading is superficial and unjust. Bojoo, with extreme grace, has exposed and I'm sure will show more material that will confute it ... but if you read reviews and articles circulating on some instagram and twitter, already you would have a certain knowledge of how the drama of Bo Gum is intriguing, fascinating , moving ... talking ... so my scream of appreciation comes from the call of elegance, from the call of pauses, colors, shades, slow rhythms, accelerations, shots that crystallize memories ... feelings ... from the call of greyness, of overcoming, of youth, of maturity ... of interruptions ... of renunciations, of the weight of responsibility, of simplicity, of the ordinary, of normality ... of contrasts, of synthesis ... of leisure, of meetings, of timing ... simply of the motions of soul, of love and of life in its ordinariness and its magic. The skills of the director, the authors, the screenwriters lies in the fact that in just two episodes they managed to spread those calls within a just introduced love story, ... still to be developed and with a uncertain or unpredictable development; the two protagonists have got the undisputed merit of having made these variegated calls palpably alive, without falling into clichés.
Only two episodes have been transmitted, that going me towards the discovery of two different sensitivities, aimed at living and loving each other, that have irremediably captured me. While the images of the landscapes, the environments, the different contexts flowed, while the dialogues alternated with the dialoguing silences, the shadows with the chiaroscuros and then with the defined outlines of the parable of life and love, my smile and tears alternated on my face: I let myself be crossed by the offered contrasts, that have awakened my emotional differences, prompting me to identify myself now in the simplicity and purity of his youth, now in the enchantment or fatality of an encounter experienced by both, now in the frailty of her, dressed in severity and professional efficiency. I never felt bored ... I just felt ... I felt emotion because it is a drama that deals with personal situations that can occur ... that occur in real life; it is not a drama unglued from reality. I find that the interpretation offered by SHK is naturally excellent.
And what about our Bo Gum? He is enchantin! My dear @kKwattana, his interpretation of the drunk literally fascinated me: it has been so realistic and believable because it is crossed by absence, dizziness and euphoria, ingredients that he wisely and masterfully amalgamated, alternating them, while not stifling the background purity of his character.
I add that the esteem that I have towards him has grown exponentially since he chose to play this character: try to play a normal guy (usually spectators are more likely to show sympathy towards a highly problematic character and with a dramatic past, made of suffering) is for him a actorial challenge not indifferent: he must succeed in making extraordinary and captivating what is ordinarily normal, but from those that are the premises, he is succeeding at great. I am convinced that Yoo, for whom love means respect and admiration, will not want to miss a single episode of Boyfriend, to admire her Bo and feel inspired by his skill.
My dear @Kkwattana, Bo does not have to prove to bee as good at acting like Yoo, and the other way around , because both, with owen peculiarities, are great actors. So I think Boyfriend is: spectacular!!! I wait with trepidation that next Wednesday comes to be able to see another episode: I do not hide that these two episodes I have seen several times. I also really enjoyed the acting of Yoo, that I think she is a very good actress; I have seen both episodes of her drama, but just to avoid hasty and superficial evaluations and not to undermine or disregard the principle of caution, I will keep my opinions for myself. However, I wish both of our beloved Bo and Yoo to reach high peaks of listening and recognition with their respective dramas. It hurts me if my long comment has bumped the sensitivity of some friends, but do not forget that this is the forum dedicated to the BOYOO couple. Now on this forum, I will return to share information on our beloved Boyoo couple.
I guess everyone is enjoying the dramas of Boyoo at the moment. I am and my mondays and tuesdays are filled with laughter and happiness.
I hope yoo jung be special guest in one of his fan meet.
ps: Like you, I found exhilarating the part of Bogummy drunk and I am glad it has received so much approval!
For everyone, BoYoo is real!!!! | 2019-04-18T10:30:53Z | https://forums.soompi.com/topic/390745-kim-yoo-jung-park-bo-gum-moonlight-couple/page/837/ |
Although network-assisted device-to-device (D2D) communications are known to improve the spectral and energy efficiency of proximal communications, the performance of cooperative D2D schemes in licenced spectrum is less understood when employed to extend the coverage of cellular networks. In this paper, we study the performance of D2D-based range extension in terms of sum rate and power efficiency when a relaying user equipment (UE) helps to improve the coverage for cell edge UEs. In our design, the relaying UE may have own traffic to transmit and receive to/from the cellular base station (BS) and can operate either in amplify-and-forward (AF) or decode-and-forward (DF) modes and can make use of either digital or analogue physical (PHY) layer network coding. In this rather general setting, we propose mode selection, resource allocation and power control schemes and study their performance by means of system simulations. We find that the performance of the DF scheme with network coding is superior both to the traditional cellular and the AF-based relaying schemes, including AF with two-slot or three-slot PHY layer network coding.
Univ Fed Ceara, Wireless Telecom Res Grp, BR-60440970 Fortaleza, Ceara, Brazil..
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), Automatic Control. Ericsson Res, Radio Dept, S-16480 Stockholm, Sweden.
In dynamic time division duplexing (DTDD) systems, the uplink (UL) and downlink (DL) resources can be configured to adapt to changing traffic conditions. Therefiwe, DTDD systems are advantageously deployed in scenarios in which the UL and DL traffic demands are asymmetric and timevarying. Unfortunately, multicell DTDD systems give rise to base station-to-base station and user equipment-to-user equipment interference, that can severely degrade the system performance. Previous works on DTDD either assumed that the UL/DL configurations are given, or they did not take into account the negative impact of multicell DTDD interference. In this letter, we propose a novel cell reconfiguration technique that considers both the prevailing traffic conditions and multicell interference levels. The proposed technique is based on an efficient solution of a mixed integer linear program, whose objective is to maximize the overall system throughput taking into account users' traffic preferences. Realistic system level simulations indicate that the proposed scheme outperforms not only the static TDD system but also other reference schemes, that disregard the DTDD specific interference effects.
Univ Fed Ceara, Wireless Telecom Res Grp, BR-60020181 Fortaleza, Ceara, Brazil..
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), Automatic Control. Ericsson Res, SE-16480 Stockholm, Sweden.
Hybrid beamfiorming (BF) architectures employing phase shifters or switches reduce the number of required radio frequency chains and the power consumption of base stations that employ a large number of antennas. Due to the inherent tradeoff between the number of radio frequency chains, the complexity of the employed analog and digital BF algorithms and the achieved spectral and energy efficiency, designing hybrid BF architectures is a complex task. To deal with this ormplexity, we propose a unifying design that is applicable to architectures employing either phase shifters or switches. In our design, the analog part (!if the hybrid BF architecture maximizes the capacity of the equivalent channel, while the digital part is updated using the well-known block diagonalizat' approach. We then employ the proposed joint analog-digital beamforming algorithm on lour recently proposed hybrid architectures and compare their performance in terms of spectral and energy efficiency, and find that the proposed analog-digital BF algorithm outperforms previously proposed schemes. We also find that phase shifterbased architectures achieve high spectral efficiency, whereas switching-based architectures can boost energy efficiency with increasing number of base station antennas.
