text
stringlengths 199
648k
| id
stringlengths 47
47
| dump
stringclasses 1
value | url
stringlengths 14
419
| file_path
stringlengths 139
140
| language
stringclasses 1
value | language_score
float64 0.65
1
| token_count
int64 50
235k
| score
float64 2.52
5.34
| int_score
int64 3
5
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 Answer | Add Yours
Whether the United States is susceptible to decline due to deficiencies in its education system is open to debate. There is no question, however, that the success or failure of a democratic form of government is contingent upon the knowledge of the public of the institutions of government and of the people they elect to run it. One of the most important founders of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, believed fervently that education was the key to the success of the democracy he and his colleagues established. As Jefferson wrote to Alexander Donald in 1788, "Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights." Similarly, in an 1816 letter to Colonel Charles Yancey, Jefferson wrote, "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
The United States can be considered to have deficiencies in its educational system. Testing has repeatedly demonstrated that Americans are ignorant of geography and history and deficient in math and the sciences. Whether that relates to voting patterns, and whether those patterns augur ill for the future of the country, however, are indeterminate. One major reason for that is that the United States is not a pure democracy insofar as the public votes on every issue that comes before it. Rather, it was deliberately established as a republic both to protect against the potentiality of an uninformed citizenry and to protect against the evolution of a dictatorship of the majority. As James Madison wrote in Federalist Paper #10:
"If a faction consists of less than a majority, relief is supplied by the republican principle, which enables the majority to defeat its sinister views by regular vote. It may clog the administration, it may convulse the society; but it will be unable to execute and mask its violence under the forms of the Constitution. When a majority is included in a faction, the form of popular government, on the other hand, enables it to sacrifice to its ruling passion or interest both the public good and rights of other citizens."
Public discourse in the United States tends to the extreme, with moderate positions subsumed under the emotionally-charged vitriol of those on the ideological wings. Reasoning based upon objective facts -- or even upon informed analysis -- is rarely reflected in public debates. This educator spent 20 years in Congress watching elected officials ruminate on all matter of issues with nary an objective fact-based argument in sight. That the country continues on its path is testament to its resiliency, but it is worth pondering how long the United States can continue down that road.
The state of education in the United States has considerable room for improvement. One could conclude that a democratic -- or republican -- form of government cannot continue in perpetuity with an increasingly un- or ill-informed electorate. With the Civil War battle at Gettysburg commemorated this month, it is worth remembering President Lincoln's concern that "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
We’ve answered 327,998 questions. We can answer yours, too.Ask a question | <urn:uuid:84566703-81c2-4e82-801f-3ba7704efa2f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.enotes.com/homework-help/education-one-major-keys-democracy-us-suceptable-442987 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00108-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967385 | 659 | 2.796875 | 3 |
A walk through Hatley history
Hatley St George and East Hatley
by Ishbel Beatty
Starting at Hatley St George Church, we shall find our way through these two Cambridgeshire villages, looking at landmarks which remind us of their past.
We cling to our Cambridgeshire identity, although we have to use the postal address of Bedfordshire. Hatley St George, once known as Hungry Hatley because of the nature of its soil, has been a separate parish from East Hatley (once known as Castell Hatley) since mediæval times. The two were united as a civil parish in 1957, and are nowadays included ecclesiastically in the parish of Gamlingay.
Through the ages there have been changes of land ownership and of boundaries: names change, buildings change, only some of them remain. If we start with the church, now a chapel of ease, to whom is it dedicated? Fourteen generations of the family of Saint George have stamped their name on the village, but it is not certain that the church is named after that saint. One 20th century ecclesiastic insisted that it should be called St James the Greater, but that question is still not resolved.
Looking at what remains of the church building, thought to have been erected in 1352, we can see how its length has been truncated by the collapse of the chancel. Rebuilding and refurbishing in the late 19th century has given us its present shape, and also the head of Queen Victoria as an arch-stop at the porch door.
Inside, you can read the names on the hatchments, funerary shields of painted wood, hanging along the walls and bearing the names of many St Georges from the 14th and 15th centuries, and of the Cottons, the family who bought the estate in 1658. Sir John Cotton had the shields repainted in 1690.
Since that time, there have been a number of different owners of house and land, and some of their memorial tablets are on the church walls: Pearse, Quintins, Carbery Evans. The Quintins changed their name to St Quintin while living here, taking the style of their Yorkshire ancestors.
There are memorial brasses of a 15th century Baldwin St George, and of Catherine Docwra of East Hatley and there are Rolls of Honour with the names of men from both Hatleys who served in the two World Wars.
A glance to the south-west from outside the church will show you the "pritty gentleman-like seate" of Hatley Park, as it was described in the 17th century, the house now somewhat altered by later building and rebuilding. The park around takes up about one-third of the parish acreage.
Turning along the Gamlingay-Croydon road to the east, we pass what were once the stables and piggeries of a 19th century Model Farm, now converted to offices and workshops. St George's Tower, built in Victorian times as a water tower, has only recently acquired this name. Further along are estate cottages of the same period as the farm. The last building in this style, once the New George Inn, bears the date 1850 and the initials of one of the St Quintins.
To our right now is a remnant of the once well-wooded landscape. The "ley" in Hatley means woodland clearing which indicates how the early settlement began here. The Domesday Book gives East Hatley a population of 24, and its peak of 164 was reached in 1861. Hatley St George's inhabitants numbered 100 in 1793. The figure for the combined villages today is about 250. Buff Wood, managed by a Wildlife Trust, takes its name from an 18th century farming tenant.
The Village Hall on our right was erected by the Astor family about 1960. Open fields appear now on either side of the road until we come to the old school house, erected for the children of the two villages in 1872. The school taught its pupils until 1965 and was then closed because of a decline in numbers. Virtually all the hedges north of the road between the two villages were planted between 1987 and 1997.
A footpath on your right will take you across the field directly to what remains of the old parish church of St Denis, East Hatley but you may prefer to continue along the road to the main turning into the house-lined street which comprises most of today's village. Near to the telephone box, notice an oak tree which was planted in 1952 to commemorate the accession to the throne of Queen Elizabeth II. On the corner stood the village smithy, much used when horses provided power for agricultural machinery.
Among the 20th century in-filling, you can pick out the few 19th century cottages which were once all that East Hatley consisted of. There are no visible remains of the mediæval village apart from the crumbling walls of the church of St Denis which closed 40 or more years ago, while its graveyard is still in use. Next to it is the old farmhouse which took the manor name and perhaps contains a few timbers of the house once occupied by East Hatley's most famous connection, Sir George Downing.
Sir George was given his
by Charles II after he adroitly switched sides after the Civil War. He is mentioned, not to his advantage, in Samuel Pepys' famous diary. He has left a carving of his arms with the date 1653 inside the porch of the church and his name is known nationally, not only because of Downing Street, but because his grandson, the third Sir George, left the family fortune to found Downing College, Cambridge.
It was the College which managed the farming estate of East Hatley from the early 1800s until 1947, when the land was divided up and sold. Before that, in the 1860s, was built the last house of the village street, nicknamed The Palace by locals. This was used by the farming and hunting Bursar on his visits. A flamboyant character, Dr John Perkins was laid to rest in the churchyard in 1901.
Both the churchyard and the field next to The Palace are surrounded by moats. Within the latter stood the parsonage which burned down in 1821. Mysteriously, and surprisingly, there were once 12 or 13 moats in East Hatley.
We now reach another part of Buff Wood, where the remains of another manor house have been identified. Walking round the wood's outer edge will reveal some of the wide arable landscape of Bedfordshire and beyond. We turn eventually up Buff Lane (the old “hundred” boundary) and arrive again at Hatley St George. | <urn:uuid:554dff0e-5ffb-47b5-b6c1-b9edc3a8fd92> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.hatley.info/leisure/historywalk.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393533.44/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00134-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981417 | 1,385 | 2.71875 | 3 |
Vacuum tube with mercury.
|Sample Image | Spin Video | QuickTimeVR Rotation|
|Vacuum tube with mercury.|
I have no idea why this vacuum tube contains beads of mercury. If it gets hot in operation that mercury will vaporize and create a gas much better able to sustain an arc than is vacuum. That is the function of mercury in arc lamps, and presumably that is what it's here for as well.
Source: Max Cane
Contributor: Max Cane
Acquired: 11 August, 2007
Text Updated: 3 September, 2007 | <urn:uuid:e68b1320-8c63-42e1-aabc-2ebf03dc1a66> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://periodictable.com/Items/080.19/index.qt.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395992.75/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00068-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.907593 | 123 | 2.84375 | 3 |
heic0813 — Photo Release
Hubble's sweeping view of the Coma Galaxy Cluster
10 June 2008
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope captures the magnificent starry population of the Coma Cluster of Galaxies, one of the densest known galaxy collections in the Universe.
Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys has observed a large portion of the Coma Cluster, stretching across several million light-years. The entire cluster is more than 20 million light-years in diameter, is nearly spherical in shape and contains thousands of galaxies.
Also known as Abell 1656, the Coma Cluster is over 300 million light-years away. The cluster, named after its parent constellation Coma Berenices, is near the Milky Way's north pole. This places the Coma Cluster in an area that is not obscured by dust and gas from the plane of the Milky Way, and so is easily visible to observers here on Earth.
Most of the galaxies that inhabit the central portion of the Coma Cluster are elliptical galaxies. These apparently featureless "fuzz-balls" are a pale golden brown in colour and contain populations of old stars. Both dwarf and giant ellipticals are found in abundance in the Coma Cluster.
Farther out from the centre of the cluster there are several spiral galaxies. These galaxies contain clouds of cold gas that are giving birth to new stars. Spiral arms and dust lanes "accessorise" these bright bluish-white galaxies, which have a distinctive disc structure.
S0 (S-zero) galaxies form a morphological class of objects between the better known elliptical and spiral galaxies. They consist of older stars and show little evidence of recent star formation, but they do show some structure -- perhaps a bar or a ring that may eventually give rise to more disc-like features.
This Hubble image consists of a section of the cluster that is roughly one-third of the way out from the centre of the whole cluster. One bright spiral galaxy is visible in the upper left of the image. It is distinctly brighter and bluer than the galaxies surrounding it. A series of dusty spiral arms appears reddish brown against the whiter disc of the galaxy, and suggests that this galaxy has been disturbed at some point in the past. The other galaxies in the image are either ellipticals, S0 galaxies or background galaxies that are far beyond the Coma Cluster sphere.
The data for the Coma Cluster were taken as part of a survey of a nearby rich galaxy cluster. Collectively they will provide a key database for studies of galaxy formation and evolution. This survey will also help to compare galaxies in different environments, both crowded and isolated, as well as to compare relatively nearby galaxies with more distant ones (at higher redshifts).
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA). Acknowledgment: D. Carter (Liverpool John Moores University) and the Coma HST ACS Treasury Team
Lars Lindberg Christensen
Hubble/ESA, Garching, Germany
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, USA
About the Release | <urn:uuid:b9473bfc-5cab-46f4-9e21-0b03023dc5c0> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic0813/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397873.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00191-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.907261 | 654 | 3.421875 | 3 |
Ed. note: This is cross-posted from the U.S. Department of Transportation.
No one who was working at the Department of Transportation 11 years ago will forget the morning of September 11, 2001. Whether it was the Federal Aviation Administration's air traffic controllers, who helped bring every aircraft in U.S. airspace safely to ground, or the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy's midshipmen, who went into the chaos of Lower Manhattan to support the maritime evacuation of Wall Street workers, 9/11 is permanently etched into the Department's memory.
To commemorate that day, the FAA's Washington Metroplex Team has named two arrival sequences to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport to honor those who died that day and those who have served our country from that day forward. Each arrival sequence is part of our new NextGen descents, which use satellite-based information to make more efficient arrivals and departures at airports. The sequences contain a series of five-letter waypoints – points in the sky through which an aircraft must fly to remain on course – and together, they spell out messages of support and remembrance for 9/11.
Aircraft flying the Freedom route to National from the northwest pass through waypoints named “WEEEE,” “WLLLL,” “NEVVR,” “FORGT” and “SEP11.” Those flying the Troops route from the southwest pass through waypoints named “USAAY,” “WEEDU,” “SUPRT,” “OOURR” and “TRUPS.” Depending on the runway configuration, aircraft might also pass through waypoints named “STAND” and “TOGETHER” or “LETZZ,” “RLLLL,” “VCTRY” and “HEROO."
This not the first time a waypoint has been designated to recall 9/11. A waypoint published last year over Shanksville, PA, was named “GARDN” (Guardian) in honor of United Flight 93, which crashed after passengers fought with hijackers for control of the plane and prevented it from reaching Washington, DC.
The men and women of America's airways were also deeply affected by the events of September 11, and airline pilots and crews have responded strongly to these new waypoints. Recently, for example, on a morning flight from Detroit to Reagan National, a Delta Air Lines pilot came over the Public Address system and began sharing the story of the new arrival procedure with his passengers. As the flight crew began their precision descent into the capital area, the pilot read aloud the names of the waypoints they would be passing through prior to arrival: HONNR, BRVRY, COURG; MORLL PLDGE: WEEEE WLLLL NEVER FORGT SEP11, ALWYZ FRDMM.
"As he was reading them," reported one passenger, "the people were all quiet, and we all stopped talking or reading or whatever else we were doing. Everyone just listened. We could hear the pilot starting to get choked up as he talked about how proud he was to read those points off as we entered DC."
The FAA’s Metroplex initiative is creating satellite-based procedures to transform our national airspace system, making it more flexible and decreasing our carbon footprint. NextGen flight tracks, like the procedures commemorating 9/11, will relieve bottlenecks, improve safety and efficiency, and foster the flow of commerce. NextGen will deliver more on-time and fuel-efficient flights, and continue to ensure that our system remains the safest air transportation system in the world.
These descents are also powerful proof that we at DOT remember 9/11 365 days a year. | <urn:uuid:9bc3fe15-ec48-4c65-8631-52afc45d21e3> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/09/10/faa-commemorates-911-nextgen-arrival-profiles-national-airport | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.92/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00001-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96842 | 795 | 2.640625 | 3 |
New ground-breaking scientific research in 2014 can now tell us just how much of an influence climate change has on a single heatwave or heat records.
1. Climate change is making Australia hotter. Hot days are happening more often while heatwaves are becoming hotter, longer and more frequent.
- The annual number of record hot days across Australia has doubled since 1960. Over the past 10 years the number of record hot days has occurred three times more frequently than the number of record cold days.
- The annual occurrence of very hot days across Australia has increased strongly since 1950 and particularly sharply in the last 20 years.
- Over the 1950-2013 period many characteristics of heatwaves have changed across Australia. They are becoming hotter, lasting longer, occurring more often and starting earlier.
- All extreme heat events are now occurring in an atmosphere that is significantly hotter than it was 50 years ago
2. While it has been clear for many years that climate change is a major factor in intensifying heat, recent scientific advances now allow us to understand the extent of the impact on individual extreme events. Climate change has significantly worsened recent extreme heat events in Australia.
- The record hot year of 2013 in Australia was virtually impossible without climate change.
- Climate change tripled the odds that the heatwaves of the 2012/2013 Australian summer would occur as frequently as they did.
- Climate change doubled the odds that the 2012/2013 heatwaves would be as intense as they were.
3. The new research showing the strong influence of climate change on heat events strengthens the case for strong action on climate change.
- Carbon emissions must be reduced rapidly and deeply if the worst of extreme heat in the second half of the century is to be avoided.
- Clean energy technologies are advancing rapidly and international action is ramping up, building momentum towards a decarbonised future.
This Climate Council report synthesises recent scientific advances, including a set of papers from a special supplement to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Vol. 95, No. 9, September 2014, 'Explaining Extreme Events of 2013 from a Climate Perspective': Arblaster et al (2014); King et al (2014); Knutson et al (2014); Lewis and Karoly (2014) and Perkins et al (2014). See journal edition here: http://journals.ametsoc.
The Climate Council acknowledges the role of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science at providing funding, computational, and networking support for some of the primary research that this report draws from, including the set of BAMS papers. | <urn:uuid:bf3bdf58-cb17-414e-a979-6f91777a7716> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.climatecouncil.org.au/quantifying-extreme-heat | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.18/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00094-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932545 | 525 | 3.671875 | 4 |
World’s Top Observatories to Collaborate for Public Education
14 February 2001
Educators from many of the world’s top observatories are heading to Cape Town, South Africa, this week, in an effort to strengthen international ties in public science education. Beginning Friday, they will attend a workshop to discuss the creation of an "International Collaborative for Educational Outreach for State-of-the-Art Telescopes."
Currently, no such international collaboration exists. Workshop attendees will discuss the goals, mission, and priorities for such a group.
"This workshop will enable all participants, especially the staff of the South African Large Telescope (SALT), an opportunity to learn from, and collaborate with, colleagues in the field of astronomy education and outreach," said Sandra Preston, workshop organizer and Director of McDonald Observatory’s Public Information Office at the University of Texas. SALT, now under construction, is a southern-hemisphere near-clone of the innovative Hobby-Eberly Telescope (HET) at McDonald Observatory.
Observatories participating in the workshop include: the Gemini Project, the W. M. Keck Observatory, Japan’s Subaru Telescope, the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Very Large Array and Arecibo radio telescopes, the Hobby-Eberly Telescope, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, the South African Large Telescope, the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, Great Britain’s Jodrell Bank Observatory, and Spain’s Gran Telescopio Canarias.
Following the workshop, the presentations and discussions will be published in the form of conference proceedings. Information on how to obtain copies will be made available at that time.
The U.S. National Science Foundation provided travel funds for participants from U.S. observatories. The Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology of the South African government provided funds for the hosting of the workshop in Cape Town.
South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) | <urn:uuid:8b10d951-aa3d-455d-ac6e-f29e2d2f4dc9> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://mcdonaldobservatory.org/news/releases/2001/0214.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395546.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00093-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.844396 | 412 | 2.703125 | 3 |
Antonio Quinde: NMAI’s Meet Native America Series
In the interview series Meet Native America, the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian invites tribal leaders, cultural figures, and other interesting and accomplished Native individuals to introduce themselves and say a little about their lives and work. Together, their responses illustrate the diversity of the indigenous communities of the Western Hemisphere, as well as their shared concerns, and offer insights beyond what’s in the news to the ideas and experiences of Native peoples today.
Antonio Quinde was the first president of ECUANARI, the Confederation of Kichwa Peoples of Ecuador, and rector of the Instituto Superior Tecnológico Pedagógico Intercultural Bilingüe Quilloac (Institute for Intercultural and Bilingual Technology and Teaching, Quilloac). Judy Blankenship recorded this interview—the blog's first with a South American leader—on June 15, 2014, in Cañar, Ecuador, and translated and edited it for the museum. The photographs are also by Judy and are used with permission.
Please introduce yourself and tell us where you're from.
My name is José Antonio Quinde Buscán, and I am an anthropologist of the Andean culture. My community is Quilloac, in the Province of Cañar. It's in southern Ecuador at an altitude of 10,100 feet in the Andes Mountains.
What is a significant point in history from your community that you would like to share?
Quilloac is an ancient indigenous community with an interesting history. When the Inkas invaded our territory in 1463, we maintained the rights to our land. But with the Spanish conquest that soon followed, in 1534, the conquistadors appropriated our land and established the largest hacienda in the region—450,000 hectares [more than one million acres]. This led to two kinds of communities: those that belonged to the hacienda, where everyone was required to work the land as peons, and those that were “free” and not part of the hacienda.
The problem with the free villages, such as Quilloac, was that the colonial Spanish government forced our people to work on roads, bridges, and mines. But when the Cañaris left their homes, they often did not return because they died of hunger, snakebites, landslides, and diseases such as malaria. For this reason, many free communities handed over their land in return for the protection of the hacienda owner. That is how Quilloac lost our territory and Pachamama [Earth Mother].
Five hundred years later, in 1964, we began to recover our land through the agrarian reform laws of Ecuador. The government bought the hacienda and divided it into parcels of land for the members of Quilloac and other communities. We had to buy the land back, but in that way we reclaimed our Pachamama.
How is your government set up?
Traditionally, Cañaris were governed by the ayllu, based on the extended families of the village or a particular area. The head of the ayllu was the oldest member of the village, the one who best knew the history, problems, and healing traditions. This was a part of all Andean cultures in Bolivia, Peru, and Ecuador.
Today, each Cañari community has a governing body elected by a general assembly that includes all who live there. In Quilloac, for example, we are about 600 families, so we are divided into five sectors, and each sector elects a president, vice president, treasurer, and so on. These elected authorities meet every two weeks, the community of each sector meets every three months, and all the communities come together in a general assembly every two years.
Is there still a functional, traditional entity of leadership, in addition to your modern government system?
The most traditional aspect of our government is community rule, based on our Andean culture. Through this structure we organize mingas—communal work days—but it also serves to reinforce unity, solidarity, reciprocity, and identity. No one is every alone in our Cañari communities.
What responsibilities do you have as a community leader?
As a leader, I have always struggled for the rights, education, identity, and respect that we Cañaris deserve as an indigenous nation of Ecuador. I’m concerned for our history, our customs, traditions, and legends, because the Cañari culture should be recognized on the national level, and by all of Latin America. We have significant archeological sites, some recognized by UNESCO. Narrío, for example, is an ancient burial site on the outskirts of Cañar that goes back 5,000 years. Fragments of Native life that date to 10,000 years ago have been found in the cave Chobshi. The most famous site in Ecuador is Ingapirca, a religious center for both Cañaris and Inkas.
To read the full interview, visit the NMAI series here.
You need to be logged in in order to post comments
Please use the log in option at the bottom of this page | <urn:uuid:0c32d7f0-d28f-4c0a-a184-585f0302a126> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2014/08/09/antonio-quinde-nmais-meet-native-america-series-156322 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395548.53/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00112-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950513 | 1,084 | 2.75 | 3 |
39% of internet users have changed passwords or canceled accounts; 6% think their personal information was swiped
About This Report
In early April, a major security flaw affecting perhaps 500,000 or more websites was announced and fixed. But the patch to the “secure socket” program that is supposed to encrypt and protect user information on secure websites was only made after more than two years of vulnerability on some of the most heavily trafficked sites, including Facebook, Google, YouTube, Yahoo and Wikipedia. Analysts warned that untold numbers of internet users might have had key personal information compromised either in their use of those websites, or their use of email, instant messaging, and even supposedly secure virtual personal networks.
This report covers public response to the revelation of the security code flaw. It was conducted among 1,501 adults between April 23-27 on landline and cell phones and in English and Spanish. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points in the overall sample and 3.1 points among the internet users in the sample (N=1,303).
The software bug was named “Heartbleed” and it was accidentally introduced to the OpenSSL encryption program on New Year’s Eve 2011. OpenSSL is an open-source program that is used by many of the sites and email programs that have the “https” prefix and “green lock” icon in their URLs. Some security commentators called Heartbleed “catastrophic” and said it one of the worst vulnerabilities ever discovered on the web.
The flaw basically allowed people to “break the lock” on sophisticated encryption software, get into the memory of security systems and gather up whatever personal information was there, including usernames, passwords, and the actual content of accounts such as credit card data or other sensitive personal information.
This report is a collaborative effort based on the input and analysis of the following individuals.
Lee Rainie, Director, Internet Project
Maeve Duggan, Research Assistant, Internet Project
Alec Tyson, Research Associate, U.S. Politics Project
Find related reports about privacy, safety, and security at | <urn:uuid:ea36d012-2e6e-4f72-8a85-73f8b087207f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/04/30/heartbleeds-impact/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397795.31/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00158-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950136 | 446 | 2.953125 | 3 |
Amnesia is a total loss of memory for events for a period of time or for events. In cases of concussion, retrograde amnesia is the permanent loss of memory for events just preceding a head injury while post-traumatic amnesia applies to a period after injury during which the patient may be conscious but incapable of recall, both at the time and later. Similar behavior to the latter, termed fugue, occurs as a psychiatric phenomenon.
Related category• HEALTH AND DISEASE
Home • About • Copyright © The Worlds of David Darling • Encyclopedia of Alternative Energy • Contact | <urn:uuid:0c2722bc-73e5-4458-9377-15137909b1df> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/A/amnesia.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396029.85/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00048-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.899389 | 117 | 3.09375 | 3 |
Von Habsburg, Otto
|born on||20 November 1912 at 02:36 (= 02:36 AM )|
|Place||Reichenau, Austria, 47n42, 15e50|
|Timezone||MET h1e (is standard time)|
|Astrology data||27°23' 01°42 Asc. 06°18'|
Known by his royal name as Archduke Otto of Austria, he was the last Crown Prince of Austria-Hungary from 1916 until the dissolution of the empire in 1918, a realm which comprised modern-day Austria, Hungary, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, and parts of Italy, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Ukraine. He subsequently became the pretender to the former thrones, Head of the Imperial House of Habsburg, and Sovereign of the Order of the Golden Fleece in 1922, upon the death of his father. He resigned as Sovereign of the Golden Fleece in 2000 and as head of the Imperial House in 2007.
The eldest son of Charles I and IV, the last Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, and his wife, Zita of Bourbon-Parma, Otto was born as third in line to the thrones, as His Imperial and Royal Highness Archduke and Prince Imperial Otto of Austria, Prince Royal of Hungary, Croatia and Bohemia. With his father's accession to the thrones in 1916, he was himself likely to become the Emperor. As his father never abdicated, Otto was considered by himself, his family and Austro-Hungarian legitimists to be the rightful Emperor-King from 1922.
Otto was active on the Austrian and European political stage from the 1930s, both by promoting the cause of Habsburg restoration and as an early proponent of European integration—being thoroughly disgusted with nationalism—and a fierce opponent of Nazism and communism. He has been described as one of the leaders of the Austrian anti-Nazi resistance. After the 1938 Anschluss, monarchists were severely persecuted in Austria, and—sentenced to death by the Nazis—Otto fled to the United States, with a visa issued by Aristides de Sousa Mendes.
Otto von Habsburg was Vice President (1957–1973) and President (1973–2004) of the International Paneuropean Union, and served as a Member of the European Parliament for the Christian Social Union of Bavaria (CSU) 1979–1999. As a newly elected Member of the European Parliament in 1979, Otto had an empty chair set up for the countries on the other side of the Iron Curtain in the European Parliament, and took a strong interest in the countries behind the Iron Curtain during his tenure. Otto von Habsburg played a central role in the revolutions of 1989, as a co-initiator of the Pan-European Picnic. Later he would be a strong supporter of the EU membership of central and eastern European countries. A noted intellectual, he has published several books on historical and political affairs. Otto has been described as one of the "architects of the European idea and of European integration" together with Robert Schuman, Konrad Adenauer, and Alcide De Gasperi.
Otto was exiled in 1918 and grew up mostly in Spain. His devout Catholic mother raised him according to the old curriculum of Austria-Hungary, preparing him to become a Catholic monarch. During his life in exile, he lived in Switzerland, Madeira, Spain, Belgium, France, the United States, and from 1954 until his death, finally in Bavaria (Germany), in the residence Villa Austria.
He died 4 July 2011.
Taeger quotes Bordoni, via Marc Edmund Jones. Specht in Meridian Feb 1982 published a chart for 2.05 am.
- Vocation : Politics : Diplomat
- Notable : Famous : Royal family | <urn:uuid:aa624bba-7e8d-4e97-85d4-5b9236cd5c99> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.astro.com/wiki/astro-databank/index.php?title=Von_Habsburg,_Otto&oldid=103406 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403826.29/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00195-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970944 | 818 | 2.90625 | 3 |
ANTIBIOTICS PROMOTE CANCER
pingouin at crystal.u-strasbg.fr
Wed Dec 4 03:43:06 EST 1996
In article <32A4FEB5.3455 at nol.net>,
Mark Peters <gquest at nol.net> writes:
>Who cares? Anyone?
>Antibiotics kill the bad germs. (The ones that don't become antibiotic
>resitant). Antibiotics also kill the good germs that help prevent the
>spread of bad germs. (loss of the good germs makes open season for
>antibiotic resistant bad germs) "Antibiotics" that do not kill yeast
>(open the season) and promote their growth. The yeast C. albicans can
>catalyze nitrosamine (a carcinogen) that causes cancer.
It is not the right group, but I have to answer. AFAIK,
C albicans is a pathogen yeast, present in minority in mocous
membrane. If the selection by antibiotics make it the majority,
then it provocs a disease called candidose.
So don't worry, each desequilibrium in epiderm or mucus
microorganic flora is visible.
If this helps,
P.S.: Follow-Up to alt.conspiracy
Service de bioinformatique / bioinformatics service
IGBMC BP 163 67404 Illkirch France
tel :(France) 03 88 65 32 71 / (international) (+33) 3 88 65 32 71
e-mail : jeanmougin at igbmc.u-strasbg.fr
"C'est pas parcequ'on monte au banc, qu'il faut descendre a jeun." (Thiefaine)
More information about the Mol-evol | <urn:uuid:2bfc286b-8bd5-4471-a0f3-943edf3caf00> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.bio.net/bionet/mm/mol-evol/1996-December/005090.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395546.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00106-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.675398 | 405 | 2.515625 | 3 |
We already know that aspies can be obsessed with patterns. In many cases, particularly school work, patterns only make sense when something is perfect and/or complete. It therefore follows that aspies often have major hang-ups about perfection and completeness at school and at work.
This obsession with impossible levels of perfection and completion can cause a lot of stress, particularly in young aspies at school and particularly where other factors, such as learning difficulties, writing problems or other forms of work-impairment are present.
For example; An aspie with poor writing skills may find that he is constantly crossing out and redoing entire paragraphs of work because it doesn't meet his or her standards. Often they will tear out a page in their exercise books rather than leave imperfect work on the page.
This isn't limited to writing and can happen during mathematics, science experiments and craft activities. In fact, the perfection issue can pervade all aspects of the aspies life from school, to sport and even solitary play.
Parents need to watch their children closely for signs of perfectionism.
In some careers, such as programming where code only works when it is correct, perfectionism is a bonus. Usually though, perfectionism is not good. In the workplace, perfection can lead to employer cricism for slowness and in school perfectionism is particularly harmful.
In cases where school children have other difficulties, perfectionism can cause students to become stressed, lose confidence in themselves and take considerably longer to complete set tasks.
Completeness is also a form of perfection. Aspie students may become very irritated if they are required to stop working on projects before they are complete.
I have a particularly vivid memory/irritation surrounding a poster I did in Kindergarten. We did a poster with the word Halloween stuck on it. I managed to cut out the last N but was not permitted to stick it on because time had run out. I kept the N for months and constantly pleaded with my teacher to let me put the N on. Instead, the poster was hung up with all the others - and with the irritating misspelling. I still feel irritated about it now, and I'm 38.
My point is simple; not allowing aspies to complete work can lead to stress, fixations and anguish. There are two ways in which work may not be completed;
- You don't allow them enough time - in which case, they should be permitted to take extra time, or perhaps take work home to complete.
- Issues of perfection prevent them from completing the work. In this case, the teachers and parents need to give the child a little "push" to move on to the next stage of the work. (eg: "That first paragraph is fine, now start on the next paragraph"). | <urn:uuid:3fdc2549-a45b-4c93-813e-1988040aa650> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://life-with-aspergers.blogspot.com/2008_05_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398075.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00055-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975926 | 576 | 2.703125 | 3 |
Rhetoric and Composition/Introduction
Dear Student, Educator, or Aspiring Writer:
Welcome to the Rhetoric and Composition Wikibook. This wikitext is designed as a full textbook replacement in first-year college composition programs. Feel free to use it in your classrooms and edit it as you see fit.
This free wikitext exists primarily as a free alternative to expensive commercial textbooks. Our desire is to make college writing instruction available to anyone with the desire to learn. Finally, we hope that readers like you will not only benefit from our work, but also contribute to its ongoing development. Whether you are a student, teacher, professor, professional writer, or anyone else interested in the subject--we invite you to join our multimedia composition by fixing mistakes, adding and editing content.
This book is written as a practical guide for students struggling to improve their writing to meet the standards expected of them by their professors, instructors, employers and co-workers. We have avoided complicated "textbook language" and jargon in favor of plain, easily understood language. Instead of complex theories of composition or linguistics, we have simply passed on what has worked well for us in our own experiences as college writers and instructors. This book is largely written by real college writers who know what it takes to earn an A on their writing projects.
You are encouraged to contribute to this book's development by editing whatever sections you feel you can improve upon. You should first, however, make liberal use of the "Discussion" tab on each page to offer suggestions or ask questions. If you do make substantial revisions, please consider adding your name and information to our Authors Page.
Rhetoric and Composition Wikitext Staff | <urn:uuid:7d63653b-511b-4d43-8d17-ca3027a8172c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Rhetoric_and_Composition/Introduction | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403825.35/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00095-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945089 | 351 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Charles Thomson Rees Wilson was
born on the 14th of February, 1869, in the parish of Glencorse,
near Edinburgh. His father, John Wilson, was a farmer, and his
ancestors had been farmers in the South of Scotland for
generations. His mother was Annie Clerk Harper.
At the age of four he lost his father, and his mother moved with the family to Manchester, where he was at first educated at a private school, and later at Owen's College - now the University of Manchester. Here, intending to become a physician, Wilson took up mainly biology. Having been granted an entrance scholarship in 1888 he went on to Cambridge (Sidney Sussex College), where he took his degree in 1892. It was here that he became interested in the physical sciences, especially physics and chemistry. (It was also possible that Wilson's decision to abandon medicine was influenced by Balfour Stewart, who was professor of physics at Owen's College at that time - about a dozen years earlier, J. J. Thomson, who also went to Cambridge, had passed through the same College.)
When standing on the summit of Ben Nevis, the highest of the Scottish mountains, in the late summer of 1894, Wilson was struck by the beauty of coronas and "glories" (coloured rings surrounding shadows cast on mist and cloud), and he decided to imitate these natural phenomena in the laboratory (early 1895). His sharp observation and keen intellect, however, led him to suspect (after a few months' work at the Cavendish Laboratory) that the few drops reappearing again and again each time he expanded a volume of moist, dust-free air, might be the result of condensation on nuclei - possibly the ions causing the "residual" conductivity of the atmosphere-produced continuously. Wilson's hypothesis was supported after exposure (early 1896) of his primitive cloud chamber to the newly discovered (end of 1895) X-rays. The immense increase of the "rain-like" condensation fitted excellently with the observation made by Thomson and McClelland immediately after Röntgen's discovery, that air was made conductive by the passage of X-rays. When, during the summer of that year, it was firmly established by Thomson and Rutherford that the conductivity was indeed due to ionization of the gas, there was no longer any doubt that ions in gases could be detected and, photographically, recorded and thus studied at leisure. Wilson's appointment as Clerk Maxwell Student, at the end of that year, enabled him to devote all his time for the next three years to research, and for a year subsequent to this he was employed by the Meteorological Council in research on atmospheric electricity. The greater part of his work on the behaviour of ions as condensation nuclei was thus carried out in the years 1895-1900, whilst after this his other occupations - mainly tutorial - prevented him from dealing sufficiently with the development of the cloud chamber. Early in 1911, however, he was the first person to see and photograph the tracks of individual alpha- and beta-particles and electrons. (The latter were described by him as "little wisps and threads of clouds".) The event aroused great interest as the paths of the alpha-particles were just as W. H. Bragg had drawn them in a publication some years earlier. But it was not until 1923 that the cloud chamber was brought to perfection and led to his two, beautifully illustrated, classic papers on the tracks of electrons. Wilson's technique was promptly followed with startling success in all parts of the world - in Cambridge, by Blackett (who in 1948 received the Nobel Prize on account of his further development of the cloud chamber and his discoveries made therewith) and Kapitsa; in Paris, by Irène Curie and Auger; in Berlin, by Bothe, Meitner, and Philipp; in Leningrad, by Skobelzyn; in Tokio, by Kikuchi.
Some of the most important achievements using the Wilson chamber were: the demonstration of the existence of Compton recoil electrons, thus establishing beyond any doubt the reality of the Compton effect (Compton shared the Nobel Prize with Wilson in 1927); the discovery of the positron by Anderson (who was awarded the Nobel Prize for 1936 for this feat); the visual demonstration of the processes of "pair creation" and "annihilation" of electrons and positrons by Blackett and Occhialini; and that of the transmutation of atomic nuclei carried out by Cockcroft and Walton. Thus, Rutherford's remark that the cloud chamber was "the most original and wonderful instrument in scientific history" has been fully justified.
In 1900, Wilson was made Fellow of Sidney Sussex College, and University Lecturer and Demonstrator. From then until 1918 he was in charge of the advanced teaching of practical physics at the Cavendish Laboratory, and also gave lectures on light. As well as his experimental work at the Cavendish Laboratory, he also made observations (1900-1901) on atmospheric electricity (mainly in the surroundings of Peebles in Scotland). In 1913, he was appointed Observer in Meteorological Physics at the Solar Physics Observatory, and most of his research both on the tracks of ionizing particles and on thunderstorm electricity was carried out there. In 1918, he was appointed Reader in Electrical Meteorology, and in 1925, Jacksonian Professor of Natural Philosophy. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1900, and this Society also honoured him with the Hughes Medal (1911), a Royal Medal (1922), and the Copley Medal (1935). The Cambridge Philosophical Society awarded him the Hopkins Prize (1920), and the Royal Society of Edinburgh the Gunning Prize (1921), while the Franklin Institute presented him the Howard Potts Medal (1925).
After his retirement Wilson moved to Edinburgh, and later, at the age of 80, to the village of Carlops, close to his birthplace at the farmhouse of Crosshouse, at Glencorse. Life after this, however, was not an empty one: C.T.R. as his friends and colleagues called him, maintained social contacts, making a weekly journey by bus to the city to lunch with them. Scientifically, too, he was active to the end, finishing his long-promised manuscript on the theory of thundercloud electricity (Proc. Roy. Soc. London, August (1956)).
Among the few who enjoyed his personal guidance may be mentioned:
Wormell (in the general field of atmospheric electricity), C. F. Powell (Nobel Prize winner 1950, for his development of the photographic method of studying nuclear processes and the discoveries made therewith on mesons), P. I. Dee and J. G. Wilson.
In 1908, Professor Wilson married Jessie Fraser, daughter of Rev. G. H. Dick of Glasgow; there were two sons and two daughters.
He died on the 15th of November, 1959, in the midst of his family.
From Nobel Lectures, Physics 1922-1941, Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 1965
This autobiography/biography was written at the time of the award and first published in the book series Les Prix Nobel. It was later edited and republished in Nobel Lectures. To cite this document, always state the source as shown above.
Copyright © The Nobel Foundation 1927 | <urn:uuid:e6a2bf6e-5148-4078-af49-afcc8532199d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1927/wilson-bio.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394987.40/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00181-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979678 | 1,524 | 2.734375 | 3 |
NetWellness is a global, community service providing quality, unbiased health information from our partner university faculty. NetWellness is commercial-free and does not accept advertising.
Saturday, June 25, 2016
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), about 76 million cases of foodborne disease occur annually in the United States and result in 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths. Individually diagnosed cases and group outbreaks of food-related illness should be reported to local and state health departments who then partner with the CDC, USDA, and FDA to detect and respond to multi-state outbreaks of disease. Typically, food-related outbreaks occur at group gatherings with meals provided by individuals, catering companies, or restaurants. However, recent outbreaks are more widespread over a longer period of time due to the distribution of contaminated products across the country. In 2009, an outbreak of salmonellosis was traced to peanut butter manufactured in Georgia and used by many manufacturing companies, resulting in illness, death, and the recall of hundreds of products throughout the nation.
Foodborne disease is usually an infection caused by bacteria, viruses, or parasites in foods or beverages. Foodborne disease also may result from toxins, chemicals, or other harmful substances, such as poisonous mushrooms. Symptoms depend upon the specific contaminant but gastrointestinal symptoms, such as nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, often occur initially. Recently, scientists have discovered that other diseases, such as Guillain-Barre syndrome in adults and hemolytic uremic syndrome (leading to acute kidney failure) in children, may result from foodborne infections.
Although foodborne disease is usually preventable, several measures are needed to avoid contamination of food from the farm to the table. Contamination with microbes can occur through the slaughtering process, farming and irrigation, infected food handlers, or cross contamination with other products. Some precautions for preventing further contamination in your home are:
For more information about safe food handling and food borne illness, call the USDA Hotline at 1-888-674-6854 (Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.).
As consumers, we share the responsibility for a safe food supply. Know where your food is grown and processed by reading labels; support your local farmer's market. Encourage Congress to advocate for food safety policies and research. Food, Inc., a revealing documentary about the safety of our food supply, will be released in Cincinnati in summer 2009. It will surely increase your awareness of the need for more quality control and food safety regulations in our country.
This article originally appeared in Nutri-bytes (June 2009), a service of the University of Cincinnati College of Nursing and was adapted for use on NetWellness with permission.
Last Reviewed: Jun 10, 2009
Bonnie J Brehm, PhD, RD
Professor of Nursing
College of Nursing
University of Cincinnati | <urn:uuid:d909ab50-6dbe-459c-b0bc-e770646a2e62> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://netwellness.uc.edu/healthtopics/diet/foodsupply.cfm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783392099.27/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154952-00005-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94992 | 591 | 3.578125 | 4 |
The wet summer continues, and so do problems with moss and algae in lawns.
Mosses are branched, threadlike plants that form a tangled, thick mat over the soil. Algae are threadlike plants that form a dense, green scum over the soil surface. Neither moss nor algae is considered parasitic, and both are spread by wind-blown spores.
Once algae dries out, it forms a tough black crust. Moss also can form a crust on the soil surface, which reduces air and water movement into the soil.
Factors that favor their development include wet and humid conditions and compacted soil with thin turf. Moss is more common in shady areas with infertile, acidic soils and excessive thatch, while algae is found in full-sun conditions and fertile soil. Many golf-course superintendents are fighting algae problems on golf greens.
The only permanent control of moss and algae is to correct the conditions reducing the grass growth. The following practices will help you overcome your problem:
Maintain good soil fertility and pH. Have the soil tested to determine proper lime and fertilizer needs.
For most turfgrasses, the pH should be 6.0 to 6.5. Centipede tolerates a lower pH better than other grasses.
Improve drainage. Soils that stay moist because of poor drainage should be contoured so that water will drain off. In some cases, tile drainage (French drains) may be necessary to correct wet conditions.
Increase light penetration and air circulation. Pruning tree limbs below 10 feet and selected limbs in the crown will improve light penetration and air movement.
Removing some of the least-desirable trees and thinning or removing shrubs also will help. Areas around buildings and vegetation with limbs close to the ground may require considerable work to provide adequate air circulation and light penetration. But if you love your shrubs and trees more than the grass, you sometimes have to decide what is more important to you.
Use a shade-tolerant grass. If there is too much shade for centipede or Bermuda, try St. Augustine or zoysia.
In areas with no direct light or little filtered light during the day, an ornamental ground cover or mulch may be better.
Cultivate compacted soils. Aeration with a machine that removes plugs of soil will help reduce compaction. Core aerators can be rented, purchased or contracted through lawn-care companies.
Cultivation and adding large amounts or organic matter can improve drainage in fine-textured soils (clay).
Irrigate deeply and infrequently (if we do have to water). Avoid light, frequent watering. Wait for signs of moisture stress, such as the development of a bluish-gray, dull color, before irrigating. Then irrigate to wet the soil to at least 6 inches.
Most healthy turfgrasses need about 1 inch of water per week during active growth. If puddling occurs, stop irrigating and wait two to three hours for the water to soak into the soil before irrigating again. Repeat the cycle as needed until the soil is wet to the desired depth.
Renovate. Generally, turf can be renovated if at least 50 percent of the area has the desired turf. If grass cover is less than 50 percent, then re-establishment will be necessary.
Chemical control of moss and algae is temporary and the problem will recur unless the growing conditions are changed. Some of the products for this use contain zinc, copper, and ferrous sulfate.
A couple of brand names are Moss Master and Moss Control. Algae also can be controlled with copper sulfate at the rate of 2 to 3 ounces per 1,000 square feet.
A nonselective herbicide such as Roundup will kill moss, but it also will kill your grass. However, Roundup could be used in limited spots completely covered by moss. Then, in 10 to 14 days, you could proceed with renovation.
Sid Mullis is director of the University of Georgia Extension Service office for Richmond County. Call 821-2349, or send e-mail to [email protected].
© 2016. All Rights Reserved. | Contact Us | <urn:uuid:4b9885e1-f3d6-485b-9254-23a83e45d72b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://chronicle.augusta.com/stories/2003/08/07/gar_383364.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783408828.55/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155008-00117-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936381 | 871 | 3.3125 | 3 |
Each iteration of Windows has meant a corresponding improvement in the techniques used for transferring data among its applications. Today's leading technique is called Automation. It allows you to work directly with objects in an application's interface using their object models. But if you want to write code in a programming language, such as Visual Basic, in order to work with the apps that support Automation, you must understand the inner workings of an application's object model--or in the case of Microsoft's Access, its two object models.Microsoft Access is the bestselling stand-alone relational database program for Windows offering both power and ease of use. And in many respects, Microsoft has made Automation the centerpiece of its vision for application development. DAO Object Model: The Definitive Reference will guide you through the Access object models, allowing you, with the support of Automation, to reference the application components you want to manipulate. An understanding of the object models is essential for developers who work with data in Access tables, or who want to manipulate components of the Access interface from other Office apps. The Data Access Objects (DAO) model is used to write and read data in Access tables. The Access object model is used to manipulate forms, reports, queries, macros, and other components of the Access interface, including most of the commands by means of the DoCmd object.This book will include an introduction and a brief description of the differences between VBA (used in most Office applications) and VBScript (used in Outlook). This chapter will also cover Office utilities and add-ons helpful in writing and debugging code, such as the Object Browser, the Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for VBA and the Interactive Debugger for VBScript. The book will then be divided into two parts; one covering the Access Object Model and the other, the Data Access Objects. Each section will have a description of what the object represents; listings of properties, events, and methods; and one or more code samples illustrating its use in VBA and/or VBScript code. Each property, event, or method section will have an explanation of the language element, and many will have code samples (either VBA or VBScript) as well.This book will detail, to an advanced user or keen intermediate user, the Access object models and how they are used. It will be the reference guide VB developers reach for when working with data in Access tables, or for manipulating components of the Access interface from other Office applications. | <urn:uuid:7dad291e-e4d1-4053-8c7d-9f788788bbbf> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9781565924352.do?sortby=bestSellers | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398516.82/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00159-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911113 | 503 | 3.015625 | 3 |
Japan creates world's fastest supercomputer which is as quick as one MILLION desktop PCs
- New machine is three times faster than China's former record holder
A Japanese supercomputer has snatched the title of the world's fastest machine, ending China's brief reign at the top after six months.
The K supercomputer, built by the Fujitsu Company, is as fast as one million desktop computers connected together.
It has more than three times the power than the previous title-holder and is capable of performing eight quadrillion calculations each second.
High-tech: The K supercomputer at Riken's laboratory in Kobe, contains 672 racks with a total of 68,544 CPUs
A quadrillion is one followed by 15 zeroes and in computer jargon the speed is known as 8.2 petaflops.
The previous fastest machine was the Chinese computer Tianhe-1A, which was clocked at 2.507 petaflops and highlighted the emergence of China's growing technological and economic power.
The Tianhe- 1A machine was the first time China had topped the speed list, wrestling the title from the U.S. who had four of the top ten supercomputers.
Experts said the development of the K machine, which is faster than five of its closest competitors combined, marks a giant leap forward in technology.
'It's a very impressive machine - it's a lot more powerful than the other computers,' said Professor Jack Dongarra, who releases a six-monthly list of the world's top supercomputers.
The speed rankings are based by running a standard mathematical equation.
The bragging rights for Japan's K computer, which has cost $1.2bn to develop, marks a return to the top for the first time in seven years.
Impressive: The computer is faster than five of its nearest rivals and marks a giant leap forward in technology
Developed at RIKEN Advanced Institute for Computational Science in Kobe, Japan, the giant computer is housed in a climate-controlled, warehouse-like structure.
It consists of 672 cabinets filled with circuit boards containing almost 70,000 processors. A family computer or laptop uses a single processor.
The K supercomputer uses enough energy to power 10,000 homes and although its creators claim the machine is energy efficient, its running costs are put at £6m a year.
'Use of the K computer is expected to have a groundbreaking impact in fields ranging from global climate research, meteorology, disaster prevention, and medicine, thereby contributing to the creation of a prosperous and secure society,' a spokesman for the RIKEN institute said.
Fujitsu and RIKEN chiefs say the project had overcome difficulties posed by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that devastated the country's northeast Tohoku region.
There are five U.S. supercomputers in the top-10 rankings, including the third-ranked Jaguar system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.
Others in the top ten include two machines from China, two from Japan and one from France.
The comments below have not been moderated.
We are no longer accepting comments on this article. | <urn:uuid:820b60f5-a81d-4441-a5f1-947abdb67596> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2005920/Japan-creates-worlds-fastest-supercomputer-fast-MILLION-desktop-PCs.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395560.14/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00163-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955002 | 655 | 2.765625 | 3 |
Yaounde, Cameroon 21-25 February 2000
PROGRESS REPORT ON THE COMMON AFRICAN AGRICULTURAL PROGRAMME (CAAP)
Background and Purpose of CAAP: A Recapitulation
CAAP Development Principles and Efforts (1994-1998)
The Contribution of the 20th Regional Conference and Subsequent Developments
The Case for a "Second Track" in the Development of CAAP
Foundations of the proposed "Second Track" to CAAP
Requested Actions by the Regional Conference
The idea of a Common African Agricultural Programme (CAAP) was born in 1992 as part of the early thinking in the African and international development communities on the operationalization of Article 46 of the young Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community (AEC).
CAAP was thus conceived as an organizing tool for the pursuit of the agricultural cooperation and integration objectives of the AEC, summarized by the Treaty, in Article 46, as:
To cooperate in the development of agriculture, forestry, livestock and fisheries in order to:
To serve as such a tool, CAAP must serve the specific agricultural cooperation and integration purposes and areas also identified by the AEC Treaty, namely: the promotion of intra-African cooperation in:
1. the production of agricultural inputs, fertilizers, pesticides, selected seeds, agricultural machinery and equipment and veterinary products;
2. the development of river and lake basins;
3. the development and protection of marine and fishery resources;
4. plant and animal protection;
5. the harmonization of agricultural development strategies and policies at regional and Community levels, in particular, in so far as they relate to the production, trade and marketing of major agricultural products and inputs; and
6. the harmonization of food security policies in order to ensure:
As recalled by the OAU/AEC Secretariat in the Strategy and Approach to the Implementation of the Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community - presented to the Experts' Meeting of the First Ordinary Session of the Economic and Social Commission of the AEC (AEC/ECOSOC), held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 6 to 7 June 1996, and underlined in the report on CAAP to the 20th FAO Regional Conference for Africa - the AEC Treaty, and the idea of CAAP, are products of a long succession of high level African commitments to regional cooperation and integration as cornerstones of African development. Notable among the formal embodiments of these commitments are:
The above-mentioned declarations, decision, plans and position documents have been traditionally regarded as logical and political extensions of the founding charter of the OAU itself, which committed its members in Article II to the coordination and intensification of their economic and technical cooperation, notably in the areas of education and nutrition. In that sense, the OAU Charter itself has been seen as adding to the long list of foundation documents underlying the AEC Treaty.
As was to be expected from the foundations of the AEC Treaty itself and therefore of CAAP (agreed by the FAO Regional Conference for Africa and the policy and legislative organs of the OAU and the AEC as an operational instrument of the AEC), the CAAP process was governed and bound to be governed by the African consensus on the development of economic and technical cooperation among African countries in general and the guidelines on agricultural cooperation and integration contained in Article 46 of the AEC Treaty, in particular.
An important part of this consensus, validated by the 18th FAO Regional Conference for Africa which first considered CAAP, was that the CAAP process had to be informed by the positive and negative experiences of the African cooperation and integration movement - and to be fully located within the overall AEC building strategy of basing the Community and its organs, institutions, policies, programmes and projects on the mobilization, participation and support of African populations, civil society, the enterprise sector, organized labour and Community-based and Non-Governmental Organizations, among others.
Based on this "CAAP consensus", the 18th FAO Regional Conference further agreed that:
These understandings led the 18th FAO Regional Conference, after endorsing the idea of CAAP, to:
- accept, inter alia, the recommendation in the draft FCAAP document that its consideration and approval processes should involve all the relevant macro, sectoral and policy organs of the OAU and AEC prior to its submission to the Assembly of Heads of State and Government for final endorsement;
- support the substantive principles and strategies underlying the FCAAP document released by the OAU Secretariat as a basis for regional and international consultations and decisions by the Governing Bodies of the AEC and OAU; and
- request that the formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of CAAP be a standing item on its agenda, in order to ensure the Conference's continuing participation in the process.
At the end of its consideration of CAAP, the 19th FAO Regional Conference, meeting in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, in 1998, inter alia:
- noted that response by Member States to requests addressed to them for observations and comments on the revised CAAP framework document had been slow, but that the OAU/AEC Secretariat should proceed with the finalization of the document immediately. As it received over 50 per cent of responses from Member States to its request of 9 February 1995, to present such a document to a planned meeting on Food Security in 1997/98 (which was to proceed with the Second Reading of FCAAP); and
- appreciated actions taken by the Sub-Regional Economic Communities in connection with the implementation of programmes and activities consistent with the objectives of CAAP.
The 19th FAO Regional Conference's concern about the slow response of Member States to requests for comments and observations on the revised CAAP document sent to them in February, 1995 for review was based on information before it that, as at January 1996 (one year after the requests were made), responses had been received from only eight (8) Member States.
To help move the effective development of CAAP forward, the Regional Conference agreed to request Member States to cooperate more closely with the OAU Secretariat in accelerating the process of adopting the CAAP framework, the immediate objective being the completion of the second and third readings of the framework document.
It may be recalled that the attention of Member States was drawn at the 20th Regional Conference in Addis Ababa in 1998 to the CAAP development stages endorsed by the 18th Regional Conference in Gaborone in 1994 and further reinforced by the 19th Regional Conference in Ouagadougou. These include:
The Regional Conference's further attention was drawn to the fact that the conditions had not been met for the planned "Second reading".
The 20th FAO Regional Conference consequently :
Following the 20th Regional Conference, the FAO Regional Representative for Africa, at the request of the OAU/AEC Secretariat, under cover of a transmittal letter from, and through FAO Representatives (and, where necessary, UNDP Representatives) in the Region, distributed all background documents on CAAP to Member States to facilitate their response to the requests for observations on the CAAP framework documents and mobilization of various stakeholders for its development and eventual implementation, as requested.
The momentum generated by the Regional Conference in Addis Ababa and the combined follow-up action by the AEC Secretariat and FAO have permitted progress to be made to the extent of bringing Member States' response to the request for their comments and suggestions on FCAAP just short of the minimum 50% response rate recommended by previous Regional Conferences as required for the "second reading".
Nine countries have also designated CAAP focal points, as requested by the 20th Regional Conference.
While these developments are encouraging, acceleration of the CAAP process would suggest a need to pursue the formal adoption of a CAAP Framework document as part of the agenda of CAAP development while considering a second available option for realizing its contributions to agricultural cooperation and integration in Africa along the lines indicated by Article 46 of the AEC Treaty.
The responses from Member States to the CAAP Framework document, while numerically insufficient for consideration of its " second reading", do fortunately have the merit of providing potential vitality to the " second leg" of the CAAP development process.
The case for a " second track" in the development of CAAP rests essentially on the premise that while the adoption of a CAAP Framework document would provide a useful supplement to the guidelines on agricultural cooperation and integration in Africa enshrined in the AEC Treaty itself, CAAP is and should be about goals and process - not necessarily a document.
The case is reinforced by the following considerations, among others:
- recognition in the CAAP Framework document, and by successive Regional Conferences, of the fact that the AEC Secretariat, Regional Economic Communities (RECs), other African Inter-Governmental Organizations (notably several river and lake basin development and management Organizations), FAO and other international agencies were already embarked on initiatives and activities that advanced CAAP aims and processes without being specifically under the umbrella of the Programme;
- guidance from successive Regional Conferences, reinforced by comments and suggestions by a number of Member States regarding FCAAP, on the need to build CAAP on the foundations provided by the legislative instruments, programmes, policies and activities and achievements of the RECs;
- recognition that the decentralization to the RECs and deconcentration to other concerned African Inter-Governmental Organizations of appropriate cooperation and integration arrangements and activities would promote ownership of relevant components of CAAP by Member States by increasing their effective leadership and control of the integrative processes nearest and dearest to them;
- while FCAAP has highlighted a number of policy and technical issues and choices (for instance, a CAAP based trade strategy within the post-Uruguay international trading environment, including for agricultural commodities; food security etc), those issues and choices now require to be settled or negotiated in the more manageable settings of RECs and other appropriate Inter-Governmental Organizations, pending, at least, further development of the AEC;
- the fact that CAAP, like the AEC itself, is designed to be an instrument of (sub)regional as well as regional or continental development; and
- the need, as an intended tool of the AEC, for CAAP development to be closely aligned with the methodology adopted for the establishment of the Pan African Economic Community itself.
Without prejudice, therefore, to the importance of an agreed CAAP Framework document but bearing in mind the need to accelerate progress on CAAP development - whatever the status of FCAAP - a second track is proposed for the development and implementation of the Programme in which the identification, formulation or strengthening of relevant agricultural cooperation and integration mechanisms, schemes, projects and activities - in cooperation with the RECs and other concerned IGOs - will be privileged over the adoption of framework documents at any level.
As a first step towards the development and implementation of the "second track" the following set of activities would be needed, not necessarily in a chronological order:
- requests by Member States to their designated CAAP focal points - and those to be designated - to work towards the installation of CAAP development (through purpose built programmes or the addition of "CAAP dimensions" to existing or planned agricultural cooperation and integration schemes at the sub-regional level) on the agenda of the policy organs of the RECs and other concerned IGOs and re-affirmations by the respective policy organs of commitment to CAAP;
- inventory of major agricultural cooperation and integration activities in Africa - regional, sub-regional, inter-sub-regional and natural resource based , with the view to identifying:
- those already serving present AEC Treaty/CAAP purposes;
- those that could be expanded or strengthened to serve AEC Treaty/CAAP purposes, in addition to their originally intended ones; and
- areas where new activities need to be promoted to serve AEC Treaty/CAAP purposes.
- arrangements for mobilizing the necessary institutional, human, financial and other resources - at the national, sub-regional, regional and international levels - for developing, implementing or strengthening sub-regional CAAPs (Sub-CAAPs) and Resource or Programme based Cooperation and Integration Activities and Schemes of an inter-sub-regional nature.
Responsibility for the development, implementation and monitoring and evaluation of policies, programmes, projects and activities based on the above foundations will have, necessarily, to be located at the mandated action levels.
For coordination and Pan-African Economic Community building purposes the action levels should liaise on " second track " activities with the appropriate AEC organs, in accordance with the AEC Treaty; the Protocol on Relations between the AEC and the RECs; or other appropriate instrument.
The Regional Conference may wish to:
- endorse the "second track" proposal outlined above;
- commend the "second track" to Member States and invite the policy and legislative organs and Secretariats of the AEC, the RECs and the concerned IGOs to do the same - and to assist the appropriate support and operational agencies, within their fields of competence, in laying the foundations for CAAP development through it;
- renew its request to Member States to designate CAAP focal points in their respective Ministries;
- further urge Member States to designate CAAP focal points in their Embassies accredited to the OAU/AEC and their OAU/Africa Desks in their Ministries of Foreign/External Affairs - to facilitate their diplomatic involvement in CAAP development, including the necessary promotion of CAAP at the legislative and policy organs' meetings of RECs and concerned IGOs, in cooperation with CAAP focal points in the Ministries responsible for agricultural/rural development;
- request the Director-General to continue to support, to the extent possible, the development and implementation of CAAP, including through the " second track", as appropriate; and
- further request the Director-General to continue to monitor progress on the development of CAAP, including responses by stakeholders, to the " second track", and report to the 22nd FAO Regional Conference for Africa accordingly. | <urn:uuid:f6702c8e-3692-467c-a3f8-9ab82b990f7b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/x3975e.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397696.49/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00095-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944929 | 2,933 | 2.609375 | 3 |
"This book is about you, what you are, and how you got here," declares psychologist Thomas Suddendorf in this multi-disciplinary exploration of what separates humans from other animals. Focusing on the brain, Suddendorf identifies six areas of mental ability -- language, mental time travel, mind reading, intelligence, culture, and morality -- and explains how "the gap" derives from human aptitude for nested scenario-building and the need to connect. For example, while animals communicate, humans have language; and where animals demonstrate problem-solving abilities, humans possess the capacity for abstract reasoning. Why the gap? Well, according to Suddendorf, we probably widened it by driving our closest hominid relatives to extinction (but that's another story). | <urn:uuid:e66e3001-21a8-43a7-a4be-e85fe3da2ef7> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.libraryaware.com/1106/NewsletterIssues/ViewIssue/c8afd960-6a73-42ea-b4a9-d1de04490a95?postId=f48b1745-481b-424a-819a-fd597bc61296 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398075.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00060-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.912473 | 157 | 2.71875 | 3 |
CLICK to download a pdf of this article
OSB and foam structural insulated panel aiming for building code acceptance
By Tony Kryzanowski
Research and testing is now being done to develop a technical guide to garner possible National Building Code of Canada (NBCC) acceptance for a composite building material called a structural insulated panel (SIP) consisting of a foam interior with oriented strandboard (OSB) as the only structural wood component around the exterior.
This work is being conducted over three years by Dr. Jon Makar at the National Research Council Canada (NRC), and is partially funded by Alberta Innovates Bio Solutions (AI Bio) through its Bioindustrial Research and Innovation program. The program supports research on new green building products.
SIPs are a factory-produced, alternative building material suitable for the floor, wall and roof assemblies of buildings. While some SIPs have studs on their sides, the ones in this project are solely supported by the OSB facer panels.
According to Natural Resources Canada studies, SIPs offer up to 50 per cent energy savings compared to conventional construction. Because the panels are manufactured in a plant, there is less on site waste generated during building construction, Additionally, manufacturers can speed up production of these SIPs because there are no studs being used, the SIPs are lighter, and on-site assembly takes less time requiring less skilled labor than traditional frame construction.
Before being tested for compliance with the NBCC, a technical guide needs to be developed for this SIP design for the Canadian Construction Materials Centre (CCMC), which is part of NRC. Its mandate is to evaluate construction products for NBCC compliance for all Canadian provinces.
Because of its construction design, acceptance of this SIP model within the NBCC could significantly benefit Alberta’s oriented strandboard (OSB) industry. Not only will it encourage more widespread SIP use in Canada, but SIP use in the United States is dominated by designs with no solid wood studs within their core.
Manufacturers and suppliers for this product have wanted to develop this technical guide since the mid-1990s, says Dr. Makar, but unlike evaluations of other building materials, developing the guide is complicated and requires significant financial support.
The technical work is now underway with financial backing from AI Bio, six SIP manufacturers, polystyrene and polyurethane foam manufacturers, an adhesive manufacturer, and two OSB suppliers, one being Ainsworth Engineered LLP. Ainsworth operates two, large oriented strandboard facilities in Alberta.
“When you look at these panels, you are doubling the use of OSB per square foot of wall because you have it on the inside and outside of the panel,” says Makar. “So as use grows, there is potential to grow the OSB market.” It also creates a market for a different type of OSB, as the OSB material used in SIP construction is specially engineered for this use.
Ken Lau, Director of Technical Services at Ainsworth Engineered Canada LP, says the company’s main motivation for supporting this research is to promote innovation and new use of OSB in building construction throughout North America. In gaining potential acceptance within the NBCC, it could lead to more SIP usage in building construction, and thereby increase market share for the company. More stringent energy codes are also encouraging builders to investigate alternative building materials like SIPs, with their ability to produce more energy efficient buildings.
“Nobody has done the long term performance tests for mechanical performance and durability for this SIP design that are needed to meet the requirements of the National Building Code,” says Dr. Makar. “The project is important because it is solving a longstanding problem for the industry. It is also going to help the industry develop this market because code officials will have a standardized process for evaluating these products, and making sure they conform to the Building Code.”
In addition to preparing the guide, Dr. Makar’s research group will be pursuing opportunities for technology transfer related to the use of the panels by the construction industry. The project will be developing and releasing, in concert with industry, technical reports and documentation that can be used by different industry professionals.
One style of SIP has a foam interior with two OSB panels on each side for support.
For more information about the SIP research program, contact Dr. Jonathan Makar at (613) 993-3797 or [email protected].
Biomass from mechanical thinning a potential biofuel resource
By Tony Kryzanowski
The mechanical thinning of juvenile trees in high density softwood and hardwood stands represents an opportunity not only to enhance the productivity of managed stands, but also an opportunity for acquiring a new source of wood biomass, says the Canadian Wood Fibre Centre (CWFC).
“It has been tested and proven that mechanical strip thinning can enhance growth potential by knocking back the densities and enhancing the vigour of the stands, making them less vulnerable to environmental risks such as insects, disease and fire,” says Derek Sidders, Regional Coordinator and Program Manager for CWFC.
He adds that by removing the juvenile trees, this also creates the potential to shorten the rotation for the remaining trees, so they can achieve merchantability and increase their product values sooner. This potential exists for numerous forest types in Canada when this silvicultural treatment is applied, says Sidders.
The machines used in this application are units with front-mounted mulchers and chippers.
Sidders says the new opportunity exists in the recovery of the biomass for direct bioenergy (heat and power) use, solid wood fuels such as wood pellets, pucks or logs, liquid fuels, or bio-products for landscape or site remediation.
As part of its woody biomass for bioenergy and inventory programs—as well as its wood biomass supply chain optimization program—CWFC will be conducting research and developing studies over the next two seasons testing new applications related to mechanical thinning of juvenile trees to achieve two objectives. The first objective is to develop and demonstrate techniques that enhance stand vigour by reducing density and sustainability risk; the second is to recover biomass for other values that Sidders says “should basically offset the cost of the treatment”.
Historically, there has been an issue related to wildfire or natural disturbance in Canada’s high density softwood forests, primarily with jackpine and lodgepole pine. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Canadian Forest Service (CFS) and forest companies, in co-operation with provincial governments in the Prairie provinces as well as the Northwest Territories, investigated techniques such as mechanical thinning to reduce the cost of brush sawing using manual labor, to try to reduce the density of these stands. This also enhanced the vigour of these stands, and reduced their risk to fires and insect infestation.
“To date, the experience shows that we can reduce the cost significantly, and we can operate in quite a variety of site conditions, harvesting juvenile wood consisting primarily of juvenile pine species less than five metres in height with densities of 20,000 to 60,000 per hectare,” says Sidders. “After 20 years of growth post strip thinning, we see risk reduction, increased vigour on the sites and they are now being treated as long-term research sites to validate that the growth response has been enhanced, and the treatment was successful and cost effective.”
He says the next phase is to develop techniques to recover the biomass removed during this type of silviculture treatment and integrating it into the feedstock supply stream for bioenergy.
Prime target sites for this treatment method are any sites with reasonable access, originating from a wildfire or natural disturbance that is regenerating with very high density softwoods.
“Our Canadian forest management practices have also created pure species-oriented softwood stands in Canada of primarily jackpine and lodgepole pine that are very high density that could also be candidates for this type of treatment,” says Sidders. “These are stands that are managed and are between the ages of eight and 20 years.”
For more information about this research program, contact Derek Sidders at (780) 435-7355 or [email protected].
Log home building ventures require careful scrutiny
This page and all contents ©1996-2015 Logging and Sawmilling Journal (L&S J) and TimberWest Journal. | <urn:uuid:0550176c-ae30-4669-801c-dc02f72d4b03> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://forestnet.com/LSJissues/2104_feb/edge.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783404826.94/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155004-00026-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945398 | 1,770 | 2.609375 | 3 |
Conductive Coatings Using Carbon Nanotubes
There are several synthesis routes known to produce such nanoparticles, but they often result in either low yields or in materials that need further processing to show optimum performance. This can lead to high material prices, and in combination with increasing raw material costs, the overall costs can become prohibitive for some applications. An example of this would be the use of silver. The average price of silver has been steadily increasing during the last few years, and silver nanoparticles are even more expensive. For coatings applications, most companies now focus on non-metallic compounds, like carbon materials, to achieve electrical conductivity.
Carbon exists as different allotropes, e.g., diamond, graphite, fullerenes and carbon nanotubes. While diamond consists of sp3 hybridized carbon with a cubic crystal lattice, all other known allotropic forms contain sp2 hybridized carbon atoms, and thus they are preferred for electrical conductivity. Since their observation in 1991 by Iijima, carbon nanotubes have been the focus of considerable research.1 Scientists have since reported remarkable physical and mechanical properties for this fascinating allotrope of carbon.2
|Table 1 Click to enlarge|
From unique electronic properties to mechanical properties that exceed any current material, carbon nanotubes offer tremendous opportunities for the development of new material systems. In particular, the excellent electrical conductivity of carbon nanotubes combined with their high aspect ratio offer potential for the development of functional coatings. This article reports on recent advances in using additives based on carbon nanotubes to enhance the electrical conductivity of several coating systems.
|Table 2 Click to enlarge|
All coatings were applied on glass panels or PET foils with wire bars at 75 µm wet film thickness. After a curing procedure, all panels were stored for 24 h in an acclimatized chamber, and surface resistivity was measured three times at each panel.
Starting formulations are shown in Tables 1-3. Multiwall carbon nanotubes from different suppliers were used in the form of aqueous dispersions.
Results and Discussion
|Table 3 Click to enlarge|
To determine the performance of multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) in different aqueous coating systems, we used a two-component clearcoat based on Bayhydrol A 145, and two one-component baking systems based on Worleesol 61 A or Bayhydrol D155, respectively. The A 145 system started curing immediately after application, while curing of the baking systems was initiated by elevated temperature. The two baking systems offer different resin chemistries; alkyd/melamine in Worleesol 61 A and polyester/melamine in Bayhydrol D155. The difference between the three systems had an influence on the distribution of MWCNT inside the coating, resulting in different percolation thresholds.
In all coatings, dosages of 0.5% to 8.0% MWCNT (calculated on solid resin) were incorporated, and films were applied on glass and PET substrates using wire bars to achieve 75 µm dry film thickness. Films with 0.5% to 2% MWCNT were already quite dark but still translucent, while higher MWCNT concentrations resulted in nontransparent coatings (Figure 1).
|Figure 1 Click to enlarge|
As seen in Figure 2, the lowest percolation thresholds were observed in the D155 system, followed by the Worleesol 61 A system. Even at low MWCNT concentrations of 0.5% to 2%, anti-static properties were achieved, and concentrations of 2% to 4% MWCNT resulted in electro-conductive coatings with surface resistivity below 105 W.
A possible explanation for this finding follows. The MWCNT were incorporated into the coatings in the form of dispersions in which the carbon nanotubes were homogeneously dispersed and stabilized by wetting and dispersing additives. This perfect distribution was transferred into the coating system. In the two-component system, curing started directly after application, which kept the carbon nanotubes in a very well-dispersed state. It resulted in a higher percolation threshold since many MWCNT were in an isolated position and were not contributing to the percolation network. The baking systems started curing after the flash off time and while applying heat. This enabled the MWCNT to agglomerate on a very small scale to achieve percolation. It can also be described as a kind of self-organization, and it seems that the resin chemistry also contributed to this process. Unfortunately, we could not yet clearly see differences in distribution by REM microscopy to prove this theory.
|Figure 2 Click to enlarge|
In addition to the influence from the resin chemistry or curing process, there was a significant contribution due to the particle size, aspect ratio and surface chemistry of the conductive pigment itself. We used two different kinds of multiwall carbon nanotubes. The first one, MWCNT 1, exhibited some structural defects and some oxygen-containing groups on the surface. The second one, MWCNT 2, had less structural defects and a less polar surface, as well as a slightly longer particle length. As a comparison, we used a conductive carbon black, which offered a polar surface and particle agglomerates with low aspect ratios compared to MWCNT. Figure 3 shows that MWCNT 2 offered lower percolation thresholds compared to MWCNT 1 in the D155 system.
To achieve the same level of surface resistivity, one would have to use between 8% to 10% carbon black, 2.5% MWCNT 1 or 1.5% MWCNT 2. This effect becomes even more predominant in the Bayhydrol A 145 system where MWCNT 1 gave almost no surface resistivity improvement. Due to their more polar particle surface, the carbon nanotubes kept their well-dispersed status inside the two-component clearcoat system and even at high concentrations of 8%, there was almost no improvement in conductivity. The MWCNT 2 had a higher aspect ratio and resulted in a percolating network, exhibiting surface resistivity of 106 Wat a MWCNT 2 concentration of 6%.
|Figure 3 Click to enlarge|
It is obvious that the performance of carbon nanotubes as well as any other conductive pigment strongly depends on several parameters. First, is the interaction between the conductive pigment and the coating matrix. If the affinity of the resin to the conductive pigment is too high and the conductive pigment stays in a perfectly dispersed status, the formation of a percolating network is hindered. Therefore, the conductive pigments should be used in the form of dispersions to guarantee a good initial dispersion status. In addition, the wetting and dispersing additives used have to guarantee good stabilization as well as suitable compatibility towards the coating matrix. Percolation will take place when the conductive pigments are allowed to agglomerate on a molecular state, still keeping a good distribution. Strong flocculation has to be avoided; otherwise the necessary amount of conductive pigments would be too high. There has to be a good balance between optimum distribution and minimum agglomeration.
|Figure 4 Click to enlarge|
The second point to be considered is to use conductive pigments with high aspect ratios to achieve percolation at low concentrations. Therefore we believe that carbon nanotubes can offer a strong benefit compared to carbon blacks due to their structural uniqueness (Figure 4).
Compared to organic anti-statics (for example, those based on quaternary ammonium salts), conductive pigments offer permanent anti-static or electro-conductive behavior to coatings. Quaternary ammonium salts can create a thin water film on the surface due to their high polarity, but their ions can migrate out of the coating matrix, often resulting in decreasing performance over time. Carbon nanotubes, especially, can overcome this drawback due to their high aspect ratio and their entanglement tendency. Figure 5 shows the surface of a clearcoat with 0.1% carbon nanotubes. The carbon nanotubes appear on some spots on the surface and disappear into the matrix again to form a three-dimensional network. This guarantees good surface conductivity, and the carbon nanotubes are strongly fixed into the matrix.
|Figure 5 Click to enlarge|
To increase the conductivity of coatings, carbon nanotubes can offer an interesting alternative to the classical conductive pigments like carbon black or metallic particles. To get the optimum benefit from this fascinating material they should be incorporated into the coating in the form of dispersions to guarantee optimum distribution. In addition, the right wetting and dispersing additives have to be used to enable percolation and compatibility with the coating matrix. Further investigations will be done to enable coatings manufacturers to predict the interaction between coating ingredients and the carbon nanotubes and the resulting performance.
1 Iijima, S. Nature354 (1991)56−58.
2 Collins, P.G.; Avouris, P. Scientific American 283 6 (2000) 62–69. | <urn:uuid:f9da786e-5fbb-4edb-a170-f7935ebe1aba> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.pcimag.com/articles/95873-conductive-coatings-using-carbon-nanotubes | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395160.19/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00152-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942405 | 1,894 | 3.140625 | 3 |
This is U Camelopardalis, a carbon star 1,500 light years away from Earth, in the constellation of the same name, near the North Celestial Pole. U Cam—as it is known—is at the end of its life, erupting layers of material from time to time:
Every few thousand years, U Cam coughs out a nearly spherical shell of gas as a layer of helium around its core begins to fuse. The gas ejected in the star's latest eruption is clearly visible in this picture as a faint bubble of gas surrounding the star.
So no, no proton torpedoes were involved in any of this.
Oh, and Hubble? I love you. [NASA] | <urn:uuid:787ae6c7-f336-4706-9ba9-7315436b2a70> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://gizmodo.com/5924013/apparently-the-death-star-was-destroyed-1500-years-ago?tag=U-Camelopardalis | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.71/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00048-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963995 | 142 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Often, I find that I’m forced to defend the teaching of poetry—to my students. It is as if they see poetry as frivolity, or worse, self-indulgence. In the world of Tumblr, Instagram, and Flipboard, where does poetry fit? Today begins our foray into resources that help teach students how poetry exists in spaces other than just textbooks and dusty bookstores.
As we discussed in yesterday’s post, the website Letters of Note can easily fit into preexisting units of study. It helps to have Mark Twain the “letter writer” teach Mark Twain the author of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. However, part of what makes the website so enjoyable is its archive of letters that deal with popular culture. Letters from cartoon characters, animators, cartoonists, astronauts and Muppets find their way onto the list and for no small reason. They offer some of the most interesting content and rhetoric.
When using letters from this popular culture category consider asking that students reflect upon what these letters argue about society and culture. What importance can be found in a fan letter to Charles Schulz? Is there significance to the fact that Marge Simpson “writes” to First Lady Barbara Bush? This exercise asks students to assess the role of popular culture and its impact on the individual and helps them to learn those pesky critical thinking skills that often elude them.
One of the most interesting ways to employ these letters is to shape them into units based on topic. Pairing “passages” together allows students to examine history, popular culture and television to create big picture arguments about who we are culturally. Below I’ve included three letters that deal with space exploration. Perhaps it’s been on my mind since the AP Language test used space exploration as the theme of its synthesis questions in 2009. Or perhaps it’s because I have a Star Trek problem.
Whatever the case, all three letters explore the final frontier in an effort to show you how to partner images, video and letters to create a “themed” focus for writing and discussion. The first is William Safire’s contingency speech for President Nixon in the event that Apollo 11 was unsuccessful and all astronauts were lost. The second letter is from Neil Armstrong on the 25th anniversary of the moon landing extolling the virtues of his spacesuit. The third letter, and a personal favorite, is from Muppet Labs to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Consider showing students the included video clips in order to lend context.
Explain and identify the use of quotation marks throughout the letter. Explain how these add to tone.
What role does the P.S. have in this letter? The P.P.S?
Why would clearly fictional characters find the need to “write” a letter to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab?
Overall topics for writing
Construct a paragraph that makes an argument about space exploration based on all three letters. Use one piece of evidence from each letter. Be sure to assess the role of the “final frontier” in your commentary.
Construct an argument about Safire’s speech for Nixon and Armstrong’s letter. How to the two texts relate to one another? What is the argument about Apollo 11’s mission? Use language directly quoted from each letter to formulate your argument.
Construct an argument about the interplay between television/film and current events. What can be argued about fictional and reality? Why? | <urn:uuid:7d6afd6d-0a71-48e5-bfbf-4397f81aa1bf> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://wheretheclassroomends.com/tag/writing-prompts | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395560.69/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00199-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934852 | 726 | 3.15625 | 3 |
Ohio Energy Project -- This K12 project offers energy education resources for teachers. Few resources are online so far, but the site offers information about educational books, games, videos, and audiotapes that can be ordered for classrooms.
Energy Quest -- aimed at elementary students. This site from the California Energy Commission includes sections on energy conservation, renewable energy, famous scientists, and nuclear energy, plus educational puzzles and games.
ABC's of Nuclear Science -- aimed at high school/college students and interested adults. Offers lots of information about nuclear structure, radioactivity and radioactive decay, nuclear reactions, fission, fusion, cosmic rays, and radiation safety. Includes radioactivity experiments for college or advanced high school students.
Roofus' Solar Home -- aimed at elementary students. Offers information and tips on using the power of the sun to save energy throughout the house. Includes fun activities for kids.
Learning about Renewable Energy -- aimed at a general audience. This excellent site contains in-depth educational sections on energy sources from the wind, sun, water, plants, and the Earth's heat. Also offers practical information for consumers and businesses.
Electricity and Magnetism -- aimed at middle school/high school students. This educational module covers static charge, moving charge, voltage, resistance, and current. Magnetism and how it relates to electricity is also be presented. Requires the Shockwave browser plug-in.
End of Page
Return to Top | <urn:uuid:a0f00904-671c-4648-96b6-753159ed8d8f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.pickocc.org/electric/general.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395546.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00031-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.889764 | 295 | 3.578125 | 4 |
Happiness is a basic human desire and one of the founding principles of the United States. Yet, it is something many find elusive, as well as a subject about which we have many questions. What fundamental truths will make us happy, even in turbulent times? Do we know why happiness seems out of reach? When our economic foundations are shaken, we may feel being happy belongs to the past, not the future.
In "Finding Happiness with Aristotle as Your Guide: Action Strategies Based on 10 Timeless Ideas," authors Gary Madvin and Geraldine Markel demonstrate how to deal with the problems of today and get back on the path to happiness. They provide vignettes of situations to which many can relate and show how the philosophical principles of Aristotle, one of the greatest thinkers of all time, can be used to move beyond the stoppers to finding-or rediscovering-happiness.
Whether you're a businessperson, community leader, wage earner, or retiree, you can follow Aristotelian ideas for creating happiness in your life and never look back. The 10 ideas and action strategies show you how to take control and stop feeling empty, overwhelmed, confused, or dissatisfied-and start feeling fulfilled, satisfied, and certain. | <urn:uuid:9b19a63f-7fa8-44dd-9a91-5a86de8a46ba> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.ebookmall.com/ebook/finding-happiness-with-aristotle-as-your-guide-action-strategies-based-on-10-timeless-ideas/gary-madvin/9781462061235 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395621.98/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00191-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933576 | 252 | 2.703125 | 3 |
How is bone cancer diagnosed?
A patient’s symptoms, physical exam, and results of imaging tests, and blood tests may suggest that bone cancer is present. But in most cases, doctors must confirm this suspicion by examining a tissue or cell sample under a microscope (a procedure known as a biopsy).
Other diseases, such as bone infections, can cause symptoms and imaging results that could be confused with bone cancer. Accurate diagnosis of a bone tumor often depends on combining information about its location (what bone is affected and even which part of the bone is involved), appearance on x-rays, and appearance under a microscope.
Since a single bone metastasis can have the same signs and symptoms as a primary bone tumor, many doctors require a biopsy to diagnose a patient’s first bone metastasis. After that, additional bone metastases can usually be diagnosed based on x-rays and other imaging tests.
Imaging tests to detect bone cancer
Most bone cancers show up on x-rays of the bone. The bone at the site of the cancer may appear “ragged” instead of solid. The cancer can also appear as a hole in the bone. Sometimes doctors can see a tumor around the defect in the bone that might extend into nearby tissues (such as muscle or fat). The radiologist (doctor who specializes in reading x-rays) can often tell if a tumor is malignant by the way it appears on the x-ray, but only a biopsy can absolutely determine that.
A chest x-ray is often done to see if bone cancer has spread to the lungs.
Computed tomography (CT) scans
The CT scan is an x-ray procedure that produces detailed, cross-sectional images of your body. Instead of taking one picture, like a conventional x-ray, a CT scanner takes many pictures as it rotates around you. A computer then combines these pictures into an image of a slice of your body. The machine creates multiple images of the part of your body that is being studied.
A CT scanner has been described as a large donut, with a narrow table in the middle opening. You will need to lie still on the table while the scan is being done. CT scans take longer than regular x-rays, and you might feel a bit confined by the ring while the pictures are being taken.
CT scans are helpful in staging cancer. They help tell if your bone cancer has spread into your lungs, liver, or other organs. These scans also show the lymph nodes and distant organs where metastatic cancer might be present.
Before the test you may be asked to drink 1 or 2 pints of a contrast agent. This helps outline the stomach and intestine to make it easier to see tumors. You might also receive an IV (intravenous) line through which a different kind of contrast dye is injected. This helps better outline structures in your body.
The injection can cause some flushing (redness and warm feeling that may last hours to days). A few people are allergic to the dye and get hives. Rarely, more serious reactions like trouble breathing and low blood pressure can occur. You can be given medicine to prevent and treat allergic reactions. Be sure to tell the doctor if you have ever had a reaction to any contrast material used for x-rays or if you have an allergy to shellfish.
CT scans can also be used to precisely guide a biopsy needle into a suspected metastasis. For this procedure, called a CT-guided needle biopsy, the patient remains on the CT scanning table while a radiologist advances a biopsy needle toward the location of the mass. CT scans are repeated until the doctors are confident that the needle is within the mass. (See the section, “Needle biopsy.”)
Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans
MRI scans use radio waves and strong magnets instead of x-rays. The energy from the radio waves is absorbed and then released in a pattern formed by the type of tissue and by certain diseases. A computer translates the pattern of radio waves given off by the tissues into a very detailed image of parts of the body. Sometimes a contrast material called gadolinium is injected into your veins to better see the tumor.
MRI scans are often the best test for outlining a bone tumor. They are also particularly helpful for looking at the brain and spinal cord. MRI scans are a little more uncomfortable than CT scans. First, they take longer -- often up to an hour. Also, you have to be placed inside a tube, which is confining and can upset people with claustrophobia (fear of enclosed spaces). The machine also makes a thumping noise that you may find disturbing. Some places provide headphones with music to block this out.