As the specification of Release 11 of the LTE standards is approaching its completion, 3GPP is gradually moving its focus toward the next major step in the evolution of LTE. The drivers of the LTE evolution include the increasing demand for mobile broadband services and traffic volumes as well as emerging usage scenarios involving short-range and machine-type communications. In this article we provide an overview of the key technology areas/components that are currently considered by 3GPP for Rel-12, including support for further enhanced local area access by tight interaction between the wide area and local area layers, signaling solutions for wireless local area network integration, multi-antenna enhancements, improved support for massive MTC, and direct device-to-device communications.
In this paper we consider an ATM transmission link., to which CBR or VBR and ABR or UBR calls arrive according to independent Poisson processes. CBR/VBR calls (characterized by their equivalent bandwidth) are blocked and leave the system if the available link capacity is less than required at the time of arrival. ABR/UBR calls, however, accept partial blocking, meaning that they may enter service even if the available capacity is less than the specified required peak bandwidth, but greater than the so called minimal accepted bandwidth. Partially blocked ABR/UBR calls instead experience longer service time, since smaller given bandwidth entails proportionally longer time spent in the system, as first suggested in and analyzed in details herein. Throughout the life time of an ABR/UBR connection, its bandwidth consumption fluctuates in accordance with the current load on the link but always at the highest possible value up to their peak bandwidth (greedy sources). Additionally, if this minimal accepted bandwidth is unavailable at the time of arrival, ABR/UBR calls are allowed to wait in a finite queue. This system is modeled by a Continuous Time Markov Chain (CTMC) and the CBR/VBR and ABR/UBR blocking probabilities and the mean ABR/UBR waiting- and service times are derived.
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering (EES), Network and Systems engineering.
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering (EES), Automatic Control. Ericsson Research.
In cellular networks, the three-node full-duplex transmission mode has the po-tential to increase spectral efficiency without requiring full-duplex capability ofusers. Consequently, three-node full-duplex in cellular networks must deal with self-interference and user-to-user interference, which can be managed by power controland user-frequency assignment techniques. This paper investigates the problem ofmaximizing the sum spectral efficiency by jointly determining the transmit powersin a distributed fashion, and assigning users to frequency channels. The problem is for-mulated as a mixed-integer nonlinear problem, which is shown to be non-deterministicpolynomial-time hard. We investigate a close-to-optimal solution approach by dividingthe joint problem into a power control problem and an assignment problem. The powercontrol problem is solved by Fast-Lipschitz optimization, while a greedy solution withguaranteed performance is developed for the assignment problem. Numerical resultsindicate that compared with the half-duplex mode, both spectral and energy efficienciesof the system are increased by the proposed algorithm. Moreover, results show that thepower control and assignment solutions have important, but opposite roles in scenarioswith low or high self-interference cancellation. When the self-interference cancellationis high, user-frequency assignment is more important than power control, while powercontrol is essential at low self-interference cancellation.
To increase the spectral efficiency of wireless networks without requiring full-duplex capability of user devices, a potential solution is the recently proposed three-node full-duplex mode. To realize this potential, networks employing three-node full-duplex transmissions must deal with self-interference and user-to-user interference, which can be managed by frequency channel and power allocation techniques. Whereas previous works investigated either spectral efficient or fair mechanisms, a scheme that balances these two metrics among users is investigated in this paper. This balancing scheme is based on a new solution method of the multi-objective optimization problem to maximize the weighted sum of the per-user spectral efficiency and the minimum spectral efficiency among users. The mixed integer non-linear nature of this problem is dealt by Lagrangian duality. Based on the proposed solution approach, a low-complexity centralized algorithm is developed, which relies on large scale fading measurements that can be advantageously implemented at the base station. Numerical results indicate that the proposed algorithm increases the spectral efficiency and fairness among users without the need of weighting the spectral efficiency. An important conclusion is that managing user-to-user interference by resource assignment and power control is crucial for ensuring spectral efficient and fair operation of full-duplex networks.
—A promising new transmission mode in cellular networks is the three-node full-duplex mode, which involves a base station with full-duplex capability and two half-duplex user transmissions on the same frequency channel for uplink and downlink. The three-node full-duplex mode can increase spectral efficiency, especially in the low transmit power regime, without requiring full-duplex capability at user devices. However, when a large set of users is scheduled in this mode, self-interference at the base station and user-to-user interference can substantially hinder the potential gains of full-duplex communications. This paper investigates the problem of grouping users to pairs and assigning frequency channels to each pair in a spectral efficient and fair manner. Specifically, the joint problem of user uplink/downlink frequency channel pairing and power allocation is formulated as a mixed integer nonlinear problem that is solved by a novel joint fairness assignment maximization algorithm. Realistic system level simulations indicate that the spectral efficiency of the users having the lowest spectral efficiency is increased by the proposed algorithm, while a high ratio of connected users in different loads and self-interference levels is maintained.
To further improve the potential of full-duplex com-munications, networks may employ multiple antennas at thebase station or user equipment. To this end, networks thatemploy current radios usually deal with self-interference andmulti-user interference by beamforming techniques. Althoughprevious works investigated beamforming design to improvespectral efficiency, the fundamental question of how to split theantennas at a base station between uplink and downlink infull-duplex networks has not been investigated rigorously. Thispaper addresses this question by posing antenna splitting as abinary nonlinear optimization problem to minimize the sum meansquared error of the received data symbols. It is shown that thisis an NP-hard problem. This combinatorial problem is dealt withby equivalent formulations, iterative convex approximations, anda binary relaxation. The proposed algorithm is guaranteed toconverge to a stationary solution of the relaxed problem with muchsmaller complexity than exhaustive search. Numerical resultsindicate that the proposed solution is close to the optimal in bothhigh and low self-interference capable scenarios, while the usuallyassumed antenna splitting is far from optimal. For large numberof antennas, a simple antenna splitting is close to the proposedsolution. This reveals that the importance of antenna splittingdiminishes with the number of antennas.
KTH, Superseded Departments (pre-2005), Signals, Sensors and Systems. KTH, School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), Information Science and Engineering.
Full-duplex communications have the potential to almost double the spectralefficiency. To realize such a potentiality, the signal separation at base station’s antennasplays an essential role. This paper addresses the fundamentals of such separationby proposing a new smart antenna architecture that allows every antenna to beeither shared or separated between uplink and downlink transmissions. The benefitsof such architecture are investigated by an assignment problem to optimally assignantennas, beamforming and power to maximize the weighted sum spectral efficiency.We propose a near-to-optimal solution using block coordinate descent that divides theproblem into assignment problems, which are NP-hard, a beamforming and powerallocation problems. The optimal solutions for the beamforming and power allocationare established while near-to-optimal solutions to the assignment problems are derivedby semidefinite relaxation. Numerical results indicate that the proposed solution isclose to the optimum, and it maintains a similar performance for high and low residualself-interference powers. With respect to the usually assumed antenna separationtechnique and half-duplex transmission, the sum spectral efficiency gains increase withthe number of antennas. We conclude that our proposed smart antenna assignment forsignal separation is essential to realize the benefits of multiple antenna full-duplexcommunications.