Radionuclide bone scans
This procedure helps show if a cancer has spread to other bones. It can find metastases earlier than regular x-rays. Bone scans also can show how much damage the primary cancer has caused in the bone.
For this test, the patient receives an injection of radioactive material called technetium diphosphonate (tek-NEE-shee-um die-fos-fuh-nate). The amount of radioactivity used is very low and causes no long-term effects. This substance is attracted to diseased bone cells throughout the entire skeleton. Areas of diseased bone will be seen on the bone scan image as dense, gray to black areas, called “hot spots.” These areas suggest metastatic cancer is present, but arthritis, infection, or other bone diseases can also cause a similar pattern. To distinguish among these conditions, the cancer care team may use other imaging tests or take bone biopsies.
Positron emission tomography (PET or PET) scans
PET scans use glucose (a form of sugar) that contains a radioactive atom. A special camera can detect the radioactivity. Cancer cells absorb a lot of the radioactive sugar because of their high rate of metabolism. PET scans are useful in looking for cancer throughout your entire body. It can sometimes help tell if a tumor is cancerous or benign. It is being combined with CT scans to better pinpoint some kinds of cancer.
A biopsy is a sample of tissue taken from a tumor so that it can be looked at under a microscope. This is the only way to know that the tumor is cancer and not some other bone disease. If cancer is present, the biopsy can tell the doctor if it is a primary bone cancer or cancer that started somewhere else and spread to the bone (metastasis). Several types of tissue and cell samples are used to diagnose bone cancer. It is very important a surgeon with experience in diagnosing and treating bone tumors do the biopsy procedure.
The surgeon will choose a biopsy method based on whether the tumor looks benign or malignant and exactly what type of tumor is most likely (based on the bone x-rays, the patient’s age, and the location of the tumor). Some kinds of bone tumors can be recognized from needle biopsy samples, but larger samples (from a surgical biopsy) are often needed to diagnose other types. Whether the surgeon plans to remove the entire tumor at the time of the biopsy will also influence the choice of biopsy type. The wrong kind of biopsy can sometimes make it hard later for the surgeon to remove all of the cancer without having to also remove all or part of the arm or leg containing the tumor. It also may cause the cancer to spread.
There are 2 types of needle biopsies: fine needle biopsies and core needle biopsies. For both types, a local anesthetic is first used to numb the area for the biopsy. For fine needle aspiration (FNA), the doctor uses a very thin needle attached to a syringe to withdraw a small amount of fluid and some cells from the tumor mass. Sometimes, the doctor can aim the needle by feeling the suspicious tumor or area that is near the surface of the body. If the tumor cannot be felt because it is too deep, the doctor can guide the needle while viewing a CT scan. This is called a CT guided needle biopsy and it is often done by an x-ray specialist known as an interventional radiologist. In a core needle biopsy, the doctor uses a larger needle to remove a small cylinder of tissue (about 1/16 inch in diameter and 1/2 inch long). Many experts feel that a core needle biopsy is better than FNA to diagnose a primary bone cancer.
Surgical bone biopsy
In this procedure, a surgeon needs to cut through the skin to reach the tumor in order to remove a small piece of tissue. This is also called an incisional biopsy. If the entire tumor is removed (not just a small piece), it is called an excisional biopsy. These biopsies are often done with the patient under general anesthesia (asleep). They can also be done using a nerve block, which numbs a large area. If this type of biopsy is needed, it is important that the surgeon who will later remove the cancer also be the one to do the biopsy.
Last Medical Review: 03/21/2014
Last Revised: 01/21/2016 | <urn:uuid:089441a2-4860-4b67-b9fe-462386c8e810> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.cancer.org/cancer/bonecancer/detailedguide/bone-cancer-diagnosis | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398628.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00093-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946187 | 1,907 | 3.671875 | 4 |
Women in the United Nations
As a standard-setting organization, the United Nations has a particular responsibility to lead by example in ensuring the equal and active participation of women at all levels of the UN system. This is also necessary for integrating a gendered perspective into UN policies and programmes. UN Women is mandated to lead, coordinate and promote the accountability of the UN system for women's equal representation.
The Charter of the United Nations stipulates that there shall be no restrictions on the eligibility of men and women to participate in every capacity and under conditions of equality in the system's principle and subsidiary organs. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights reinforced this principle, stating that there can be no distinction or discrimination on the basis of gender.
The UN General Assembly has set numerical targets on the representation of women from as early as 1986. In 1995, the Beijing Platform for Action established a goal of 50:50 gender balance for UN staff at the professional levels and above, to be achieved by 2000.
Today, the goal of gender parity applies to all categories of UN staff posts, without regard to the type or duration of appointment, the series of staff rules under which the appointment is made, or the source of funding. | <urn:uuid:1b9d8c52-e684-4012-8c1d-9c1a660d1a42> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.un.org/womenwatch/uncoordination/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395613.65/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00095-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.919849 | 243 | 3.171875 | 3 |
The silky sifaka (Propithecus candidus), or silky simpona, is a large lemur characterized by long, silky white fur. It has a very restricted range in northeastern Madagascar, where it is known locally as the simpona. It is one of the rarest mammals on earth, and is listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as one of the world's 25 most critically endangered primates. The silky sifaka is one of nine sifaka species (genus Propithecus), and one of four former subspecies of diademed sifaka (P. diadema). Studies in 2004 and 2007 compared external proportions, genetics, and cranio-dental anatomy supporting full species status, which has generally been accepted.
The silky sifaka has a variable social structure, and lives in groups of two to nine individuals. It spends most of its day feeding and resting, though it also devotes a considerable amount of time to social behaviors, such as playing and grooming, as well as traveling. Females occasionally take priority over males during feeding. Like other eastern sifakas, it consumes mainly leaves and seeds, but also fruit, flowers, and even soil on occasion. It is a seasonal breeder and only mates one day a year during the start of the rainy season. As with other sifaka species, non-maternal infant care is common. Group members of all ages and both sexes will often groom, play, occasionally carry, and even nurse infants that are not their own. The silky sifaka vocalizes frequently despite its moderately sized vocal repertoire consisting of seven adult calls. Like all lemurs, it relies strongly on scent for communication. Males will frequently scent-mark on top of scent-marks made by other group members, particularly females. Males also gouge trees with their toothcomb (a special arrangement of the bottom, front teeth) prior to chest scent-marking. This chest marking results in males having brown-stained chests, the only visible trait that can be used to distinguish between adult males and adult females.
The species is only found within a few protected areas in the rainforests of northeastern Madagascar, with the majority of the remaining population in Marojejy National Park and Anjanaharibe-Sud Special Reserve. A few groups have also been found in the Makira Forest Protected Area, the Betaolana Corridor, and some unprotected forest fragments. The silky sifaka is hunted throughout its range as there is no local taboo (fady) against eating this species. Habitat disturbance, such as slash-and-burn agriculture (tavy), illegal logging of precious woods (particularly, rosewood) and fuel-wood, also occurs within the protected areas where it is found.
The name "sifaka" is a reference to a common general alarm vocalization given by western dry forest sifakas in which they emit an explosive, hiss-like "shee-faak" call several times in succession. On the east coast, local residents refer to the larger bodied diademed sifaka as simpona, a name which refers to the species' sneeze-like "zzuss" alarm vocalizations. The calls are emitted in a variety of stressful circumstances such as presence of humans, falling trees, terrestrial predators, and after aggression between group members. The species name, candidus, is Latin for "white", while the species name of the taxonomic synonym sericeus is derived from the Greek word for "silk".
The silky sifaka was initially described in 1871 by French naturalist Alfred Grandidier in a formally published letter to French zoologist Alphonse Milne-Edwards. Grandidier's description was based on his own observations north of the Bay of Antongil in the last few months of 1870. He then named the species Propithecus candidus due to its white color, which he likened to that of the Verreaux's sifaka (Propithecus verreauxi), but without the dark fur on its head or the ash-colored spot on the back. The first specimen was obtained in 1872 and provided by "Monsieur Guinet", a planter from Sambava. The specimen allowed both Grandidier and Milne-Edwards to more thoroughly describe the species based on its skin, coat, and skull. Upon those findings, they changed the name to P. sericeus. Upon further review in 1875, Grandidier demoted the silky sifaka to a variety or "race" of the diademed sifaka. By the time German zoologist Ernst Schwarz standardized lemur taxonomy in 1931, P. sericeus had become a taxonomic synonym for the species, with the original name, Propithecus candidus, taking priority.
Schwarz placed all sifakas into two species, the larger diademed sifaka from the eastern rainforests and the smaller Verreaux's sifaka from the dry forests and spiny forests of the west and south. At the time, both species comprised four subspecies, and the silky sifaka was listed as P. diadema candidus, a subspecies of the diademed sifaka. In his 1982 book Primates of Madagascar, anthropologist Ian Tattersall upheld this classification. When anthropologist Colin Groves reviewed the taxonomy in his book Primate Taxonomy in 2001, he also upheld the subspecies status of the silky sifaka because variations in fur coloration between the available specimens suggested converging similarities with the diademed sifaka's coloration. Groves later noted that the coloration of the two species did not overlap, suggesting that the populations were distinct.
In 2004, Mayor et al. showed that despite having a similar karyotype (the number and appearance of chromosomes) of 42 chromosomes (2n=42), the silky sifaka was distinct from the diademed sifaka. This was shown through genetic tests (D-loop sequencing) and by comparing external proportions. For example, the silky sifaka has a shorter tail. Their analysis indicated a closer relationship with Perrier's sifaka (Propithecus perrieri). Russell Mittermeier and colleagues followed by adopting the full species status of the silky sifaka for the 2nd edition of Lemurs of Madagascar in 2006. Although Groves maintained the silky sifaka as a subspecies in the 3rd edition of Mammal Species of the World in 2005, he recognized it as a distinct species in 2007 by acknowledging the work of Mayor et al. and also noting the additional distinction that the silky sifaka has relatively long molar teeth compared to the length of its toothrow. Despite the promotion to full species status, the silky sifaka is still considered to be a member of the P. diadema group, a group of four closely related, large-bodied, eastern rainforest sifakas. The other three members of this group are the diademed sifaka, Perrier's sifaka, and Milne-Edwards' sifaka (Propithecus edwardsi). The species status of the silky sifaka, as well as other sifakas, does not have universal support: in 2007, Tattersall argued against species distinctions within Propithecus, claiming the decisions were made prematurely.
In 1974, Tattersall spotted what he thought was a color variant of the silky sifaka north of Vohemar in northeast Madagascar. Describing it as such eight years later in The Primates of Madagascar, he not only cited its mostly white fur, but also uncharacteristic traits such as a patch of orange on its crown and tufted ears. It was not observed again until 1986, when a team led by paleoanthropologist Elwyn Simons captured specimens for captive breeding and identified it as a new species, named as the golden-crowned sifaka (Propithecus tattersalli) in 1988.
Geographic range and habitat
The silky sifaka is confined to a small region of northeastern Madagascar within a strip of humid forest stretching from Maroantsetra in the south to the Andapa Basin and the Marojejy Massif in the north. Marojejy National Park represents the northern limit of its current distribution, although historical sifaka range maps created by Grandidier and Milne-Edwards in the late 19th century show the silky sifaka as far north as the Bemarivo River, north of Sambava. The Androranga River may represent the northwestern range limit within the Tsaratanana Corridor. The southern limit of its range appears to be the Antainambalana River, within the Makira Conservation Site. It is not known if the silky sifaka has ever ranged as far south as the Masoala Peninsula. As of 2009, new observations of a few groups of the silky sifaka in unprotected forest fragments adjacent to northeastern Makira (Antohaka Lava and Maherivaratra) may slightly enlarge the known geographic range of this species. The presence of the silky sifaka has been documented within Marojejy National Park, Anjanaharibe-Sud Special Reserve, the Makira Forest Protected Area, the Betaolana Corridor, and the Tsaratanana Corridor. In 2008, 16 groups were discovered in western Marojejy near Antsahaberoaka.
The silky sifaka tends to be found at higher elevations than any of the other sifaka species and also occupies the greatest range of elevations for the group. In Marojejy National Park and Anjanaharibe-Sud Special Reserve, where most of the remaining groups exist, it is not found below 700 m (2,300 ft) of elevation and not above 1,875 m (6,152 ft). However, at its southernmost location in Makira (Andaparaty), several groups inhabit forest fragments at an unusually low elevation of 300 m (980 ft). The silky sifaka inhabits three types of elevation-specific habitats: primary montane rainforest, sclerophyllous forest, and the most elevated portions of low ericoid bush. It is unknown how sensitive the silky sifaka is to disturbance or whether it avoids habitat edges ("edge-intolerant") or is more edge-tolerant like the diademed sifaka. Like other rainforest sifaka species, it seldom crosses unforested regions between forest fragments.
In the Anjanaharibe-Sud Special Reserve, the silky sifaka is sympatric (shares the same geographic range) with the white-fronted brown lemur (Eulemur albifrons) and an all-black population of indri (Indri indri). In Marojejy National Park, it is sympatric with the white-fronted brown lemur. In 2008, it was suggested that the silky sifaka may be sympatric with the red ruffed lemur (Varecia rubra) near Maherivaratra and Andaparaty.
The silky sifaka is one of the larger sifaka species, with a head-body length of 48–54 cm (1.6–1.8 ft), a tail length of 45–51 cm (1.5–1.7 ft), a total length of 93–105 cm (3.1–3.4 ft), and a weight of 5–6.5 kg (11–14 lb). As its common English name suggests, its long, white fur has a silky texture. Not all individuals are completely white: some have silver-gray or black tints on the crown, back, and limbs. The base of the tail ("pygal region") can be yellow. The ears and face are hairless, and the skin may be a mix of pink and black, completely black, or completely pink. The tips of the ears protrude slightly above the fur on the rest of the head. Its eyes have a deep orange-red coloration. Its appearance is distinctive, and since no other sifakas share its range, it is not easily confused with other lemur species.
While it is difficult to distinguish adult males and females in other eastern rainforest sifakas, such as the Perrier's sifaka and Milne-Edwards' sifaka, gender in the silky sifaka is easily discerned due to differences in fur coloration of the upper chest. Females have white fur, while males have a large brown patch of fur that results from scent marking with a gland on the chest and throat (the sternal gular gland). During mating season, the size of the "chest patch" increases to cover both the chest and abdomen as a result of increased scent marking.
Until the 21st century, brief observations and lemur surveys had merely documented the presence of the silky sifaka in special reserves and national parks. More recently, a 14-month study and two short-term studies in Marojejy National Park have revealed previously unknown details about its behavioral biology, communication, and feeding ecology. The silky sifaka has a variable social structure and is known to live in male-female pairs, one-male groups, and multi-male/multi-female groups. Group sizes range from two to nine individuals, while the home ranges are estimated to range from 34 to 47 ha (0.13 to 0.18 sq mi), varying in size by location.
According to some studies, the silky sifaka spends most of its day resting and feeding (approximately 44.4% and 25% respectively). It also devotes approximately 16.8% of the day to social behavior, such as personal grooming, social grooming (allogrooming), and play. The rest of the day is spent traveling and sleeping. Other sources report that the species divides half of the day between traveling and foraging, while the rest is spent resting. Daily foraging usually starts at dawn unless delayed by rain. Group movement is usually led by females, and groups usually travel 700 m (2,300 ft) per day, and may climb 500 m (1,600 ft) along vertical slopes. Although the species spends its time in the trees, terrestrial play is not uncommon, even among adults, with play sessions lasting 30 minutes or more. Like other sifakas, it uses a type of arboreal locomotion known as vertical clinging and leaping. Dominance hierarchies have not been documented among female sifakas, including the silky sifaka, although seasonal hierarchies are known to occur. Aggression, which is generally infrequent, occurs primarily during feeding, where females take priority over males, although submissive signals are not always obvious.
The silky sifaka's diet is similar to that of other eastern rainforest sifakas, consisting primarily of leaves (folivory) and seeds (seed predation). It is highly varied and includes many plant species. A two-month study from the mid-2000s showed that the silky sifaka can feed on as many as 76 species of plant from 42 families. Its favorites included primarily tree species, but also some lianas. The most prominent plant families in the diet were Moraceae (20.30%), Fabaceae (12.87%), Myrtaceae (12.65%), Clusiaceae (10.13%) and Apocynaceae (9.49%). In the study, feeding upon these four plant families took up as much as 37.06% of the total feeding time for the silky sifaka: 16.09% on the fruit of Pachytrophe dimepate, 8.43% on the seeds of Senna sp., 6.52% on the young leaves of Plectaneia thouarsii, and 6.02% on the fruit of Eugenia sp. In sum, folivory accounted for 52% of the feeding time, while frugivory (fruit-eating) accounted for 34%, and seed predation made up 11%. The consumption of flowers, as well as soil (geophagy), was rarely observed in this study. Prior to this, preliminary studies had reported that folivory account for 75% of the diet, while fruits and 15% was seed predation, 7% was flower consumption, and bark and soil made up the remainder.
Like all other lemurs, the silky sifaka is a seasonal breeder, and it is thought that it mates only one day a year during the start of the rainy season sometime in December or January. Infants are born six months later in June or July. Females typically give birth to a single infant once every two years, although births in consecutive years have been observed. Infants initially cling to the fur of their mother's chest for nearly four weeks and then switch to riding on her back. As with other eastern rainforest sifakas, the infants of this species develop rapidly. This may be due to assistance in the care of infants by all group members (known as alloparental care)—a trait typical among all sifakas. Non-maternal care usually takes the form of allogrooming, but also playing, occasional carrying, and in rare cases, nursing. The dispersal of offspring is thought to be similar to that of other eastern rainforest sifakas, with both males and females transferring out of the group at sexual maturity. However, dispersal has only been observed once with a young adult male, who left its natal group and proceeded to oust an older male from a group in which he had been a member for seven years. Female dispersal and group transfer has not yet been observed.
Silky sifaka vocalizations
General purpose alarm call
Roar given in response to large birds
Sound made when an individual gets lost
Another type of contact call
|Problems listening to these files? See media help.|
The only documented predator of the silky sifaka, other than humans, is the fossa, a cat-like carnivore found only on Madagascar. Although no aerial predators are known, the silky sifaka often watch the sky and emit loud "aerial disturbance" roars at the sight of the large Madagascar buzzard (Buteo brachypterus) and other small birds. Another more general alarm call is the loud, sneeze-like "zzuss" vocalization, which are emitted in response to terrestrial disturbances, calls from lost group members, and aggression by other group members. Acoustic analyses of the "zzuss" vocalization have shown that the call's acoustic structure differs between individuals and by gender.
Adult eastern sifakas have a moderately sized vocal repertoire of about seven call types. It is uncertain if their vocalizations have specific or varied contexts, and as with other primates, arousal level may play a role in the acoustic structure of its calls. Despite the limited size of the silky sifaka's vocal repertoire, it does exhibit high call rates of seven calls per hour, on average. Even infants are known to have several specialized vocalizations. The most frequently emitted silky sifaka vocalizations are low-amplitude, low-frequency, tonal "hum" and "mum" vocalizations. These contact calls are used in a variety of circumstances including group movement, affiliation, foraging, and while resting.
The silky sifaka uses well-developed olfactory (smell-based) communication, as with all other prosimian ("pre-monkey") primates. Like other eastern rainforest sifakas, it has several specialized glands for scent-marking, including a sebaceous gland on the chest, found only in males, and mixed apocrine-sebaceous glands on the genitals in both sexes. Unlike the true lemurs of the genus Eulemur, the silky sifaka does not directly scent-mark its conspecifics (allomarking), although it does scent-mark its territory. Both sexes will often urinate while scent-marking. Males and females scent-mark in different ways: females rub their genital glands in an up-and-down motion against trees, while males may use their chest gland, genital glands, or a combination of both. Males will also use their specialized prosimian toothcomb to gouge trees before scent-marking with their chest—a behavior that leaves long-lasting visible marks. The gouging is thought to serve a role in communication and has no dietary component, since males do not eat the bark or tree gum.
Males scent-mark more frequently than females, as much as two or three times as often. Males also respond to female scent-marking by overmarking with their own scent glands, usually by combining chest and genital marking. They will also overmark other males, although less quickly and less often. In a one-year study, males responded to 71% of the marks made by females within an average of 61 seconds while only 17% of male marks received a response from other group members. Because males overmark frequently, this results in "totem-tree marking", where certain trees become covered by male scent and gouge marks. However, no observations of widespread home range border scent-marking have been reported. Scent-marks are usually left on trees in the core area of the home range, as opposed to the territorial boundaries.
According to the most recent IUCN Red List assessment, the silky sifaka is Critically Endangered. It is one of the rarest and most critically endangered lemurs. The silky sifaka is one of five lemurs listed as one of "The World's 25 Most Endangered Primates" and has been on the list all five times since its inception in 2000. Its population size is estimated to range between 100 and 1,000 individuals, while the number of mature individuals is thought to be less than 250. There are no silky sifakas in captivity, such as in zoos.
The silky sifaka is the flag-ship species for the protected areas in which it is found, particularly for Marojejy, which has recently been inaugurated as part of a World Heritage Site cluster known as the Rainforests of the Atsinanana. Habitat disturbance, such as slash-and-burn agriculture (known locally as tavy), logging of precious woods (e.g., rosewood) and fuel-wood, also occurs within the protected areas where it is found. Unlike the golden-crowned sifaka (Propithecus tattersalli), there is no local taboo (fady) against eating this species, and the hunting of bushmeat is a known issue within its range. It is most heavily hunted in the northern and western parts of Marojejy, as well as other areas around the Andapa Basin. The species is restricted to 90,000 ha (350 sq mi) of protected areas, although this may be an overestimation because in much of its range the silky sifaka is not found below 700 m (2,300 ft) in altitude, possibly due to either hunting pressure or habitat preference.
Illegal logging of precious hardwoods, such as rosewood and ebony, has become one of the greatest threats to the silky sifaka's habitat, especially since the 2009 Malagasy political crisis. Its two largest protected areas, Masoala National Park and Marojejy National Park, have been the hardest hit. The disturbance caused by selective logging increases the likelihood of forest fires, helps invasive species take root, impairs habitat, and causes the loss of genetic diversity.
Local villages adjacent to its remaining protected areas adopted a two-pronged strategy towards silky sifaka conservation education. First, a "cognitive component" was implemented to increase knowledge and awareness through radio interviews, slide presentations, and the disbursement of literature in twelve primary and secondary schools. Additionally, an "emotional component" was begun to link silky sifaka conservation with positive emotional experiences, with the goal of establishing a psychological connection between the children and the lemur. To do this, groups of children were taken on three-day educational eco-tours in Marojejy National Park. Both the teachers and the students showed interest and genuine concern about the plight of the silky sifaka.
Plans are being made to both expand Anjanaharibe-Sud Special Reserve and link existing parks and reserves in the region with wildlife corridors. These corridors include the Betaolana Corridor between Marojejy and Anjananharibe-Sud and Makira, which will connect Anjananharibe-Sud with Masoala National Park to the south. In addition to providing additional habitat for the silky sifaka, the corridors would promote genetic exchange between currently isolated populations.
- Groves, C. P. (2005). "Order Primates". In Wilson, D. E.; Reeder, D. M. Mammal Species of the World (3rd ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 111–184. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0. OCLC 62265494. http://www.bucknell.edu/msw3/browse.asp?id=12100091.
- Andrainarivo, C., Andriaholinirina, V. N., Feistner, A., Felix, T., Ganzhorn, J., Garbutt, N., Golden, C., Konstant, B., Louis Jr., E., Meyers, D., Mittermeier, R. A., Patel, E., Perieras, A., Princee, F., Rabarivola, J. C., Rakotosamimanana, B., Rasamimanana, H., Ratsimbazafy, J., Raveloarinoro, G., Razafimanantsoa, A., Rumpler, Y., Schwitzer, C., Thalmann, U., Wilmé, L. & Wright, P. (2008). Propithecus candidus. In: IUCN 2008. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Retrieved 1 January 2009.
- Mittermeier et al. 2006, pp. 383–387
- Mittermeier et al. 2006, pp. 341–344
- Simons, E.L. (1988). "A new species of Propithecus (Primates) from northeast Madagascar". Folia Primatologica 50 (1–2): 143–151. doi:10.1159/000156340. PMID 3148530.
- Patel, E.R.. "Adult Silky Sifaka Vocal Repertoire". SIMPONA. http://www.simpona.org/vocalizations.html. Retrieved 5 July 2010.
- Patel, E.R.; Anderson, J.D.; Owren, M.J. (2006). "Exploring the function of "Zzuss" alarm vocalizations in wild silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus): moderate evidence for individual distinctiveness". International Journal of Primatology 27 (Suppl 1): 504. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjsfZGZg. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Borror 1960, p. 21
- Borror 1960, p. 91
- Grandidier, A. (1871). "Observations sur les Propithèques de Madagascar. Extrait d'une Lettre adressée à M. Milne Edwards, par M. Alf. Grandidier. [Observations on Propithecus in Madagascar. Extract from a letter addressed to Mr. Milne Edwards, from Mr. Alf. Grandidier.]" (in French). Comptes rendus hebdomadaires des séances de l'Académie des sciences 72: 231–232. http://books.google.com/books?id=0XobAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA232.
- Milne-Edwards, A.; Grandidier, A. (1872). "Description d'une nouvelle espèce de Propithèque (Propithecus sericeus) [Description of a new species of Propithecus (Propithecus sericeus)]" (in French). Revue et Magasin de Zoologie. 2nd 23: 273–274.
- Milne-Edwards & Grandidier 1875, pp. 300–302
- Schwarz, E. (1931). "A revision of the genera and species of Madagascar Lemuridae". Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1931: 399–428. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1931.tb01020.x.
- Groves, C.P.; Helgen, K.M. (2007). "Craniodental characters in the taxonomy of Propithecus" (PDF). International Journal of Primatology 28 (6): 1363–1383. doi:10.1007/s10764-007-9226-5. http://si-pddr.si.edu/dspace/bitstream/10088/8317/1/vz_Groves_and_Helgen_2007_International_Journal_of_Primatology_Propithecus.pdf.
- Tattersall, I. (2007). "Madagascar's lemurs: Cryptic diversity or taxonomic inflation?". Evolutionary Anthropology 16: 12–23. doi:10.1002/evan.20126.
- Groves 2001, p. 89
- Mayor, M.I.; Sommer, J.A.; Houck, M.L.; Zaonarivelo, J.R.; Wright, P.C.; Ingram, C.; Engel, S.R.; Louis Jr., E.E. (2004). "Specific status of Propithecus spp." (PDF). International Journal of Primatology 25 (4): 875–900. doi:10.1023/B:IJOP.0000029127.31190.e9. http://www.mireyamayor.com/files/publications/Mayoreta2004.pdf.
- Harcourt 1990, pp. 204–205
- Patel, E.R. (2009). Mittermeier, R.A.; Wallis, J.; Rylands, A.B. et al.. eds (PDF). Primates in Peril: The World's 25 Most Endangered Primates 2008–2010. Illustrated by S.D. Nash. Arlington, VA.: IUCN/SSC Primate Specialist Group (PSG), International Primatological Society (IPS), and Conservation International (CI). pp. 23–26. ISBN 978-1-934151-34-1. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/Primates.in.Peril.2008-2010.pdf.
- Tattersall 1982, pp. 99–101
- Wilmé, L; Callmander, M.W (2006). "Les populations reliques de primates: les Propithèques [Relic populations of primates: sifakas]" (in French) (PDF). Lemur News 11: 24–31. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/LN11.pdf.
- Rasolofoson, D.; Rakotondratsimba, G.; Rakotonirainy, O.; Rakotozafy, L.M.A.; Ratsimbazafy, J.H.; Rabetafika, L.; Randrianarison, R.M. (2007). "Influences des pressions anthropiques sur les lémuriens d'Anantaka, dans la partie est du plateau de Makira, Maroantsetra, Madagascar [Influence of human pressure on lemur groups on the Makira Plateau, Maroantsetra, Madagascar]" (in French) (PDF). Madagascar Conservation and Development 2: 21–27. http://www.mwc-info.net/en/services/Journal_PDF%27s/Issue2/Influences_des%20Pressions_Anthropique.pdf?ID=848&PID=4412.
- Humbert, H. (1955). "Une merveille de la nature à Madagascar. Prémière exploration botanique du Massif du Marojejy et de ses satellites [A wonder of nature in Madagascar. First botanical exploration of Morojejy Massif and its satellites]" (in French). Mémoires de l'Institut Scientifique de Madagascar. B 6: 1–210. OCLC 175062995. http://www.madadoc.mg/8438_une%20merveille.pdf.
- Guillaumet, J.L.; Betsch, J.M.; Blanc, C.; Morat, P.; Peyrieras, A.; Paulian, R (1975). "Étude des écosystèmes montagnards dans la région malgache. III. Le Marojezy. IV. L'itremo et l'ibity. Geomorphologie, climatologie, faune et flore (Campagne RCP 225, 1972–1973) [Study of mountain ecosystems in the region of Madagascar. III. The Marojejy. IV. The Itremo and Ibity. Geomorphology, climatology, fauna and flora (RCP Campaign 225 1972–1973)]" (in French). Bulletin du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle. 3 25 (309): 29–67. http://www.madadoc.mg/12261_etude%20des%20ecosystems%20III.pdf.
- Duckworth, J.W.; Evans, M.I.; Hawkins, A.F.A.; Safford, R.J.; Wilkinson, R.J. (1995). "The lemurs of Marojejy Strict Nature Reserve, Madagascar: A status overview with notes on ecology and threats". International Journal of Primatology 16 (3): 545–559. doi:10.1007/BF02735803.
- Sterling, E.; McFadden, K. (2000). "Rapid census of lemur populations in the Parc National de Marojejy, Madagascar". Fieldiana Zoology. New Series 97: 265–274. http://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/2838173.
- Schmid, J.; Smolker, R. (1998). "Lemurs of the Reserve Special d'Anjanaharibe-Sud, Madagascar". Fieldiana Zoology. New Series 90: 227–240. http://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/2821311.
- Patel, E.R.; Andrianandrasana, L.H. (2008). "Low elevation silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus) in the Makira Conservation Site at Andaparaty-Rabeson: Ranging, demography, and possible sympatry with red ruffed lemurs (Varecia rubra)" (PDF). Lemur News 13: 18–22. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/LN13.pdf.
- Goodman, S.M.; Raherilalao, M.J.; Rakotomalala, D.; Raselimanana, A.; Schütz, H.; Soarimalala, V. (2003). Les Lémuriens. In Goodman, S.M.; Wilmé, L.. "Nouveaux résultats d’inventaires biologiques faisant référence à l'altitude dans la région des massifs montagneux de Marojejy et d'Anjanaharibe-Sud [New results of biological inventories referring to the altitude in mountainous region of Marojejy and Anjanaharibe-South]" (in French). Recherches pour le Développement. Sciences Biologiques (19): 279–286.
- Irwin 2006, pp. 305–326
- Mittermeier et al. 2006, pp. 431–455
- Lehman, S.M.; Mayor, M.; Wright, P.C. (2005). "Ecogeographic size variations in sifakas: a test of the resource seasonality and resource quality hypotheses" (PDF). American Journal of Physical Anthropology 126 (3): 318–328. doi:10.1002/ajpa.10428. PMID 15386235. http://icte.bio.sunysb.edu/pdf_files/lehmanetal2005.pdf.
- Garbutt 2007, pp. 187–189
- Mittermeier et al. 1994, pp. 249–250
- Patel, E.R. (2006). "Activity budget, ranging, and group size in silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus)" (PDF). Lemur News 11: 42–45. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/LN11.pdf.
- Patel, E.R. (2007). "Non-maternal infant care in wild Silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus)" (PDF). Lemur News 12: 39–42. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/LN12.pdf.
- Queslin, E.; Patel, E.R. (2008). "A preliminary study of wild silky sifaka (Propithecus candidus) diet, feeding ecology, and habitat use in Marojejy National Park, Madagascar (Abstract #143)" (PDF). International Primatological Society. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjtLZ8rW. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Patel, E.R.; Coke, C.S.; Ritchie, A.; Santorelli, C. (2003). "Alloparental care (including allonursing) in free-ranging silky sifakas (Propithecus diadema candidus) in a primary northeastern montane rainforest in Madagascar". American Journal of Primatology 60 (Suppl 1): 71. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjtWEzXZ. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Patel, E.R. (2005). "Silky sifaka predation (Propithecus candidus) by a fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox)" (PDF). Lemur News 10: 25–27. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/LN10.pdf.
- Patel, E.R.; Anderson, J.D.; Owren, M.J. (2005). "Sex differences in the acoustic structure of an alarm vocalization in a monomorphic primate: Wild silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus) of Northeastern Madagascar". American Journal of Primatology 66 (Suppl 1): 46–47. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjtoex16. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Patel, E.R.; Coke, C.S.; Ritchie, A.; Santorelli, C. (2003). "Assessing production specificity of free ranging silky sifaka (Propithecus diadema candidus) "antipredator" vocalizations: Weak evidence for "aerial predator" but not "terrestrial predator" calls". American Journal of Primatology 60 (Suppl 1): 71–72. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjteQznI. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Patel, E.R.; Anderson, J.D.; Irwin, M.T.; Owren, M.J. (2005). "Quantifying the vocal repertoire of wild adult diademed sifakas (Propithecus diadema diadema) in Madagascar". American Journal of Primatology 66 (Suppl 1): 48. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjtvKvY0. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Owren, M.J.; Patel, E.R. (2008). "A little of this, a lot of that: Specificity and variability in nonhuman primate vocal repertoires (Abstract #742)" (PDF). International Primatological Society. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rju6uE2q. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Gron, K.J. (2008). "Primate Factsheets: Diademed sifaka (Propithecus diadema) Behavior". Primate Info Net. National Primate Research Center, University of Wisconsin. http://pin.primate.wisc.edu/factsheets/entry/diademed_sifaka/behav. Retrieved 30 June 2010.
- Schilling 1979, pp. 461–542
- Patel, E.R.; Girard-Buttoz, C. (2008). "Non-nutritive tree gouging in wild Milne-Edwards' sifakas (Propithecus edwardsi): Description and potential communicative functions (Abstract #283)" (PDF). International Primatological Society. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjuClGl5. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Patel, E.R. (2006). "Scent-marking in wild silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus) in Madagascar: sex differences and seasonal effects in usage and response across multiple scent-mark types". International Journal of Primatology 27 (Suppl 1): 496. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjubfWQr. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Andrianandrasana, L.H.; Patel, E.R.; Wright, P.C. (2007). "A comparison of scent overmarking in two species of wild rainforest sifakas: silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus) and Milne-Edwards' sifakas (Propithecus edwardsi) (Abstract)". Prosimian Congress.
- Ritchie, A.; Patel, E.R. (2006). "The existence and potential function of "totem-tree" scent-marking in silky sifakas (Propithecus candidus)". International Journal of Primatology 27 (Suppl 1): 504. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjuhCb5a. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- IUCN (2007). "Rainforests of the Atsinanana (Madagascar) — ID No. 1257" (PDF). World heritage nomination — IUCN technical evaluation. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjuQCjBN. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Patel, E.R. (2007). "Logging of rare rosewood and palisandre (Dalbergia spp.) within Marojejy National Park, Madagascar" (PDF). Madagascar Conservation and Development 2 (1): 11–16. http://www.mwc-info.net/en/services/Journal_PDF%27s/Issue2/Logging_of_Rosewood.pdf?ID=845&PID=4412.
- Nielson, M.; Patel, E.R. (2008). "The role of taste preference and wealth in bushmeat hunting in villages adjacent to Marojejy National Park, Madagascar" (PDF). Primate Eye (XXII Congress of the International Primatological Society) 96 (Special Issue): 222–223. Archived from the original on 4 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5rjuIIW4I. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
- Kelley, E.; Mayor, M.I. (2002). "Preliminary study of the silky sifaka (Propithecus diadema candidus) in north-east Madagascar" (PDF). Lemur News 7: 16–18. http://www.primate-sg.org/PDF/LN7.pdf.
- Patel, E.R.; Marshall, J.J.; Parathian, H. (2005). "Silky Sifaka (Propithecus candidus) conservation education in Northeastern Madagascar" (PDF). Laboratory Primate Newsletter 44 (3): 8–11. http://www.simpona.org/Patel%20et%20al.%202005_Cons%20Edu.pdf.
- "The Lemurs of Marojejy and Anjananharibe-Sud" (PDF). Marojejy National Park. 2007. Archived from the original on 3 August 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5ridSHglO. Retrieved 3 August 2010.
- Books cited
- Borror, D.J. (1960). Dictionary of Word Roots and Combining Forms. Mayfield Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-87484-053-7.
- Garbutt, N. (2007). Mammals of Madagascar, A Complete Guide. A&C Black Publishers. ISBN 978-0-300-12550-4.
- Groves, C.P. (2001). Primate Taxonomy. Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN 978-1-56098-872-4.
- Harcourt, C. (1990). "Introduction". In Thornback, J.. Lemurs of Madagascar and the Comoros: The IUCN Red Data Book. World Conservation Union. ISBN 978-2-88032-957-0.
- Irwin, M.T. (2006). "Chapter 14: Ecologically Enigmatic Lemurs: The Sifakas of the Eastern Forests (Propithecus candidus, P. diadema, P. edwardsi, P. perrieri, and P. tattersalli)". In Gould, L.; Sauther, M.L.. Lemurs: Ecology and Adaptation. Springer. ISBN 978-0-387-34585-7. http://books.google.com/?id=nsBtrhsMU5EC&printsec=frontcover&q.
- Milne-Edwards, A. & Grandidier, A. (1875) (in French). Histoire naturelle des mammifères, Tome 1, Texte i [The natural history of mammals, Book 1, Part i]. Histoire physique, naturelle et politique de Madagascar. Volume VI. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale. OCLC 494592496.
- Mittermeier, R.A.; Tattersall, I.; Konstant, W.R.; Meyers, D.M.; Mast, R.B. (1994). Lemurs of Madagascar. Illustrated by S.D. Nash (1st ed.). Conservation International. ISBN 1-881173-08-9.
- Mittermeier, R.A.; Konstant, W.R.; Hawkins, F.; Louis, E.E.; Langrand, O.; Ratsimbazafy, J.; Rasoloarison, R.; Ganzhorn, J.U. et al. (2006). Lemurs of Madagascar. Illustrated by S.D. Nash (2nd ed.). Conservation International. ISBN 1-881173-88-7.
- Schilling, A. (1979). "Olfactory communication in prosimians". In Doyle, G.A.; Martin, R.D.. The Study of Prosimian Behavior. Academic Press. ISBN 0-12-222150-8.
- Tattersall, I. (1982). "The Living Species of Malagasy Primates". The Primates of Madagascar. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-04704-5. | <urn:uuid:d488a88b-6048-4050-ba0b-e4c94ee511e3> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://eol.org/data_objects/23345677 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393533.44/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00179-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.814357 | 10,387 | 3.40625 | 3 |
In 1900, Professor David Hilbert gave a talk entitled "The Future of Mathematics" before the Second International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris (See Bulliten of the American Mathematical Society, vol. 8, 1902). In his talk Hilbert listed 23 problems that showed the breadth and depth of mathematics and represented challenges for mathematicians in the 20th century. Only three remain unsolved 6, 8, and 16. A Norwegian newspaper is reporting that 21-year old Elin Oxenhielm has solved the second part of problem 16 having to do with boundary cycles for polynomial differential equations.
Hilbert is of historic importance to Computer Scientists. Hilbert believed, as did many mathematicians of his day that (a) you could build a complete system of mathematics, capable of describing every problem, (b) that a valid sequence of steps in that system could never give an inconsistent answer (i.e. 2+2=5) and (c) that in that system, mechanical proof would be sufficient to discover every theorem (decidability). (Note that by "mechanical," Hilbert wasn't talking of machines or computers, but the rote application of rules.) Hilbert did not believe in unsolvable problems.
If you remember your computability theory correctly, Kurt Godel showed that (a) and (b) were not true---no system can be complete and consistent (known as Godel's Incompleteness Theorem). Godel's work did not show, however that there was no way to distinguish the provable from the unprovable. In other words (c) might still be true inside a incomplete, but consistent set of rules like the mathematics we use everyday. Every Computer Scientist knows of the halting problem wherein Alan Turing showed that (c) was not true either.
Interestingly, Turing's approach to solving the problem was to envision a machine, the Turing machine, and then show there were problems such a machine could not solve. Another mathematician, Alonzo Church, working on the same decidability question, took another approach and the result was Lambda Calculus, the basis for much of the formal work in programming languages and the inspiration for LISP. Turing very nearly did not get the credit he deserved for proving undecidability because Church published his results first. This wasn't the first such scrape for Turning. His PhD dissertation had been to show the Central Limit Theorem of statistics, not realizing that it was already solved. Only after his committee was convinced that he had worked in complete ignorance of the other work was he awarded his degree.
If you're interested in these things and like biographies, I can recommend several books.
- Hilbert-Courant by Constance Reid is a dual biography of Hilbert and Courant---two great mathematicians of the early 20th century. The biography is quite readable and understandable by anyone with an interest in mathematics.
- Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges is a book every computer scientist ought to read. The book does an excellent job of covering Turing's important and tragic life.
Its fascinating to me to know how broad the interests of men like Hilbert and Turing were. In Hilbert's day there was no such thing as applied mathematics. All mathematics was applied and it was not unusual for mathematicians and physicists to be interchangeable. I often wonder what the future holds for Computer Science. What are the links between the science and the $2 trillion per year IT industry. Does CS matter anymore? I believe the answer is yes, but I think computer scientists do a poor job of creating relevance. We've become less and less applied to the real problems of the day and seem to take a certain pride in that. | <urn:uuid:964dc5b4-cbdf-41b9-b677-92598fe6bbb6> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.windley.com/archives/2003/11/hilbert_no_16_p.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396106.71/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00082-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976192 | 758 | 3.578125 | 4 |
Waste Management Practices
RCED-99-205: Published: Jul 1, 1999. Publicly Released: Jul 1, 1999.
- Full Report:
Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on animal waste management practices, focusing on: (1) waste management practices used in the United States; (2) practices used in other countries; (3) potential new practices based on technologies transferred from other industries; (4) federal financial and technical assistance available to producers for waste management and the processes for obtaining this assistance; and (5) the role of federal agencies in conducting or supporting research to develop new waste management practices, including innovative uses of current practices.
GAO noted that: (1) a wide variety of animal waste management practices are available to livestock and poultry producers; (2) these practices include techniques to: (a) limit waste runoff, such as cementing and curbing animal confinement areas or planting grassed buffers around these areas; (b) collect and store waste; (c) alter or treat waste, such as reformulating feed mixes or composting; and (d) use waste, such as an organic fertilizer, an additive to animal feed, or on-farm energy generation; (3) a farmer's selection of a particular practice or system of practices depends on site-specific factors, cost considerations, and state and local regulations; (4) animal waste management practices used in other major livestock and poultry production countries are similar to those used by U.S. farmers; (5) however, unlike the United States, some of these countries have government-subsidized companies manage animal waste and related structures, use waste for commercial energy generation, and impose requirements that limit the size of herds or flocks; (6) political and economic circumstances in these countries are factors in choosing these approaches to animal waste management; (7) regarding potential new practices based on technologies used in other industries, some federal officials believe that multistage treatment technologies used to manage municipal wastewater and sewage could be adapted for large animal production operations; (8) the Department of Agriculture (USDA) administers the major federal programs that provide financial and technical assistance to producers to manage their animal wastes; (9) most of this assistance is provided through the Department's Environmental Quality Incentives Program, which shares the cost of implementing waste management practices with farmers through direct payments; (10) several additional assistance programs are administered by the Environmental Protection Agency or the Fish and Wildlife Service; (11) USDA's Agricultural Research Service and Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service are the principal federal agencies conducting or supporting research to develop new or innovative animal waste management practices; and (12) for example, in recent years these agencies have conducted or sponsored research to reduce and stabilize the nutrients in animal wastes and to improve waste composting techniques. | <urn:uuid:76166b06-2ce8-464e-a7db-2d55bb952a3e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.gao.gov/products/RCED-99-205 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398873.39/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00106-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.912602 | 580 | 3.3125 | 3 |
In Australia, the life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples is around 17 years lower than that of non-Indigenous Australians. The infant mortality rate for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples is twice that of all Australians. And Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples are three times as likely to report some form of diabetes than non-Indigenous Australians.
The Federal Government has committed to improving the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples and closing this life expectancy 'gap' within a generation. Our research proves that the government's one-size-fits-all solutions and blanket policies cannot deliver these results.
"If we move out somewhere else we forget about bush medicine. It's important for us to know. Bush medicine help both way."
Joycie Jones Pitjara
Instead, an integrated human rights solutions - one that empowers people and engages people to take responsibility for the solutions - is required. The success of this approach is shown by the Urapuntja Health Service, a community-controlled Aboriginal health service provider on the Utopia homelands in remote Australia.
Over a period of three years, we worked with the Alyawarr and Anmatyerr Peoples in Utopia. Our publication, Two ways to health (PDF 1.2Mb) highlights our key findings and case studies exemplifying this "two way" approach to closing the gap on health in the Northern Territory.
The right to health under international law
All people have the right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health under Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The right to health does not necessarily translate as a right to be healthy, but states do have obligations to provide the conditions and services to ensure that people have the best chance to be healthy.
The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights defines how this right should be implemented:
- The state has a duty to make available adequate healthcare facilities, with trained professionals and essential medicines.
- Health facilities, goods, services and information on health must be physically and economically accessible to everyone, without discrimination.
- Health facilities, goods, services and information on health must also respect medical ethics, be culturally appropriate and sensitive to gender and life-cycle requirements.
- Delivery of health services requires, among other things, skilled medical personnel, scientifically-approved and unexpired drugs and hospital equipment, safe and potable water and adequate sanitation.
Indigenous Peoples right to health
Under international law, Indigenous Peoples have rights to specific measures to improve their access to health services and care. This includes:
- Services need to take traditional preventive care, healing practices and medicines into account. They need to recognise and protect the vital medicinal plants, animals and minerals necessary for the full enjoyment of health for Indigenous Peoples.
- In Indigenous communities, the health of the individual is often linked to the health of the society as a whole and has a collective dimension. Any displacement of Indigenous Peoples from their traditional lands against their will denies them sources of nutrition and breaks their connection with the land. This has a deleterious effect on their health.
- Resources should be provided for Indigenous Peoples to design, deliver and control health services.
Urapuntja Health Service demonstrates ‘two way’
The Urapuntja Health Service is an Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Service that was established at Utopia in the Alyawarr homelands in 1978. It services approximately 1,400 Alyawarr people living on their traditional homelands across more than 3,000 square kilometres in the central desert region of Australia. The clinic is overseen by a board of elders and community leaders who govern the clinic and appoint staff including the CEO, doctors, nurses, Aboriginal community health workers, administrators and drivers.
Protecting, respecting and fulfilling the human rights of Aboriginal Peoples is fundamental to the philosophy of the health service and informs how health services are delivered in the Utopia homelands. The Alyawarr Peoples describe it as ‘two way’.
Two way reflects a genuine partnership between Aboriginal people and health service providers. It combines Western, scientific and Aboriginal knowledge of health and healing, using both modern and traditional medicines. Services are delivered by doctors, nurses and Aboriginal community health workers in a way that reflects the reality of Aboriginal lives in remote Australia and respects Aboriginal culture and law.
Two way also refers to the control of health services beingm shared between Aboriginal governance structures and the health service providers. This model is the embodiment of a rightsbased approach to healthcare delivery.
To learn more, read through Two ways to health below, or download the report (PDF 1.2Mb). | <urn:uuid:874d9590-c572-4b28-8f2d-82d2d02c76cb> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.amnesty.org.au/indigenous-rights/comments/26350/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397428.37/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00170-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929288 | 952 | 3.1875 | 3 |
Curing addiction: Twelve Steps or fixing the brain?
Hans Pols – Associate Professor, History and Philosophy of Science at University of Sydney
MEDICAL HISTORIES – The fourth instalment in our short series provides a brief overview of Alcoholics Anonymous and considers the reasons for its success.
Alcoholics Anonymous provides a non-medical intervention for problem drinking. It’s based on a Twelve Steps program of spiritual and character development, and tends to polarise the medical field, largely because of its emphasis on spirituality.
AA is arguably one of the only treatments effective for alcoholics wishing to become sober. And few, if any, support groups or organisations can claim the widespread acceptance and awareness of Alcoholics Anonymous. But AA’s approach to curing addiction is not medical at all.
Why is it that an organisation founded on the idea of a spiritual awakening has been able to cement itself firmly in the history of addiction research and treatment? Has this been a help or a hindrance to understanding the condition?
In the nineteenth century, physicians considered all forms of addiction to be a sign of akrasia, or weakness of will. This developed into a view that addiction is a consequence of an individual’s psychological development interacting with their social environment.
Alcoholics Anonymous was founded by Bill Wilson and Dr Bob Smith in 1935. It was largely after 1956, when the American Medical Association recognised alcoholics as legitimate patients requiring medical care, that the idea that alcoholism was a disease took hold. But physicians were not able to come up with a medical cure that worked.
The now familiar concept that the cause of addiction is to be found in the brain appeared after this. Advancements in technology allowed researchers to pinpoint some of the pathways of addiction.
In 1979 Avram Goldstein argued that heroin and all narcotics work on our brain’s reward system. These drugs hijack the regular pathways of dopamine, wreaking havoc on the brain’s ability to regulate it and endorphins. This havoc, he argued, leads to addiction.
This “brain-based” model of addiction directed research until the 1980s and 1990s, when Dr Stanton Peele and Dr Bruce Alexander independently began to question the isolation of addiction research from cultural contexts.
Both Peele and Alexander wrote that addiction is more than just the effect of a drug on the brain. The context in which an individual engages in drug taking is equally important as the drug itself. Alexander went as far as to argue that the idea of drug-induced addiction was a myth.
In contrast, in 2004 the World Health Organization released the report Neuroscience of Psychoactive Substance Use and Dependence, summarising the advancements of the neurosciences in the early parts of the twenty-first century. The report concluded that substance dependence is a disorder of the brain like other brain disorders. It also suggested that addiction was largely determined by biological and genetic factors.
Throughout this, Alcoholics Anonymous and its fellowship organisation Narcotics Anonymous steadily gained momentum as the frontline treatment for alcohol and narcotic addiction. Alcoholics Anonymous is not well-known for promoting the disease model of addiction, though it usually steers clear of any discussion of its medical aspects. It wasn’t until 1973 that the organisation’s conference literature contained reference to alcoholism as a disease.
Research into the effectiveness of Alcoholics Anonymous is made difficult by the self selection of members, which leads to sampling bias. In all, these studies produced inconsistent results.
The organisation provides a free service with non hierarchical system of governance and a good track record of individual testimonies. It has made its way into many treatment plans and strategies for recovering addicts. But it is not without critique. As early as 1964, Arthur H Cain, a member of AA himself referred to the organisation as a “cult” and a “hindrance” to research and psychiatry, suggesting the model didn’t allow addicts to obtain other kinds of help should they need it.
The narrative of addiction that Alcoholics Anonymous and the Twelve-Step program provides addicts and clinicians is a pervasive one. It was a powerful contribution to the way that substance users created and developed their identities as “addicts”.
The personal stories that have emerged out of addiction literature reveal that the Alcoholics Anonymous model has been thoroughly ingrained into the wider story of addiction. This may affect individuals’ experience of the condition.
It’s possible that this has been to the detriment of clear research. By defining themselves as “addicts” and assimilating the model of addiction that Alcoholics Anonymous provided, substance users may have unwittingly affected the course of their condition. Yet as suggestive as neurological research may have been, it did not provide the miracle cure some hoped for. For better or worse, this means that we are stuck, for the time being, with the Twelve Steps program.
Reproduced with Permission The Conversation | <urn:uuid:168cd6ac-a5ac-4343-a8cb-2d80cf37a315> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://onenesspublishing.com/2012/11/curing-addiction-twelve-steps-or-fixing-the-brain/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783402479.21/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155002-00108-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956406 | 1,008 | 3.484375 | 3 |
October 4, 2010
Walnuts Can Help Improve Reaction to Stress
A diet rich in walnuts and walnut oil may prepare the body to deal better with stress, according to a team of Penn State researchers who looked at how these foods, which contain polyunsaturated fats, influence blood pressure at rest and under stress.
Previous studies have shown that omega-3 fatty acids -- like the alpha linolenic acid found in walnuts and flax seeds -- can reduce low density lipoproteins (LDL) -- bad cholesterol. These foods may also reduce c-reactive protein and other markers of inflammation."People who show an exaggerated biological response to stress are at higher risk of heart disease," said Sheila G. West, associate professor of biobehavioral health. "We wanted to find out if omega 3-fatty acids from plant sources would blunt cardiovascular responses to stress."
The researchers studied 22 healthy adults with elevated LDL cholesterol. All meals and snacks were provided during three diet periods of six weeks each.
The researchers found that including walnuts and walnut oil in the diet lowered both resting blood pressure and blood pressure responses to stress in the laboratory. Participants gave a speech or immersed their foot in cold water as a stressor. Adding flax seed oil to the walnut diet did not further lower blood pressure. They report their findings in the current issue of the Journal of the American College of Nutrition.
"This is the first study to show that walnuts and walnut oil reduce blood pressure during stress," said West. "This is important because we can't avoid all of the stressors in our daily lives. This study shows that a dietary change could help our bodies better respond to stress."
A subset of the participants also underwent a vascular ultrasound in order to measure artery dilation. Results showed that adding flax oil to the walnut diet significantly improved this test of vascular health. The flax plus walnuts diet also lowered c-reactive protein, indicating an anti-inflammatory effect. According to West, that could also reduce risk of cardiovascular disease.
The researchers used a randomized, crossover study design. Tests were conducted at the end of each six-week diet, and every participant consumed each of the three diets in random order, with a one-week break between. Diets included an "average" American diet "“ a diet without nuts that reflects what the typical person in the U.S. consumes each day. The second diet included 1.3 ounces of walnuts (roughly 9 walnuts) and a tablespoon of walnut oil substituted for some of the fat and protein in the average American diet. The third diet included walnuts, walnut oil and 1.5 tablespoons of flaxseed oil. The three diets were matched for calories and were specifically designed for each participant so that no weight loss or gain occurred. The walnuts, walnut oil, and flax oil were either mixed into the food in such offerings as muffins or salad dressing or eaten as a snack. About 18 walnut halves or 9 walnuts make up the average serving used by the researchers.
After each diet, the participants underwent two stress tests. In the first test, they received a topic; and they were given two minutes to prepare a three-minute speech, which they presented while being videotaped. The second stressor was a standard physical test of stress consisting of submerging one foot in ice-cold water. Throughout these tests, the researchers took blood pressure readings from the participants.
Results showed that average diastolic blood pressure -- the "bottom number" or the pressure in the arteries when the heart is resting -- was significantly reduced during the diets containing walnuts and walnut oil.
Walnuts are a rich source of fiber, antioxidants, and unsaturated fatty acids, particularly alpha linolenic acid, an omega-3 fatty acid, and these compounds could be responsible for the beneficial effects on blood pressure. Flax oil is a more concentrated source of omega-3 fatty acids than walnut oil, but this study did not test whether flax oil alone could blunt cardiovascular responses to stress.
"These results are in agreement with several recent studies showing that walnuts can reduce cholesterol and blood pressure," noted West. "This work suggests that blood pressure is also reduced when a person is exposed to stress in their daily life."
Also working on this research were Penny Kris-Etherton, Distinguished Professor of nutrition; Laura Cousino Klein, associate professor of biobehavioral health; Andrea Likos Krick, recent doctoral recipient, biobehavioral health; Guixiang Zhao, recent doctoral recipient, nutritional sciences; Rachel M. Ceballos, recent doctoral recipient, biobehavioral health; Todd F. Wojtowicz and Matthew McGuiness, former Penn State undergraduate students; Deborah M. Bagshaw and Paul Wagner, Penn State and Bruce J. Holub, university professor emeritus, University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
The California Walnut Commission, Sacramento California, the Heart and Stroke Foundation, Ontario, Canada and the National Institutes of Health supported this research.
On the Net: | <urn:uuid:6615a0c1-8cbc-4e6a-96c4-d33fbebe82fe> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1926278/walnuts_can_help_improve_reaction_to_stress/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396538.42/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00002-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957553 | 1,058 | 2.828125 | 3 |
The strongest evidence for the ability for environmental exposures to contribute to the development of diabetes comes from longitudinal studies. These are studies that take place over a period of time, where the exposure is measured before the disease develops.
A study of pesticide applicators in the U.S. found that diabetes incidence increased with the use (both cumulative lifetime days of use and ever use) of some organophosphate pesticides: dichlorvos, trichlorfon, alachlor, cyanazine, and the organochlorine pesticides aldrin, chlordane, and heptachlor. Those who had been diagnosed more than one year prior to the study were excluded, and the participants were followed over time, ensuring that exposures were reported prior to diagnosis. While these people were exposed occupationally, many of these pesticides are available to the general public. This study was based on data from the Agricultural Health Study, which includes over 33,000 participants from Iowa and North Carolina (Montgomery et al. 2008).
Another longitudinal study, also using data from the Agricultural Health Study, looked at exposure data from farmers' wives. It found that diabetes incidence was associated with exposure to five pesticides: three organophosphate pesticides: fonofos, phorate, and parathion; as well as the organochlorine pesticide dieldrin, and the herbicide 2,4,5-T (Starling et al. 2014).
A study of farmers in China found that various pesticides were associated with changes in glucose levels, as well as kidney, liver, and nerve damage (Huang et al. 2016).
Children exposed to modern-day pesticides in the womb (because their mothers worked in greenhouses) had a lower birth weight, and then an increased body fat accumulation from birth to school age than children who were not exposed to pesticides in the womb (the effects were increased if the mothers smoked as well) (Wohlfahrt-Veje et al. 2011). The same authors also found that the metabolic and cardiovascular effects associated with these pesticide exposures depended on genetic background (Andersen et al. 2012; Jørgensen et al. 2016).
Prenatal exposure to the antibacterial agent triclosan was not associated with weight or height in newborn boys, although slightly associated with smaller head circumference. Other phenols were associated with higher birth weight, and the fungicide methylparaben continued to be associated with weight at age 3 (Philippat et al. 2014). Prenatal triclosan was not associated with fat mass during childhood either (age 4-9) (Buckley et al. 2016).
Organophosphorous pesticide levels in the mother were associated with lower birth size in Black U.S. infants, but not in other ethnic groups (Harley et al. 2015).
In a study from France, fetal exposure to organophosphate pesticides was associated with insulin levels as early as birth (Debost-Legrand et al. 2016).
Cross-sectional studies are studies that measure exposure and disease at one point in time. These provide weaker evidence than longitudinal studies, since the disease may potentially affect the exposure, and not vice versa.
A survey of farmers from Saskatchewan, Canada, found that men who worked with insecticides had an increased risk of diabetes as compared to farmers who did not work with insecticides. On the other hand, overall, living on a farm was associated with a decreased risk of diabetes (as compared to other rural residences), probably due to the outdoor lifestyle (Dyck et al. 2013).
During the 1980s and 1990s in the northern U.S. Midwest, death rates from type 2 diabetes were higher in counties that had a higher level of spring wheat farming than in counties with lower levels of this crop. The herbicide 2,4-D is commonly used on this crop. A study compared people who have had a previous exposure to 2,4-D to those who had non-detectable levels of exposure, and found that exposure to 2,4-D was associated with adverse changes in glucose metabolism, a possible predisposing factor for diabetes. The effects were only seen in people with low levels of HDL, the "good" cholesterol (Schreinemachers 2010).
A study of the staff of an Australian insecticide application program found higher mortality rates for diabetes, as compared with the general Australian population, especially people reporting occupational use of herbicides (Beard et al. 2003).
Urinary levels of a dichlorophenol pesticide, 2,5-DCP, has been associated with obesity in U.S. children (Twum and Wei 2011), as well as in U.S. adults (Wei et al. 2014). In both of these studies, the risk of obesity increased as exposure increased, in a dose-dependent manner. These studies suggest that exposure to the fumigant insecticide paradichlorobenzene may increase the risk of obesity.
The dichlorophenol pesticides, 2,4-DCP and 2,5-DCP, were associated with body weight measures (BMI, waist circumference, and obesity) in U.S. adolescents. Triclosan was not associated with any of these measurements in this study (Buser et al. 2014), nor was triclosan associated with obesity in children from India (Xue et al. 2014).
Exposure to high levels of pesticides is common in developing countries, especially organophosphate pesticides. A study of these farmers showed that they had higher blood glucose levels (both fasting and after a glucose tolerance test), as well as neurological symptoms such as depression, as compared to a comparison group who were not exposed (Malekirad et al. 2013).
A study of Egyptian farmers (without diabetes) found that those with higher levels of malathion in their blood had higher insulin resistance, waist circumference, and body mass index (BMI). Not surprisingly, the farmers, who had been working with pesticides for 15-20 years, had higher levels of malathion in their blood than the comparison group who were not farmers (Raafat et al. 2012).
Pesticides may contribute to the growing rates of diabetes in sub-Saharan Africa. People in these countries may be more susceptible to the effects of pesticides due to a variety of factors, such as undernutrition, lack of access to health care, genetic predisposition, high exposure levels, and exposure during developmental periods, such as in the womb and during childhood (Azandjeme et al. 2013).
Comparing pesticide sprayers with unexposed controls in Bolivia, exposure to the pyrethroid pesticides was associated with pre-diabetes and higher blood glucose levels (HbA1c) in the sprayers (Hansen et al. 2014).
There are case studies documented in the scientific literature of people who developed high blood sugar and what was thought to be diabetic ketoacidosis immediately after consuming pesticides (e.g., in a suicide attempt). For example:
A larger study, of 184 people without diabetes who had been poisoned by organophosphate pesticides, found that 121 of them had high blood sugar levels when hospitalized. Those with the highest glucose levels had the highest risk of death. However, the fatality risk varied based on which type of pesticide it was (Moon et al. 2016). These cases present a challenge for endocrinologists (Shahid et al. 2014).
However, acute, large-dose organophosphate pesticide poisonings, while increasing blood glucose and ketone levels in the short run, seem to resolve relatively quickly, and do not seem to trigger diabetes in the first month or so (although longer-term follow-up studies are needed). Nor does prior diabetes increase the risk of mortality from these poisonings, at least in one study from Taiwan (Liu et al. 2014).
A number of organophosphate pesticides have been found to disrupt beta cell function, including malthion (Hectors et al. 2011). Animals exposed to malathion develop high blood sugar levels, and their carbohydrate metabolism is affected in ways that could promote insulin resistance (Rezg et al. 2007; Rezg et al. 2010). In fact, more recent studies shows that malathion does indeed produce insulin resistance in adult rats, in addition to high blood sugar levels (Lasram et al. 2014a), high insulin levels, and high HbA1c, whereas an anti-oxidant protects against these effects (Lasran et al. 2014d). Acute exposure to malathion causes transitory high blood glucose in rats accompanied by glucagon depletion, implying that the malathion caused the liver to release its sugar stores, raising blood sugar levels. Triglycerides and LDL (the "bad" cholesterol) were also increased (Lasram et al. 2009). Both acute and chronic exposures to malathion increased blood glucose and insulin secretion in rats. The higher insulin levels were not enough to overcome the high blood sugar levels (Panahi et al. 2006). In another study, exposure to malathion increased blood glucose and insulin levels in rats, as well as decreased glycogen levels in the liver. Malathion also increased insulin resistance in these rats, which continued one month after exposure ended (Lasram et al. 2014b).
Exposure to low doses of chlorpyrifos for 2-4 weeks resulted in high blood glucose levels in rats (Lukaszewicz-Hussain, 2013). Short-term acute exposure-- a single dose-- raised blood glucose, LDL and triglyceride levels in rats as well (Acker and Noqueria 2012). Long-term exposure of rats to monocrotophos led to glucose intolerance, insulin resistance, and high blood sugar (Nagaraju et al. 2014). Chronic exposure to chlorpyrifos also increased body weight in mice (Peris-Sampedro et al. 2015a); the same authors found that certain genes seem to increase susceptibility to the effects of chloripyrifos (including increasing insulin resistance, blood sugar levels, food ingestion, and cholesterol levels) (Peris-Sampedro et al. 2015b).
Animals exposed to diazinon, another organophosphate pesticide, were found to have impaired glucose tolerance and lower insulin levels (Pakzad et al. 2013). Diazinon has also been found to cause the liver to release glucose into the blood in rats, supporting the idea that diazinon exposure may predispose people to diabetes (Teimouri et al. 2006). In fish, glucose levels rise after exposure to diazinon (Ghasemzadeh et al. 2015). A review summarizes the many potential molecular mechanisms involved in how organophosphorous pesticides can contribute to insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes (Lasram et al. 2014c).
Dichlorvos, another organophosporous pesticide, causes changes in energy metabolism genes in zebrafish (an animal used to test for toxic effects) (Bui-Nguyen et al. 2015).
Long term, low dose exposure to the herbicide atrazine resulted in increased body weight and increased insulin resistance in rats. Those rats that were exposed and also ate a high-fat diet showed exacerbated weight gain and insulin resistance (Lim et al. 2009). Fish exposed to atrazine developed high blood glucose levels-- the higher the dose, the higher the glucose. Seven days after the exposure was removed, blood glucose levels went back to normal. (Other studies have found this same pattern in fish exposed to other pesticides as well) (Blahova et al. 2014).
A fungicide, tolylfluanid, used in paint and on fruit crops, commonly detected in Europe, has been shown to promote the formation of fat cells as well as induce insulin resistance in fat cells. These findings raise a concern that this chemical, an endocrine disruptor, could disrupt metabolism and contribute to the development of diabetes (Sargis et al. 2012). Further investigation shows that tolylfluanid alters fat cell function by activating the glucocorticoid receptor, which plays an important role in controlling metabolism. This mechanism may be a new way that chemicals could promote metabolic diseases such as diabetes and obesity (Neel et al. 2013). Mice exposed to tolylfluanid had more weight gain, higher total fat mass, glucose intolerance, and increased insulin resistance (Reginer et al. 2014).
When researchers exposed fat cells to imidacloprid, a neonicotinoid insecticide (now restricted in Europe due to bee colony collapse disorder), they found that there was increased fat accumulation in these cells (Park et al. 2013). When they exposed fat, liver, and muscle cells to this insecticide, they found that there was increased insulin resistance. Essentially, the exposed cells did not take up as much glucose as unexposed cells did (Kim et al. 2013).
When rats were exposed to omethoate, a commonly used insecticide in most developing countries, the effects suggested that omethoate has the potential to cause insulin resistance (Zhang et al. 2014).
Permethrin, an insecticide used as an insect repellent, impairs glucose homeostasis and alters fat cell development in laboratory studies (Kim et al. 2014).
One pesticide, TFM, is used to kill sea lampreys (an invasive species) in the Great Lakes. One of the ways is works is by affecting glycogen levels in the lampreys, disturbing energy metabolism (curiously, adults are more susceptible to these effects) (Henry et al. 2015).
Early life exposure to organophosphate pesticides causes metabolic dysfunction resembling pre-diabetes in animals, especially when adults eat a high-fat diet (Slotkin 2011). Male rats exposed to the organophosphate pesticide chlorpyrifos just after birth, showed high insulin levels when not fasting as adults that resembles the metabolic pattern seen in type 2 diabetes in humans (Slotkin et al. 2005).
Male rats exposed to low doses of parathion just after birth showed high blood glucose levels and increased weight gain later in life (Lassiter et al. 2008). These authors point out that animals exposed to organophosphates as adults show increased weight gain and other diabetes-like changes. Exposures in early development may be even more significant. A further study by the same authors found that unlike chlorpyrifos and malathion, the effects of early life parathion exposure in rats lessened by adolescence, although other changes occur later that affect glucose utilization. The effects of parathion were not worsened by a high fat diet, but the effects of this diet and parathion were similar to each other (Adigun et al. 2010).
When pregnant mice were exposed to very low levels (400-times below the EPA's "no observed adverse effect level") of triflumizole, a fungicide used on food and ornamental crops, their offspring had excess fatty tissue, as compared to unexposed controls. Triflumizole also caused stem cells and pre-fat cells to develop into fat cells (Li et al. 2012).
A study found that women who mixed or applied pesticides to crops or repaired pesticide application equipment during the first trimester of pregnancy had a higher risk of developing gestational diabetes. In the women who reported agricultural exposure during pregnancy, the risk of gestational diabetes was associated with the use of four herbicides (2,4,5-T; 2,4,5-TP; atrazine; butylate) and three insecticides (diazinon; phorate carbofuran) (Saldana et al. 2007).
A Canadian study found that first-trimester levels of pesticides generally were not associated with gestational diabetes or impaired glucose tolerance during pregnancy. However women with higher levels of the organophosphate pesticides dimethylphosphate (DMP) and dimethylthiophosphate (DMTP) had a lower risk of gestational diabetes. The authors propose that this could be because of increased fruit/vegetable consumption (which is also associated with higher pesticide levels) (Shapiro et al. 2016).
Only one study has looked at pesticide levels in people with type 1 diabetes. It found that Egyptian children with newly diagnosed type 1 diabetes had higher levels of malathion in their blood than healthy controls (as well as numerous organochlorine pesticides, discussed on the persistent organic pollutants page). However, these children also had lower levels of the organophosphate pesticides chlorpyrifos and profenofos than the control children (El-Morsi et al. 2012).
Pesticides are a food contaminant, as a result of their use in agriculture. Daily ingestion of low doses of diquat, an extensively used herbicide, induces intestinal inflammation in rats. The authors of this study suggest that repeated ingestion of small amounts of pesticides, as could be found in food, may have consequences for human health and may be involved in the development of gastrointestinal disorders (Anton et al. 2000). Another pesticide, carbendazim, reduces the richness and diversity of gut microbiota in mice (Jin et al. 2015). Chlorpyrifos exposure during development affects the gut microbiota, impairs the intestinal lining, and stimulates the immune system of pup rats (Joly Condette et al. 2015). Another study also shows that chlorpyrifos affects gut microbiota, resulting in intestinal inflammation and abnormal intestinal permeability (Zhao et al. 2016). Intestinal disorders like these are common in people with type 1 diabetes (see the diet and the gut page for more studies on this topic).
Organophosphate pesticides have been found to be toxic to the immune system in animals and sometimes humans (Galloway and Handy 2003). Humans chronically exposed to chlorpyrifos have also been found to have increased levels of autoantibodies (Thrasher et al. 2002). In animal studies, chlorpyrifos affects the immune system-- both stimulating and suppressing it (Noworyta-Głowacka et al. 2014). Another pesticide carbaryl, causes inflammation and is toxic to the immune system, causing an unbalanced immune response that promotes autoimmunity in animals (Jorsaraei et al. 2014). Other pesticides are also known to affect the immune system, especially during development (e.g., Jiang et al. 2014).
A review on pesticides and immunotoxicity finds that there is some human and animal evidence indicates that some pesticides can affect the immune system. This evidence, however, is too sparse to be conclusive (Corsini et al. 2013). More research is ongoing (e.g., Lee et al. 2015).
Cross-sectional data from a large U.S. study (NHANES) found that of all toxins measured, the association between autoimmune antibodies (not type 1 specific) and triclosan was statistically significant (Dinse et al. 2015).
Some authors argue that glyphosate, the pesticide used on wheat, is to blame for the autoimmune disease celiac disease (Samsel and Seneff 2013).
One chemical known to cause type 1 diabetes in humans is the now-banned rat poison Vacor. In the late 1970s, a few people tried to kill themselves by eating Vacor, and ended up with type 1 diabetes instead. Vacor destroys beta cells directly, but has also been found to be linked to type 1-related autoimmunity (Karam et al 1980).
Does pesticide exposure affect blood glucose control or the risk of complications in people with diabetes? We do not know yet.
One diabetes complication, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), is associated with environmental chemical exposure. A search of the toxicological literature found that pesticides were among the most frequently identified chemicals associated with fatty liver in rodent studies. Of the 123 chemicals associated with fatty liver, 44% were pesticides-- especially fungicides and herbicides (Al-Eryani et al. 2014). Chlorpyrifos, for example, promotes fat accumulation in the liver (Howell III et al. 2016).
Some researchers have looked to see whether the pesticide diazinon affects rats with diabetes differently than rats without diabetes. An animal model of type 1 diabetes shows that diabetes increases the toxicity of diazinon (Ueyama et al. 2007). An animal model of type 2 diabetes shows that diazinon worsens glucose tolerance in these rats, leading to higher blood glucose levels (Ueyama et al. 2008).
The organophosphorous pesticide monocrotophos has been shown to exacerbate the complications in rats with chemically-induced type 1 diabetes, including raising glucose levels (Begum and Rajini, 2011), and causing intestinal dysfunction (Vismaya and Rajini, 2014).
To download or see a list of all the references cited on this page, as well as additional article on pesticides related to diabetes, see the collection Pesticides and diabetes/obesity in PubMed.
One additional reference not on PubMed is:El-Morsi DA, Rahman RHA, Abou-Arab AAK. Pesticides Residues in Egyptian Diabetic Children: A Preliminary Study. J Clinic Toxicol. 2012;2:138. Full text | <urn:uuid:5c75633a-d9c6-4a90-8bf6-3023c5586d12> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.diabetesandenvironment.org/home/contam/pesticides | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395620.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00050-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9421 | 4,425 | 3.21875 | 3 |
Honeycutt: Proposed ozone standards are based on contradictions
Updated 2:43 pm, Saturday, February 22, 2014
Last month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released two draft ozone documents signaling their plans to lower the ozone standard. The agency's reasoning is that, even though ozone levels are consistently lower than we've ever measured them, health effects such as asthma are still occurring. In fact, asthma diagnosis is on the rise, and sadly, the reason is not clear. However, EPA's claim that ozone is causing new cases of asthma (despite disagreement from several of their science advisers) doesn't make scientific or common sense, because ozone levels have generally decreased nationwide. Lower ozone levels are not causing asthma cases to increase.
In proposing the new standard, the Environmental Protection Agency has primarily targeted two endpoints. The first is small, temporary decreases in lung function (FEV1). How small? EPA used a study suggesting that inhaling 60 parts per billion ozone while exercising for nearly seven hours can cause a 2.8 percent decrease in FEV1. Ask your doctor if this is something to be concerned about. Mine says it is not, and that this change cannot be accurately detected by lung function tests. In fact, this decrease is not considered adverse by the American Thoracic Society and is within normal daily variation. EPA itself said, "Some experts would judge single occurrences of moderate responses to be a nuisance."
The second endpoint considered by the federal agency is premature mortality. This is based on studies that reported associations between ozone concentrations and rates of mortality in large groups of people. These studies found very small effects and contradictory results. Important factors such as how much ozone people actually breathed, blood pressure, smoking, diet, use of medications, other pollutants, etc., were not fully considered. The main problem with these studies is that measurement of ozone at an outdoor monitor is much higher than an individual's exposure to ozone. Numerous studies have demonstrated that Americans spend the majority of their time indoors, where ozone concentrations are extremely low. This is especially true during hot, sunny summer afternoons when ozone is highest. Nevertheless, the EPA analysis assumes all people are outdoors eight hours a day, every day.
How Houston stacks up
Texas cities' compliance with the federal ozone standard, which is currently 75 part per billion:
Dallas-Fort Worth: 87
San Antonio: 81
Beaumont- Port Arthur: 75
El Paso: 72
Corpus Christi: 70
Source: Texas Commission on Environmental Quality
Lowering the standard sounds simple, but it poses a tremendous challenge to Texas cities. Most of the ozone-forming chemicals come from vehicle exhaust, which Texas has little to no control over. Both EPA and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality have imposed stringent reductions on sources such as power plants and refineries for many years. Overly stringent regulations could hurt electric reliability and cause consumer price increases. For what benefit? EPA itself says that it only expects to see "small decreases or virtually no change" in some health effects considered in its analysis. In the released documents, EPA calculates lowering the standard would actually increase ozone-related mortality in cities such as Houston.
Some say that 17,000 studies were used in setting the ozone standard. In reality, most are only mentioned in passing and few are actually used to set the standard. In addition, what doesn't come across in the EPA documents is that the studies are not consistent. For this reason, it is necessary to use a "weight of evidence" approach that incorporates all of the available information quantitatively, not just a few cherry-picked positive studies. The Environmental Protection Agency does not use a true weight-of-evidence approach. With EPA's cherry-picking approach, the hypothetical health benefits will always outweigh the costs of regulations.
You'll also hear special interest groups say that arguing with the Environmental Protection Agency amounts to "attacking the science." Let's be clear. The agency's failure to present an accurate picture of the science does not serve the public's interest and does not lead to improved public health. Instead, its narrow focus diverts attention from much more significant, immediate environmental problems. For example, the small risk posed by ozone falls well below potential risks posed by poor water quality and water shortages caused by drought.
EPA will likely move forward with a one-size-fits-all ozone standard, not considering whether the standard is even achievable by Houston. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality believes public health is improved through science-based regulations that direct efforts toward true sources of health risk. We take this job seriously and execute it to the best of our ability, using sound science and the law as our guide.
Honeycutt is director of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality's toxicology division. | <urn:uuid:f360386c-0117-48b3-8014-7acd1ee5a266> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Honeycutt-Proposed-ozone-standards-are-based-on-5258662.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.92/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00087-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954369 | 973 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Learn something new every day
More Info... by email
Though there may not be any official definition for either one of these fields, there are some generally accepted differences between media and public relations. The jobs are so similar that many firms may hire one individual to fill both roles, depending on the size of the company. These professionals help the company by not only dealing with the news media, but also projecting a consistent image of the company to the public in a way that is consistent with the desires of the company.
The main difference between media and public relations is that the term media relations is more limited. While public relations may include dealing with the media to some degree, media relations is a specialty. Therefore, those in strictly media relations positions will spend their time fielding calls from the media, identifying and "spinning" relevant news items, as well as writing press releases in an effort to keep the media informed about what is happening at the company. Depending on the desire of the company for free publicity, this could be a very busy position.
In fact, the demands of the media can be such a specialized field that some companies focus exclusively on this type of work. These media relations companies work with clients to get their names out and generate positive publicity. If a crisis or negative event does hit the company, these companies can also help by providing the media with a place to go where they know they can find the correct information. Thus, it helps the client by providing a centralized source that is not contradictory.
A public relations professional will do more than just deal with the media. In fact, a public relations person may not deal with media at all if the company decides to split its media and public relations segments into separate entities. In such as case, a public relations person may be responsible for outreach and serve as a liaison at special events, help plan those events, and even write a company newsletter so that employees can stay informed about what is happening.
No matter how the line is drawn between media and public relations, these jobs require a great deal of skill in mass communication. Professionals in these positions often must anticipate what information will be in demand, and know how to access it quickly. Further, they must do so in a way that does not make the company look bad. Most individuals in these fields hold at least a Bachelor's degree in communications or journalism. Some likely have experience working in the journalism field, either in print or broadcast media.
Comfyshoes-Sometimes a celebrity may want certain information to be leaked out to the public and will do this through a publicist who directs the celebrity’s image.
For example, Angelina Jolie might want the public to know about all of her international adoptions and charity work around the world in order to gain favor with the American Public.
As a matter of fact, these stories began developing as Jolie suffered a bit of bad publicity because of her responsibility in breaking up the marriage of Jennifer Anniston and Brad Pitt.
Usually in PR media, a publicist makes statements on behalf of the celebrities.
Subway11-Public relations and the media are related because the media tends to display what they feel is newsworthy and public relations seek to make information about a company, person, or brand newsworthy in a positive way.
Public relations also involve crisis management. This is where public relations and media relations really become involved.
For example, in the Tiger Woods scandal, the crisis that Tiger Woods faced became a daily news item as the media felt it was a newsworthy story. It was not until a public relations firm set in that the negative publicity eased up a bit.
The publicist encouraged Tiger Woods to have a press conference and apologize for his indiscretions. It was not until
this moment that Tiger Woods’ public persona began to heal.
Public relations firms offer an important service to their clients because they seek to change the public’s perception of their client in a positive way which leads to additional revenue for their client.
Public and media relations involve the public perception of a brand, a company, or a celebrity.
Public relations and the media are related in that they both provide information to the general public.
PR media relates to the information that a company, a brand, or a celebrity might want to release in order to develop its public image or repair some damage that was done due to negative publicity.
Many jobs in public relations are filled with former journalists. As a matter of fact about 70% of people working in new media and public relations were former journalists.
One of our editors will review your suggestion and make changes if warranted. Note that depending on the number of suggestions we receive, this can take anywhere from a few hours to a few days. Thank you for helping to improve wiseGEEK! | <urn:uuid:342c55fa-99ab-4f74-bf1c-f725a8d6a183> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-difference-between-media-and-public-relations.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783392099.27/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154952-00036-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962429 | 978 | 2.578125 | 3 |
For a workshop at the ECAL University of Art and Design in Switzerland, students were asked to come up with new unorthodox ways to capture video using a GoPro camera. The results are pretty awesome.
Lead by the Dutch designer [Roel Wouters], students in the Media & Interaction Design program worked together with Industrial Design students to create these fascinating camera rigs. From “the eye”, a water based stabilizing ball, to a silly bobble hat can be spun around the user, the results are super fun and unique to watch. The workshop was one week long and produced five different camera rigs as featured in the following video.
Continue reading “Unorthodox GoPro Camera Rigs Produce Unreal Videos”
[Luke Wren] just wrote in to tell us about his new science blog called Wren’s Tech — it’s only a few days old, but he’s already got some pretty cool science experiments written up! Like how to estimate the muzzle velocity of a BB gun using just a voice recorder, and a curtain!
There are many different ways you could do this. One of the easiest is using a high-speed camera with a known grid or pattern as the background — like how Mythbusters does it. Unfortunately, high-speed cameras are usually out of reach for most hobbyists. [Luke] explains a rather cool system you can build with some electronics, whereby you have two thin wires a known distance apart — run current through both and use a circuit that can detect the interrupt as your projectile breaks the wires — or, you can use a voice recorder. Continue reading “Estimating BB Gun Muzzle Velocity with a Voice Recorder and a Curtain”
Remember the Sega Saturn? You know, that short-lived game system of the mid 90’s. Well, [c_mon] is still a fan and decided to make a portable version with a built in screen.
As you can see from the photos, the main case is made from wood, plywood to be exact. Several pieces of the plywood were cut out using a CNC Router and laminated together to achieve the full height needed to enclose the internal electronics. The finished case takes up a little less real estate than the original, however it is slightly taller.
You may recognize the screen as an old PSOne unit. The screen was taken part and housed in it’s own wooden enclosure which is hinged to the main case. The video is supplied to the screen by a composite output from the Saturn. There is no unique CD lid either, the screen functions as one when it is folded down. For sound there are a couple built in powered speakers that tap into the stock audio output.
To ad a little pizzazz, [c_mon] routed in a groove in the top to accept some EL wire. There are also some cool engravings in the wooden case, including the Saturn Automobile Manufacturer logo on the top of the screen lid…. whoops!
I got a great seat on the main floor for the first big DEFCON 22 talk which is a welcome to the con and discussion of the badge hardware. [LosT], the creator of this year’s badge, started the discussion with a teaser about the badge… there’s a phone number hidden as part of the challenge. [LosT] took a call from someone chasing the puzzles. The guy was in the audience which was pretty fun.
The process of building a puzzle that can be solved at DEFCON is really tough. How do you make it just hard enough that it won’t get pwned right away but easy enough that a large number of attendees will be able to figure it out during the weekend? The answer is to build a secure system and introduce strategic flaws which will be the attack vectors for the attendees solving the badge challenge.
Of course the badge can be used as a development platform. The populated electronics on the board all have these nice little footprints which can be cut to disconnect them from the chip. The breakout headers on either side of the board allow you to connect headers for your own uses. Great idea!
The back of the lanyards have special characters on them too. This encourages community at the conference. To solve the puzzle you need to find others with different lanyards. Compare the glyphs and crack the code (so far I have no clue!!).
Know what I’m doing wrong? Have suggestions on where to go from here? I’ll be checking the comments!