Three-node full-duplex is a promising new transmission mode between a full-duplex capable wireless node and two other wireless nodes that use half-duplex transmission and reception respectively. Although three-node full-duplex transmissions can increase the spectral efficiency without requiring full-duplex capability of user devices, inter-node interference - in addition to the inherent self-interference - can severely degrade the performance. Therefore, as methods that provide effective self-interference mitigation evolve, the management of inter-node interference is becoming increasingly important. This paper considers a cellular system in which a full-duplex capable base station serves a set of half-duplex capable users. As the spectral efficiencies achieved by the uplink and downlink transmissions are inherently intertwined, the objective is to device channel assignment and power control algorithms that maximize the weighted sum of the uplink-downlink transmissions. To this end a distributed auction based channel assignment algorithm is proposed, in which the scheduled uplink users and the base station jointly determine the set of downlink users for full-duplex transmission. Realistic system simulations indicate that the spectral efficiency can be up to 89% better than using the traditional half-duplex mode. Furthermore, when the self-interference cancelling level is high, the impact of the user-to-user interference is severe unless properly managed.
Binary power control (BPC) is known to maximize the capacity of a two-cell interference limited system and performs near optimally for larger systems. However, when device-to-device (D2D) communication underlaying the cellular layer is supported, an objective function that considers the power consumption is more suitable. We find that BPC remains optimal for D2D communications when the weight of the overall power consumption in the utility function is bounded. Building on this insight, we propose a simple near-optimal extended BPC scheme and compare its performance with a recently proposed utility optimal iterative scheme using a realistic multicell simulator. Our results indicate that a near optimal D2D performance can be achieved without lengthy iterations or complex signaling mechanisms.
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), Network and Systems engineering. Royal Inst Technol, KTH, Stockholm, Sweden..
To further improve the potential of full-duplex communications, networks may employ multiple antennas at the base station or user equipment. To this end, networks that employ current radios usually deal with self-interference and multi-user interference by beamforming techniques. Although previous works investigated beamforming design to improve spectral efficiency, the fundamental question of how to split the antennas at a base station between uplink and downlink in full-duplex networks has not been investigated rigorously. This paper addresses this question by posing antenna splitting as a binary nonlinear optimization problem to minimize the sum mean squared error of the received data symbols. It is shown that this is an NP-hard problem. This combinatorial problem is dealt with by equivalent formulations, iterative convex approximations, and a binary relaxation. The proposed algorithm is guaranteed to converge to a stationary solution of the relaxed problem with much smaller complexity than exhaustive search. Numerical results indicate that the proposed solution is close to the optimal in both high and low self-interference capable scenarios, while the usually assumed antenna splitting is far from optimal. For large number of antennas, a simple antenna splitting is close to the proposed solution. This reveals that the importance of antenna splitting diminishes with the number of antennas.
Millimeter-wave using large-antenna arrays is a key technological component forthe future cellular systems, where it is expected that hybrid beamforming along withquantized phase shifters will be used due to their implementation and cost efficiency.In this paper, we investigate the efficacy of full-duplex mmWave communicationwith hybrid beamforming using low-resolution phase shifters, without any analogself-interference cancellation. We formulate the problem of joint self-interferencesuppression and downlink beamforming as a mixed-integer nonconvex joint opti-mization problem. We propose LowRes, a near-to-optimal solution using penaltydual decomposition. Numerical results indicate that LowRes using low-resolutionphase shifters perform within 3% of the optimal solution that uses infinite phaseshifter resolution. Moreover, even a single quantization bit outperforms half-duplextransmissions, respectively by 29% and 10% for both low and high residual self-interference scenarios, and for a wide range of practical antenna to radio-chain ratios.Thus, we conclude that 1-bit phase shifters suffice for full-duplex millimeter-wavecommunications, without requiring any additional new analog hardware.
Device-to-device (D2D) communications underlaying a cellular infrastructure has recently been proposed as a means of increasing the cellular capacity, improving the user throughput and extending the battery lifetime of user equipments by facilitating the reuse of spectrum resources between D2D and cellular links. In network assisted D2D communications, when two devices are in the proximity of each other, the network can not only help the devices to set the appropriate transmit power and schedule time and frequency resources but also to determine whether communication should take place via the direct D2D link (D2D mode) or via the cellular base station (cellular mode). In this paper we formulate the joint mode selection, scheduling and power control task as an optimization problem that we first solve assuming the availability of a central entity. We also propose a distributed suboptimal joint mode selection and resource allocation scheme that we benchmark with respect to the centralized optimal solution. We find that the distributed scheme performs close to the optimal scheme both in terms of resource efficiency and user fairness.
Device-to-device (D2D) communication integrated into cellular networks is an advanced tool to take advantage of the proximity of devices and allow for reusing cellular resources and thereby to increase the user bitrates and the system capacity. However, the introduction of D2D in legacy long term evolution (LTE) cellular spectrum requires to revisit and modify the existing radio resource management and power control (PC) techniques in order to fully realize the potential of the proximity and reuse gains and to limit the interference to the cellular layer. In this paper, we examine the performance of the legacy LTE PC tool box and benchmark it against an utility optimal iterative scheme. We find that the open loop PC scheme of LTE performs well for cellular users both in terms of the used transmit power levels and the achieved signal-to-interference-and-noise-ratio distribution. However, the performance of the D2D users as well as the overall system throughput can be boosted by the utility optimal scheme, by taking better advantage of both the proximity and the reuse gains. Therefore, in this paper we propose a hybrid PC scheme, in which cellular users employ the legacy LTE open loop PC, while D2D users exploits the utility optimizing distributed PC scheme. We also recognize that the hybrid scheme is not only nearly optimal, and can balance between spectral and energy efficiency, but it also allows for a distributed implementation at the D2D users, while preserving the LTE PC scheme for the cellular users.
This letter proposes distributed beamforming as a means of reducing interference in dynamic time division duplexing multiple input multiple output networks. Specifically, we formulate an optimization task, whose objective is to minimize the base station (BS) transmit power, while satisfying a predefined signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio threshold for each downlink user equipment and keeping the BS to BS interference power below a tolerable level. An iterative decentralized solution requiring reduced signaling load based on primal decomposition is proposed. This decentralized algorithm is shown to iterate towards the centralized solution, while feasible but suboptimal solutions can be obtained at any iteration.
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering (EES). Ericsson Research.
Systems and methods are disclosed for selecting resources for direct device to device (D2D) communications in a cellular communication, network. in one embodiment, a downlink resource is selected as a resource tor a direct D2D communication link between a first wireless device and a second wireless device if a base station serving each of the first and second wireless devices is equipped with an interference cancellation receiver and both the first and second wireless devices are less than a predefined threshold radio distance from their serving base station. An uplink resource is selected as a resource for the direct D2D communication link if the base station serving each of the first and second wireless devices is equipped with an interference cancellation receiver and at least one of the first and second wireless devices is more than the predefined threshold radio distance from its serving base station.