In honor of DEFCON, this week we’re looking at some cryptography and reverse engineering projects over at Hackaday.io Every hacker loves a hardware puzzle, and [Tom] has created a tool to make those puzzles. His Hardware Reverse Engineering Learning Platform consists of a shield with two ATmega328 chips and an I2C EEPROM. The two Atmel chips share a data bus and I2C lines. Right in the middle of all this is an ST Morpho connector, which allows an ST Nucleo board to act as a sniffer. The platform allows anyone to create a reverse engineering challenge! To successfully reverse engineer a board, it sure helps to have good tools. [coflynn] is giving that to us in spaces with The ChipWhisperer. ChipWhisperer is an open source security research platform. The heart of the system is a Xilinx Spartan 6 FPGA. The FPGA allows very high speed operations for things like VCC and clock glitching. ChipWhisperer is an entire ecosystem of boards – from LNA blocks to field probes. The entire system is controlled from an easy to use GUI. The end result is a powerful tool for hardware attacks. On the Encryption side of the house, we start by keeping the Feds at bay. The [Sector67] hackerspace has collectively created NSA AWAY. NSA AWAY is a simple method of sending secure messages over an insecure medium – such as email. A one-time use pad is stored on two SD cards, which are used by two Android devices. The message sender uses an Android device to encrypt the message. On the receive side, the message can be decoded simply by pointing an android device’s camera at the encrypted data. So easy, even a grandparent could do it! Next up is [Josh’s] Bury it under the noise floor. “Bury it” is an education for cryptography in general, and steganographic software in particular. [Josh] explains how to use AES-256 encryption, password hashing, and other common techniques. He then introduces steganography by showing how to hide an encrypted message inside an image. Anyone who participated in Hackaday’s ARG build up to The Hackaday Prize will recognize this technique. [yago] gives us encrypted voice communications with his ZRTP Hardphone. The hardphone implements the ZRTP, a protocol for encrypted voice over IP communications. The protocol is implemented by a Raspberry Pi using a couple of USB sound cards. User interface is a 16×2 Line character LCD, a membrane keypad, and of course a phone handset. Don’t forget that you need to build two units,or whoever you’re trying to call will be rather confused!
Finally we have the Mooltipass. Developed right here on Hackaday by [Mathieu Stephan] and the community at large, Mooltipass is a secure password storage system. All your passwords can be stored fully AES-256 encrypted, with a Smart Card key. Under the hood, Mooltipass uses an Arduino compatible ATmega32U4 microcontroller. UI is through a OLED screen and touch controls. That’s it for this week! Be sure to check out next week’s Hacklet, when we bring you more of the best from Hackaday.io!
It’s Friday morning and time for another round of Astronaut Or Astronot, the little lottery thing where we’re giving away lots of dev boards, programmers, and an awesome meter to someone on hackaday.io if they have voted in the latest round of voting.
There’s no video this week because, you know, DEFCON, but the person randomly chosen did not vote. Too bad.
This means the voting will continue next week, same time. If you want a chance to get your grubby mitts on a bunch of awesome gear, vote. Do it now.
Who of us out there don’t have a spare iPad and Mac Classic kicking around? If you are one of those lucky folks then this project is for you. [site hirac] has made a pretty neat stand for an iPad made out of a Mac Classic case (translated). It just happens that the screens of the Mac Classic and iPad are pretty darn close in size. Although the screen size is similar, the resolution is not. The original Macintosh Classic had a black and white screen with a resolution of 512 × 342 pixels. The iPad’s resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels has 450% more pixels than the original Mac.
To get the iPad to fit correctly, the case had to be significantly modified. First, all of the internals of the Mac were removed, leaving just an empty case. The front panel of the case was removed and a slot on the left side is made. This slot helps to allow the iPad to slide into the Mac. On the inside of the front panel quite a few of injection molded supports were trimmed away for clearance. A slot was also cut in the left side of the rear case half. When the case is re-assembled, the slots in the front and rear halves provide a large enough hole for the iPad to fit through. Oddly, there are some plastic features on the front panel that are at just the right height to hold the iPad in the ideal location to line up with the screen cutout in the case.
Continue reading “iPad Finds New Home in Mac Classic” | <urn:uuid:aa0c9ffd-8811-42ee-8b99-a6a7897941e8> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://hackaday.com/2014/08/08/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399106.96/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00125-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942375 | 2,086 | 2.828125 | 3 |
|Name: _________________________||Period: ___________________|
This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.
Multiple Choice Questions
1. What sentence must the defendant face if proven guilty?
(a) The death penalty.
(b) Life imprisonment with the possibility of parole.
(c) Life imprisonment without possibility of parole.
(d) At least thirty years imprisonment.
2. After eleven jurors vote "guilty" and one juror votes "not guilty", what process do the jurors decide on in order to resolve the matter?
(a) They decide to separate into two groups and discuss different aspects of the evidence.
(b) They decide to re-examine the evidence.
(c) They decide to take in a verdict of "undecided".
(d) They decide that the eleven men should each take a turn to explain to the dissenting juror why he is wrong.
3. In the beginning of the deliberations, how do most of the jurors demonstrate a lack of seriousness about their role as jurors?
(a) They do not pay attention to the details.
(b) They are casual in their discussions.
(c) They read the newspaper.
(d) They are concerned about how the trial has kept them from attending to their own interests.
4. What does the verdict from the second vote among jurors prove?
(a) That the evidence is clearer after the discussion.
(b) That the arguments presented by the dissenting juror had some effect.
(c) That the foreman does a good job of managing the ballot.
(d) That the dissenting juror is right in his "not guilty" verdict.
5. How does the dissenting juror explain the defendant's record of violence?
(a) He says the defendant has been conditioned this way by living in the ghetto.
(b) He says the defendant has been wayward because of bad company.
(c) He says the defendant has an abusive father who has beaten him since he was a young boy.
(d) He says the defendant was left by his mother as a child.
6. Which juror asks the guard to bring in the murder weapon for closer examination?
(a) Juror Eight.
(b) Juror Nine.
(c) The foreman.
(d) Juror Three.
7. What important information casts doubts on the eyewitness' story in the first discussion of the evidence?
(a) The eyewitness is old with impaired vision.
(b) The eyewitness has to walk a long way to the door after hearing the body fall.
(c) The eyewitness wears glasses.
(d) The eyewitness claims to have seen the murder through the windows of a passing elevated train.
8. What is the defendant's alibi?
(a) He claims to have been hanging out with his friends.
(b) He claims to have been at the movies.
(c) He claims to have been at the store.
(d) He claims to have been at the ball game.
9. What comment by Juror Ten reveals his prejudice?
(a) He dislikes all people who are not of his racial background.
(b) He dislikes all foreigners.
(c) He dislikes all Caucasians.
(d) He has lived among people "like the defendant" and they cannot be trusted.
10. What is the setting in which the reader first meets the twelve characters who give the play its name?
(a) The murder scene.
(b) The jury room in a New York court.
(c) The bus in which the jurors are being transported to court.
(d) The court room.
11. Which juror rebukes Juror Ten for his racist comment?
(a) Juror Nine.
(b) Juror Seven.
(c) Juror Eight.
(d) The foreman.
12. According to the defendant, why did he buy the alleged murder weapon?
(a) To give it as a present to his friend.
(b) Because the one he had before was stolen.
(c) Because he lost the one he had before.
(d) Because his father beat him.
13. What important fact does Juror Three point out about something the defendant purchased on the day of the murder?
(a) The defendant purchased a knife identical to the murder weapon.
(b) The defendant purchased a butcher knife similar to the murder weapon.
(c) The defendant purchased a dangerous knife.
(d) The defendant purchased a pen knife that could have inflicted a fatal wound.
14. Why does the dissenting juror challenge the fact that other jurors are willing to take the alleged eyewitness' word when they would not accept the defendant's word?
(a) Because the eyewitness belongs to the same ethnic group.
(b) Because the eyewitness belongs to the same family as the victim.
(c) Because they assert that the eyewitness was unreliable.
(d) Because they assert that all people from the defendant's community are liars and the eyewitness is from the area.
15. According to one witness, where in the apartment building did the murder occur?
(b) On the landing.
(d) On the staircase.
Short Answer Questions
1. Why is it clear from the dissenting juror's action that anyone could have had a weapon similar to the murder weapon?
2. At what time of year does the jury in Twelve Angry Men meet to hear testimony and determine a verdict?
3. How does the prosecution help to establish for the jury that the eyewitness was in a position to see the murder?
4. Where does the old man who testifies for the prosecution live?
5. In what process does the defendant ask questions of the prosecution's witnesses?
This section contains 911 words
(approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) | <urn:uuid:ea669a9e-a578-40f5-8529-61fdbb6172dc> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.bookrags.com/lessonplan/twelve-angry-men/test1.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397873.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00081-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955366 | 1,260 | 2.921875 | 3 |
- Alzheimer’s is a form of dementia that describes memory and cognitive loss over a period of time.
- Memory problems are usually the first symptoms of Alzheimer’s. Remembering things that have been recently learned is especially difficult.
- Caregiver burnout is common in people who care for someone with Alzheimer’s. It can occur when supporting the person with Alzheimer’s overshadows your own needs.
Alzheimer’s disease is a form of dementia. It is the most common form of dementia. Dementia is a term used to describe memory loss and loss of other intellectual capabilities, like reasoning and thinking, that are severe enough to cause problems in daily life. Alzheimer’s disease is named after Dr. Alois Alzheimer, who discovered the disease in 1906.
Alzheimer’s largest risk factor is aging. However, it is not a normal part of aging. While the majority of people who have Alzheimer’s are over the age of 65, it can happen in someone younger. Early-onset Alzheimer’s is when the disease becomes noticeable in someone in their 40s or 50s. About 5 percent of people with this disease are in this age group.
This is a disease that progressively gets worse over time. In late stages, someone with Alzheimer’s may not be able to communicate or reason with those around them. They will also eventually need full-time care for everyday life. According to the Alzheimer’s Association, it is the 6th leading cause of death in the United States. The average life span of someone with the disease is eight years after diagnosis, but they can live up to 20 years depending on other health conditions. There is no cure at this time. However, there are treatments that can slow the progression and improve the quality of life for those with the disease.
Memory problems are usually the first symptoms of Alzheimer’s. Remembering things that have been recently learned is especially difficult. Some other symptoms are:
- confusion about places or times (may be mild at first)
- unable to find words with speaking
- misplacing objects you use regularly
- changes to personality
- new irritability
- making bad decisions
- difficulty organizing thoughts
- repeating things over and over
- forgetting things and not remembering them later
- difficulty with numerical calculations
- difficulty responding to everyday problems
- mood swings
- paranoia and distrust of others (including immediate family or close friends)
This disease does not affect everyone in the same way, so individuals may experience symptoms at different times. If you or a loved one has any of these symptoms and they are causing problems with everyday life, you should talk to your doctor.
The exact cause of Alzheimer’s is not clear, but there are a number of genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors that can contribute. However, what is known is that Alzheimer’s damages the brain and its brain cells. This leads to the brain shrinking. The brain of someone with Alzheimer’s usually has two types of abnormalities: plaques and tangles.
Plaques are clumps of protein that get in the way of communication between brain cells. This causes damage and possibly even the death of these brain cells. These protein clumps are called amyloid plaques.
The system that carries nutrients through the brain is a protein called Tau. In the brain of someone with Alzheimer’s, threads of this protein (better known as neurofibrillary tangles) collect in the brain cells. These tangles prevent nutrients from being carried through the brain.
The apolipoprotein E gene (APOE) has a part in late-onset Alzheimer’s. However, having this gene does not determine that you will definitely get Alzheimer’s. Most early-onset cases are caused by changes in certain genes. These changes are inherited. However, many cases of both forms of Alzheimer’s occur with no known causes.
Most people with Down Syndrome will eventually develop Alzheimer’s. It is believed to be because of their extra copy of chromosome 21.
There are a number of things that are considered risk factors for Alzheimer’s. The most common of these is aging, as it tends to occur in people over the age of 60. Some other common risk factors are:
- family history (genetics)
- individuals with Down syndrome
- being female (this could be due to the fact that they usually live longer than men)
- mild cognitive impairment, which causes an increased risk but not a certainty of developing the disease
- severe head trauma
There are also a number of heart health issues that scientists believe may be risk factors in the development of Alzheimer’s. Some of these include:
- heart disease
- high blood cholesterol
- high blood pressure
- poor diet
The research continues into how reducing these risk factors may reduce the risk of developing the disease.
There is not currently a way to definitely diagnose Alzheimer’s. However, through tests and information provided to the doctor, they can make a judgement as to whether or not Alzheimer’s is causing symptoms. Some questions and tests the doctor may use in diagnosis are:
- question the patient and family members about changes in behavior, difficulty with daily tasks, medical history, and changes in personality
- test for memory, counting, problem solving, and/or language
- blood and urine tests to rule other conditions out
- brain scans to rule out other possible conditions, which may include CT scan, MRI, or positron emission tomography (PET scan)
- neuropsychological testing
Some or all of these tests may be repeated later to measure how memory and brain functions change over time.
Other conditions that may cause similar symptoms are stroke, tumor, sleep problems, side effects from medications, and others.
Research is ongoing in the field of Alzheimer’s and dementia, and new methods of diagnosing the disease may be on the horizon.
Alzheimer’s disease is complex and there isn’t one form of treatment that will treat it. Doctors treat the symptoms of the disease as well as work to slow its progression.
There are two types of medications that are used to treat mental function. They are cholinesterase inhibitors and memantine (Namenda).
Cholinesterase inhibitors help with cell to cell communication in the brain. These drugs can also help with agitation and depression, which occur with the disease. Some of the common forms of this class of drugs are:
- donepezil (Aricept)
- galantamine (Razadyne)
- rivastigmine (Exelon)
Memantine (Namenda) also helps with cell to cell communication in the brain. It slows the progression of Alzheimer’s symptoms. It is used in moderate to severe forms of the disease. It may also be used in combination with a cholinesterase inhibitor.
There are a number of things you can adopt in your lifestyle or the lifestyle of someone you love that will help manage some of the symptoms of Alzheimer’s. Making the home and surroundings safe and supportive is one of the main changes that can be made. A few of the things that you can do to achieve this are:
- Always keep keys, wallet, etc., in the same place.
- Remove unnecessary mirrors (images in mirrors can confuse or scare those with Alzheimer’s).
- Make sure shoes have good traction to avoid slipping and falling.
- Keep photos and other meaningful things in view.
- Keep a mobile phone in your pocket with GPS to help if you ever get lost.
- Keep medication simple and in a daily container to avoid confusion.
- Keep a routine as much as possible.
As with most health conditions, exercise is an important part of the routine. Even if balance keeps you or a loved one from walking regularly, stationary bike or chair exercises are an option. Nutrition is also important to watch. Healthy shakes and smoothies are good alternatives for meals or snacks, as those with Alzheimer’s may forget if they have eaten. Someone with Alzheimer’s should also be sure to drink lots of liquids to avoid constipation and dehydration.
There are a number of alternative treatments that promote brain health and improved brain function. However, there are no studies that show these to be effective for slowing the progression of Alzheimer’s at this time. Some of those that are currently being studied are:
- omega-3 fatty acids in fish
- vitamin E
It is important to remember that even natural or alternative therapies can interact with medications. Be sure to talk to the doctor before you or a loved one try any alternative methods.
Caring for someone with Alzheimer’s can be a challenge physically, emotionally, and financially. It often involves a major shift in a relationships, when a child begins caring for a mother or a spouse begins caring for their spouse. It can be very challenging to care for someone who can be irritable, paranoid, or not even believe they need care at times. Many caregivers deal with guilt, frustration, and grief over the loss of the relationship. It can also cause social isolation. It is important that you find support. This can be through other family members, friends, or support groups.
Learning all you can about the disease can be very helpful. With research ongoing, it is important to stay up-to-date on new discoveries. There are also classes that can teach you how to cope with the difficult behaviors you will encounter as you care for your loved one.
Caregiver burnout is common in people who care for someone with Alzheimer’s. It can occur when supporting the person with Alzheimer’s overshadows addressing your own needs, either physically, emotionally, or both. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Many people don’t know enough about what caregiving takes to know how to offer to help. It is up to you to reach out and ask for it. Reach out to friends or family that may be able to give you a break from time to time. Even just 30 minutes to take some time for yourself can help.
Be sure to check in your community for respite care or adult day care facilities that can give you some much needed time off from caregiving. Many of these facilities will also help your loved one to continue social interaction and aid in slowing the progression of the disease.
To help you cope with caregiving responsibilities and to manage your stress, it is important that you remember to take care of yourself. Some ways to do this are:
- Maintain a regular exercise routine.
- Join a support group.
- Take care of your emotional and spiritual needs.
- Take care of your physical health.
- Ask for help.
Research has not yet found a way to prevent Alzheimer’s disease. However, there are some things that research suggests may help. You can do the following to help slow the progression or possibly prevent the disease:
- Keep your mind active with word games, puzzles, and memory games.
- Continue learning new things. This is another way to keep your mind active.
- Stay physically active.
- Be socially active.
- Stop smoking.
- Get adequate sleep.
- Treat high blood pressure.
There is not current proof that any of these will prevent you from getting the disease. However, they all promote good brain health and have many other benefits beyond helping to fight against Alzheimer’s disease.
It is important to talk to a doctor if you notice some of the signs of Alzheimer’s in yourself or someone you care about. There are treatments that can help slow the progression of the disease. The earlier you can start on these, the better your quality of life can be.
Researchers are working right now to better understand Alzheimer’s and its effect on the brain. Once they better understand the disease, it will be easier to research treatments. In the meantime, Alzheimer’s research is one of the leading forms of research being performed today. New information is being learned daily and new treatments are being studied. If you or a loved one is diagnosed with this disease, the best thing you can do is talk to your doctor and start treatment as early as possible. | <urn:uuid:83b7d61f-ca3e-4d04-8264-c8bf248cfb9e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.healthline.com/health/alzheimers-disease-overview | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783391519.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154951-00016-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954036 | 2,554 | 3.34375 | 3 |
A very interesting freely available article. See also this recent blog post, Polynesians more Asian than Melanesian. Like previous studies on e.g., Europeans, European Americans, Native Americans, Indians, the scientific study of humanity by grouping individuals in clusters (i.e., races and subraces) is leading the way for a deeper understanding of the origins of the world's populations and ethnic groups.
PLoS Genetics Vol. 4, No. 1, e19 doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.0040019
The Genetic Structure of Pacific Islanders
Jonathan S. Friedlaender et al.
Human genetic diversity in the Pacific has not been adequately sampled, particularly in Melanesia. As a result, population relationships there have been open to debate. A genome scan of autosomal markers (687 microsatellites and 203 insertions/deletions) on 952 individuals from 41 Pacific populations now provides the basis for understanding the remarkable nature of Melanesian variation, and for a more accurate comparison of these Pacific populations with previously studied groups from other regions. It also shows how textured human population variation can be in particular circumstances. Genetic diversity within individual Pacific populations is shown to be very low, while differentiation among Melanesian groups is high. Melanesian differentiation varies not only between islands, but also by island size and topographical complexity. The greatest distinctions are among the isolated groups in large island interiors, which are also the most internally homogeneous. The pattern loosely tracks language distinctions. Papuan-speaking groups are the most differentiated, and Austronesian or Oceanic-speaking groups, which tend to live along the coastlines, are more intermixed. A small “Austronesian” genetic signature (always <20%) was detected in less than half the Melanesian groups that speak Austronesian languages, and is entirely lacking in Papuan-speaking groups. Although the Polynesians are also distinctive, they tend to cluster with Micronesians, Taiwan Aborigines, and East Asians, and not Melanesians. These findings contribute to a resolution to the debates over Polynesian origins and their past interactions with Melanesians. With regard to genetics, the earlier studies had heavily relied on the evidence from single locus mitochondrial DNA or Y chromosome variation. Neither of these provided an unequivocal signal of phylogenetic relations or population intermixture proportions in the Pacific. Our analysis indicates the ancestors of Polynesians moved through Melanesia relatively rapidly and only intermixed to a very modest degree with the indigenous populations there. | <urn:uuid:e04fa00f-31c6-443a-923c-89d5df714e83> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2008/01/genetic-structure-of-pacific-islanders.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395620.56/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00080-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.916583 | 528 | 3.28125 | 3 |
When Is A Theory Wrong?
"Simple," you may say. "All you have to do is test the theory against experimental data and, if predictions don't work, toss the theory in the garbage can." In practice, however, things are way more complicated.
Take it from the start: a hypothesis is proposed to explain a known phenomenon, say, the orbit of the moon or the cause of a disease. The hypothesis can also propose the existence of something new, for example, the existence of a particle or global warming. The first case, a hypothesis that explains what's out there, is easier to deal with. Experiments are set up to test the hypothesis. Does it explain what it's supposed to explain? Are there rival hypotheses that do a better job, that is, explain more with less? Assuming the hypothesis passes the tests, it is then accepted until something better comes along.
It's the second case, a hypothesis that predicts new phenomena, that is more challenging. What if the particle isn't found? Or global warming is deceptively subtle?
The complication, at least in the physical sciences, comes from the way predictive hypotheses are built. In general, and especially in physics, chemistry, and astronomy, hypotheses are based on mathematical models, descriptions that attempt to approximate the workings of Nature. Every model is thus an incomplete replica of what's really trying to explain. As a consequence, no model is complete or perfect.
In particle physics, the branch of physics that tries to find the most basic constituents of matter and studies how they interact with one another, all that we know up to now is condensed in the so-called Standard Model. According to the model, there are 12 fundamental particles of matter arranged into three "families" with four members each.
For example, the matter we are made of, atoms, is composed of electrons, protons, and neutrons. Protons and neutrons are, in turn, composed of two types of a different particle called a "quark." So, the family of particles that dominates the world around us is composed of the electron and the up and down quarks. In addition, there is the electron-neutrino, an elusive particle that shows up in radioactive decays and at the core of the Sun.
The other two families have a similar structure, but the particles are heavier. Their members are found mostly (but not exclusively) through high-energy collisions in particle accelerators such as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), famous for the discovery of the Higgs boson this past July. By the way, the Higgs is the newest member of the Standard Model, although we still need to understand a few of its properties to know exactly where it sits. (Sean Carroll just published a book on the Higgs, which I highly recommend, The Particle at the End of the Universe.)
Since every model is incomplete, there are gaps in the Standard Model. To fill them, physicists propose extensions, new models with new particles. The main test of these extensions is to find out if the particles they predict exist. Of the extensions, the most popular by far is called supersymmetry.
Proposed in 1974, supersymmetry is indeed super: if the world is supersymmetric there should be twice as many particles out there. The reason is that supersymmetry transforms every particle into a new one by changing a fixed amount of its internal rotation, or spin. (For the experts, by ½ of Planck's constant, equivalent to the spin of the electron.)
There are many possible extensions of the Standard Model that invoke supersymmetry; they make different predictions for what kinds of particles experiments should find. The simplest predict that all supersymmetric particles (the extra ones that double the count) should be unstable but for the lightest of them all. This fellow should be around if these models are correct. Supersymmetry has also been proposed as an explanation to the cosmological dark matter problem, or why galaxies seem to rotate faster than what simple Newtonian gravity predicts. The lightest supersymmetric particle would gather on the outskirts of galaxies, creating an invisible dark cloak that changes its rotation speed.
Physicists at the LHC and dozens of other experiments have been avidly hunting for supersymmetric particles. Up to now, they found no trace of any. Recently, LHC physicists looked at the decay of a particle called the B-meson, further complicating things for supersymmetry. (Particles are usually unstable and decay, or disintegrate, into lighter ones.) Different models predict different types of decay. Of these, the B-meson has a particularly rare one, at least according to the Standard Model, where it decays into two muons, heavier cousins of the electron. For every billion times the B-meson decays, it only follows this path three or four times. Observations of B-meson decay at the LHC have fallen in line with Standard Model predictions, not with the decay predictions of most supersymmetric models.
Given the lack of data in support of supersymmetry after all these years, why is the theory still considered viable?
The complication comes from the way mathematical models depend on various adjustable parameters. For example, the decay rate of a particle may depend on its mass and the way it interacts with other particles; if certain types of decays aren't seen, parameters can be changed to reflect that. The model may be made to hide from available experiments. And given that technology has more concrete limits than the imagination of theorists, a model may always be beyond the detectable.
How, then, can such types of models be ruled out? Well, simpler versions may be ruled out when the tweaking of parameters becomes so extreme that the model loses its original motivation: it explains nothing and becomes too cumbersome. Or a forbidden particle is discovered. Then there are always the more complicated versions, with more parameters that are harder to rule out.
The point is that there isn't a clear-cut answer. The physicist Max Planck used to say that wrong ideas don't die out, their proponents do. It will be interesting to watch what will happen in the next few years with supersymmetry and its proponents if tests keep producing negative answers. | <urn:uuid:6bbdb36e-3550-4396-a81d-c737b338d814> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://nhpr.org/post/when-theory-wrong | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398628.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00091-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944597 | 1,288 | 3.359375 | 3 |
In... "The Happiness Hypothesis," Jonathan Haidt, a moral psychologist at the University of Virginia, has been constructing a broad evolutionary view of morality.... driven by two separate mental systems, one ancient and one modern, though the mind is scarcely aware of the difference. The ancient system, which he calls moral intuition, is based on the emotion-laden moral behaviors that evolved before the development of language. The modern system — he calls it moral judgment — came after language, when people became able to articulate why something was right or wrong.Read the whole thing. And take the tests. I did. The tests compare your answers to the answers of political conservatives and liberals, and, for me, supported my belief that I am in the middle. (I'm not sure whether my test results were classified as conservative or liberal. You're asked several questions in the beginning, about social issues, economics, and national security. Since I go left, middle, and right, respectively, on those questions, I don't know where my answers counted.)
The emotional responses of moral intuition occur instantaneously — they are primitive gut reactions that evolved to generate split-second decisions and enhance survival in a dangerous world. Moral judgment, on the other hand, comes later, as the conscious mind develops a plausible rationalization for the decision already arrived at through moral intuition.
September 18, 2007
"He likens the mind’s subterranean moral machinery to an elephant, and conscious moral reasoning to a small rider on the elephant’s back."
How morality may have evolved: | <urn:uuid:3b22ccfd-cee6-4336-bdb9-3ab99d6d514d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://althouse.blogspot.com/2007/09/he-likens-minds-subterranean-moral.html?showComment=1190146740000 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783408840.13/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155008-00017-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948006 | 320 | 2.921875 | 3 |
- About Us
- Career Center
- Nano-Social Network
- Nano Consulting
- My Account
Basic scientific curiosity paid off in unexpected ways when Rice University researchers investigating the fundamental physics of nanomaterials discovered a new technology that could dramatically improve solar energy panels.
The research is described in a new paper this week in the journal Science.
"We're merging the optics of nanoscale antennas with the electronics of semiconductors," said lead researcher Naomi Halas, Rice's Stanley C. Moore Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering. "There's no practical way to directly detect infrared light with silicon, but we've shown that it is possible if you marry the semiconductor to a nanoantenna. We expect this technique will be used in new scientific instruments for infrared-light detection and for higher-efficiency solar cells."
More than a third of the solar energy on Earth arrives in the form of infrared light. But silicon -- the material that's used to convert sunlight into electricity in the vast majority of today's solar panels -- cannot capture infrared light's energy. Every semiconductor, including silicon, has a "bandgap" where light below a certain frequency passes directly through the material and is unable to generate an electrical current. By attaching a metal nanoantenna to the silicon, where the tiny antenna is specially tuned to interact with infrared light, the Rice team showed they could extend the frequency range for electricity generation into the infrared. When infrared light hits the antenna, it creates a "plasmon," a wave of energy that sloshes through the antenna's ocean of free electrons. The study of plasmons is one of Halas' specialties, and the new paper resulted from basic research into the physics of plasmons that began in her lab years ago.
It has been known that plasmons decay and give up their energy in two ways; they either emit a photon of light or they convert the light energy into heat. The heating process begins when the plasmon transfers its energy to a single electron -- a 'hot' electron. Rice graduate student Mark Knight, lead author on the paper, together with Rice theoretical physicist Peter Nordlander, his graduate student Heidar Sobhani, and Halas set out to design an experiment to directly detect the hot electrons resulting from plasmon decay.
Patterning a metallic nanoantenna directly onto a semiconductor to create a "Schottky barrier," Knight showed that the infrared light striking the antenna would result in a hot electron that could jump the barrier, which creates an electrical current. This works for infrared light at frequencies that would otherwise pass directly through the device.
"The nanoantenna-diodes we created to detect plasmon-generated hot electrons are already pretty good at harvesting infrared light and turning it directly into electricity," Knight said. "We are eager to see whether this expansion of light-harvesting to infrared frequencies will directly result in higher-efficiency solar cells."
About Rice University
Located on a 285-acre forested campus in Houston, Texas, Rice University is consistently ranked among the nation's top 20 universities by U.S. News & World Report. Rice has highly respected schools of Architecture, Business, Continuing Studies, Engineering, Humanities, Music, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences and is known for its “unconventional wisdom." With 3,485 undergraduates and 2,275 graduate students, Rice's undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio is less than 6-to-1. Its residential college system builds close-knit communities and lifelong friendships, just one reason why Rice has been ranked No. 1 for best quality of life multiple times by the Princeton Review and No. 4 for "best value" among private universities by Kiplinger's Personal Finance.
For more information, please click here
Copyright © Rice UniversityIf you have a comment, please Contact us.
Issuers of news releases, not 7th Wave, Inc. or Nanotechnology Now, are solely responsible for the accuracy of the content.
|Related News Press|
News and information
Artificial synapse rivals biological ones in energy consumption June 21st, 2016
Drum beats from a one atom thick graphite membrane June 15th, 2016
Yale researchers’ technology turns wasted heat into power June 27th, 2016
FEI and University of Liverpool Announce QEMSCAN Research Initiative: University of Liverpool will utilize FEI’s QEMSCAN technology to gain a better insight into oil and gas reserves & potentially change the approach to evaluating them June 22nd, 2016
Novel capping strategy improves stability of perovskite nanocrystals: Study addresses instability issues with organometal-halide perovskites, a promising class of materials for solar cells, LEDs, and other applications June 13th, 2016 | <urn:uuid:1fd4ac6c-1223-4580-b8dc-25d0b2755f38> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.nanotech-now.com/news.cgi?story_id=42402 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399522.99/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00172-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910918 | 986 | 3.6875 | 4 |
When Indians Became Cowboys
September 9, 1995
About the Author
Peter Iverson received his B.A. in 1967 from Carleton College, his M.A. in 1969, and his Ph.D. in 1975 from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship in 1999. His primary area of research is American Indian history in the 20th and 21st centuries. Iverson teaches at Arizona State University.
About this Book
In this book on Indian cattle ranching, Peter Iverson describes a way of life that has been both economically viable and socially and culturally rewarding. Thus, an Indian rancher can demonstrate his generosity and his concern for the well-being of others by giving cattle or beef to relatives or by feeding people at a celebration. An expert rider possesses a skill appreciated by others. A rancher who raises prime cattle demonstrates that Indians can compete in an activity that dominates the surrounding non-Indian society. | <urn:uuid:b467b90a-4dfa-45f9-8534-ec3afcdd32d7> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.azpbs.org/books/authordetail.php?id=233 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393332.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00085-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973432 | 195 | 2.75 | 3 |
by Staff Writers
Washington (AFP) May 28, 2011
Climate change is expected to alter the global industry in fruits and nuts dramatically as tree crops such as pistachios and cherries struggle in the rising temperatures, researchers said.
A study said that even if polluters took greater action to cut carbon emissions, the impact of climate change will likely be severe enough that the nearly $100 billion-a-year fruit and nut industry needs to reassess planning.
Trees in temperate regions evolved to need a chilly period so they can grow in the spring. Rising temperatures pose a special problem for temperate but comparatively warm areas where the winter chill is already in short supply.
The study, published in May by the online journal PLoS One, expected fruit and nut trees to be highly affected in California, the southeastern United States, China's Yunnan province and southern and southwestern Australia.
Areas that have already seen the worst losses of winter chill include Israel, Morocco, Tunisia and the Cape region of South Africa, the study said.
Common fruits and nuts in the warmer temperate areas include pistachios, which are popular in Iran and California, along with walnuts, cherries and peaches.
Co-author Eike Luedeling of the Nairobi-based World Agroforestry Centre said that farmers making long-term investments needed to realize quickly that fruits and nuts are more vulnerable than many other crops.
"If I'm growing wheat or maize, then from one year to the next I can decide whether to plant a little late or plant a little earlier or plant a different variety," Luedeling said.
"But for trees, you can't. Once you've made a decision to plant a certain crop, you're locked in for 30 years," he said.
Luedeling, who observed the problem of declining yields while researching trees in Oman, said that the economic impact of climate change to fruits and nuts would depend on decisions being made now.
"If farmers wake up to the reality of climate change and start making these adjustments -- switching to cultivars that are appropriate in the future, but not necessarily now yet -- then the disruption to markets could be minimal," he said.
"But if we don't, if farmers believe they can keep doing what their grandfathers have done, then we will see some serious problems," he said.
Climate change is forecast to have less impact on cooler temperate regions and the winter chill may actually increase in some colder regions, the study found.
Co-author Evan Girvetz, a senior climate scientist at The Nature Conservancy, a US environmental group, said cooler regions had a greater window for rising temperatures as they started out with more days of winter chill.
But many warmer areas are "already on that edge of not having enough cold temperatures during the winter for good fruit and nut production," Girvetz said.
"They have years when you don't have enough full production and as we move into the future, we are finding that that's going to become more common," he said.
Even if the world cuts down on greenhouse gas emissions, "we are still projecting that the suitability for growing these crops is likely to decrease," he said.
The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in a major report in 2007 forecast that the world would heat up by 1.8 to 4.0 degrees Celsius (3.2-7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100 compared with pre-industrial levels and that some damage was irreversible.
However, political momentum to fight climate change has since declined, especially in the United States, with a number of conservative lawmakers raising doubts about the science and saying that action is too costly.
Comment on this article via your Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail login.
Anti-GM food protest leaves 18 injured in Belgium
Brussels (AFP) May 29, 2011
Environmental activists stormed a field of genetically modified potatoes in Belgium Sunday, breaking through a security cordon in a raid that left police and protesters injured, authorities and organisers said. Police said they briefly detained around 40 people taking part in the "Field Liberation Movement", which aimed to destroy the research crop in the northwestern town of Wetteren, accor ... read more
|The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2011 - Space Media Network. AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement| | <urn:uuid:2c499521-31bf-401b-97bd-dccf831ff430> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.seeddaily.com/reports/Climate_change_to_deal_blow_to_fruits_nuts_study_999.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394414.43/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00022-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949122 | 982 | 2.96875 | 3 |
PATTON, JOHN LESLIE, JR.
PATTON, JOHN LESLIE, JR. (1905–1971). John Leslie Patton, Jr., African-American teacher, principal, and author, was born on May 19, 1905, to John Leslie Patton, Sr., and Ella Thomas Patton in Dallas. Patton and his older sisters, John Ella and Marqueriette, attended Bethel A.M.E. Kindergarten and Dallas public schools for their early education. Patton attended the Dallas Colored High School where teacher Portia Washington Pittman, the daughter of Booker T. Washington, provided an early influence for him. He graduated in 1922, the same year the Dallas Colored High School was relocated into a new building and renamed Booker T. Washington High School. Patton then enrolled at Prairie View State Normal and Industrial College (now Prairie View A&M University), where he served as an officer in the Reserve Officers Training Corps. He received his teaching certificate in 1924, and in 1926 he earned a bachelor of arts degree. He later did post graduate work at New York University and Southern Methodist University.
Around 1926 Patton took a teaching position at J. P. Starks Elementary School in Dallas. In 1928 he joined the faculty at his alma mater, Booker T. Washington High School, where he taught history. Seeking to expand the school curriculum to include information about the achievements of black historical figures, Patton developed a course about African-American history in 1933, and subsequently he authored A Student’s Outline Guide for the Study of Negro History. Patton and colleague H. I. Holland revised the book in 1939. They outlined the purpose of the course in the revised edition:
The course in Negro History was intended to serve the following purposes: (1) to give Negro youth a better understanding of the struggles and problems which the Negro race has encountered in America; (2) to give a greater appreciation of the progress and contributions which the Negro has achieved; (3) to show that the Negro has formed an integral part of the American civilization; (4) to awaken a proper social consciousness and pride in the developments and achievements which the Negro has made; and (5) to stimulate in Negro youth a proper desire to achieve greater freedom and greater accomplishments.
Patton became principal of Booker T. Washington High School in 1939. Upon his appointment, he added his black history curriculum to the permanent course work for all students. Under his leadership, he instituted the inclusion of college preparatory courses for returning servicemen on the GI Bill, the addition of business and technical classes in night-school programs, as well as the implementation of vocational training and work-study programs. Patton also served as assistant director of the Dallas Public Evening Schools and director of the Adult Civil Defense Program. He was principal at Booker T. Washington for a total of thirty years.
Patton was very active in the Dallas community, including the local chapter of the NAACP, Dallas Negro Chamber of Commerce, and Teachers State Association of Texas. He was a longtime member of Bethel AME Church and served as a trustee and frequent public speaker. His numerous affiliations, awards, and memberships included: board of management, Moorland branch YMCA; a trustee of the Dallas Public Library; National Youth Program Committee for the National Council of the YMCA; Distinguished Alumni Award, Prairie View A&M College; Citizenship Award, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity; Life Member Award, National Congress Colored Parents and Teachers; Life Member Award, National Education Association; Citation, National Foundation of the March of Dimes; Citation, Dallas Teachers Council; member, Boy Scouts of America; member, Free and Accepted Masons; member, Phi Delta Kappa; member, Knights of Pythias; member, Dallas School Administrators Association.
In 1969 Patton left his position as principal to become the deputy assistant superintendent of personnel and community relations for the Dallas Independent School District. He was the first African American to receive a top administrative appointment in the DISD. He served for three years but soon retired due to recurring illness. Patton died in Dallas on July 19, 1971. He was survived by his wife, Eva Stanton Patton, and a stepdaughter, Bobbie Franklin Wells. He was buried in Lincoln Memorial Cemetery in Dallas. The John Leslie Patton, Jr. Elementary School was established in his honor by the DISD in 1976.
“Dallas History Items: John Leslie Patton, Jr.,” Dallas Historical Society (http://www.dallashistory.org/history/dallas/patton.htm), accessed March 4, 2012. Dallas Morning News, February 8, 1968; July 21, 1971; February 19, 1987; April 6, 15, 1999. “John Leslie Patton, Jr.: Portrait of an Educator,” Dallas Historical Society (http://www.dallashistory.org/history/dallas/portrait.htm), accessed March 4, 2012. Mamie L. McKnight, ed., First African American Families of Dallas: Creative Survival, Exhibition, and Family History Memoirs (Dallas: Black Dallas Remembered Steering Committee, 1987). Mamie L. McKnight, ed., First African American Families and Settlements of Dallas: On the Inside Looking Out Memoirs (Dallas: Black Dallas Remembered, Incorporated, 1990).
Image Use Disclaimer
All copyrighted materials included within the Handbook of Texas Online are in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 related to Copyright and “Fair Use” for Non-Profit educational institutions, which permits the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA), to utilize copyrighted materials to further scholarship, education, and inform the public. The TSHA makes every effort to conform to the principles of fair use and to comply with copyright law.
For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this article.Handbook of Texas Online, Bailey Haeussler, "Patton, John Leslie, Jr. ," accessed June 27, 2016, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fpaah.
Uploaded on April 25, 2013. Modified on May 21, 2013. Published by the Texas State Historical Association. | <urn:uuid:4a2c639a-6e5f-45f5-89cd-f68042ee4e25> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fpaah | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396147.66/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00094-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951113 | 1,352 | 2.84375 | 3 |
An analysis by the Research Section of the Workers’ Party
The global background
The current global crisis emerged from the workings of the capitalist class structure, initially in the USA and subsequently around the world. Since the mid-1970s, workers’ average real wages in the USA stopped rising partly because the computerisation of production displaced workers and partly because of capitalists’ decision to increasingly move production to more profitable foreign locations. Because employers needed fewer workers in the USA, wages fell there for the first time in 150 years (1820-1970).
However, productivity kept rising, partly because of the computerisation of production processes and partly because workers were being pressurised to produce more. Workers in the USA produced ever more for their employers to sell and yet their wages remained stagnant. The last 30 years realised capitalists’ wildest dreams- a new gilded age was upon them. The surpluses extracted by capitalist employers rose. Yet, stagnant wages and huge surpluses eventually plunged US capitalism into deep crisis. (Wolff)
Progression of real incomes (including capital gains) of the top percent and the lower 90% in United States 1950-2005 (1979=100)
Source : Estimates based on Emmanuel Saez et Thomas Piketty, “Income Inequality in the United States, 1913-2006”, Tables and figures updated to 2006, July 2008 : http://elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/ From Houben
This contradiction between overproduction on the one hand and stagnating wages on the other is a core contradiction of the capitalist system and leads to its cyclical crises. The super rich can only buy so many yachts, Dubai island retreats and football teams. They tend to rely on working people to be the main consumers of goods in capitalist societies. But with workers being increasingly exploited and new technologies developing so that even more can be produced, capitalism produces more goods than workers can afford to consume.
The capitalist crisis appears in the form of overproduction, i.e. a … surplus of production or of the production capacities in use in relation to what can be sold. In this regard, it is different from pre-capitalist recessions which were mainly caused by phenomena which created underproduction. And overproduction in a world which underfeeds the majority of the population, which does not supply them with enough drinking water, shelter, clothes, etc., is simply shocking. (Houben)
The condition of the working class in the rich countries was also affected by the global growth in the number of people working under capitalist relations of exploitation. Beginning in the early ‘80s there was an unprecedented rise in the number of people working in the global capitalist market. In this period the USSR and most of the other Socialist Bloc countries collapsed, and China and India were opened up to exploitation by imperialist transnational corporations. The International Labour Organisation estimates that by 2000 the global capitalist labour force had more than doubled from 1.46 billion to 2.93 billion This growth has placed a downward pressure on workers’ wages in the rich countries, on their terms and conditions of work, and on their job security as has the growth in the numbers of people unemployed around the world- a global reserve army, many millions of whom scratch a living in the huge slums that have grown up in the poor world in recent decades . The development of (relatively small) fabulously wealthy indigenous elites in these new markets has also created new markets for capitalist goods and services. (Goldstein)
So, who received all the surplus money gained from increasing exploitation of workers, new technology and the globalisation of production? Corporate boards of directors received most of those surpluses. A huge chunk went as payouts to top executives while another portion served as increased dividends to shareholders in corporations. Other parts of this surplus bonanza financed the transfer of production abroad, increased the computerization of workplaces in order to reduce payrolls, and were paid out in lobbying for beneficial state actions such as reducing corporate taxes. (Wolff)
Corporations deposited mounting surpluses in banks, which in turn grew and invented new financial instruments to profit further from those surpluses. It was believed by some economists that the explosion of new financial instruments was an attempt by capitalists to offset the sluggish or stagnating rates of profit that had been in existence in the USA since the mid-1970s. These radical economists believe that in future capitalists will not be able to ensure sufficient profits in the real economy and as result we have entered a new period in which capitalists will increasingly pursue profits in the financial sector. As a result, according to this perspective further financial crashes are almost inevitable under the present system, barring the development of epochal new technology – as powerful a lever of growth as the automobile was a hundred years ago. (Despite the dot.com mania of the late ‘90s, the Internet has not proven to have anything near the same potential as an engine of economic growth as automobiles were when they first came off the production lines.) (Foster and Magdoff)
Other more sanguine thinkers, such as Gordon Brown, believed that the era of cyclical boom and bust was over and that we had arrived at a ‘New Economy’, something like the ideally balanced economy of neo-liberal myth. History – not yet over- has proved them wrong. In any case, financial capital – unmediated by the actual production of goods and services – has been increasingly important to the workings of the global economy since the mid 1970s.
In 1980, the value of financial instruments was estimated to be equivalent to the world Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In 1993, that value was twice as high. And, by the end of 2005, it was more than three times higher i.e. 316% of world GDP. Between 2000 and 2004, government and private debt securities accounted for over half of this increase. This shows the growing role of debt and leveraged buyouts as the motor of this process.
In 2004, daily trade of derivatives totaled 5.7 billion dollars and trade of currency 1.9 billion dollars. Together amounting to 7.6 billion dollars daily. That’s more than the value of annual exports. (Cottenier and Houben)
In the USA, when the dot.com bubble burst in the late 90s the Fed under Alan Greenspan, fearing a recession, reduced interest rates and ushered in the era of extremely easy business and household credit. The banks and financial institutions responded with a plethora of new financial instruments through which debt was bought and sold on the international financial markets.
New instruments included securities such as “collateralized debt obligations” (comprised of mortgage, credit card, corporate, and student-loan debt); “credit default swaps” (deals to insure such new securities); and other “derivatives” for trading the risks of fast multiplying new credit instruments among those with the surpluses to invest. Because the new instruments operated completely outside existing regulations in a “shadow credit system” ever bigger risks were undertaken for ever bigger profits. Specialized enterprises such as hedge funds arose to invest rising corporate surpluses and exploding executive incomes in the murky shadows of high finance. Huge profits were made over the last 20 years, but the resulting capitalist exuberance once again overreached its limits. (Wolff)
With their wages stagnating, how were workers able to consume the things they produced? In the USA and in other rich countries, such as Ireland, this was facilitated by an extraordinary rise in levels of household debt. Workers were suffering increased exploitation and stagnating wages and they offset this by taking out loans- credit card loans, student loans, second (and even third) mortgages. Instead of paying workers higher wages, capitalists arranged it so that workers got enough to live at the level they expected by taking out high interest loans. Annual savings made by all families in the USA fell from 8% of GDP in 1980 to 5% in 1990 and 1.5% in 2000. At the same time the debts of US families rose from about 50% of GDP in 1980 to 65% in 1990, 75% in 2000 and 100% in 2007. (Cottenier and Houben) Even the poorest and those with poor credit histories, who had previously been unable to avail of easy credit, were able to buy into the property market through sub-prime mortgages. It must have seemed like the perfect system for capitalists. Until it all began to unravel.
…defaults on credit card debt, auto loans, student loans, and mortgages took off in 2008. The new kinds of securities based on workers’ debts began to lose value in the markets. Banks, hedge funds, and others holding those securities faced mounting losses. Corporations that insured those securities via credit default swaps, etc., could not pay when so many securities’ values collapsed. Banks had used their depositors’ money and borrowed still more to buy such securities. Banks’ losses prevented repaying those loans or guaranteeing their depositors’ money. Financial markets froze as borrowers and lenders stopped trusting one another and drastically reduced transactions. Bust followed bubble followed boom, once again. (Wolff)
Ireland was a beneficiary of the rising surpluses being enjoyed by the US ruling class in the 1990s. American firms invested more capital overseas in the 1990s- in excess of $750 billion- than in the previous four decades combined. Of this, roughly half went to Europe and after 1993 25% of all US investment in the EU went to Ireland (which has just 1% of the EU population). (O’Toole (a)) This represented the culmination of a decades-long process of opening up of the Irish state to foreign business. Ireland represented a good deal for American capital for a number of reasons. It had low corporate taxes, wage moderation expressed through a partnership process, active state involvement in attracting overseas jobs and was the recipient of EU structural funds which may have raised Ireland’s GNP by up to 4%. (O’Toole (a)) As it transpires, the Irish state was also willing to turn a blind eye to a whole range of financial misdeeds and crimes in pursuit of its share of the global pot, although Ireland was not alone in this. In the manufacturing sphere, US pharmaceutical and computer firms took advantage of Ireland’s low-tax regime. By 1999 half of all Irish manufacturing jobs in were in foreign-based companies compared to an EU average of 20% and by 2000, foreign investors spent the equivalent of $38,000 for every man, woman and child in Ireland. (O’Toole (b))
In keeping with the development of the globalised financial sector, Ireland was also a recipient of inward investment in this sphere. Founded by Charles Haughey in 1987, the International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) came to play an increasingly important role in the Celtic Tiger economy. In 2002 Ireland was the largest location for declared pre-tax profits for US firms and in 2005 the IFSC accounted for 75% of all foreign investment in Ireland. By 2008 the IFSC was dealing with €1 trillion per year. At its height the IFSC had 25,000 employees and garnered €1.2 billion in taxes. In return for this boost to the Irish economy the Irish government ensured that regulators operated what the IDA called “a flexible and business focused tax and regulatory system”. (Quoted in O’Toole (b): 130) This allowed for the development of “apparently vast financial operations with huge paper assets but almost no substance.” (O’Toole (b):129) In 1998 the Irish government allowed the treasury arms of transnational corporations (TNCs) to set themselves up as banks and by 2007 400 of these banks were in existence, whose chief aim was to ensure that the parent TNC paid as little tax as possible. These banks were mostly front companies with few employees and engaged in no real banking activity. Ireland was a global centre of tax avoidance (legal) and evasion (illegal). The IDA itself boasted of Ireland having become the new Bermuda.
The Workers’ Party has previously outlined its view on how the Irish government conspired with big builders and the banks to squander the monies that came into the exchequer and developed the housing bubble with little or no thought as to the long-term consequences so that when the global collapse came, Ireland was in no position to deal with it. What follows is an attempt to outline where we are now and a brief outline of options open to the Left in Ireland at this time.
While the largely unregulated financial economy was booming, and US investment was creating industrial and financial jobs, not everybody in Ireland was living the dream. In fact, the gap between rich and poor widened to one of the worst in the world. “In the last three years of the boom (2004 to 2007) alone, the richest 400 people in Ireland added €41 billion to their combined personal wealth. Yet, somehow, Irish people went on believing that they lived in a relatively classless society. (O’Toole (b): 76) The idea that ‘we’re all in this together’ remains powerful and is used by the government, by most commentators to construct a fictional divide between ‘vested interests’ and the rest of the country. In the current climate these ‘vested interests’ include public service workers, nasty bankers (Seanie Fitzpatrick, Richard Boucher, Michael Fingleton), dinosaur trade unions and their venal leaders. The underlying idea is that if we can disentangle the cronies from ‘crony capitalism’ and put ‘good’ bankers in place, all will be well again. It is an evident piece of fiction but as propaganda it may be working. For example, a recent Sunday Independent poll found that 55% of respondents would favour an all party government in the current economic climate. (25th April 2010).
The Workers’ Party does not believe that a unity government made up of two right-wing parties and a few others would be able to deal with economic woes to the benefit of the majority. We have no time for the bankers and their buddies in construction and in Fianna Fáil .We believe that a privileged ‘golden circle’ was partly responsible for the way things have panned out here. But we are aware that Ireland’s fate has been tied up with an increasingly globalised capitalism. We are equally aware that a squeaky-clean Fine Gael-led coalition government wouldn’t be of any help to the vast majority of the Irish people. A new direction will have to be coursed if we are to develop a society which looks after the interests of the majority.
Economic Crisis: a Deflationary Approach
Broadly speaking, within the capitalist system, there are two main approaches to dealing with large government deficits. One approach is to cut wages, and government spending and use the money saved to pay back the debt including interest. Cutting workers wages and entitlements is also supposed to make the economy more globally competitive. There are problems with this approach. The first problem is that even fewer people will be able to afford goods and services at their current prices. Cuts will lead to higher unemployment and wage cuts put less money in workers’ pockets. People have less money to put into the economy. A lack of demand may in turn lead to a need on the part of sellers to lower prices and a general deflationary tendency in the economy. There is also the risk that the people at the bottom end of the wealth pyramid might start taking to the streets, as they are currently doing in Greece.
The alternative approach involves the government spending money on social services (or anything – it could equally involve the government spending money on weapons and wars), which in turn will get more people working, producing, spending and paying taxes, which in the longer run will help to clear the deficit. As we might expect of a government which is hardly interested in the plight of that special ‘special interest’, the vast majority, the government has chosen a potentially deflationary and socially painful course of cuts, tax increases (aimed at the most vulnerable) and shut-downs.
According to the latest ESRI Quarterly Economic Commentary (Spring 2010), economic output has been flat between 2009 and 2010. They expect economic growth of 2.5% of GDP in 2011. As for the job forecast..
…we expect unemployment to fall between 2010 and 2011, averaging 13¾ per cent in 2010 and 13 per cent in 2011. This expected fall in the rate of unemployment is related to expected migratory outflows – 60,000 in the year ending April 2010 and 40,000 in the year ending April 2011. (p.1)
In the ESRI report there are clear signs that government policy is undermining demand in the economy.
In tune with government thinking the report notes that rising public debt and concerns about “medium-term fiscal sustainability in many advanced economies could potentially derail the recovery process by unsettling financial markets and increasing the cost of borrowing, thereby crowding out private consumption and investment” But it also notes that
… there remains a concern that the outstanding impairments in financial systems and in housing markets, together with rising unemployment levels, may impede the recovery in household spending to a greater extent than currently expected. In addition, much of the rebound in global economic activity has been driven by the extraordinary policy stimuli and there are still few indications that autonomous private demand is taking hold in the advanced economies. One of the key risks is that a premature termination of supportive policies may undermine the recovery. (p.6)
The Fianna Fáil /Green government is very much about “terminating supportive policies”. As implied in the quotation above, other governments have followed a different approach to that of the Fianna Fáil / Green coalition by putting extraordinary amounts of money into the economy in the hope of stimulating growth. Later, the ESRI Commentary notes that government figures show that “the volume of investment spending fell by 29.7 per cent in 2009. This figure was made up of a fall of 33.8 per cent in building and 15.7 per cent in machinery and equipment.” Figures for consumption also show a fall for the period.
The ESRI Commentary bases its budget forecast for 2011 on the pre-announced targets included in Budget 2010.
In the (2010)[Budget] document these include total cuts of €3 billion, with €2 billion targeted at the current side of the budget and a €1 billion reduction in capital expenditure. …we have assumed a freeze in welfare payments and public sector pay rates together with further reductions in the volume of public consumption which is forecast to fall by 2 per cent in 2011.
…we have implemented these measures to estimate the impact of the pre-announced budget plans on the public finances and the wider economy.
We estimate that such a budget package would reduce the General Government Deficit by between 1½ and 2 percentage points of GDP. The impact on the wider economy is to reduce the growth rate by approximately one percentage point. In addition, the level of employment is lower and emigration flows higher than in the absence of such a package. These are real costs attached to the programme of fiscal consolidation being pursued by the government. Despite these costs it is the view of this Commentary that such measures are necessary to ensure the medium-term sustainability of the public finances. Given the range of measures which have already been introduced, the 2011 budget is likely to involve some very difficult choices. While there are likely to be significant cost savings to be made in the capital programme which should mitigate the effects of the cuts on the levels of volume investment, it is nevertheless the case that by 2011 public investment levels in current prices will be one-third lower than in 2008. Implementing further cuts in current expenditure and increases in taxation will also be challenging…
The recently announced plans for providing support to the banking system involve very significant increases in the level of government involvement in the financial sector. It is very difficult to put exact figures on the level of government monies involved. However, a tentative estimate of the order of €73 billion, equivalent to 47 per cent of GDP in 2010, can provide a guideline. … Of course these are gross figures and much of this liability is matched by assets both within NAMA and in AIB and Bank of Ireland. Nevertheless, it is possible that the net cost to the taxpayer of this support to the banking system, based on the latest figures available, will be of the order of €25 billion or more. (p.23. Our emphasis)
The picture which emerges here is clear. On the one hand, the vast majority are expected to suffer a contraction in the economy, a growth in unemployment and emigration, in 2011 public investment will be a third lower than it was in 2008 and more cuts in taxation and government expenditure, although challenging, are expected. On the other hand, the government is going to give around €73 billion to the banks and might get €48 billion back meaning that generations of Irish people will end up paying for €25 billion or more that this government has given to the banks.
In the immediate term, the Workers’ party is in favour of government policies which will put money into workers’ pockets and which will ensure that social services are maintained at 2008 levels and even expanded. We seek a coalition of all parties which are opposed to the deflationary anti-worker policies of Fianna Fáil and its hangers on. We do not believe that a Fine Gael-led coalition, even with sincere social democrats in cabinet positions, will even begin to protect the living conditions and livelihoods of the majority of our people. We note that in his recent leader’s speech to the Labour Party conference Eamonn Gilmore’s big ideas on healthcare and a constitutional convention are already part of Fine Gael policy so that “… at the same time as he was challenging … Fine Gael’s bid to become the largest party in the state, Gilmore was setting out policy positions which would fit comfortably with [Enda] Kenny’s platform”. (‘Back Room’, Sunday Business Post, April 25th 2010) We hope that this does not mean that the Labour Party is planning to throw its lot in with Fine Gael after the next election. The Labour Party is – as usual- at a crossroads. This time it should turn to the Left, with the goal of finding allies and building lasting coalitions in that direction.
The Workers’ Party also notes with dismay the way in which most of the leaders of the Trade Unions have accepted a public sector agreement which offers Ireland’s 300,000 public sector workers very little. Indeed the little that it does offer in relation to voluntary redundancies and no further pay cuts is “subject to no currently unforeseen budgetary deterioration” and will almost certainly be taken away again. Jack O’Connor of SPITU has argued that “we are living in a ruined economy, and … any action we take will be depicted as an attack on the citizens of the country.” He seems to have bought into the arguments of those on the other side of the table. The Workers’ Party believes that it is incumbent on the Trade Union movement to show by word and deed that it represents the working class of Ireland in its broadest sense. The Trade Union movement needs to come out fighting against scare stories about ‘sectional interests’ and cushy public sector jobs instead of giving in to them.
In relation to jobs, Fianna Fáil has recently been coming out with what can only be termed well-spun guff about post-recession Ireland becoming a ‘smart’, ‘green’ economy- what the newspapers have started calling ‘environomics’. The economist Michael Hennigan at the finfacts website shows how unrealistic the aim of creating tens of thousands of Irish jobs in the green economy is. He notes(quoting Forfás) that between 1998-2008 fewer than 4,000 new jobs were added by Irish and foreign firms in tradeable goods and services while during the same period more than half a million new jobs were created in construction, the public sector, retail and distribution. Moreover, research from the USA – a highly entrepreneurial culture – shows that only a small the number of business start-ups in tradeable goods and services last more than 10 years. Meanwhile, the government is talking about creating 80,000 sustainable jobs in the ‘new’ green economy. They are even talking about “a green IFSC” which could create 20,000 jobs over the next five to 10 years. According to Eamon Ryan, the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, “It could specialise in clean energy project finance or carbon trading,” Ryan said. “It could also look at ethical fund management and administration. We would specialise in three or four key areas.” The reference to “ethical fund management” is particularly choice.
Even those who did well out of the Celtic Tiger have to accept that those days are over. Speaking to business people in Dublin’s Mansion House, Craig Barrett former CEO at Intel, reminded his audience of the competitive pressures that faced them. He argued that with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the abandonment of socialist principles in nations like India, for example, an estimated 3 billion additional people entered the free world economic system.
“And guess what, they also want good jobs and have a rich educational heritage. You have 3 billion new customers, you also have 3 billion new competitors … The FDI [Foreign Direct Investment] era is over. Real economic investment will be indigenous and growth will come from investment in new ideas.”(‘The FDI era is over, says Craig Barrett’. Businessandleadership.com)
No new green tiger is going to emerge when the CEOs are speaking in those terms.
The State as the Key Driver
For the Workers’ Party the state should be the key driver in job creation because we seek a society were goods will be produced according to the agreed needs of the people and not the dicatatorship of the market. We note that during the final Tiger boom- between 2000 and 2008 – the net capital stock of the Irish state more than doubled from €222 billion to €477 billion. Of course, given the priorities of the government, €70 billion of this went into housing and €27.5 billion went into upgrading the roads -the latter an important, and arguably useful, investment. Road building accounted for almost 30% of the increase in ‘core’ productive capital stock (i.e. capital stock excluding dwellings, retail and transportation/storage). And most of the rest of the increase in Ireland’s ‘core’ productive capital stock was related to the state or semi-state sectors. It was not driven by private enterprise.
Of the €50bn rise in 2000-2008:
- €14.5bn is manifested in roads;
- €9bn went into schools, hospitals and buildings and equipment related to public administration;
- €7bn was invested by the semi-state companies that dominate electricity and gas supply;
- €3bn was pumped into water works, waste management and sewerage.
Private sector net investment in the capital stock – apart from retail, storage, transportation and housebuilding – was only €14.5bn in the eight years to 2008 (in constant 2007 prices). (finfacts team)
Even during the laissez-faire era of the Celtic Tiger at its height, the state was a crucial driver of core productive capital stock. This realisation must inform future policy.
A realistic radical approach to job creation has to put the basic needs of people first in terms of affordable housing, health, education and food and water provision. Radicals should ask why the government is not meeting basic needs in these areas and in the area of full employment. Will the government tax the wealthy and redistribute wealth to the benefit of the great majority? Will environmental concerns with the limits of our environmental systems and the necessity of sustainability assume more importance than the need to make a profit? If the global economy grows at 3% per annum, within thirty years it will have doubled in size. Can the global environment realistically withstand such growth? The profit system is unable to find solutions to these problems. Another world is necessary.
Jo Cottenier and Henri Houben ,‘System Crisis‘, International Communist Review , 2009
ESRI Quarterly Economic Commentary, Spring 2010
Finfacts Team “Davy says Ireland was never a wealthy country; High income in 2000-2008 largely wasted”, finfacts.com, February 19th, 2010
John Bellamy Foster and Fred Magdoff, The Great Financial Crisis, Causes and Consequences, Monthly Review Press, 2009
Fred Goldstein Low-wage capitalism: colossus with feet of clay- what the new globalized, high-tech imperialism means for the class struggle in the U.S. World View Forum 2008
Henri Houben, Institute of Marxist Studies, Brussels
Contribution to the Fourth World Association for Political Economy (WAPE) Conference, ” Nation, State, and Democratic Governance of the Global Economy and Politics ” Paris, 28-29 May 2009
Fintan O’Toole (a) After the Ball, Tasc at New Island, 2003
Fintan O’Toole (b) Ship of Fools, Faber and Faber, 2009
Rick Wolff, ‘Capitalism’s Crisis through a Marxian Lens‘ MRZine.
Latest posts by Research Section (see all)
- The Workers Party’s Response to HM Treasury document, “Rebalancing the Northern Ireland Economy” - July 25, 2011
- Roots of the Current Crisis: An Analysis by the Workers’ Party - July 9, 2010
- Stormont’s Sectarian Squabbles Hides Failure to Run the Economy - February 5, 2010
- Does Wealth Trickle Down? - September 21, 2009
- Getting to the Root of Racism and Sectarianism - August 26, 2009 | <urn:uuid:933408f7-b6ac-489e-aeb7-8d3df8a70984> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.irishleftreview.org/2010/07/09/roots-current-crisis-analysis-workers-party/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395620.56/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00191-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964608 | 6,279 | 2.828125 | 3 |
Users select a fuel, volume units, a quantity, and hit solve. A gallon of liquid hydrogen, for instance, has about as much energy as a pint of gas. The calculator was developed by Shec-Labs, (Solar Hydrogen Energy Corporation), in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada (sheclabs.com). The research lab says it also develops solar-powered devices that produce hydrogen by the disassociation of water.
The calculator works for fuels including hydrogen, natural gas, gasoline, coal, and butane, as liquids and as gas at several pressures. The calculator is accessible free at sheclabs.com/calc/fuel_energy_equivalen ce.php | <urn:uuid:44162861-10d5-4f5e-a5a2-08a7943e67ab> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://machinedesign.com/print/news/whats-hydrogen-equivalent-gallon-gas | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00199-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958059 | 143 | 3 | 3 |
Here are some key terms that you may find useful for reading Standard Template Library (STL) literature and documentation.
A container is an object that stores objects as its elements. Normally, it's implemented as a class template that has methods for traversing, storing, and removing elements. Examples of container classes are list and vector.
The quality of being generic, or type-independent. The above definition of the term container is too loose because it may apply to strings, arrays, and structswhich also store objects. However, a real container isn't confined to a specific data type or a subset of types. Rather, it can store any built-in or a user-defined type. Such a container is said to be generic. A generic container provides a uniform interface regardless of the actual type of elements it stores. Note that a string, for instance, can only contain characters; therefore, it's not generic. Genericity is perhaps the most important characteristic of STL.
A set of operations applied to an object or a sequence of object that accesses or manipulates the data therein in a specified manner and returns a result accordingly. Examples of algorithms are sort(), copy(), and remove(). STL algorithms are implemented as function templates that usually take iterators bound to a sequence of elements.
An iterator is an object that behaves like a generic pointer. Iterators are used for traversing, adding, and removing container elements. In many ways, they behave like ordinary pointers except that they are generic and safer. Iterators are classified into subcategories that characterize their capabilities. These subcategories include input iterators, forward iterators, bidirectional iterators, and more.
An adaptor is a special object that can be plugged to an exiting class or function to change its behavior. For example, by plugging a special adaptor to the sort() algorithm, you can control whether the sorting order is descending or ascending. STL also defines several kinds of sequence adaptors, which transform a container to a different container with a more restricted interface. A stack, for instance, is built from a queue container and an adaptor that provides the necessary push and pop operations.
Big Oh Notation
A special notation used in performance measurements of algorithms. The STL specification imposes minimum performance limits on the operations of its algorithms and container methods. An implementation is allowed to offer better performance but not worse. In other words, the limits express the worst case scenario. The Big Oh notation enables you to evaluate the efficiency of algorithms and containers for a given operation. For instance, an algorithm such as find(), that traverses every element is a sequence (in the worst case scenario) has the following notation:
T(n) = O(n). // a linear operation | <urn:uuid:6f3b72d6-1b30-4fe4-a964-a5dfc36f2309> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.devx.com/tips/Tip/14102 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00000-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.899704 | 560 | 3.921875 | 4 |
To dresse a Crab
PERIOD: England, 1545 | SOURCE: A Propre new booke of Cokery | CLASS: Authentic
DESCRIPTION: Crab meat dressed in its own shell
To dresse a Crab.
First take awaie all the legges and heddes / and then take all the fisshe out of the shelle & make the shelle as clene as ye can and putte the meate in to a disshe and butter it upon a chafyng dishe of coles and putte there to sinamon and suger and a little vineger, and when ye have chafed it and seasoned it / then put the meate in the shelles again and bruse the heddes and set them upon the disshe side and serue it.
To dress a Crab.
First take away all the legs and heads / and then take all the fish out of the shell & make the shell as clean as you can and put the meat into a dish and butter it upon a chafing dish of coals and put thereto cinnamon and sugar and a little vinegar, and when you have warmed it and seasoned it / then put the meat in the shells again and bruise the heads and set them upon the dish side and serve it.
The original recipe calls for the side of the serving platter to be garnished with the cooked crab heads, slightly "bruised" or cracked, indicating that crayfish may also be used.
For an added visual effect, sprinkle a little fine cinnamon over the shelled meat just before serving.
This dish may also be served with additional vinegar or clarified butter as a side sauce.
Read a medieval text about crayfish HERE.
RETURN TO: A Renaissance Cookery Book
A Boke of Gode CookeryA
Renaissance Cookery Book
© 1997 - 2003 James L. Matterer
ALL GODE COOKERY RECIPES | <urn:uuid:8ed49351-5a36-47ee-9fb4-cab7be038b6e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.godecookery.com/trscript/trsct001.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00021-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910607 | 413 | 2.640625 | 3 |
Citation: Inman M (2010) Clever Cattle Parasite Captures Cell Division Machinery. PLoS Biol 8(9): e1000498. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1000498
Published: September 28, 2010
Copyright: © 2010 Mason Inman. 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.
Competing interests: The author has declared that no competing interests exist.
Parasites have developed clever and diverse ways of making sure they're carried from one generation to the next and spread through their hosts' bodies—not surprising since their lives depend on it. When some viruses want to ensure safe passage to the next generation, they incorporate their DNA right into the host's genome. Others link their genome to host chromosomes so it gets carried along whenever the host's cells divide. The protozoan parasite Toxoplasma gondii, on the other hand, rides along in its host's immune cells, allowing it to spread farther and faster through the body.
But there's one especially clever parasite—Theileria, a genus of protozoa that infects cattle across the world—that's known to cause a cancer-like disease, making its host's white blood cells divide rapidly, as its way of quickly passing itself on to many of its host's cells and increasing its chances of continuing its life cycle.
Theileria's life cycle, like that of many parasites, is convoluted. Theileria first enters cattle when they're bitten by ticks infected with the parasite. In cattle, it colonizes white blood cells, and then passes into red blood cells. That puts it in the right place to get passed on to ticks when they feed on infected cattle. Once a tick takes a blood meal, Theileria moves first into the insect's gut, and then on to their salivary glands, from which it can be transmitted to other cattle while the tick is feeding and start its cycle anew.
It is during the key stage of the Theileria life cycle when it lives inside the cow's white blood cells that it forces host cells to divide over and over. During this stage, it takes on a form known as a schizont, a super-cell with many replicating nuclei inside. When the cattle's cells divide, the schizont also divides in two, with each half passed on to the host's daughter cells.
If the parasite wound up in only one daughter cell after each host cell division, it would never increase the number of blood cells it colonized and thus would have a small chance of getting ingested by feeding ticks and being passed on from there. But that's not what happens. Theileria manages to insert itself into both daughter cells in each cell division, exponentially multiplying its numbers in the process. But just how it manages this impressive feat has remained unclear.
A new study by Conrad von Schubert and colleagues in the group of Dirk Dobbelaere shows that Theileria inserts itself into both daughter cells by co-opting parts of the host cell's division machinery. Through this mechanism, the parasite gets treated much like the host's own chromosomes, so that the parasitic super-cell gets neatly divided in two for delivery to each daughter cell.
During the host cell's normal cell division cycle, known as mitosis, long strands of DNA molecules condense into chromosomes visible under a microscope. The chromosomes then line up near the center of the cell before being divided into duplicate halves. Each half is then dragged to opposite sides of the cell so when the cell divides, each daughter cell has a full complement of chromosomes. Protein complexes called microtubules—long, tentacle-like structures—play a key role in this process, grabbing hold of the chromosomes, and pulling them toward the opposite sides of the cell before the cell splits in two. Acting almost like a chromosome in disguise, the Theileria parasite uses the same microtubules to be pulled towards the opposing ends of the dividing cell. But how does it deal with the next step: cell division? A key molecule involved in orchestrating this dance, called Polo-like kinase 1 (Plk1), helps organize the microtubules and determine where the cell pinches together to split in two. New chemical tools, which quickly and completely inactivate Plk1 at specific time points during cell division, allowed Conrad von Schubert and colleagues to test how Theileria might interact with this enzyme.
To investigate Plk1's contribution to this process, von Schubert and colleagues used fluorescent antibodies to label Plk1, microtubules, and a molecule on the outside of Theileria cells known as Theileria annulata surface protein 1 (TaSP1). To see where the parasite and key parts of the host's cell division machinery were at various stages of cell division, they stopped the process at particular points. During a preparatory stage of cell division called G2, Plk1 is abundant in host cells. These authors found that at this point Theileria scavenges Plk1 and attaches it to its surface. As the host cell starts mitosis, Theileria releases Plk1, but only transiently. In the next stage of division known as anaphase—at which point the host cell's chromosomes divide into two equal halves and each half moves into one side of the cell—Theileria again rapidly dons Plk1 on its surface. This seems to ensure that a special set of host microtubules, assembling between the separated chromosomes in preparation for cell division, become tightly associated with the schizont. The cell then pinches together at exactly this place and, at the end of the process, as the thin remaining bridge keeping the daughter cells together is severed, the schizont is also cleaved. In this way, Theileria appears to ensure that it also gets split in two and passed on to both of the new host cells.
It seems that by cloaking itself with Plk1, Theileria is, in a sense, disguising itself as part of the host cell's division machinery. It may also be triggering the cell to divide right at the spot where the parasite sits, the authors argue.
In all, the study reveals how this unique parasite has found evolutionary success through a different route than many other parasites. Rather than attaching itself directly to the host's chromosomes, it manipulates key parts of the host's cell division machinery. This helps ensure that when the cells divide, the parasite will be poised and ready to hitch a ride.
von Schubert C, Xue G, Schmuckli-Maurer J, Woods KL, Nigg EA (2010) The Transforming Parasite Theileria Co-Opts Host Cell Mitotic and Central Spindles to Persist in Continuously Dividing Cells. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.1000499 | <urn:uuid:ba580494-d209-4168-a168-2287dad98049> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1000498 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397567.28/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00092-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941581 | 1,443 | 3.390625 | 3 |
By Gaye Levy
Guest writer for Wake Up World
Last month the news of wildfires in Michigan, New Mexico and elsewhere sent a wake up call to those who live in fire country. Draughts, lightening, human carelessness and simply freaks of nature can cause a wildfire. As more and more homes are built away from the cities close to wooded areas, the risk of loss from a wildfire increases. There is also a risk if you travel to a wooded recreational or wilderness area and a wildfire strikes.
This is not a topic I see mentioned much in the preparedness world. Mostly what you do hear about is the devastation and the total loss of property. But what about the loss of life and personal safety? Like any other catastrophe, preparing for wildfire is something that can and should be done using the basics tenants of preparing a kit (bug out bag), creating a family communications plan, and learning how to hunker down and shelter in place.
What causes a wildfire?
Wildfires often begin unnoticed and they are typically triggered by natural causes such as lightning, volcanic eruption, sparks from rock falls, and spontaneous combustion. Unfortunately, wildfires are also triggered by foolishness and carelessness on the part of humans. This includes arson, discarded cigarettes and sparks from equipment and and power lines.
The really bad thing about wildfires is that they spread quickly, igniting brush, trees, forests and the homes and businesses in their path.
Protecting yourself before the wildfire begins
As with all things preparedness, knowing the risks and anticipating the problem ahead of time will go a long way toward insuring your safety as well as the safety of your property. Here are some things you can do in anticipation that a wildfire just might happen.
- Maintain a 30 to 100 foot defensible space around your home to act as a fire break.
- Clear a 10 foot area around propane tanks and the barbecue.
- Regularly dispose of newspapers and rubbish.
- Regularly clean our debris from roof and gutters.
- Rake up leaves, dead limbs and twigs. Clear flammable vegetation from around and under structures.
- Mow grass regularly.
- Remove dead branches that extend over the roof.
- Thin a 15-foot space between tree crowns, and remove tree limbs within 15 feet of the ground.
- Ask the power company to clear branches from power lines.
- Stack firewood at least 100 feet away from your home. Clear combustible materials within 20 feet and use only UL-approved wood burning devices.
- Follow local burning regulations.
- Store flammable materials in approved safety cans.
- Inspect chimneys twice a year. Clean them at least once a year.
- Install smoke detectors on each level of your home and in each bedroom. Test them monthly and change the batteries twice a year.
- Teach each family member how to use a fire extinguisher (ABC type) and show them where it’s kept.
- Keep a ladder that will reach the roof.
- Purchase and keep handy household items that can be used as fire tools: a rake, hand saw or chain saw, bucket and shovel.
- Plant fire-resistant shrubs and trees. For example, hardwood trees are less flammable than pine, evergreen, eucalyptus or fir trees.
- Clear items that will burn from around the house, including wood piles, lawn furniture, barbecue grills, tarp coverings, etc. Move them outside of your defensible space.
- Review your homeowner’s insurance policy and also prepare/update a list of your home’s contents. Better yet, use your camera and make a video your home contents.
- Identify and maintain an adequate outside water source such as a small pond, cistern, well, swimming pool, or hydrant.
- Have a garden hose that is long enough to reach any area of the home and other structures on the property.
- Keep your cell phones charged and a full tank of fuel in your vehicle.
When Fire Threatens
- Listen to your radio for reports and evacuation information.
- Back your car into the garage or park it in an open space facing the direction of evacuation.
- Close doors and windows. Leave the key in the ignition. Close garage windows and doors, but leave them unlocked. Disconnect automatic garage door openers.
- Confine pets to one room. Plan for their care if you must evacuate.
- Arrange for temporary housing outside the threatened area.
During a Wildfire
- Take shelter at temporary housing at a friend or relative’s home outside the threatened area in case you need to evacuate. (This is where advance planning is important.)
- Wear protective clothing – sturdy shoes, cotton or woolen clothes, long pants, a long-sleeved shirt, gloves and a handkerchief to protect your face.
- Close outside attic, eaves and basement vents, windows, doors, pet doors, etc. Remove flammable drapes and curtains. Close all shutters, blinds or heavy non-combustible window coverings to reduce radiant heat.
- Close all doors inside the house to prevent draft. Open the damper on your fireplace, but close the fireplace screen.
- Shut off any natural gas, propane or fuel oil supplies at the source.
- Connect garden hoses. Fill any pools, hot tubs, garbage cans, tubs or other large containers with water.
- Place lawn sprinklers on the roof and near above-ground fuel tanks. Wet the roof.
- If you have gas-powered pumps for water, make sure they are fueled and ready.
- Place a ladder against the house in clear view.
- Disconnect any automatic garage door openers so that doors can still be opened by hand if the power goes out. Close all garage doors.
- Place valuable papers, mementos and anything “you can’t live without” inside the car in the garage, ready for quick departure. Any pets still with you should also be put in the car.
- Move flammable furniture into the center of the residence away from the windows and sliding-glass doors.
- Turn on outside lights and leave a light on in every room to make the house more visible in heavy smoke.
- Leave doors and windows closed but unlocked. It may be necessary for firefighters to gain quick entry into your home to fight fire.
- If advised to evacuate, do so immediately.
- Tell someone when you are leaving and where you are going.
- If you evacuate your home, place a note on the door indicating when you left and where you are going. If you absolutely must leave pets in the home, place a sign on the window saying PET INSIDE.
- Take your disaster supplies kit (bug out bag) with you.
- If you do find yourself trapped by wildfire inside your home, stay inside and away from outside walls. Close doors, but leave them unlocked. Keep your entire family together and remain calm.
After a Wildfire
When the fire has been contained, there are still some things you need to do to insure your safety.
- If you remained at home, check the roof immediately after the fire danger has passed. Put out any roof fires, sparks or embers. Check the attic for hidden burning sparks.
- For several hours after the fire, maintain a “fire watch.” Re-check for smoke and sparks throughout the house.
- If you detect heat or smoke when entering a damaged building, evacuate immediately.
- Avoid damaged or fallen power lines, poles and downed wires.
- Watch animals closely and keep them under your direct control. Hidden embers and hot spots could burn your pets’ paws or hooves.
- Follow public health guidance on safe cleanup of fire ash and safe use of masks.
- Wet debris down to minimize breathing dust particles.
- Wear leather gloves and heavy soled shoes to protect hands and feet.
- Discard any food that has been exposed to heat, smoke or soot.
- Do NOT use water that you think may be contaminated to wash dishes, brush teeth, prepare food, wash hands, make ice or make baby formula.
- Remain calm. Pace yourself. You may find yourself in the position of taking charge of other people. Listen carefully to what people are telling you, and deal patiently with urgent situations first.
The Final Word
Given wind and the right conditions, wildfires can move quicker than you can run. That means the best and the surest way to survive a wildfire is to escape well in advance. This is not to say that destruction by wildfire is preventable – what it says is that your personal safety, comfort and survival can be predicted and insured. by being prepared and getting out of dodge.
Do not be cavalier about wildfires – they can not only be costly, but also deadly.
For more information, FEMA has a excellent nine page brochure Wildfires: Are You Prepared. I highly recommend that you get a copy and keep it with the other documents in your preparedness library.
Enjoy your next adventure through common sense and thoughtful preparation!
About the Author
Gaye Levy lives and teaches the principles of a sustainable, self-reliant and stylish lifestyle through emergency preparation and disaster planning. She does this through her website at BackdoorSurvival.com, an online preparedness blog that provides lifestyle tools, tips, and thoughts to guide you through the back door of life in the 21st century. With an emphasis on prepping and survival, she writes about and shares practical, thoughtful, and inspirational tools for survival in uncertain times.
Backdoor Survival is currently listed on the Survival Top 50. In addition, Gaye is a frequent guest on the Preparedness Radio Network and the soon to be author of a book on 21st century preparedness. Also known as SuvivalWoman, Gaye speaks her mind and delivers her message with optimism and grace, regardless of mayhem swirling around us. | <urn:uuid:8c6271ae-a444-4957-9a63-9100c6266c77> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://wakeup-world.com/2012/06/17/how-to-prepare-your-home-and-your-family-for-a-wildfire/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395346.72/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00010-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.919143 | 2,089 | 3.59375 | 4 |
(Last Updated on : 09/02/2010)
The poems belonging to the school of mythological poems have special characteristics. They are combination of the nation of the rasas of vir and Bhakti or vir, sringar and Bhakti. Prithviraj Rathore is the best example of this school. Many poets like Barhat Isardas and Khidiya Jagga have contributed equally to both the major trends of Charan poetry: the historical and heroic and the mythological and religious.
Charans trace their origin from Shakti. They believe in eighty-four extraordinary incarnations of the Goddess in their community. Awadji, Mahmay, Calairay and Karaniji are a few such names. A good number of poems, mostly invocations to these goddesses incarnate, and particularly on Karaniji and on Shakti were written based on Markandey Puran. The warrior is a Shakti worshipper and naturally Shakti worship has been popular in Rajasthan
. Similarly, poems on Lord Shiva
, describing the legend of his two marriages with Sati and Parvati
, were composed.
Many charming and impressive poems on Lord Rama
and Lord Krishna
legends, describing particularly their heroic and redeeming aspects, a characteristic of this trend, were written. The only exceptions are the two small poems on Radha
by Sanya Jhula and Bankldas in the period of 400 years. Other legendary characters like Pandavas, Abhimanyu, Prahlad and the ten incarnations of God had also been the subject of the poems. Mention of twenty-four incarnations of God in Rajasthani poetry as by Kaviya Karanidan, is only an exception and appears to have been due to later influence of the Bhagawat and Braj-Bhasa poetry. Apart from this, certain poems on Nirgun Bhakti, like Kesoda Gadan's Nisani Vivek Var, were also written. There are a few other works which contain praise of God.
Saptsati ra Chand by Sridhar Vyas and Mataji ra Chand by Khidiya Canan were written in praise of Shakti in the 15th century. Tejoji Caran and Kanhoji Barhat are other important poets of this century who wrote devotional verses decrying the prevalent social evils.
Jaysinha, probably a Brahmin
poet, had narrated in his Hari Rasu, composed in the early 16th century, the attributes of God for self-purification and pleasure, with feelings of devotion in simple language.
Alluji Kaviya was well-known amongst the Charan Bhakt poets of Rajasthan. His stray verses, mostly chappayas and some pingal gits are still available. They sing the praises of Rama, Krishna, and Siddhas like Gorakhnath, Jambhoji and others. Emotional intensity and devotion have made his chappayas most appealing.
Isardas was primarily a bhakti poet and for him Bhakti
is a means of liberation from the bonds of birth and death. To chant the praise of God and repeat His names are the best ways of Bhakti and his poetry emphasized this particular theme. The poems of Isardas vividly portray the events and emotions of religious generosity, harmony and synthesis. He has eulogized one Almighty who appears in different forms and in many ways. Siddhas, Saints, Nine Naths and Hussain are present with mythological bhaktas; in his poem Gun Agam. He has chided God for not having granted a son to Mohammed Saheb and for the death of Hussain. He has equal regard for 'Puran' and 'Kuran'. Hari Ras and Deviyan are regarded as the books of recitation respectively of the Vaisnvas and Saktas.
In Gun Ninda Stuti, ironical censure and commendation of numerous deeds of various incarnations of God have been simultaneously mentioned. Vaman's fraud on Bali and the carrying away of Jamwanti by Krishna are two examples. This shows not only his devotion but also a sense of playful affinity. In Hari Ras he raises two fundamental questions about Karma
and Brahma that is whether the living being originated first or the karma originated first. The bond of birth and death follows the living being from the very beginning and it is due to the previous karma. The question remains if he is, not free to do karma, why should he undergo the sufferings. On the other hand, the scriptures declare that the living being is free to do karma. So, either the scripture or the karma theory is wrong.
The second question Isardas raised was how the Nirakar Brahma originated and how this origin was brought about. The poet answers the first question by saying that in this beginning there was only Parbrahma and nothing else, not even Atman
or Karma. With regard to the second, he only bows down in the spirit of 'Neti-Neti'.
Rathore Prithviraj composed many miscellaneous verses, dohas and gits. They sing praises of Lord Rama
, Lord Krishna
, the Ganga River
and many heroes. But the Veli Krisan Rukmini is the basis of the poet's perennial glory. In this particular work the poet has successfully combined the main characteristics of the three trends of Rajasthani poetry, viz., the secular love poetry, the historical and heroic poetry and sant poetry. Basically, it is an erotic love poem concluding in bhakti. The heroic description in it is to strengthen, and for perfection of, sringar ras. The poet has not only depicted the exciting erotic emotions but, wherever possible in the context, has also fired the imagination and stimulated the senses. Erotic depictions arc endowed with delicate grace. The innermost emotions of Rukmini
have been delicately reflected in her outward demeanour. The similes, complete in all respects, are suggestive and picturesque. The poet is cautious in the choice of appropriate words. In the use of Sanskrit words, he has followed the style of Ranmall Chand. The language used is literary Rajasthani.