Embodiments described herein relate generally to wireless communication systems, and more particularly, to intercell interference coordination for radio resource control.
A method for controlling flow of data packets sent roaming user on a plane usuariobasado IP, said method comprising the steps of: a. control individual flows of data packets from mobile user sent on plane usuariobasado IP from a plane common control based on IP provided with agents (15) midcom in queel common control plane based on IP is spaced from the plane IP-based user, dichocontrol being provided by: b. each packet flow data mobile users register their identity in each middlebox (13, 14) said flow is along a path from an originating terminal to a dedestino terminal in the user plane IP-based c . in response, each middlebox user plane IP-based registers (16) itself and wings identities of packet flows data roaming user it runs in the plane of usuariobasado IP in an agent ( 15) midcom in the common control plane based on IP with which éstoscomunican using a signaling protocol to support extended midcom delflujo registration and control data packets phones, user d. agent midcom, now aware of the flows of data packets of móvilesregistrados user, which signals (17) control commands to the middleboxes that were recorded, belonging dichasórdenes the management of packet flows mobile data user delplano middleboxes the respective user based on IP.
Since the seminal paper by Knopp and Humblet that showed that the system throughput of a single cell system is maximized if only one terminal transmits at a time, there has been a large interest in opportunistic communications and its relation to various fairness measures. On the other hand, in multicell systems there is a need to allocate transmission power such that some overall utility function is maximized typically under fairness constraints. Furthermore, in multicell systems the degree of resource allocation freedom includes the serving cell selection that allows for load balancing and thereby the efficient use of radio resources. In this paper we formulate the joint serving cell selection (link selection) and power allocation problem as an optimization task whose purpose is to maximize either the minimum user throughput or the multicell sum throughput. Both the max-min and the max-throughput problems are non-polynomial hard and we therefore propose heuristic solution approaches. We present numerical results that give new and valuable insights into the trade off between fair and sum throughput optimal joint resource allocation strategies.
Device-to-device (D2D) communications underlaying a cellular infrastructure has been proposed as a means of taking advantage of the physical proximity of communicating devices, increasing resource utilization, and improving cellular coverage. Relative to the traditional cellular methods, there is a need to design new peer discovery methods, physical layer procedures, and radio resource management algorithms that help realize the potential advantages of D2D communications. In this article we use the 3GPP Long Term Evolution system as a baseline for D2D design, review some of the key design challenges, and propose solution approaches that allow cellular devices and D2D pairs to share spectrum resources and thereby increase the spectrum and energy efficiency of traditional cellular networks. Simulation results illustrate the viability of the proposed design.
A method and apparatus for allocating radio resources to an elastic session in a cell in a CDMA network is presented. The method comprises allocating, to the elastic session, a radio resource share corresponding to a reduced transmission rate wherein the reduction in transmission rate corresponds to a peak transmission rate of the elastic session being slowed down by a first slowdown rate. The first slow down rate is determined in dependency of the transmission rate requirements of the ongoing sessions in the cell in a manner so that the radio resource share allocated is not lower than a radio resource share corresponding to the maximum transmission rate if a total amount of resources available for allocation to ongoing sessions in the cell is sufficient for all ongoing sessions to transmit at a respective peak transmission rate.
A method in a first wireless device for adjusting Signal-to-Interference-plus-Noise-Ratio, SINR, target and a transmit rate is provided. The first wireless device is configured to transmit data to a second wireless device over a Device-to-Device, D2D, link. The first wireless device receives a report on a control channel from the second wireless device. The report comprises a measurement of SINR on said control channel and/or a data channel transmitted by the first device. The first wireless device adjusts a transmit power for the control channel and/or the data channel based on the reported measurement of the SINR on said control channel and/or data channel transmitted by the first device. The first wireless device then adjusts a SINR target and a transmit rate based on the adjusted transmit power. The SINR target and transmit rate are to be used when transmitting on the data channel over the D2D link to the second wireless device.
A first user terminal and method of operating the first user terminal so as to provide location information associated with the first user terminal to a second user terminal are disclosed. The first user terminal and the second user terminal are comprised within a wireless communication system, which wireless communication system further comprises a plurality of radio base stations of which a first one of the plurality of radio base stations is serving the first user terminal. A signal is received from one of the radio base stations comprising the absolute geographical coordinates corresponding to the location of that radio base station. Pilot signal measurements are performed on the received signal. The absolute geographical coordinates corresponding to the location of the first user terminal are determined based on the performed pilot signal measurements and the received absolute geographical coordinates of the radio base station. The determined absolute geographical coordinates are transmitted to the second user terminal.
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), Automatic Control. Ericsson Res, Stockholm, Swede.
Device-to-device (D2D) communication in a cellular spectrum increases the spectral and energy efficiency of local communication sessions, while also taking advantage of accessing licensed spectrum and higher transmit power levels than when using unlicensed bands. To realize the potential benefits of D2D communications, appropriate mode selection algorithms that select between the cellular and D2D communication modes must be designed. On the other hand, physical-layer network coding (NWC) at a cellular base stationwhich can be used without D2D capabilitycan also improve the spectral efficiency of a cellular network that carries local traffic. In this paper, we ask whether cellular networks should support D2D communications, physical-layer NWC, or both. To this end, we study the performance of mode selection algorithms that can be used in cellular networks that use physical-layer NWC and support D2D communications. We find that the joint application of D2D communication and NWC scheme yields additional gains compared with a network that implements only one of these schemes, provided that the network implements proper mode selection and resource allocation algorithms. We propose 2 mode selection schemes that aim to achieve high signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio and spectral efficiency, respectively, and take into account the NWC and D2D capabilities of the network.
Device-to-device (D2D) communications in cellular spectrum have the potential of increasing the spectral and energy efficiency by taking advantage of the proximity and reuse gains. Although several resource allocation (RA) and power control (PC) schemes have been proposed in the literature, a comparison of the performance of such algorithms as a function of the available channel state information has not been reported. In this paper, we examine which large scale channel gain knowledge is needed by practically viable RA and PC schemes for network assisted D2D communications. To this end, we propose a novel near-optimal and low-complexity RA scheme that can be advantageously used in tandem with the optimal binary power control scheme and compare its performance with three heuristics-based RA schemes that are combined either with the well-known 3GPP Long-Term Evolution open-loop path loss compensating PC or with an iterative utility optimal PC scheme. When channel gain knowledge about the useful as well as interfering (cross) channels is available at the cellular base station, the near-optimal RA scheme, termedMatching, combined with the binary PC scheme is superior. Ultimately, we find that the proposed low-complexity RA + PC tandem that uses some cross-channel gain knowledge provides superior performance.
A network node assigns resources for use in wireless communication based on priority. The network node receives, from a wireless communication device, a service request message that requests connection of a communication session. The network node determines a priority level for the requested communication session. The priority level comprises a cellular layer admission priority of whether the network node can preempt cellular resources of an existing communication session in order to admit the requested communication session on the cellular layer, and a device-to-device (D2D) layer admission priority of whether the network node can preempt D2D resources of an existing communication session in order to admit the requested communication session on the D2D layer. The network node assigns resources based at least in part on the priority level. The resources are used for D2D communication or cellular communication.
According to a first aspect of embodiments herein, a method in a first network node for handling device discovery of second user equipments in a second network for Device-to-Device (D2D) communication is provided. The network node is comprised in a first network. The first network node obtains information from a second network node within the second network. The information relates to resources for sending device discovery beacon signals in a second network. The first network node sends the obtained information to a first user equipment served by the first network node. The obtained information relates to said resources for sending device discovery beacon signals in the second network. The information enables the first user equipment to discover beacon signals from the second user equipments in the second network and/or to send beacon signals to be discovered by the second user equipments in the second network.
The embodiments herein relate to network nodes, devices and methods therein. In particular, embodiments herein relate to enabling device to device communication in a radio communications network.
KTH, School of Electrical Engineering (EES), Automatic Control. Ericsson Research, Sweden.
We consider the uplink of a single cell single input multiple output (SIMO) system, in which the mobile stations use intra-cell orthogonal pilots to facilitate uplink channel estimation. In such systems, the problem of transmission power balancing between pilot and data is known to have a large impact on the mean square error (MSE) for the received signal and, consequently, on the achievable uplink data rate. In this paper, we derive a closed form expression of the MSE for the received signal as a function of the pilot and data power levels under a per-user sum pilot-data power constraint. As a major contribution, our model is developed for arbitrary channel covariance matrices and it enables us to study the impact of the number of antennas and antenna correlation structures, including the popular 3GPP spatial channel model. Numerical results suggest that the effect of the antenna spacing is limited, but the angle of arrival and angular spread have a strong and articulated impact on the MSE performance. Moreover, as the number of antennas at the base station grows large, we show that a higher percentage of the power budget should be allocated to pilot signals than with a lower number of antennas. | 2019-04-21T22:55:41Z | http://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/resultList.jsf?af=%5B%5D&aq=%5B%5B%7B%22personId%22%3A%22u1cec4wg+OR+0000-0002-2289-3159%22%7D%5D%5D&aqe=%5B%5D&aq2=%5B%5B%5D%5D&language=en&query= |
Corrupted gradient directions (GD) in diffusion weighted images may seriously affect reliability of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI)-based comparisons at the group level. In the present study we employed a quality control (QC) algorithm to eliminate corrupted gradient directions from DTI data. We then assessed effects of this procedure on comparisons between Huntington disease (HD) subjects and controls at the group level.
Sixty-one HD patients in early stages and forty matched healthy controls were studied in a longitudinal design (baseline and two follow-ups at three time points over 15 months), in a multicenter setting with similar acquisition protocols on four different MR scanners at four European study sites. A QC algorithm was used to identify corrupted GD in DTI data sets. Differences in fractional anisotropy (FA) maps at the group level with and without elimination of corrupted GD were analyzed.
The elimination of corrupted GD had an impact on individual FA maps as well as on cross-sectional group comparisons between HD subjects and controls. Following application of the QC algorithm, less small clusters of FA changes were observed, compared to the analysis without QC. However, the main pattern of regional reductions and increases in FA values with and without QC-based elimination of corrupted GD was unchanged.
An impact on the result patterns of the comparison of FA maps between HD subjects and controls was observed depending on whether QC-based elimination of corrupted GD was performed. QC-based elimination of corrupted GD in DTI scans reduces the risk of type I and type II errors in cross-sectional group comparison of FA maps contributing to an increase in reliability and stability of group comparisons.
Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) has become increasingly accepted in magnetic resonance (MR) neuroimaging [1, 2]. As with other MR modalities, the quality of diffusion weighted images (DWI) can be affected by a variety of factors, such as acquisition sequence, homogeneity of the magnetic field, stability of the gradient amplitude, slew rate variations, as well as by differences in multichannel radio-frequency coils and parallel imaging parameters . The acquisition time for DTI is longer than for conventional MR imaging due to the large number of recorded gradient directions (GD) that are required. Artifacts in GD may originate from both the acquisition system (such as eddy-current and vibration artifacts) and the subject scanned, such as cardiac pulsation and particularly head motion [2, 3]. Signal changes produced by these artifacts can be severe and may eventually result in erroneous diffusion tensor values . In order to detect artifacts in DTI, quality control (QC) assessment was suggested in previous studies with a variety of methods [2, 4–7]. In 2007, quality assessment was performed by Hasan using isotropic tensor scans of water phantoms providing a useful framework for QC and parameter optimization in DTI. In vivo DTI QC was performed by the software tool DTIprep which provides a framework for automatic QC by slicewise correlation check. Most recent studies introduced a sophisticated QC method for detecting bias of Fractional Anisotropy (FA) and the principal direction by a Rician noise model or suggested an integrative tool for an automatic DTI analysis and quality assurance pipeline . However, the effect of corrupted volumes within DTI data sets on the results of comparisons at the group level has not been investigated yet.
The aim of this study was therefore to examine if the application of QC to DTI data, in combination with strict elimination of corrupted GD, results in differences in group comparisons of DTI-based metrics compared to using no QC. To this end, we used data from patients with Huntington disease (HD) who are prone to involuntary movement during a DTI scan. We used data from the PADDINGTON study (Pharmacodynamic Approaches to Demonstration of Disease-modification in Huntington’s disease by SEN0014196), a multi-centre study with a total sample size of initially 101 data sets. In addition, participants underwent MRI three times 6 months apart, which allows validation of the results, i.e., results clusters for comparisons at the group level.
HD is a monogenetic, autosomal dominant neurodegenerative disorder of high penetrance characterized by a progressive dysfunction of the basal ganglia, clinically resulting in cognitive decline, typically hyperkinetic movement disorder and behavioural alterations (e.g. apathy, perseveration and irritability). Demonstrating biological alterations during the pre-clinical phase in HD mutation carriers may permit the identification of biomarkers, and any modulation of such potential biomarkers by interventions with therapeutic intent may point to the possible efficacy of experimental therapies. Therefore, neuroimaging techniques investigating structural and functional properties of the HD brain may have biomarker potential (for reviews see [8, 9]): given the pathophysiology of HD and its effects on white matter integrity an outstanding representative of these potential technical biomarkers is DTI.
In the present study, those structures were of particular interest that had been identified in previous DTI studies in HD: an increase of FA values in the basal ganglia, and FA reductions in the external and internal capsule, in parts of the thalamus, and in subcortical white matter [10–12]. The present study addresses the investigation of the impact of QC on DTI data with the exemplary application to HD. We investigated whether identification and elimination of corrupted GD from cross-sectional data sets would lead to changes in cross-sectional result patterns. Therefore, the novelty of this study is to examine if and to which extent disturbances during DTI acquisition had an effect on DTI-based metrics at the group level. The main question was whether between-group differences are reliable with or without application of QC, i.e. does the application of QC have any effect on the results of between-group differences. While previous studies had investigated the impact of QC on single subject data, we extended this concept to a study at the group level. Hence, this study is a continuation of previous QC-studies in DTI [2, 4–7] and complements those studies for aspects of QC on the reliability of between-group statistics.