Nisani is also a well known poem belonging to the school of mythological and religious poems. The subject of the Nisani is mainly Sankar's Vedant, though Bhakti and Yog-Sadhana have also been dealt with. The poet's message is to know the self and to liberate oneself from the bonds of birth and death. The Nisani has been very popular and provides examples of religious synthesis. The language is Khadi Boli mixed with Rajasthani. It is easy and idiomatic.
The mythological and religious poems of Medieval Rajasthani Literature
are endowed with exquisite language. It depicts action in an objective and picturesque manner. The dialogues are brief, befitting and meaningful. They are natural and flow effortlessly. There are also contextual depictions of human weaknesses and sensibilities. The narrative poems belonging to this category depict the different lilas of Lord Rama and Lord Krishna.
Opa Adha son of Charan Bakhtaji of village Pesawa, is a well-known bhakt poet and is said to have composed many Dingal gits, but only twenty of them have survived. These gits show a path to Bhakti. They are highly moving, and are replete with easy expressions and similes chosen from history and folk life. Indicating the supremacy of God's will, he gives the example of the fall of the Mughal Empire and the rise of the Maratha power. In fact Opa Adha is the last great poet of the mythological and religious branch of the Charani poetry in the Medieval Period.
It can be concluded saying that poems belonging to the school of mythology and religion during the medieval era in Rajasthan have richness in language and the emotions have been portrayed in a wonderful manner. | <urn:uuid:ba8a8f02-b7e9-4bfb-9d90-6df12e6a717e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.indianetzone.com/44/rajasthani_mythological_poems_.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397562.76/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00148-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964185 | 1,674 | 2.71875 | 3 |
Wright Brothers Day: Books on Flight
All Library locations will be closed on Monday, July 4, for Independence Day.
Observed since 1963, Wright Brothers Day on December 17 marks the anniversary of Orville and Wilbur Wright’s first manned flight near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina on December 17, 1903. What better way to appreciate the remarkable invention of the airplane than with a good book? Check out one of these biographies, histories, or memoir.
The Wright brothers
Award-winning biographer James Tobin takes on the story of the Wright brothers in To Conquer the Air: The Wright Brothers and the Great Race for Flight. This narrative biography details their invention, personal relationships, and competitors.
The Wright Brothers Legacy: Orville and Wilbur Wright and Their Aeroplanes, by Walt Burton and Owen Findsen, presents the subject through photographs. Over 250 are included in this book that show the brothers’ experiments, flights, and air shows, as well as memorabilia and souvenirs.
Co-host of NPR’s All Things Considered, Noah Adams tells the story of the Wright brothers and their family through his own personal journey in The Flyers: In Search of Wilbur and Orville Wright. Adams retraces the trip made by Wilbur Wright to North Carolina in 1900 and visits other sites of significance, such as the Huffman Prairie Flying Field. Along the way, Adams provides a unique look at these historic men and their accomplishments.
For the kids, get one of these books so they can learn the inspirational story of the Wright brothers. My Brothers' Flying Machine: Wilbur, Orville, and Me by Jane Yolen depicts these historic events through the narration of the Wright brothers’ sister; Airborne: A Photobiography of Wilbur and Orville Wright by Mary Collins paints a portrait of the Wright brothers with 60 historic photographs; and First to Fly: How Wilbur & Orville Wright Invented the Airplane by Peter Busby provides a detailed biography with a large colorful format that should appeal to grade-school children.
History of flight
Former curator of the National Air and Space Museum, Jay Spenser explores airplane history in The Airplane: How Ideas Gave Us Wings. More than a discussion of the Wright brothers’ work, Spenser details the people involved throughout the world in the invention of all parts of this amazing machine.
Inventing Flight: The Wright Brothers & Their Predecessors by John D. Anderson, Jr. presents the developments that led up to the first successful flight in 1903 from the work of Leonardo da Vinci to aviation pioneers in the 19th century.
For a pictorial history, check out Flight: A History of Aviation in Photographs by historian T.A. Heppenheimer. With over 400 photographs, this book captures the history of flight from its first attempts to the modern day.
Early women aviators
The world of flight in the early twentieth century belonged to more than men. These women carved a path for many to follow.
Well-researched and entertaining, The Sound of Wings: The Life of Amelia Earhart by Mary S. Lovell explores the abbreviated life of this record-setting pilot and advocate for women’s rights. Born in Atchison, Kansas, Earhart was the first woman to fly solo across both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. She disappeared in 1937 over the Pacific in an attempt to fly around the world.
Lauren Kessler details the flamboyant life of Florence “Pancho” Lowe Barnes in The Happy Bottom Riding Club: The Life and Times of Pancho Barnes. In the 1920s, Barnes flew stunt planes for the movie studios and founded the Association of Motion Picture Pilots. Later, she started the Women’s Air Reserves and eventually owned a nightclub in the Mojave Desert that catered to military and test pilots.
Raised on a farm in East Africa, Beryl Markham was a successful horse trainer, an adventurous African bush pilot, and in 1936, the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean from east to west. West With the Night, originally published in 1942, is Markham’s lyrical memoir of her life up to that momentous occasion. | <urn:uuid:c9f4c353-1c3c-4487-a702-065cea849234> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.kclibrary.org/blog/what-read-month/wright-brothers-day-books-flight | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783404826.94/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155004-00052-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92067 | 881 | 2.796875 | 3 |
The part of the anatomy of Daucus carota var. sativus that is easily recognized by most people is the storage root portion. These storage roots are orange in color and are most often conical or cylindrical in shape. The tap roots did not always have these morphological traits. Carrots that are sold in stores are grown from lines that were rigorously selected for specific traits. The traits that are selected for include color, shape, and xylem to phloem ratio. Carrots that are considered to be the best for consumption have a high amount of phloem compared to the amount of xylem. This ratio is an adaptation that decreases the size of the carrots core, which allows for better eating. Another adaptation is the large root size. The enlargement of the tap root is an adaptation that makes Daucus carota var. sativus worth cultivating.
Xylem and phloem, which were mentioned previously, are specialized tissues used by the plant for specific purposes. Xylem is a one way path used by the plant to transport water. This path leads from the roots to the uppermost portions of the plant. The path heading down from the top of the plant to the roots is called phloem. This tissue is used to transport sugars, which are produced via photosynthesis. Phloem is not limited to one way travel the substances flowing within the pathway are free to travel from source to sink.
The leaves of Daucus carota var. sativus alternate and are compound. In the United States the leaves are not often utilized for human consumption, but in other areas the leaves are utilized for food.
The flowers of Daucus carota var. sativus are formed in a structure called an umbel. The shape of the compound flower structure is almost umbrella like in appearance. Each tiny flower that makes up the umbel has five petals and is most often white in color. The tiny flowers are responsible for reproduction.
To learn more about the nutrition and habitat of carrots click here. | <urn:uuid:88ae8f9f-eece-4e40-bce8-bda964581ee5> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://bioweb.uwlax.edu/bio203/s2009/hordyk_pete/Anatomy.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396222.11/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00121-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970824 | 419 | 3.40625 | 3 |
Learn something new every day
More Info... by email
There are many signs that might indicate speech impairment in children. They include failing to make appropriate sounds by the expected age range and failure of a child to recognize or show interest in sounds in his environment. Making fewer sounds and speaking fewer words than one's peers may also signal a problem. Parents and caregivers also can stay alert for abnormal sound qualities or distortion in children's voices. Additionally, if a child's words are difficult to decipher after he has reached about four years of age, this can be a sign of impairment.
One of the most common signs of speech impairment in children is a delay in beginning to speak. If a child has not begun speaking long after his peers have begun chattering away, this can be a sign of a problem. Likewise, if a child says some words but does not seem capable of speaking as many words as his peers, this may indicate an issue as well. It is important to note, however, that some children just begin to speak later than others or take longer to develop a wide vocabulary, so this is not always a sign of a problem. As such, parents are often advised to discuss their worries with a pediatrician rather than jumping to the conclusion that something is wrong.
In many cases, one of the earliest signs of speech impairment in children is the lack of producing sounds in response to the people or things around them. For instance, most children make cooing or squawking sounds before they reach a year old, and many begin to babble sounds that seem to resemble words, like mama and dada, even if they do not associate these words with their mothers or fathers. By about a year and three months old, many children are able to imitate at least some of the sounds they hear in their environments and say at least a couple of words. At two years of age, many children are able to make rather simple sentence constructions, and between the ages of two and three years old, vocabulary typically increases dramatically. The lack of such progression may indicate a speech impairment.
As a child grows older, the signs of speech impairment may include a voice that sounds strange or distorted. For example, it might have an odd quality or sound raspy. Parents and caregivers can also be alert for pitch abnormality when trying to detect speech difficulties. Likewise, if a child seems to speak much slower than normal, he may need evaluation. Leaving out certain letter sounds after three or four years of age can indicate an issue as well.
Some people worry about speech impairment in children when the words a child says are difficult to understand. To some extent, however, this is normal and not a cause for concern. Most children say things that are difficult to decipher until they are about four years old. If a child is older than four and most of his words are difficult for people outside his household to understand, this may indicate a need for a speech evaluation.
One of our editors will review your suggestion and make changes if warranted. Note that depending on the number of suggestions we receive, this can take anywhere from a few hours to a few days. Thank you for helping to improve wiseGEEK! | <urn:uuid:d94e5e1c-9fd2-4177-a0d3-9d9cf7e06a25> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-the-signs-of-a-speech-impairment-in-children.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397748.48/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00137-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980285 | 647 | 3.546875 | 4 |
ESCANABA - After months of work, the fifth grade science students from Escanaba Upper Elementary released the salmon fry they had raised from eggs into the Escanaba River Friday morning.
"They've done a great job. They really care about these salmon," said Escanaba Upper Elementary fifth grade teacher Traci Pinar.
The 65 students in Pinar's two science classes raised the fish as part of the Salmon in the Classroom program through Trout Unlimited and in partnership with the Department of Natural Resources and the Escanaba River Association.
Ilsa Matthes | Daily Press
James Cantrill, vice president for the Fred Waara Chapter of Trout Unlimited, helps students put the fry into plastic bags so they can be transported to the water’s edge.
Ilsa Matthes | Daily Press
Students from Escanaba Upper Elementary examine insects collected from the water before releasing the salmon that they raised at school into the Escanaba River Friday. The waterborne insects will provide food for the small fish.
"It's a great way to teach conservation to kids and the life-cycle of the fish," said James Cantrill, vice president of the Fred Waara chapter of Trout Unlimited.
The Fred Waara chapter of Trout Unlimited, which is located in Marquette, works with seven schools - including Escanaba Upper Elementary - to bring the cold water fish into the classroom.
"We think we have the largest Salmon in the Classroom program in the United States, and we will purchase all the equipment and everything - huge aquariums that we put into elementary schools, middle schools, that type of thing," said Cantrill.
The DNR provided the students at Escanaba Upper Elementary with 200 eggs in November. Of those eggs, roughly half grew into fish that survived to be released into the river.
"Last year we had like 160 - it was a really good year - but this year we had what they call EMS, early mortality syndrome, all across everybody that got their eggs," explained Pinar. "They say you could lose up to like 75 percent of our population with that, so we were really worried because we had a huge die off."
All of the students were taught the skills necessary to raise the fish from eggs to fry that could be released into the wild. The students were then broken into groups and each group was given a week to tend to the needs of the young fish.
"They actually change the water, they're feeding everyday, they're taking the measurements of the alkalinity and the pH, nitrates, nitrites - all that stuff," said Pinar.
While all the students enjoyed releasing the fish, some enjoyed the other tasks necessary to raise the fish even more. For fifth grader Courtney Johnson, cleaning the tank was the best part of the project.
"It was really cool because a lot of the other kids didn't know how to do it so then I would always have to go up with them. I don't know I guess it was just really fun," said Johnson, adding that releasing the fish was her second favorite part of the program.
Each student took time to name the fish they were releasing into the wild before saying their last goodbyes.
"We had five, we had five children. We had George; George Sr.; George Jr.; Georgina, and Erin," said student Erin Davidson.
Because salmon that are not hatched in captivity return to the location where they hatched to spawn and these fish cannot return to the classroom, the fish who survive to spawning age will need to find their own places to mate and lay eggs.
"These fish, the ones that will make it out to (Lake) Michigan, they will probably find someplace, because that spawning urge is pretty strong. So they will find tributaries - maybe it's the Escanaba, maybe it's some of these others - and they will start doing it," said Cantrill.
While neither Trout Unlimited nor the DNR track the fish to see if they return to the Escanaba River or if they chose other spawning locations, with any luck the students' hard work will pave the way for future generations of salmon fry.
"(The students are) awesome. They've done more than I ever thought fifth graders could do, and this is our third year doing it," said Pinar. | <urn:uuid:e4d4e79d-0c47-4c51-a302-26b0258e5f2d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://dailypress.net/page/content.detail/id/547418/New-Arrivals.html?nav=5003 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399117.38/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00107-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978772 | 897 | 2.71875 | 3 |
Core Knowledge got its start from E.D. Hirsch’s years teaching literary theory as an English professor, he writes in How Two Poems Helped Launch a School Reform Movement in The Atlantic. He discovered the importance of background knowledge when he looked at ways to improve college students’ writing.
When the topic was familiar to readers, you could measure the benefits of good writing (and the problems caused by bad writing) quite consistently. But the time and effort it takes to understand a text on an unfamiliar topic completely overwhelms the effects of writing quality.
At a Richmond community college, students couldn’t read or write clearly because they lacked a base of knowledge, Hirsch writes.
These students, primarily from disadvantaged backgrounds, could easily read a text on “Why I like my roommate.” But even after controlling for vocabulary level and syntax, they could not easily read about Lee’s surrender to Grant. These Richmond students, surrounded by Civil War mementos on Monument Avenue, were clueless about the Civil War. Their lack of knowledge was the reason they were unable to read well about anything beyond the most banal topics.
Researchers have found that “relevant prior knowledge — information already stored in one’s long-term memory — is the single most important factor in reading comprehension,” Hirsch writes.
Schools talk about “grade level” reading skills. This makes sense for decoding skills, but not reading comprehension, Hirsch argues. Students can comprehend a reading passage if the content is familiar, but struggle if it’s unfamiliar. ”
For understanding a text, strategies help a little, and knowledge helps a lot,” Hirsch concludes. | <urn:uuid:c1001dde-609d-4b4e-b4fd-05b4d68ef4a3> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.joannejacobs.com/2013/04/reading-writing-and-knowing/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783408840.13/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155008-00049-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946639 | 352 | 3.484375 | 3 |
James Hope, a 17 year old male from Gloucester asks on April 17, 2004,Last year in school we learned about nuclear decay, and how some atoms decay by releasing gamma rays, which have enough energy to cause damage to flesh. We were also taught that several inches of lead will make a gamma ray harmless. However, in order to make it harmless surely the energy of the gamma ray must decrease, and according to E=hf, this means the frequency must therefore become less. Is this right? Because it seems odd that by putting the right amount of lead in the way you can change the frequency of the gamma rays and have visible light coming out the other side.
viewed 15011 times
Indeed, the process of stopping a gamma photon in lead (or any shielding material) is often a case of decreasing its energy, or increasing its wavelength, in successive steps until it is wholly absorbed. The major interaction for this energy reduction is inelastic (Compton) scattering of atomic electrons.
It is true, therefore, that a gamma photon could be converted to other, lower-energy, types of photons in this manner. It may even become a photon of visible light, and, if the shielding material were transparent to light (which lead isn't!), or if this happened at the surface, such a photon could then emanate from the material.
However, what is more likely to occur is the gamma photon reaching a lower energy whereby it could excite a number of low-orbit electrons and thus become wholly absorbed (the "photo-electric effect"; sort of the reverse of x-ray production). Furthermore, should a lucky gamma photon survive this energy regime there are a host of other photon-matter interactions at lower energies, which would reduce the chances of further survival down to the energy range of visible light. But it's not impossible.
Note: All submissions are moderated prior to posting.
If you found this answer useful, please consider making a small donation to science.ca. | <urn:uuid:b05ca9b5-d05c-44b4-8a1a-9edac893a3be> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.science.ca/askascientist/viewquestion.php?qID=2052&-table=activities&-action=list&-cursor=0&-skip=0&-limit=30&-mode=list&-lang=en | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783391519.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154951-00040-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965786 | 408 | 3.71875 | 4 |
Find information on common issues.
Ask questions and find answers from other users.
Suggest a new site feature or improvement.
Check on status of your tickets.
Resonant tunneling diode (RTD) is a diode with a resonant tunneling structure in which electrons can tunnel through some resonant states at certain energy levels. The current–voltage characteristic often exhibits negative differential resistance regions.
Learn more about quantum dots from the many resources on this site, listed below. More information on RTD can be found here.
Piece-Wise Constant Potential Barrier Tool MATLAB Code
19 Jun 2010 | Downloads | Contributor(s): Dragica Vasileska, Gerhard Klimeck
this is the MATLAB code of the PCPBT in the effective mass approximation. | <urn:uuid:2e3ac9f9-43b3-4ff7-862a-d00c24c18b81> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | https://nanohub.org/tags/resonanttunnelingdiodes/downloads?sort=date | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398516.82/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00054-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.832474 | 165 | 2.5625 | 3 |
Alzheimer's: Revolutionizing Diagnosis and Treatment
A new diagnostic tool, called amyloid imaging, which uses an FDA-approved agent called Amyvid to bind to abnormal proteins in the brain, is allowing physicians, for the first time ever, to diagnose Alzheimer's Disease definitively. This screening tool could also provide researchers with the insight they need to one day prevent Alzheimer's Disease.
It is generally accepted that treatments for Alzheimer's Disease, the seventh leading cause of death in the U.S., will be much more effective if introduced prior to the onset of symptoms and before significant brain destruction occurs. However, until now researchers could not study treatments to prevent Alzheimer's Disease because they had no way of knowing who would develop it.
Learn more about Amyloid Imaging and how it works in the video below:
Views or opinions presented in this video are solely those of the physician(s) or presenter(s) and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of Memorial Hermann Health System. This video is presented to the public for educational purposes only and Memorial Hermann Health System is not responsible for its content. Patients should consult a physician regarding the diagnosis and treatment of any medical condition.
Learn more about the future medications being developed to treat Alzheimer's at the Alzheimer's Association web site. | <urn:uuid:ee10e3a7-3b0f-43df-ae93-97874693a2a9> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://neuro.memorialhermann.org/conditions-treatments/alzheimer-s--revolutionizing-diagnosis-and-treatment/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399117.38/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00118-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940327 | 265 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Details about Using SPSS for Social Statistics and Research Methods:
Ideal as a companion to a statistics or research methods text or as a stand-alone guide, Using SPSS for Social Statistics and Research Methods shows readers how to use SPSS software in statistical data analysis. This fully updated Second Edition features images and directions drawn from SPSS Version 17.0 and now uses the latest version of the GSS (General Social Survey) as a secondary data set.
New and Continuing Features
Offers a fully updated graphics chapter that highlights new features available in SPSS 17.0, including information on alternative routes to creating graphics Includes updated examples, screenshots, and tables throughout Briefly introduces statistical techniques before moving on to demonstrations Offers new or expanded discussions of regression, correlation, t-test, chi-square, lambda, gamma/somers' d, and ANOVA Uses several kinds of computer files including data files, output files, and syntax files Covers a wide range of data analysis topics to help students who are working independently on a research proposal, project, or paper This supplementary text is designed as a manual for SPSS use for social statistics and research methods classes and is an excellent companion to any undergraduate statistics or research methods textbook. It will also serve as a useful reference for those learning to use the SPSS software for the first time.
Back to top
Rent Using SPSS for Social Statistics and Research Methods 2nd edition today, or search our site for other textbooks by William E. Wagner. Every textbook comes with a 21-day "Any Reason" guarantee. Published by Sage Publications, Inc.
Need help ASAP? We have you covered with 24/7 instant online tutoring. Connect with one of our Statistics tutors now. | <urn:uuid:e77c659d-0a08-4c34-8b9b-584823a47071> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.chegg.com/textbooks/using-spss-for-social-statistics-and-research-methods-2nd-edition-9781412973335-1412973333 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397749.89/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00007-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.887501 | 363 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Patients no longer take only one or two medications prescribed by and known to their primary physician. A patient’s regime may encompass multiple medications that include over-the-counter, herbal supplements, and nutraceuticals, along with myriad prescription medications, many of which may be unknown to several of the patient’s prescribing physicians and could result in dangerous interactions when combined.
Medication safety is a critical component of safe patient care, whether it is general medication knowledge or a provider’s awareness of all medications that a patient is taking.
The Institute of Medicine studied the prevalence of medication errors and found that they are surprisingly common and costly. When all types of errors are taken into account, a hospital patient can expect on average to be subjected to more than one medication error each day. One study estimated 450,000 preventable adverse drug events (ADEs) in hospitals each year, and another found that among outpatient Medicare patients there are about 530,000 preventable ADEs each year.
These medication errors are undoubtedly costly. In the Medicare group, one study found that the annual cost of treating ADEs was $887 million.1 The Joint Commission’s sentinel event database has over 350 medication errors resulting in death or major injury.2 The most common causes of errors involved medication management and medication reconciliation. A majority of medication reconciliation errors resulted from an improper dose or quantity, followed by omission error and prescribing error.3
Improving Medication Safety
Both The Joint Commission and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) are focusing on improving medication systems across the continuum of healthcare. The IHI has challenged healthcare organizations and practitioners to make changes to improve four fundamental areas in parallel:
- Culture: Develop a culture of safety where staff and leaders are committed to safety and staff are safety conscious and freely report concerns.
- High-Hazard Medications: Decrease risk of harm from those medications known to cause the most severe adverse drug events.
- Core Medication Processes: Improve processes for ordering, dispensing, and administering medications.
- Reconciliation: Ensure that medication information is reconciled at transition points.4
The Joint Commission’s 2011 National Patient Safety Goals for Ambulatory Care addressed medication safety for the ambulatory clinical setting. “Medications,” for purposes of the goal in the outpatient setting, would include any prescription medication, over-the-counter, herbal, sample, vitamins, nutraceutical, vaccines, parenteral nutrition, and any product designated by the Food and Drug Administration as a drug.5 (The 2011 National Patient Safety Goals and Implementation Expectations for Ambulatory Care can be accessed in The Joint Commission’s E-dition at: https://e-dition.jcrinc.com.)
The Joint Commission’s goal is:
Goal 03.06.01: Improve the safety of using medications.
Appropriate Medication Management
As medications are commonly a part of the patient’s treatment plan, appropriate management is vital to patient safety. Development of standardized systems to ensure safe retrieval and preparation that address similar medications, or “look-alike/sound-alike” medications, and labeling have shown to decrease error and improve outcomes.6
Maintaining look-alike and sound-alike medications or medications of multiple concentrations in the same area can result in a patient receiving an incorrect medication. The following case illustrates what can happen if “look-alike” medications are stored in the same place:
The patient with a history of elevated intraocular pressure presents to his physician. The patient is prepared for Schiotz tonometry. The physician, who is running 30 minutes behind schedule, reaches into the supply cabinet drawer for the topical anesthetic but instead picks up the hemoccult developer, which is stored in the same drawer. It is dispensed in a small plastic squeeze bottle that is similar to the topical anesthetic. The hemoccult developer is applied to the patient’s eyes, and it produces an immediate and intense pain. The physician, realizing the error, quickly irrigates the patient’s eyes and sends him to the emergency room. Because the squeeze bottles look very similar, the physician did not notice that the bottle he picked up was not the topical anesthetic.
Providers should review all medications in the clinic—both routine and sample medications—for look-alike and sound-alike products and standardize and limit the number of medications and concentrations that will be available in the clinic or surgery center. Maintain a list of approved medications and review it yearly to ensure that only those medications on the list are present. Yearly review will also update the physician on new medications available for patient use.
Safe medication practices in labeling all medications, containers, and solutions on and off the sterile field will affect not only outpatient surgery centers but also clinics with minor surgery procedure rooms and general examination rooms. The purpose of this requirement is to ensure that the patient does not receive an incorrect medication or solution because the person administering it was unaware of the container’s actual contents. An example of this is when one person draws a syringe of medication or prepares a solution but another person administers the medication or utilizes the solution.
Consider the 44-year-old, ASA Class II patient scheduled for pain management injection therapy in the physician’s clinic surgical suite. Conscious sedation is provided by a registered nurse under the supervision of the physician. After IV access is obtained, the nurse prepares a syringe of Versed for sedation, plus a 20 cc syringe of saline to serve as a “flush” after administration of the Versed. The physician prepares another 20 cc syringe with lidocaine for the injection. Both syringes are placed on a tray in the surgical field but not labeled. The nurse administers the lidocaine intravenously instead of the saline, resulting in ventricular tachycardia. The patient is admitted post-resuscitation and sustains permanent cardiac impairment due to the effects of the lidocaine.
Labeling is to occur when a medication or solution is transferred from the original packaging to another container, for example, into a syringe. Include the drug name, strength, amount, expiration date when not used within 24 hours, and expiration time when expiration occurs in less than 24 hours on the label.7 Verify all labels verbally and visually by two qualified individuals when the person preparing the medication is not the person administering the medication.
Label only one medication or solution at any time. Discard any unlabeled medications or solutions immediately. Maintain original containers for reference until conclusion of the procedure.
Multidose Medication Vials
Multidose vials present both an infection control and an efficacy concern. Medications can lose effectiveness and multiple punctures may introduce bacteria if used beyond 28 days. All medications should be stored with an expiration date, the last date the product is to be used if it has not been opened. If the product has been opened, a revised expiration date needs to be marked clearly on the vial. The U.S. Pharmacopeia and the Association for Professionals in Infection Control, recommend that open vials be used within 28 days of opening, unless otherwise specified by the manufacturer. Conversely, if the manufacturer has specified an earlier expiration date, that date must be respected. If any question arises as to the sterility of the vial, it should be discarded immediately. It may be beneficial to assign a clinical staff member the responsibility of monitoring medication vials for date and expiration. Properly dispose of expired medications as identified by the manufacturer, local pharmacy, local hospital pharmacy, or local department of health and environment.
Medications should be stored at the appropriate temperature to maintain efficacy. There are reliable alarming and recording thermometers readily available. Also, wireless thermometers are available that send updates to a central computer. Other options such as min/max thermometers should also be considered. Using the “penny in the cup” method* does not provide adequate monitoring due to differences in appropriate temperatures or refrigerator construction. In addition, without the use of continuous monitoring, there is no way to tell how long the temperature was out of standards. In addition to monitoring the unit’s temperature, procedures should be in place for taking action if the temperature range is found to be out of compliance.
*The “penny in a cup” method is used by some organizations to monitor freezer temperature. A penny is placed on top of a small cup of frozen water and kept in the freezer compartment, with the idea that, as long as the ice remains frozen, the freezer unit has remained within an acceptable temperature range.
Another major area for patient risk is medication error during transitions in care, also known as handoffs. This occurs whether it is a new patient coming to a clinic for the first time, transferring care to another provider, or admitting the patient to the hospital. Development, reconciliation, and communication of an accurate medication list throughout the continuum of care are essential steps to reduce transition-related adverse drug events.8 Reconciliation avoids medication errors such as omissions, duplications, dosing errors, or drug interactions and improves medication safety.9 The continuum of care includes any change in setting, service, practitioner, or level of care.
The medication reconciliation process has five steps:
- Develop a list of current medications the patient is taking.
- Develop a list of medications to be prescribed, if applicable.
- Compare the medications on the two lists.
- Make clinical decisions based on the comparison.
- Communicate the new list to appropriate caregivers and to the patient.10
Physicians should obtain and document a complete list of the patient’s current medications at the initial appointment. Instruct the patient to bring a list of current medications to the first visit, including the name of the medication and its dose, route, frequency, and purpose. Ask the patient to bring in all medication containers, if possible, to ensure accuracy of the list. Review the list with the patient to verify that all medications continue to be taken at the time of the appointment. As noted previously, medications include prescription, over-the-counter medications, and herbal supplements.
The medication list, or reconciling form, is not intended to be a patient’s entire lifetime medication history. Rather, it is a list of only those medications the patient is taking at the time. A nurse or physician can complete the list, and no specific form is required or necessary. The critical points to document are the medication name and its dose, route, frequency, and purpose. Include the patient’s allergies or sensitivities as another patient safety measure. Utilize this reconciling form when prescribing new medications or treatment orders for the patient.
When a patient is referred to another practitioner, level of care, or service, such as diagnostic testing, forward a copy of the reconciling form to the next provider of service. If the patient is to return for further care, reconcile any newly ordered medications or those administered by the referring practitioner within a specified time frame that is consistent with the anticipated follow-up activities.
Physicians should place the reconciling form in a consistent, highly visible location in the patient’s medical record. A copy should be provided to the patient after the initial visit and whenever there has been a change, whether it is a new medication ordered or a medication discontinued.
The process for reconciling medications in outpatient settings (including the emergency department for patients who are not admitted) is a bit different from the process for inpatient transitions.
Once a medication list is completed at the end of the outpatient visit, a clinician needs to verify two questions:
- Based on what occurred in the visit, should any medication that the patient was taking or receiving prior to the visit be discontinued, altered, or held pending consultation with the prescriber?
- Have any new prescriptions been added today?
These questions should be reviewed by the physician who completed the procedure (when one occurs) or by the physician who evaluated and treated the patient:
- If the answer to both questions is “no,” the process is complete.
- If the answer to either question is “yes,” the patient needs to receive clear instructions about what to do—all changes, holds, and discontinuations of medications should be specifically noted. Include any follow-up required, such as calling or making appointments with other practitioners, and a time frame for doing so.
When patients are recurring outpatients, a medication list can be kept on file rather than re-created on every visit. Each time the patient comes for a visit, the list should be re-verified for any additions, deletions, or changes to medications, doses, frequencies, routes, and alterations from original prescription or instructions.11
Medication reconciliation is not necessary under all circumstances, as when a patient is referred for non-contrast radiologic procedures or for laboratory venipuncture. However, when a patient is referred to radiology where IV conscious sedation or contrast agents are to be administered, a list of medications is to be forwarded and reviewed by either a pharmacist or physician who is physically present at the patient’s side and can complete the medication review.
Under the following conditions, a discharge reconciliation or communication of the list of the patient’s current medications is not necessary:
- When the encounter is a brief outpatient encounter.
- When the medications administered act locally with negligible system effect.
- When the medications are administered under the direct control of a licensed independent practitioner or reviewed by a pharmacist prior to administration.
- In situations where no other medications are used during the encounter.
- When no new medications are prescribed for or provided to the patient for use after discharge.
- If there are no changes to the patient’s current medications.
- When any provider of care to whom the patient is being referred already has the patient’s current medication information.
For patients who are seen frequently, such as diabetics or prenatal checks, obtain a complete list at the initial visit and update the list when new medications are ordered.
Patient Safety Recommendations
The following additional recommendations are provided to improve safe medication use in the outpatient clinic setting:
- Obtain a medication history and enter it into the chart. Include prescription medication, over-the-counter medications, vitamins, herbal products, dietary supplements, alternative medicine, and homeopathic medications.
- Have staff update this list at each patient encounter.
- Provide the patient with an up-to-date list at the end of each encounter.
- When telephoning prescription orders, inform the pharmacy about the patient’s co-morbid conditions, allergies, weight, date of birth, and the indication for use.
- Prepare a prescription label for medication samples for the patient to take home each time a sample is given.
- Provide medication counseling to the patient/caregiver through a medium that he or she can understand.
- Do not store drugs (sample medications or clinic medications) that look alike or sound alike adjacent to each other. Drugs with different concentrations or routes should not be stored adjacent to each other.
- Secure all medications that are in the clinic, whether routine or sample medications, in lockable closets or cabinets to prevent unauthorized access by patients or visitors. Controlled substances should be maintained in double-locked locations and counted daily whenever patients are present to ensure all narcotics are there.
- Review all medications at least monthly for their expiration dates. Dispose of outdated medications properly. Assign a clinical person to review all medications and rotate the task to ensure compliance.
- Document all medications administered to the patient during the clinic visit, including vaccines and sample medications. Ask the patient about medication allergies or sensitivities to substances at each visit or at least yearly, and document the information on the medication form for easy access.
- Provide education to the patient on the medications he or she is taking and any potential interactions, such as with herbal and nutritional substances. Also include signs and symptoms of untoward reaction with instructions to call the clinic for further care. Involving the patient as an active participant in his or her own medication knowledge is a critical aspect of medication safety.
1. Committee on Identifying and Preventing Medication Errors: Incidence and Cost. In: Aspden P, Wolcott JA, Bootman JL, Cronenwett LR, eds. Preventing Medication Errors: Quality Chasm Series. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press; July 2006:105–142.
2. Sentinel Event Alert: Using Medication Reconciliation to Prevent Errors. Journal on Quality and Patient Safety [serial online]. 2006;32(4):230–232. Available from: Joint Commission Resources, Oakbrook Terrace, IL. Accessed February 15, 2007.
4. Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Topics: Patient Safety: Medication Systems: How to Improve page. Available at: www.ihi.org/IHI/Topics/PatientSafety/MedicationSystems/HowToImprove/. Accessed February 14, 2007.
5. The Joint Commission. E-edition. Glossary: Medication. https://e-dition.jcrinc.com. Accessed July 6, 2011.
6. The Joint Commission. E-edition. Medication Management Standards. https://e-dition.jcrinc.com. Accessed July 6, 2011.
8. The Joint Commission. Sentinel Event: Sentinel Event Alert: sea_35 page. Available at: www.jointcommission.org/assets/1/18/SEA_35.pdf. Accessed July 6, 2011.
11. Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Topics: Patient Safety Medication Systems: Changes: Reconcile Medications at All Transition Points: Reconcile Medications in Outpatient Settings. Available at: www.ihi.org/IHI/Topics/PatientSafety/MedicationSystems/Changes/IndividualChanges/ReconcileMedicationsinOutpatientSettings.htm. Accessed February 14, 2007.
By Susan Shepard, MSN, RN, Director, Patient Safety Education.
The guidelines suggested here are not rules, do not constitute legal advice, and do not ensure a successful outcome. The ultimate decision regarding the appropriateness of any treatment must be made by each healthcare provider in light of all circumstances prevailing in the individual situation and in accordance with the laws of the jurisdiction in which the care is rendered. | <urn:uuid:4e4c8036-3108-4cbd-bf6e-16a6f75cbf36> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.thedoctors.com/KnowledgeCenter/PatientSafety/articles/CON_ID_002123 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395621.98/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00174-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905529 | 3,824 | 2.859375 | 3 |
Oklahoma Prison Riot Remembered
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — It's been 40 years since inmates rioted at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary at McAlester — one of the most destructive prison riots in American history. The prison erupted into violence on July 27, 1973, the result of overcrowding, inadequate supervision, poor health care and a culture of violence within the prison walls. When rioting ended three days later, three inmates had been killed by other inmates, more than 20 correctional officers and inmates were injured and a dozen buildings had burned to the ground. The prison was eventually rebuilt as a maximum security prison. Jerry Massie, public information officer for the Department of Corrections, says the riot forced state leaders and correctional officials to change the way the state's prisons operated. Training improved for correctional officers and other prison staffers. Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. | <urn:uuid:c6fac24d-04d8-4cff-bc67-e284c940c6c3> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://publicradiotulsa.org/post/oklahoma-prison-riot-remembered | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394987.40/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00048-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970277 | 177 | 2.5625 | 3 |
PUBLIC HEALTH ASSESSMENT
ANNIE CREEK MINE TAILINGS
LEADE, LAWRENCE COUNTY, SOUTH DAKOTA
The Annie Creek Mine Tailings Site is located about 3.5 miles west of the town of Lead in theBlack Hills region of South Dakota. The site includes an area once known as Reliance Tailingsand areas along Annie and Spearfish Creek, where sedimentation of mine tailings have occurred. Mine tailings were deposited at the headwaters of Annie Creek as a result of gold miningactivities that occurred from 1907 to 1916. Arsenic and other heavy metals were released intoAnnie Creek as a result of a crib dam failure which retained the tailings at the old Reliance Mine.
The primary contaminant of concern is arsenic. Arsenic contamination has been detected insurface water, groundwater, alluvial soils, stream bed sediments and biota. The potential existsthat vacationers and seasonal residents may be occasionally exposed to arsenic through ingestionof surface water and groundwater or by incidental ingestion of contaminated sediments from thestream beds of Annie and Spearfish Creek. ATSDR has concluded that Annie Creek MineTailings presents a no apparent public health hazard since the available data do not indicate thatthe occasional exposures to site contamination are occurring at concentrations that would be expected to produce adverse health effects.
Area residents expressed concern about the impact of releases of arsenic from the site on 1) thequality of the Spearfish municipal water supply 2) the quality of game fish in Spearfish Creekand 3) the potential for arsenic to migrate from Annie Creek and Spearfish Creek into waterwells located at residences along the two streams.
Information collected during preparation of the public health assessment indicated that theSpearfish municipal water supply is not impacted by the contamination in Annie Creek. Themunicipal water supply is not obtained from Spearfish Creek.
Arsenic was detected in two species of fish, the trout (Spearfish Creek) and the mountain sucker(Annie Creek). Although arsenic was detected in an edible species of fish, the brown and brooktrout, the levels detected would not be associated with any adverse health effects for therecreational consumer.
Arsenic was detected in the groundwater and in the surface water of Annie Creek. The wells atresidences around Annie and Spearfish Creek were not used for drinking water. If thegroundwater or surface water was ingested by a vacationers or seasonal residents at the reportedconcentrations, no adverse health are expected to occur.
There have been no adverse health effects reported by area residents or public health officialsconcerning exposure to arsenic contamination at the Annie Creek Mine Tailings Site.
In 1989, Wharf Resources built a waste rubble facility in the upper reaches of the Annie Creekdrainage to stabilize the original Reliance Tailings pile. A non-time critical removal action wasimplemented for Annie Creek Mine Tailings. The removal action included: covering exposedareas of arsenic-contaminated tailings with clean soil; drainage controls to divert surface waterrunoff; institutional controls which included deed (residential use) and access restrictions;surface and groundwater monitoring; and public information programs to address potentialhuman risk posed by the site. These actions will reduce the impact of the Reliance Tailings onAnnie and Spearfish Creek. ATSDR recommends no further action for the Annie Creek MineTailings Site.
The Annie Creek Mine Tailings Site (Old Reliance Tailings) is located about 3.5 miles west ofthe town of Lead, Lawrence County, South Dakota, about 4 miles west of the Terry Creek Roadturnoff from Federal Route 85. Access to the old tailings is limited by an 8-foot wire meshfence, gates, a security guard, and a cover of waste rock. The waste rock cover ranges from 60 to 150 feet over a large portion of the old Reliance Tailings.
The mine tailings dispersed along Annie Creek are the result of mining and milling activities thattook place between 1907-1916. The tailings cover a 5 acre area deposited at the headwaters(upper 1/4 mile) of the Annie Creek. The old tailings (Old Reliance Tailings) were producedduring gold mining activities that occurred from 1907 to 1916 at the site. Wharf Resourcescurrently operates two open pits (Annie Creek Mine and Foley Ridge/Annie Arm Mine), an orecrusher, four cyanide leaching pads, and a processing facility near the Annie Creek which are not part of the site.
Wharf Resources installed a french drain partially through the old tailings to divert spring waterfrom contacting the tailings. Additional lateral drains were installed to divert water percolatingthrough the waste rubble facility around the tailings. The Old Reliance Tailings are now coveredby about 60 to 150 feet of waste rock deposited as a result of current activities on the site. Topsoil and grass have been placed over the waste rock and old tailings to minimize erosion. The waste rubble facility was permitted under the state. Waste rock is continuing to be depositedas part of the active mining operation under a State mining permit. A history of operations and site related activities are presented in Table 1.
|Gold ore was processed at the site using a cyanide leachingmethod.|
No mining activities were conducted at the site.
The US Geological Survey monitored water quality in SpearfishCreek.
Wharf Resources began operating a gold recovery facility at thesite. The facility is currently active.
Wharf Resources monitored surface water quality in Annie Creekdownstream from the tailings pile.
Wharf Resources monitored water quality in Annie springs at thesite.
SDDENR submitted a Preliminary Assessment of the site to U.S.EPA Region VIII Office in Denver, Colorado.
An EPA Field Investigation Team monitored the tailings, surfacewater, sediment, and groundwater in the vicinity of the site.
Wharf Resources monitored fish tissue in Annie Creek andSpearfish Creek.
EPA evaluated the site under the Superfund Hazard RankingSystem (1).
The site was proposed for the Superfund National Priorities List.
A site visit was conducted by Joe Hughart, Environmental Health Specialist, Tina Forrester,Toxicologist, and Susan Muza, Regional Representative on October 15-18, 1991. Site data inState and County government files were reviewed. ATSDR representatives met with personnelfrom the South Dakota Department of Environmental and Natural Resources (SDDENR) and theSouth Dakota Department of Health (SDDOH). County health nurses, local physicians, and theSpearfish Canyon Homeowners Association were also contacted. A tour of the Wharf ResourcesMine was conducted by the mine operator. Annie Creek was observed from the WharfResources property boundary to the confluence with Spearfish Creek.
It was observed during the site visit that:
|-||Direct contact with the tailings at the headwaters of Annie Creek is unlikely since the site is in an isolated location and the Reliance Tailings are currently under 50-160 feet of waste rock.||-||Most of the residences along Annie and Spearfish Creek are seasonal vacation homes.|
The Annie Creek Mine Tailing Site is located in Lawrence County. Ninety percent of theresidents of Lawrence County are white, 1% are Hispanic, and the remaining population belongto other ethnic groups. There are fewer residents below 18 years of age in Lawrence County,compared to the state population, and slightly more residents are 18 to 64 years old. Thepercentage of residents over 65 years of age is comparable to the state average. Ten percent ofthe families in Lawrence County live below the poverty level. The per capita income ofLawrence County residents slightly exceeds the state per capita income. Over 75% of LawrenceCounty residents are high school graduates, and about 13% have 4 or more years of college (2).
There are 20 homes located along the Annie Creek and Spearfish Creek (near its confluence withAnnie Creek). Fifteen residences are vacation homes with limited annual occupance, three arepermanent residences, and two are summer homes. The number of occupants of these residencesare unknown. One permanent residence is located on Spearfish Creek, upstream from theconfluence with Annie Creek. Two other residences are located one mile from the confluence onSpearfish Creek. The only residence in the Annie Creek drainage is the Kannenberg cabin whichis used as a vacation home. This cabin is located 3/4 miles from the site. A commercial districtis located in Lead, about 3.5 miles east of the site. Terry Peak Ski Resort is located one mile south of the site (3).