Data in this study were collected in the framework of the European PADDINGTON project at four study sites in Europe (Leiden, the Netherlands; London, UK; Paris, France; Ulm, Germany) . The PADDINGTON study is an international initiative that aims to provide pharmacodynamic approaches for disease-modifying clinical trials. Work package 2 of this project entails the collection of 3.0 Tesla MRI (volumetric and DTI) scans acquired using similar acquisition protocols from patients with HD in an early disease stage and from healthy control participants, with the objective of identifying biomarkers of disease progression. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and the International Conference on Harmonisation guideline on Good Clinical Practices and applicable local regulatory requirements and laws. All participants were ambulatory and agreed to volunteer for MRI scanning after giving written informed consent.
All HD patients had a genetically confirmed diagnosis with a trinucleotide (cytosine-adenine-guanine) repeat length of 36 or higher, and had clinical features of mild HD at stage I based on the Unified Huntington’s Disease Rating Scale (UHDRS) with a Total Functional Capacity (TFC) score of 11–13. In total, 61 HD and 40 control subjects were scanned at visit 1, 56 HD and 39 control subjects were scanned at visit 2 (6 months after baseline), and 55 HD and 37 control subjects were scanned at visit 3 (15 months after baseline).
Acquisition parameters for the different sites were similar with slight variations of the standardized acquisition protocol. DTI was performed with echo planar sequences, where each data volume consisted of 52 to 76 axial slices of 2.0 mm or 2.2 mm thickness (depending on the scanner of the different sites, whole brain coverage was guaranteed), with no inter-slice gaps, and an acquisition matrix of between 112 ×112 to 128 × 128 with in-plane resolution of 2.0 × 2.0 mm2, or 2.2 × 2.2 mm2, respectively. TR ranged between 8 s and 13 s, and TE ranged between 56 ms and 86 ms. Each DTI data set consisted of more than 40 b = 1000 s/mm2, and one or more b = 0 scans. More detailed acquisition parameters for the different sites have already been reported previously .
A DTI scan consists of a number of gradient encoding volumes, e.g. some b = 0 scans as well as a number of scans with different diffusion encoding gradients . Diffusion tensor calculation results in an over-determined equation system and further parameterization for quantification of the diffusion anisotropy is the fractional anisotropy (FA) . FA, a dimensionless scalar measuring the diffusion directionality in a single voxel, was used as the DTI-based metric for this study.
In a general simplification, any measured MR signal is a combination of the true quantity, acquisition system noise, environmental noise, and subject specific noise. Ideally, the quality of the measured signal (i.e. the signal to noise ratio: SNR) can be improved by signal accumulation . If applied to DTI data, the repeated recording of diffusion encoding volumes should lead to an improvement of the accurateness of the diffusion tensor and the FA value in each voxel [17, 18]. Thus, if some of those repeated gradient direction (GD) images were corrupted by subject movement or by other sources of noise, the integration of these corrupted GD images into the tensor calculation (or FA values, respectively) would bias the results. Contrariwise, the removal of noisy or corrupted volumes from tensor calculation (or FA values, respectively) could reduce this bias .
The in-house DTI analysis software Tensor Imaging and Fibre Tracking (TIFT; [19, 20]) was used for post-processing and statistical analysis. Figure 1 shows a schematic overview of data processing and analysis, divided into the iterative template-specific normalization to the Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI) stereotactic frame – with and without QC, respectively (Figure 1A), and the scheme for statistical analysis (Figure 1B). Whole brain-based spatial statistical analysis is a voxel-based DTI analysis approach in which unbiased results at whole brain basis are obtained, as previously reported [20, 22]. FA-maps were calculated from MNI-normalized DTI data, and a Gaussian smoothing filter of 8 mm FWHM was applied to the individual normalized FA-maps. In a consecutive step, voxelwise statistical comparison between the patient groups and the corresponding control group was performed by Student’s t-test. FA values below 0.2 were not considered for calculation as cortical grey matter shows FA values up to 0.2 . Next steps were correction for multiple comparisons using the false-discovery-rate (FDR) algorithm at p < 0.05, and a clustering procedure for further reduction of type I and type II errors. In general, a threshold cluster size of 512 voxels is to be considered a good choice . However, a lower threshold cluster size of 64 voxels (corresponding to a sphere with radius of approximately 1 acquisition voxel) was applied in this study in order to elucidate also small-size differences.
Analysis schemes for cross-sectional comparison. (A) Schematic example for an iterative template-specific MNI-normalization: after a 1st normalization step based on landmarks, first templates T1 ((b = 0) template and FA-template) were obtained by arithmetic averaging of DTI-data I0. Analyses were performed with or without quality control (QC) and subsequent gradient direction elimination. Subsequently, in an iterative procedure, normalized DTI-data I1 were obtained by non-linear normalization to the previously defined templates (T1). From these newly normalized DTI-data I1, new templates (T2) were derived which again could be used for normalization. This iterative process is stopped when a predefined coincidence (measure by correlation) between DTI-data and templates was reached. (B) Scheme for whole brain-based spatial statistics: FA-maps are calculated from normalized DTI data and a smoothing filter to the individual normalized FA-maps is applied. In a consecutive step, voxelwise statistical comparison between the patient groups and the corresponding control group is performed. Final steps are correction for multiple comparisons using the false-discovery-rate (FDR) algorithm and a clustering procedure for further reduction of type I and type II errors.
〈a j,n 〉 denotes the arithmetic average intensity of the slice n under observation of GD j and 〈a i,n 〉 slice n for comparison of GD i.
reflecting the deviation of a single slice n of GD j to the respective slices of all other GD.
Q j reflects the minimum of slicewise comparisons of all slices for GD j. If Q j falls below a certain threshold, the whole GD was eliminated for analysis. The procedure is not iterative, and Q j values of different GD are influenced by each other. Thus, in the case of a series of corrupted GD (with hypointense slices), the global level of Q j decreases. As a solution, the Q-level could be lowered, or as an alternative, an iterative approach (e.g. ) could be performed, eliminating the GD with lowest Q j in a first step and then perform QC again with the remaining GD.
In , a threshold of 0.8 was suggested. Lower thresholds could lead to unidentified corrupted GD and by a higher threshold, the Q-level of the whole data set will be lowered in data sets with more corrupted GD since Q-values of all volumes are influenced by each other.
That way, an artefact correction was performed by detecting GD with at least one slice showing intensity changes, i.e. artefacts caused by spontaneous subject movement or other sources of distortion.
The possible impact of corrupted GD on FA-maps was analysed by ROI analysis in FA maps prior to MNI normalization for a single visit with and without QC based elimination of GD. ROIs at the identical anatomical position of other visits could act as a reference. This analysis was performed by the following procedure: (i) DTI data of a single HD subject were selected in which two visits showed no corrupted GD and one visit showed a series of corrupted GD. (ii) A difference map was calculated from FA maps of the visit with corrupted GD by simple subtraction of the FA maps with and without GD elimination. (iii) In a data-driven approach, a ROI was placed in a brain region where differences in FA were detected by the difference map. (iv) An experienced operator identified the anatomical ROI position in the FA maps of the other visits without the knowledge of FA values. (v) Mean FA values of all visits in the respective ROIs were compared in the contrast with vs. without QC-based GD elimination.2) Using cross-sectional whole brain comparison the impact of corrupted GDs on FA maps was assessed in HD participants and controls. Corrupted GDs may impact FA maps in two ways. (i) FA values differ (Figure 1A and Figure 2) and (ii) MNI Registration of the subject’s FA image to the study-specific group template (which are based on study specific FA templates calculated from single subject FA maps) also could show differences, i.e. the MNI normalization process of all DTI data sets might also be influenced by differences in the FA maps of individual participants (Figure 1B).
Corrupted slices in DTI volumes. DTI data (volumes number 29 to 31) of an HD subject (subject 589). Upper panel: reconstructed central sagittal slice where axial slices affected by noise are visible (volume number 30). Lower panel: With a QC-threshold of Q = 0.8, nine gradient directions (GD) were detected as corrupted by noise.
Furthermore, between-group differences in cross-sectional data were investigated. The result patterns were compared to cross-sectional comparisons of DTI data sets from two further visits. Thus, each time point of the longitudinal data has been used as a single cross-sectional test point. This way, longitudinal data per-subject was used as a scan-rescan reproducibility test with the inherent assumption that the effect of progression of the disease over the time scale of the study on the diffusion images is negligible in first order, and hence the group-wise differences should only slightly proceed for the three time points.
Hypointense slices indicating corruption in single volumes of an individual DTI data set (Figure 2, upper panel) were identified by reduced Q-values (Q < 0.8) within the respective volume (Figure 2, lower panel).In more than 50% of the HD patients’ DTI data, a constellation could be found where GD elimination led to an adjustment of ROI-based mean FA values. Figure 3 illustrates an example for a ROI analysis (HD subject 589). Here, visits 1 and 3 had no GD eliminations while nine corrupted GD were found in visit 2. A ROI was placed in the position where the difference matrix of visit 2 (with vs. without GD elimination) showed its local maximum in FA differences. Mean FA values in the ROI were compared to mean FA values of visits 1 and 3 at the identical ROI positions. Thus, without QC, FA values in the selected ROI in FA maps from visit 2 data were lower compared with FA values from visits 1 or 3. After elimination of the nine corrupted volumes, FA values of visit 2 data in the selected anatomical ROI were identical to FA values of visits 1 and 3.
Region of interest analysis of FA maps from three longitudinal DTI scans. Region of interest (ROI) analysis of visit 1 and visit 3 were without gradient direction (GD) elimination by quality control (QC) since no corruption was evident. During visit 2, 9 GD (compare Figure 1) had to be eliminated. ROI based mean FA values changed with and without QC, respectively. Although ROI localization was identical for the three visits the respective slices look apparently different due to different slice orientation during acquisition.
In the next step, the impact of QC-based GD elimination on the cross-sectional comparisons between FA maps from HD participants against controls was investigated: results clusters, i.e. patterns of significant FA reductions and increases, from cross-sectional differences between HD subjects and controls were compared with or without QC-based GD elimination for the three visits.The application of the QC algorithm resulted in specific QC characteristics for each DTI data set with identified volumes to be eliminated for FA calculation. The statistics for the number of eliminated volumes for all DTI data sets are summarized in Figure 4 as GD elimination statistics. The numbers of GDs excluded during the QC process for each participant are displayed separately for each visit. The removed GD were tested on systematic distribution concerning (i) the frequency of a specific GD and (ii) the frequency of spatial orientation. A random frequency and spatial distribution of removed GD was found without clustering in a particular orientation, that way vibration-induced artifacts (e.g. ) could be excluded.
Quality control statistics. Gradient direction (GD) elimination statistics per each visit displays the number of gradient directions excluded in the QC process separately for each subject and for each of the diagnostic groups.
Four data sets showed more than 10 corrupted GD. An intrinsic property of the QC algorithm is that it shows a general reduction of the Q value for a greater number of corrupted GD. For these four scans the Q level was lowered to 0.7. Consequently, in each of the four scans more than 20 GD could be used for tensor calculations. Since this number is still sufficient due to the results of , the affected scans were not entirely eliminated from the study. All remaining scans showed less than 10 QC eliminations, i.e. less than 20% of GDs were eliminated in DTI data sets due to QC so that no (substantial) single data set FA changes could be expected according to .
Cross-sectional result patterns differ if QC-based GD elimination was applied (see for example Figure 5, left panel – visit 1). The QC-based GD elimination influences the FA maps and thus, as a consequence, appearance of result clusters of smaller extent from cross-sectional group comparisons. For example, in visit 1 the group comparison without QC-based GD elimination showed a cluster with FA decrease in the hippocampal region (no. 21 – Table 1) which does not appear under QC-based GD elimination (type I error). On the other hand, a cluster in the frontal lobe (no. 14 – Table 1) appears for visit 1 with QC-based GD elimination which is not present without QC-based GD elimination (type II error). The hippocampal cluster (no. 21) was not confirmed by longitudinal data, i.e. cross-sectional group comparisons at visits 2 and 3, whereas the frontal lobe cluster (no. 14) appears also at visit 2 and visit 3 cross-sectional comparisons.
Results of cross-sectional group comparison. Clusters of significant FA differences between HD subjects and controls for the three visits. Hot colors indicate FA reductions in the comparison controls vs. HD subjects, cold colors indicate FA increases in this comparison. (A) Representative slices of identical MNI coordinates (0/-29/0) for visits 1 to 3 with and without quality control (QC), respectively. Red circles indicate additional clusters depending if QC based gradient direction elimination was performed, or not. (B) Examples of clusters that are only present in one visit, depending if QC based gradient direction elimination was performed or not. An example is shown for each visit 1 to 3; for clarity of presentation, the respective slices of the other visits for which no clusters could be detected are not displayed.
Clusters (cl.) of the FA map group comparison between HD subjects and controls (cl. size/voxels and MNI coordinates of the area with highest significance). All clusters listed in this table show a p-value of p < 0.001. Basically, several cluster groups that are interconnected in different analyses were found. Clusters 1,2 (FA increase): clusters located in the basal ganglia. Clusters 3-17 (FA reduction): clusters covering the thalamic area, external and internal capsule, and corpus callosum (CC); additional clusters in the occipital, frontal, parietal lobe, and limbic regions. Clusters 18-21 (FA reduction): small clusters in the temporal and parietal lobe, the internal capsule, and the hippocampus.
Figure 5 and Table 1 summarize results of cross-sectional group comparisons of HD participants and controls for the three visits with or without QC-based GD elimination. The overall patterns of FA reductions or increases were consistent for all visits, i.e. regional FA increases in the basal ganglia and FA reductions in the internal and external capsule, thalamic regions and corpus callosum (CC). This result was achieved although the number of contributors differed during each visit. For the three visits, cross-sectional FA comparisons showed result patterns sharing common clusters. This effect also appeared irrespective of the analysis being performed with or without QC-based GD elimination; as a consequence cluster locations and sizes in Table 1 could not be directly compared. FA reduction clusters covered the internal and external capsule, the thalamic region, and the CC. In addition, clusters were found in the occipital, frontal, parietal lobe, and limbic areas. Clusters with FA increase involved the basal ganglia. Depending on the performance of QC-based GD elimination, additional small clusters appeared in the temporal and parietal lobe, the internal capsule, and in the hippocampus.
Cluster 18 is an example of a cluster that does not show up in visit 2 (cross-sectional comparison) without QC (type II error). Clusters 20 and 21 are examples of clusters that appear only in visit 1 without QC (type I error).
Movement associated image corruptions are a matter of concern in neuroimaging research. These artefacts may reduce the potential of DTI as a biomarker in HD. Algorithms are therefore needed that compensate for corrupted volumes in a DTI scan.
In this study, we used an algorithm for automatic and objective detection of volumes that contain corrupted slices. Identified volumes with corrupted GD were then excluded from further calculations of DTI metrics. The question to what extent GD could be removed from a DTI data set without relevant changes to FA maps had previously been addressed . The present study is a continuation of QC-based studies of our group as well as of other groups [2, 4, 5, 7]. It could be demonstrated in the present study that corrupted volumes in DTI acquisitions have impact on the results of cross-sectional group comparisons of FA maps.
The effects of corrupted volumes on cross-sectional result patterns were two-fold: first, corrupted volumes influenced FA values alone, and secondly, as a consequence, they could have impact on registration of the subject’s FA image to the study-specific group template (which is based on study specific FA templates calculated from single subject FA maps). This means that the MNI normalization process of all DTI data sets was also influenced by differences in the FA maps of individual participants.
In this study, no entire scans had to be eliminated although the first QC showed some scans with a greater number of corrupted GD. For these cases, a Q threshold reduction could detect the most corrupted volumes and the number of remaining GD was considered still sufficient for accurate tensor detection. In cases where Q threshold reduction detects so many GD that only few non-corrupted GD would survive correction, we suggest that such a data set should be entirely eliminated from the study.
The results of our analysis demonstrate that the voxelwise pattern of cross-sectional FA group differences between HD subjects and controls showed high consistency with previous reports of other research groups (e.g. [10, 11]). In addition, the repeated cross-sectional group comparisons showed rather constant result patterns. Differences between results with and without QC-based GD elimination in terms of cluster size and location originate from interconnections between clusters.
Importantly, the presence or absence of clusters in FA maps of visit 2 relative to visits 1 and 3 most likely reflect type I or type II errors, respectively, since their localisation does not match with brain regions typically affected in HD whose FA changes could be explained by the course of the disease per se. Since some of the cross-sectional FA changes of visits 1 and 3 are consistent, differences in FA changes for visit 2 cannot be reasonably attributed to disease progression, due to the temporal relationships between the data. In a single cross-sectional test point, the inconsistency of clusters between the group-wise results with and without corrupt GD removal is not technically adequate to label the differential presence or absence of clusters as type I or type II errors: however, the consistency of these results across three separate cross-sectional tests provides additional evidence for classification.
This study is based on a general approach how the incorporation of corrupted GD could affect tensor calculations and group differences at whole brain level and at the group level. However, if the gradient directions removed are isotropically distributed both within and between subjects, the influence will be akin to SNR reduction. If gradients in a particular direction are more likely to lead to artefact and hence volume removal (as it is the case in vibration-induced artefact in diffusion imaging), this could cause a bias in tensor estimation, and therefore non-stationarity in statistical power depending on the underlying fibre orientations. It is open to discussion whether the whole volume should be eliminated when only a few slices show corruptions. If only single slices were omitted for FA calculation, the remaining voxels (with no slice in any volume being corrupted) would show less bias. On the other hand, FA maps would then be calculated where the voxel FA values in one FA map would originate from a different number of GDs. In order to keep the number of GD constant from which FA values of an individual FA map are calculated, we suggest that each FA map should be calculated with the number of GD contributing to the diffusion tensors in the voxels should be kept constant for individual FA maps if repeatedly measured across time. Nevertheless, FA maps of different subjects could still originate from different sets of GD.
A different situation emerges regarding intraindividual longitudinal data comparisons. Here, case one would require the number of GDs to be identical across repeated measurements for single subjects to reliably estimate longitudinal changes in FA maps. For the aim of this study, longitudinal data were only used for validation of cross-sectional result patterns while we did not compare FA maps within HD subjects, or controls, longitudinally. Therefore, further research is needed how to apply QC on GD for longitudinal FA analysis.
With respect to the validation of cross-sectional result patterns by longitudinal data itself, it might be considered that the consistency of these clusters between the three time points (or lack thereof) does not in all cases provide evidence for the labelling of these inconsistent clusters as errors. In fact, if a cluster is present without GD rejection and disappears with GD rejection, this suggests but is not full evidence to label this cluster as a type I error, as the ‘actual’ difference in unknown; it is the absence of this cluster in the statistical tests at other time points that makes it probable that the cluster is in fact a statistical error.
The QC-based GD elimination described in this study is a global tool to eliminate corrupted GD. However, if slice dropout is caused by subject movement, the probability of the subject moving back to the precise location they were in before the movement is rather unlikely. Therefore, even explicit inter-volume motion correction may not be adequate to fully recover these volumes, as non-linear volume components will be present in the movement regression. This depends on factors like slice timing and order. Therefore, the ultimate justification for rejection of GD is grounded in the mechanism by which diffusion images are acquired.
In summary, QC of DTI data clearly impacted upon the results pattern of FA reductions and increases at the group level when comparing HD subjects and controls. We could show that some small clusters were observed in cross-sectional results without QC-based GD elimination, suggesting that corrupted GDs may increase the risk of type I errors and should consequently be eliminated during a QC process. Furthermore, QC-based GD elimination was associated with emergence of otherwise undetected clusters of group differences indicating that QC-based GD elimination may also protect against type II errors at the level of group comparisons.
Hans-Peter Müller, Jan Kassubek contributed equally to this work.
This work was supported by the European Union under the Seventh Framework programme– PADDINGTON Project, Grant Agreement No. 261358, and the European Huntington’s Disease Network (EHDN), project 070 – PADDINGTON. We thank all the participants, HD patients and volunteers, and their families for their participation.
HPM: conception and design, collection of data, data analysis and interpretation, manuscript drafting. JK: conception and design, collection of data, data analysis and interpretation, manuscript drafting. GG: collection of data, critical revision of manuscript. RS: data interpretation, critical revision of manuscript. ACL: data interpretation, critical revision of manuscript. SK: methodological development. NZH: collection of data, critical revision of manuscript. RACR: collection of data, critical revision of manuscript. AD: collection of data, critical revision of manuscript. SJT: collection of data, critical revision of manuscript. MO: collection of data, critical revision of manuscript. SDS: conception and design. GBL:collection of data, conception and design. All authors read and approved the final manuscript. | 2019-04-20T03:06:44Z | https://biomedical-engineering-online.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1475-925X-13-128 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.