The primary industry in the immediate vicinity of the site is mining (about 44% of the work forceare employed as miners). The closest mines beyond the site are located about 1.2 milesnortheast. About 17% of the work force are employed in professional services, 2% are employedin construction, and 4% in manufacturing (4). Less than 1% of the work force are employed inagriculture. There are no farms in the immediate vicinity of the site. A fish hatchery is located at Spearfish, about 12 miles downstream from the site.
The closest health care facilities are located in Lead, about 3.5 miles east of the site. The closestschool to the site is a high school in Lead, located about 4.2 miles east of the site. Elementaryschools are located about 4.7 miles east of the site. Solid waste from several other mines arepresent in the Spearfish Creek watershed. There are no records of releases of hazardoussubstances in Lead or in Spearfish in the EPA Toxic Release Inventory database.
Natural Resource Use
Groundwater is used as a source of drinking water for Wharf Resources. The on-site well is 360feet deep and draws water from the Pasahapa Limestone, the Englewood Formation (limestone),and the Whitewood Formation (dolomite). Depth to the saturated zone in this well is 288 feet. Rocks in the vicinity of the site consist of fractured Tertiary igneous intrusives andMississippian-age limestones. The limestone formations lie along the flanks of the Black HillsUplift, the core of which consists of igneous intrusive rocks. The igneous rocks generally do notyield sufficient water to function as aquifers. Some water wells in the area draw water from thelimestones. Limestone wells in the area generally yield 5 to 100 gallons per minute, withmaximum yields of about 4,000 gallons per minute. The saturated zone in limestone wells isusually located 100 to 300 feet below ground surface (5).
Springs forming Annie Creek are located along the flanks of the tailings pile. Annie Creekdischarges into Spearfish Creek about 2 miles southwest of the waste rubble facility. SpearfishCreek provides recharge to water wells completed into alluvium. Soil on the Reliance Tailingsite consists of mining spoil and colluvium. The soil is not used for farming in the area.
Thirteen residences have groundwater wells. Most wells are shallow (10-50 feet) and areprobably completed in the alluvium. Only one residence uses surface water for householdpurposes (toilets, washing dishes, but not drinking water).
The area around Annie and Spearfish Creek are primarily used for recreational activities. Recreational use is limited to summer months and activities include hiking, fishing and hunting. No residents use Annie Creek for fishing, only a few use the area for hiking. The area ofSpearfish Creek near Annie Creek is used for recreational purposes only. An annual motorcyclerally is held in Sturgis, South Dakota, and people camp along Spearfish Creek during that period. The rally is usually held during the first week of August. The Terry Peak ski slopes and lodgeare located about 1 mile south of the site.
Trout fishing is popular in streams below the site. The State of South Dakota has designatedAnnie Creek as a cold water marginal stream for trout. The annual fish harvest for Annie Creekis about 65.0 lbs/acre. Spearfish Creek has been designated by the state as a cold water stream,excellent for trout, approved for immersion and limited contact recreation. The annual fish harvest for Spearfish Creek is about 200 lbs/year.
Government agencies routinely collect information on the health of the population within theirboundaries. Using state health data bases it may be possible to determine whether certain healtheffects occur at a higher rate than expected in a given area. The State does not maintain chronicdisease registries (i.e cancer or birth defect registries). Local physicians interviewed by ATSDRreported no diseases or symptoms that could be positively associated with exposure to arsenic inthe environment in the vicinity of the site. The physicians did report that occupational healthstudies had been conducted on workers at a mine near Deadwood for chronic obstructivepulmonary disease and lung cancer (6,7).
ATSDR contacted the SDDENR, SDDOH, and a member of the Spearfish Canyon HomeownersAssociation to determine if local residents have health concerns about the site. The followingconcerns were reported to ATSDR:
- Citizens were concerned about the impact of mine tailings from Annie Creek on the municipal water supply.
- Citizens were concerned that residential wells that draw water from the alluvial aquifer along Spearfish Creek were impacted by tailings from Annie Creek.
- Citizens were concerned that the trout that inhabit Annie and Spearfish Creek were contaminated.
There were no symptoms or illnesses reported as community health concerns in relation toreleases of heavy metals into the environment at the Annie Creek (Reliance) Mine Site.
ATSDR will address these concerns in detail in the Public Health Implications section of this public health assessment. | <urn:uuid:44e11103-ab87-49c9-afa1-5ad651fd3b13> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/HAC/pha/pha.asp?docid=1067&pg=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397111.67/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00049-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950141 | 2,862 | 3.15625 | 3 |
Strobe Exposures in Underwater Photography
In Vol. 1 we talked about the basics of ambient light photography, as the first step in mastering wide-angle underwater photography. We discussed how we let light into the camera body with our shutter speed and aperture controls, and how we use our ISO control to set how sensitive the camera's sensor is to light. Basically your cameras main function is to keep light out, and you as a photographer have the job of letting light in using those three controls.
Adding artificial light, typically one strobe or multiple strobes, can give you much more creative control over your images, filling in shadows and adding back color that has been absorbed by the water. When we combine both ambient and strobe light together we have a balanced light image. This is how the majority of wide angle underwater images are produced. But before we start with balanced light photography lets work on strobe lit only images.
Many of you may already be shooting images using only strobe light. Most macro images are just that, but we also need to be able to light wide angle images with just our strobes. There are times when no other light source is available such as in a cave or a shipwreck. When you learn what can and can't be lit properly with your strobes, you will have a much better understanding when it comes to balancing different light sources.
Airplane engine at Truk, Nkon D2X 10-17@12mm 1/200 f/8.0 ISO 100
Camera and Strobe Controls Underwater:
So what camera controls are available to us when we are lighting with just our strobes? Well we learned there are only three in vol. 1. Your ISO and aperture controls work exactly the same way but our shutter speed has no effect on our strobe exposure. That is because our strobes go off in a nano second! Actually I have no idea how fast a nano second is but like our strobes, it's fast. Our strobes turn on and turn off much faster than the fastest sync speed. In addition to the two camera controls we also have multiple power settings on most strobes and one other item that is not really a control at all, distance. A strobe can only expose one particular distance correctly at a time. In other words if you take a perfectly lit image and take the same image a foot closer without changing any other settings it will be over-exposed. Move further away and it will be under-exposed. The same is true for subject distance. If you are trying to light a sea fan with a diver next to it, the diver needs to be the same distance from the camera as the fan. If the diver is a few feet behind the fan, the diver will be under- exposed. It's true that different subjects will reflect light differently but this should give you the basic concept. So let's recap: we have ISO, aperture, strobe power, and distance to worry about. Only 4 controls, that shouldn't be too hard!
To review - we have 4 controls to worry about:
Distance from our strobe to the subject
Inside a Cave while diving Palau, Nikon N90 / film. The other diver is holding a slave strobe that my strobes set off. We had pre-arranged this before hand.
To TTL or not to TTL, that is the question:
In the days of film there was a sensor that calculated how much light was being reflected off the film itself. When the sensor received enough light it would shut off your strobe before it completed a full power dump. Most digital cameras calculate TTL in a different way often using pre flashes but the results are essentially the same. TTL works well in many normal lighting situations. But for many dramatic and balanced lighting situations, I would suggest using manual strobe settings. You can further tweak your TTL settings by adjusting the flash compensation control on your camera. Some strobe manufactures have TTL converters with compensation controls on them like the ones from Sea-n-Sea or the ones ikelite installs in their housings. Learning to shoot with manual strobe settings can only help you with your TTL shooting in the future. You will have a better understanding of what is and what is not possible.
Compressor, known as "R2D2" Nikon D2X, Tokina 10-17@13mm 1/125 f/4.0 ISO 100
Shooting Manual Strobes:
Using a hand held flash meter is great in a studio but not very practical underwater. So how do we decide on an f-stop, power setting and distance combination? We guesstimate. We used to use guide numbers back in the days when we used film and shot the same ISO all the time. Back then most strobes only had a few power settings. The guide number was provided by the manufacturer and represented how powerful the strobe output would be. The problem was not all guide numbers were created equal so many people set up test to come up with their own. Once you had a guide number you could divide that number by either the f-stop or the distance and get the corresponding figure. For example if I had a strobe with a guide number of 40 at ISO 100 and I was 5 feet away from my subject, I should shoot at f8. 40/5=8 The problem is that a guide number is for a given ISO and power setting. With multiple power settings and the ability to change ISO between shots, guide numbers just are not practical any more. It's much easier to get familiar with your strobe's power settings and check your LCD screen or histogram for exposure.
Strobe Exposure Exercise:
Here's a useful exercise that will help you get familiar with your strobe and camera settings:
Set up for wide angle photograpy, and set your ISO to 100 or 200. Set your shutter speed at the fastest sync speed (probably 1/250th on most dSLRs). Set your strobe on ½ power. I would start with one strobe and add a second when your comfortable with your results. Set your f-stop to f/8. Go down and find a nice big non-swimming subject like a sea fan. Start at about 3 to 4 feet away move forward or back until you get the perfect exposure. Once you do, go to the lowest and highest power settings and repeat the process. Then repeat the entire process at different f-stops. If you spend a couple of dives on this, you will be very familiar with your camera and strobe settings.
Truck, lying in deep water, well below 100ft.. Tokina 10-17@12mm 1/160 f/4.5 ISO 100
Aiming your Strobes:
There are a number of creative techniques such as backlighting, side-lighting, top-lighting, etc.
We will be covering those in later volumes of the “Shooters Toolbox”, but for now we are concerned about learning exposure, so we will start with forward edge lighting. The light comes out of our strobes in the shape of a cone. The exact shape and angle is going to depend on the brand and model. Most strobes suitable for wide angle have around a 90 degree or greater coverage. That's a pretty wide beam of light coming out of your strobe. It's been very popular to position the two strobes in the 10 and 2 position, aimed straight ahead or even slightly out. This technique works well in preventing backscatter but it often produces somewhat flat looking images. You need shadows to help create depth to your images. That being said, this is probably a good place to start when working on just exposure. Just know that when your shooting very close to your subject you will need to move the strobes in closer to the camera. As you back away from your subject you can spread your strobes out a bit.
Diffusers, Snoots and Gels:
There are a number of items that we can add to the front of our strobes. The most popular being diffusers. Just as the name implies they diffuse the light, spreading it out to a wider beam and softening the light creating less shadows. They also typically reduce the power by up to a full stop. Snoots do just the opposite. They narrow the beam and produce a very direct point of light. The exact shape and size of the light will very on the design of your snoot. Gels are used to change the color temperature of your strobes or for special effects. They also will cut the power output of your strobes.
Skull deep inside a wreck, 10-17@10mm 1/160 f/8.0 ISO 100. This skull was on the ceiling.
Coming soon in the next article:
In the third volume of “Shooters Toolbox”, we will be combining the techniques we talked about in both ambient and strobe lit photography. We will be creating balanced lit images and you should have a good understanding of basic lighting techniques. With that small set of skills you can go out and shoot just about anything. It works for macro, wide angle and everything in between. It's the basic knowledge you need to move on to other creative underwater photography techniques such as splits, motion blurs, and creative lighting. We will be covering those techniques and more in upcoming volumes. Feel free to contact me if there is anything in particular you would like covered.
Continue to part III: Balanced Light Exposures
Shooter's Toolbox Volume 1, Ambient light underwater photography,
By Todd Winner
SUPPORT THE UNDERWATER PHOTOGRAPHY GUIDE:
The Best Service & Prices on u/w Photo Gear
Visit Bluewater Photo & Video for all your underwater photography and video gear. Click, or call the team at (310) 633-5052 for expert advice!
The Best Pricing, Service & Expert Advice to Book your Dive Trips
Bluewater Travel is your full-service scuba travel agency. Let our expert advisers plan and book your next dive vacation. Run by divers, for divers. | <urn:uuid:3d9664b9-c9d9-4655-97e9-54141d9d7a55> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.uwphotographyguide.com/wide-angle-strobe-exposures | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397797.77/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00143-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940669 | 2,087 | 2.703125 | 3 |
German: Vocabulary II
Common Patterns Between German and English - A helpsheet for year 7 (or other years) with the relationships between German and English spellings.
German Language Activities at EnchantedLearning.com - contains many useful resources for young learners: English-German and German-English picture dictionary with links to related pages; Charts, quizzes, student handouts on vocabulary related to dozens of themes.
German | Curriculumbits.com – This site offers a number of animated interactive games on basic German vocabulary: colours; “geht” or “ist” + buildings; months; meeting and greeting; pronouns; telling your age; numbers; days of the week; countries of Europe; classroom objects and language; and personality traits.
Learn German for Children - a series of posters, word searches and crosswords to help familiarise your children with basic vocabulary: Die Wochentage von Montag bin Sonntag (The Days of the Week); Die Zahlen von eins bis zehn (Numbers from 1 to 10).
Can you name the most commonly used words in the German language? This timed game requires that you guess and type as many of the 100 most frequently used German words in 12 minutes.
Deutsch nach Englisch: Poster / Plakate - 6 posters illustrating 288 words which are closely related in German and English.
Vocabulary Training Exercises/Wortschatz Übungen - interactive vocabulary practice exercises.
Indo-European languages tutorial website - German - Contains lists of terms with articles by themes. | <urn:uuid:6709d57c-397d-47a8-b0bf-b2999cd571b0> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.caslt.org/resources/modern-lang/german-resource-links-vocabulary2_en.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398869.97/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00123-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.840603 | 330 | 4.09375 | 4 |
Issue Date: February 21, 2011
Virtual Science Fair
Google can now add science fair to its diverse and growing portfolio of projects and investments. Last month, the Internet giant launched the Google Science Fair, the first global online science fair, for youths aged 13 to 18. “Our company is founded on experimentation, and we’re hoping to encourage the same behavior in the next generation of scientists,” says Google spokeswoman Katherine Eller.
Chemistry is one of 11 categories in which participants can submit their projects. Chemistry Nobel Laureate Kary B. Mullis, who invented the polymerase chain reaction, is among the panel of judges.
“I think Google’s effort should be applauded,” says Elizabeth Marincola, president of the Society for Science & the Public, which administers both the Intel Science Talent Search and the Intel International Science & Engineering Fair. “It has the potential to reach a large number of kids, and anything that gets young people interested and engaged in science is good.”
An online science fair has its benefits. “Right now, opportunities to participate in science fairs and science competitions depend very much on where a student happens to have been born,” says Adam E. Cohen, who won first place in the 1997 Westinghouse (now Intel) Science Talent Search and is now an assistant professor of chemistry and chemical biology and of physics at Harvard University. “We’re probably missing a lot of potentially great scientists because they were born someplace where there aren’t many opportunities.”
Moreover, an online science fair makes sense at a time when schools are cutting science fairs out of their budgets, says Jeffrey I. Seeman, a visiting senior research scholar at the University of Richmond.
To enter the Google Science Fair, participants create a Google site with a virtual presentation that includes a question, hypothesis, research summary, experimental data, observations, conclusion, and works cited. Participants must also create a two-minute video or slide presentation summarizing their project. Google encourages participants to use the company’s suite of free online tools including Google Apps, Google Docs, YouTube, and Google Earth in building their sites.
“Science literacy in our country needs to be improved at all levels for all ages, and this is a bold attempt to add another building block that can improve science literacy in a self-learning, self-discovery model,” Seeman says. “What is badly needed are lots of initiatives that offer people at all ages the opportunity to grow and learn.”
Last year, Seeman launched a website aimed at improving science literacy. The Archimedes Initiative features students sharing their science fair experiences with each other through videos.
A new book written by current and recent Harvard undergraduates, titled “Success with Science: The Winners’ Guide to High School Research,” also offers students’ insights into participating in science competitions.
Submissions to the Google Science Fair are being accepted through April 4. Sixty semifinalists will be announced on May 9, and up to 15 finalists will vie for awards to be presented in July at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. Three finalist winners, one in each age category, 13–14, 15–16, and 17–18, will be selected.
The science fair is supported by Google’s partner institutions: National Geographic Society; CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research; Scientific American; and Lego Group. From the three finalists, a grand-prize winner will be chosen to receive a $50,000 scholarship from Google and his or her choice of an “experience” at Google or one of its partner institutions. The winner will also receive a National Geographic trip to the Galapagos Islands, among other prizes. The two other finalists will each receive a $25,000 scholarship from Google and will have second and third choice by random selection of one of the remaining experiences at Google, CERN, Scientific American, or Lego Group.
The general public will have the opportunity to view the projects of the 60 semifinalists and comment on their work. They can also vote on their favorite for the People’s Choice Award Prize, which is a $10,000 scholarship from Google.
Despite the advantages of an online science fair, face-to-face interactions remain an important part of the science fair experience, says chemistry Nobel Laureate Dudley R. Herschbach, trustee emeritus of the Society for Science & the Public Board of Trustees and Harvard University emeritus professor. “If you ask the students, they would say that the opportunity to have face-to-face meetings with senior people who express great interest in what they’re doing counts for a lot,” says Herschbach, who is a longtime supporter of science competitions. Marincola agrees, “It’s through these face-to-face interactions that you can really deepen your understanding of science.”
Still, every opportunity to get involved in a science fair will help improve science literacy. “We’re by no means trying to eliminate the traditional science fair,” says Eller. “We’re trying to encourage additional ways for students to get inspired by science.”
- Chemical & Engineering News
- ISSN 0009-2347
- Copyright © American Chemical Society | <urn:uuid:6b77a73a-7309-49e1-94e0-902c6f12cab8> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://cen.acs.org/articles/89/i8/Virtual-Science-Fair.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00147-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939184 | 1,120 | 3.046875 | 3 |
The Paschal (Paschall) Family US. History
The Paschal family has Its roots as a farming family. The Paschal family In the United States can be traced back directly to Thomas Paschal, who was born about 1523 In Bristol, England. Family lineage has Its earliest documented roots In Auvergne, France where John Paschal was born In 1475. He died in 1548. The French Paschals were Protestants who were severely persecuted so they left for England during the late 1400ís or early 1500ís. The first family members moved to Essex, then later to Bristol, where Thomas Paschal was born. His son Andrew Paschal was the first to leave England for the new world in the 1600ís.
Upon entering the United States, Andrew Paschal and his descendants lived In the Middlesex County, NJ area. Thomas Paschal was a son whom we descended from. He was a craftsman that worked with pewter, much like a silversmith. It Is told that he purchased about 500 acres from William Penn (whom the slate of Pennsylvania was named after). This land was located on the Skuylkill River, which flows through Philadelphia. This land Is a neighborhood In present-day Philadelphia and Is still called Paschallville. It Is In the southwestern part of the city. In fact a library branch Is called the Paschalville library.
William Paschal was born In Philadelphia, PA on July 22, 1693. He married Phereba Ward.
In the mid 1700ís, the United States government began the North Carolina Land Grants, William Paschal and family moved south, Into Warrenton County, NC, just south of the Virginia border. They farmed and lived In this area. They had several children. The present day Paschals here In Carroll County descended from a son, Samuel Paschal. William and Phereba Paschal had another son, Isaiah. He had a grandson, George Washington Paschal, Sr., who married Sarah Ridge. George Washington Paschal, Sr. was born In Greene County, GA, November 23, 1812.
Sarah Ridge, a Cherokee Indian princess (see, every family has one! I had to laugh as this is really what was passed out at the family reunion!), was the daughter of the second highest chief of the Cherokee Nation. Major Ridge, chief of the Chickamauga tribe, married Susannah Wickett. Major Ridge and his family made their home In what Is today known as Rome, GA. Major Ridge was one of the three Cherokee leaders who signed the treaty at New Echota (present day Calhoun, GA) with the U.S. government, which led to the relocation of the Cherokees to Oklahoma; In exchange for $ 5,000,000 and lands out west. His conviction was that, after much fighting and bloodshed, leaving peacefully for Oklahoma was the only way for the Cherokee to survive as a nation and culture. He believed that education and peaceful civilization would better the lives of the Cherokee.
George Washington Paschal, Sr. and wife Sarah Ridge Paschal moved to Arkansas In 1837. George was appointed the chief justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, by the state legislature. In 1847, they moved to Austin, Texas. He was a friend and advisor to Sam Houston. He defended Indian claims against the United States government.
In the early 1800ís, descendants of Samuel Paschal continued their migration Into South Carolina. From Abbeville Co. SC, family members moved into Carroll and Heard County, GA and parts of Alabama. Most settled here in Carroll County or still live nearby. Other descendents of Samuel Paschal moved on Into other states In the southeast and even as far away as Texas.
Our great-grandfather, George William Paschal and great-grandmother Annie Paschal were born, lived and died In the Ephesus community of northwestern Heard County, GA. They are both buried In the Ephesus Baptist Church cemetery.
Info on the Indian Branch of the Paschal family and where they are today.
View My Guestbook
Sign My Guestbook | <urn:uuid:2fbfa3f5-615d-4fab-8f9a-530cddd0a89b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://webspace.webring.com/people/jo/ozzma/photos.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396455.95/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00155-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981188 | 842 | 3.15625 | 3 |
Share your news and viewsShare your stories, photos and videos.
A major report into climate change is a wake-up call New Zealand must heed, one of its main authors says.
The second part of the fifth United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report has just been released.
It predicts a 2-4 degree Celsius rise in average temperatures in New Zealand by the end of the century and warns of increased risk of wildfire, storms, floods, landslides and sea level rises.
Professor Tim Naish, director of the Antarctic Research Centre at Victoria University, was one of the lead authors of the first part of the report released in September.
The second part, including a chapter focused on Australasia, had clear implications for New Zealand, he said.
The country faces a half-metre rise in sea levels by 2100 and increasing storms, with "one in 100 year" events becoming annual occurences by the end of the century, Naish said.
"This report is a wake-up call for New Zealand to take its head out of the sand, to take a longer-term view - at least longer than an electoral cycle - and rise to the challenge of adaptation if we are to future-proof this country for coming generations."
The Australasia chapter lists a series of impacts the country is likely to experience.
"Extreme weather events, such as droughts and flooding will become more frequent as the wet regions in the west of New Zealand can expect more rainfall and the already dry regions of Canterbury, the far North and the East Cape become drier with significant implications for water resources, increased risk for our climate-sensitive primary industries such as agriculture and horticulture and challenges for hydro-electricity generation," Naish said.
Another climate expert, Judy Lawrence, of the New Zealand Climate Change Research Institute at Victoria, said there was "a significant adaptation deficit" in the country.
Most of the planning to cope with climate change was only conceptual. To adapt to sea-level rise and flooding risk, New Zealand had to be ready to relocate people, invest in flood protection and control land use in risk areas.
"Institutionally our devolved planning system leaves each local government to fend for themselves, without much in the way of centralised support," Lawrence said.
"Scientifically, there is only a patchy picture of where the highest risks lie and who are the most vulnerable.
"Both these issues need to be addressed to assess, efficiently and comprehensively, what is at risk and what range of options there are for addressing the risks."
Climate Change Minister Tim Groser said New Zealand was focused on reducing global emissions. Adaptation was the responsibility of local councils.
"Central government agencies also provide information, guidance and research funding to support adaptation of New Zealand business and infrastructure," he said.
The report's top 10 points:
• IPCC report opens: ''Human interference with the climate system is occurring, and climate change poses risks for human and natural systems.''
• Key risks include: death, injury and disrupted livelihoods in low-lying coastal zones and small island states from storm surges, sea-level rises.
• Systemic risks to key infrastructure networks, including water and power, from extreme weather events.
• Risks also to food insecurity and breakdown of food systems from extreme weather.
• Impacts seen: ''glaciers continue to shrink almost worldwide'', while coral reefs and arctic eco-systems among those already affected.
• Species on the move: while a few recent species extinctions are ''attributed as yet to climate change'', many terrestrial, freshwater and marine species have shifted geographic range and abundance.
• Recent climate-related extremes, such as heat waves, droughts, floods, cyclones and wild fires reveal significant vulnerabilities to both human populations and eco-systems.
• Climate-related hazards exacerbate other stressors, particularly for those in poverty.
• Adaptation is mixed where planning for sea-level rises ''remains piecemeal''. Efforts to cope with reduced water availability more common.
• Economic costs are ''more likely than not'' to be greater than the 0.2-2 per cent GDP range cited. That estimate excludes catastrophic changes, tipping points, among other factors.
- Fairfax Media | <urn:uuid:f2c052ec-262d-49b3-baba-a449a77f9f84> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/9887196/Climate-change-Report-a-wake-up-call-for-NZ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397213.30/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00173-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948021 | 885 | 2.65625 | 3 |
Assignment: Are you living with depression?
iREPORTERS SIGNED UP
Created September 17, 2012 by
World Mental Health Day falls on October 10, and this year's theme is a condition common around the world: depression. Despite its ubiquity, clinical depression, like many mental illnesses, continues to carry a stigma. At CNN iReport, we hope to hear your personal stories of coping with depression. You could be part of a project to fight this stigma.
About 5% of the world's population suffers from depression, according to the World Health Organization, and the disease cuts across many demographics. No cure is available, but there are effective treatments. Unfortunately, many people can't access these treatments due to limited resources, or won't access them because of the stigma involved.
If you've suffered from clinical depression, we want to hear your story. Share a photo of yourself if you're comfortable, and tell us what you wish people could know or understand about this debilitating condition.
UPDATE: We profiled six people living with depression. Listen to their stories of survival here.
We appreciate that mental health is a sensitive topic, and all submissions will be treated with discretion.
If you are considering suicide, while we at CNN are not trained to offer you the best guidance on what to do right now, we are concerned for your safety and would like to direct you to someone who may be able to help. The trained counselors at the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline are available 24/7 by calling 1-800-273-TALK (8255). The call is free and confidential. We hope that you can remain safe, not do anything to hurt yourself, and continue to reach out. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline has partnered with us to be a source of help to those who feel they can’t go on. They would love to hear from you. You can learn more about them at http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org. | <urn:uuid:0715ff54-dfc4-466a-895a-703d14eea3ee> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://ireport.cnn.com/topics/842861?hpt=hp_bn11 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395346.6/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00084-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958991 | 404 | 2.703125 | 3 |
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a governing body unique in the sports world. The NCAA is an organization that blends athletic governance, academic regulation over its participants, and revenue generation under one tightly structured umbrella. While primarily a body that is devoted to the advancement and supervision of sport in an amateur setting, the NCAA methods regarding the stewardship of intercollegiate athletics are consistent with classic corporate organization models.
The NCAA was founded over 50 years after American intercollegiate sport established a niche in the public consciousness. From the first truly intercollegiate football games in the 1870s, football rivalries grew in the universities of the eastern United States. The rules of the game were not fully formalized until 1906, when the forward pass became legalized. The early contests were both hard fought and dangerous, including "gang tackling" and tactics such as the "flying wedge," a device by which the ball carrier was shielded by his ten teammates in a wedge formation that was thrust full-speed into the opposition. Serious head injuries and skeletal fractures were relatively common, and after a number of football player fatalities in the early 1900s occurred during intercollegiate contests, the then-president of United States, Theodore Roosevelt, was subject to considerable public pressure to ban football from intercollegiate athletics.
At the urging of Roosevelt, representatives of 13 universities met in 1905 with the intention of making football safer. From these meetings came the formation of the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (IAAUS), which was constituted with 62 members in 1906. The IAAUS became the National Collegiate Athletic Association in 1910. The membership of the modern NCAA is an aggregation of over 1,000 institutions. In the nomenclature of American intercollegiate athletics, the expression "college sports" includes colleges, which are four-year degree-granting institutions often specializing in liberal arts programs, as well as universities, which tend to offer more comprehensive academic programs, including postgraduate and doctoral studies. Junior colleges are not a part of the NCAA framework; these are two-year institutions that offer associate degrees. Junior colleges have their own national governance and structure. It is not uncommon for junior college student athletes, particularly in basketball, to transfer to a college or university program after completion of their two-year program; such players are often referred to as a "juco transfer."
While the initial focus of the IAAUS and the successor NCAA was the regulation of football safety, intercollegiate sports of all types experienced a dramatic expansion after the end of World War I. The NCAA provided governance over the men's intercollegiate sports of its member institutions only until the late 1970s, offering no championship opportunities for women until that time. The first collegiate track and field championships were organized by the NCAA in 1921, and through the succeeding years the NCAA expanded its sanctioned championships to include team sports such as baseball, whose first College World Series was held in 1947, ice hockey in 1948, soccer in 1959, and lacrosse in 1971.
The history of the national collegiate basketball championships highlights the rise of the NCAA in contrast with other bodies that have been a part of competitive college sports landscape throughout the history of the NCAA. Created in 1901 by James Nai-smith at what is now Springfield College in Massachusetts, basketball enjoyed a remarkable growth at a collegiate level. In 1901, a group known as the Helms Committee determined the national champion through a vote of its members. In 1937, a business group based in Kansas City organized a national basketball championship, with an emphasis on small college participation. This organization later became known as the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA); the NAIA exists today as a distinct governing body with a membership of over 250 academic institutions.
In 1939, the NCAA assumed control of the Helms Committee, and it convened its first tournament that year. At the same time, the National Invitational Tournament (NIT) was born, a tournament where college teams were invited to play in a single knockout elimination format at Madison Square Garden in New York City. For many years, the NCAA and NIT competitions were not mutually exclusive, (City College of New York won both events in 1950, the only institution to do so) and the NIT had equivalent prestige to that of the NCAA championship. By the 1960s, the NCAA basketball tournament had become the premier college postseason tournament, and by the 1980s, the NIT was relegated to an event for teams that could not qualify for the NCAA championship. In 2005, the NCAA acquired all rights to the NIT competition, which is now operated under the NCAA auspices.
The growth of all NCAA sports prompted the creation of different competitive divisions in the early 1970s. It had become evident that in many sports, smaller institutions had difficulty competing against larger and better-funded schools that offered better and more comprehensive forms of athletic scholarships, thus attracting better athletes. The tension between the academic purposes of postsecondary education, and the corresponding attention paid by admissions directors to College Board results and high school grades, and the value accorded athletic success at many institutions has been an undercurrent in the work carried out by the NCAA in its regulatory capacity since the 1930s. In modern America, where the cost of university education will commonly range from $20,000 to $50,000 per year of study, a "full-ride" athletic scholarship is a significant prize, as it is common for students to graduate from university with student loan debt in excess of $50,000.
As an attempt to standardize the practices of the institutions, the NCAA created competitive divisions in 1973. All NCAA member schools must comply with the rules with respect to their division in order to compete within the sports championships offered at each division. The divisions include:
For the sport of football only, the NCAA created the subdivisions of Division 1A and Division 1AA in 1978.
Since 1973, the NCAA has created an extensive regulatory framework regarding the structure of each division. In addition to the rules with respect to the availability of athletic scholarships, each division has requirements for its participating institutions. In Division 1, all members must provide seven varsity sports for each gender, with each sport having a minimum number of games required in each season. In revenue-generating sports such as football, Division 1A schools must comply with minimum stadium seating requirements, and all such Division 1 institutions are capped regarding the amount of financial aid that they may offer to prospective student athletes. A significant feature of many Division 1 sports programs is the ability of the school to recruit its prospective athletes on a national and international basis.
Division 2 schools are required to offer a minimum of four varsity sports for both men and women. Division 2 schools are not bound by the facility requirements of Division 1. Division 2 student athletes are often recruited on a regional as opposed to a national basis.
Division 3 schools offer no financial aid based on athletic ability, as the athletic departments at these institutions are funded as with any other aspect of the institution. While highly competitive, Division 3 athletics emphasizes the athlete over the nature and the quality of the facilities.
The NCAA imposes standard rules regarding participation in its championships, including minimum academic averages and a power to test athletes for prohibited substances such as anabolic steroids.
Almost all NCAA institutions are organized into conferences for the purposes of competitive play. Each conference is a regionally based entity, and conference play between the member schools comprises the bulk of a school's competitive schedule in a season. Conferences such as the Big Ten began as football leagues. The Big Ten, whose most famous members include Ohio State and University of Michigan, was first organized in 1896. It is an irony in the formation of the Big Ten that it was created for the express purpose of "restricted eligibility to athletics for bona fide, full-time students who were not delinquent in their studies." This sentiment has bothered college and university administrators to the present day across the United States.
Although most conferences have an extensive tradition, which has served to create passionate inter-school rivalries, some athletic conferences came into being to take advantage of increased television revenues that flow to the conference and ultimately to its member institutions. The most successful of the relatively recent conference formations has been the Big East Conference, created in 1979 to both increase the level of competition for its member schools and to take advantage of a media market centered in the
The NCAA governed men's sports exclusively until 1979; the organization of women's intercollegiate athletics had begun on an ad hoc basis with a golf championship in 1941; other championships in a number of sports were convened throughout the 1960s, to little national attention or acclaim. The Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) was founded in 1971, as a separate governing body from the NCAA. With the passage of the federal U.S. legislation known as Title IX, which provided a number of guarantees regarding women's sport and its funding relative to male sports, women's sports of all types enjoyed an unprecedented growth in American colleges and universities; by 1980, the AIAW had over 900 member institutions. The NCAA organized its first women's basketball national championship in 1982, and this action prompted the disintegration of the AIAW. From 1982 forward, the NCAA has organized its women's championships along the same lines as those in male sports.
A large portion of the current work of the NCAA is with respect to its generation of revenues from the major championships held in the Division 1 men's sports of basketball and football. March Madness, as national basketball championship is popularly known, attracts a huge television audience; each of the conferences to which the 64 successful qualifiers belong receives a share of the monies from the tournament, as does the individual team and their athletic department. The BCS, the corresponding football championship series for Division 1A teams, also generates hundreds of millions of dollars in television revenues for the NCAA.
The concept of the student athlete has been one of constant attention from the NCAA throughout its history. The chief criticism of college sports in the United States has been the perception that in many sports, particularly those where the athlete has the potential to move on to the professional ranks, have been rife with abuses. The most common criticisms are with respect to recruiting students who do not have the grades that would qualify them for admission to the institution from high school, the payment of illegal monies or gifts to student athletes while they are attending the college or university, or the failure to vigorously monitor the academic progress of student athletes while they are in attendance at the institution. The NCAA has in place a number of very specific rules concerning each of these areas, the violation of which carries significant sanctions. These penalties include the suspension of the sports program from NCAA competition, the disqualification of the individual athlete, the loss or restriction of future scholarships to the program in question, and similar penalties. Critics of NCAA governance often point to the companion rules regarding the manner in which teams may train, with up to 20 hours per week in practice, additional weight room and personal training obligations, and extensive in-season travel as conditions that entirely contradict a student athlete model.
The most prominent of these initiatives has been the attention paid to student athlete graduation rates, particularly among black athletes. As of late 2005, the NCAA states that 62% of all student athletes graduate within six years of their commencement; the graduation rate among the student body as a whole is 60%. | <urn:uuid:1f606423-87c6-44ae-aff1-a86573fa1a7b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.faqs.org/sports-science/Mo-Pl/National-Collegiate-Athletic-Association-NCAA.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396224.52/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00049-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977339 | 2,325 | 3.21875 | 3 |
Updated: August 2004
On October 21, 1994, the United States and North Korea signed an agreement-the Agreed Framework-calling upon Pyongyang to freeze operation and construction of nuclear reactors suspected of being part of a covert nuclear weapons program in exchange for two proliferation-resistant nuclear power reactors. The agreement also called upon the United States to supply North Korea with fuel oil pending construction of the reactors. An international consortium called the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) was formed to implement the agreement.
The Agreed Framework ended an 18-month crisis during which North Korea announced its intention to withdraw from the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), under which North Korea committed not to develop nuclear weapons. (See ACA's Chronology of U.S.-North Korean Nuclear and Missile Diplomacy for more information on U.S.-North Korean nuclear relations.)
Agreed Framework Breakdown
KEDO announced November 21, 2003 that it would suspend construction of the two light-water nuclear reactors in North Korea for one year beginning December 1. The suspension came in response to Pyongyang’s failure to meet “the conditions necessary for continuing” the project, according to the KEDO announcement.
KEDO further stated that the project’s future “will be assessed and decided by [its] Executive Board before the expiration of the suspension period.” But a Department of State spokesperson said several days earlier that there is “no future for the project.”
Furthermore, Washington announced that Pyongyang admitted during an October 4, 2002 bilateral meeting to possessing a uranium-enrichment program, which could be used to build nuclear weapons and would violate North Korea’s commitment to forgo the acquisition of such weapons. North Korea has denied that it said this. In response to the reported admission, KEDO suspended oil shipments to North Korea the next month. North Korea reacted December 12 by announcing that it would restart the nuclear facilities governed by the Agreed Framework. After a series of exchanges with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), IAEA inspectors left the country December 31 after Pyongyang expelled them. North Korea announced on January 10, 2003 that it was withdrawing from the NPT, effective the next day. Pyongyang’s official status with the treaty remains ambiguous.
The construction of the future light-water reactors was far behind schedule. The first reactor was initially slated for completion in 2003 but was not likely to be operational until 2008 at the earliest. Numerous events—most notably North Korea’s Taepo Dong-1 missile test-firing in 1998—strained relations between Washington and Pyongyang, resulting in the construction delays.
The agreement ultimately brokedown, and a negotiations over North Korea's nuclear program shifted to a larger process known as the Six Party Talks, which also included South Korea, Japan, China, Russia and the United States.
Terms of the Agreed Framework
Joint U.S.-North Korean Obligations:
- The United States and North Korea committed to move toward normalizing economic and political relations, including by reducing barriers to investment, opening liaison offices, and ultimately exchanging ambassadors.
The Clinton administration made some progress on fulfilling this aspect of the framework toward the end of its second term, most notably when then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visited Pyongyang in October 2000. Additionally, in June 2000, Washington eased longstanding sanctions against North Korea under the Trading with the Enemy Act, the Defense Production Act, and the Export Administration Act, clearing the way for increased trade, financial transactions, and investment. Pyongyang is still prohibited, however, from receiving U.S. exports of military and sensitive dual-use items and most related assistance.
- Both sides commit not to nuclearize the Korean Peninsula. The United States must "provide formal assurances" not to threaten or use nuclear weapons against North Korea. Pyongyang is required to "consistently take steps" to implement the 1992 North-South Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
The United States' most recent commitment to this obligation was in the October 12, 2000 Joint Communiqué between Washington and Pyongyang. The relevant portion reads: "The two sides stated that neither government would have hostile intent toward the other and confirmed the commitment of both governments to make every effort in the future to build a new relationship free from past enmity."
Bush administration officials have said several times that the United States has no intention of attacking North Korea. A January 7, 2003 joint statement from the United States, Japan, and South Korea reaffirmed this commitment in writing, stating that the United States "has no intention of invading" North Korea.
The Bush administration, however, has sent mixed signals about its intentions toward North Korea. Pyongyang argues that the United States has not lived up to its commitment because President George W. Bush called North Korea part of an "axis of evil" in January 2002. North Korea also accuses Washington of targeting North Korea for a "preemptive nuclear attack."
In September 2002, the Bush administration released a report which emphasizes pre-emptively attacking countries developing weapons of mass destruction. It explicitly mentions North Korea. In addition, a leaked version of the Bush administration's January 2002 classified Nuclear Posture Review lists North Korea as a country against which the United States should be prepared to use nuclear weapons, although it does not mention pre-emptive nuclear strikes.
North Korean Obligations
- Reactor Freeze and Dismantlement: The framework calls for North Korea to freeze operation of its 5-megawatt reactor and plutonium-reprocessing plant at Yongbyon and construction of a 50-megawatt reactor at Yongbyon and a 200-megawatt plant at Taechon. These facilities are to be dismantled prior to the completion of the second light-water reactor.
North Korea has restarted the reactor. Although North Korea has said it is developing a nuclear deterrent, it has not explicitly threatened to use any spent fuel from its restarted reactor to build nuclear weapons.
- Inspections: North Korea must come into "full compliance" with IAEA safeguards when a "significant portion of the [light-water reactor] project is completed, but before delivery of key nuclear components." Full compliance includes taking all steps deemed necessary by the IAEA to determine the extent to which North Korea diverted material for weapons use in the past, including giving inspectors access to all nuclear facilities in the country. The CIA estimates that Pyongyang has not accounted for one to two nuclear weapons worth of plutonium from the Yongbyon reactor.
The Agreed Framework states that North Korea must fully comply with IAEA safeguards when "a significant portion of the LWR project is completed, but before delivery of key nuclear components." The United States, however, had been demanding that North Korea begin cooperation with the IAEA as soon as possible, because the agency needs approximately three to four years to complete inspections. There had been concerns that waiting to start inspections until a significant portion of the project is completed would jeopardize the Agreed Framework's ultimate success, because it would further delay completion of the reactors. North Korea will no longer be required to comply with IAEA inspections once its withdrawal from the NPT is complete.
- Spent Fuel: The spent fuel from North Korea's 5-megawatt reactor at Yongbyon is to be put into containers as soon as possible (a process called "canning") and removed from the country when nuclear components for the first light-water reactor begin to arrive after North Korea has come into full compliance with IAEA safeguards.
The canning process, conducted with U.S. financing, began April 27, 1996 and was finished in April 2000. The spent fuel, however, remains in North Korea, and Pyongyang may have reprocessed it into weapons-grade plutonium. The amount of fuel is sufficient for several nuclear weapons, according to the CIA.
- NPT Membership: The Agreed Framework requires that North Korea remain a party to the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
North Korea announced January 10, 2003 that it was withdrawing from the treaty, effective January 11. Although Article X of the NPT requires that a country give three months' notice in advance of withdrawing, North Korea argues that it has satisfied this requirement because it originally announced its decision to withdraw March 12, 1993 and suspended the decision one day before it was to become legally binding. Whether North Korea remains an NPT state-party is ambiguous.
- Establish and Organize KEDO: This includes the securing of diplomatic and legal rights and guarantees necessary to implement the light-water reactor project.
KEDO was established on March 9, 1995, and membership now includes 12 states and the European Union, which provide electrical-power supplies and financial assistance to help KEDO implement the Agreed Framework.
- Implement the Light-Water Reactor Project: The United States is to facilitate the construction of two 1,000-megawatt light-water nuclear power reactors.
KEDO delegated responsibility to Japan and South Korea to finance and supply North Korea with two light-water reactors. After several years of site preparation, ground was broken in August 2001 in Kumho, North Korea. KEDO poured the concrete for the first reactor in August 2002, but suspended the project on December 1, 2003.
- Provide Heavy-Fuel Oil Shipments: To compensate for the electricity-generating capacity that Pyongyang gave up by freezing its nuclear reactors, KEDO will supply North Korea with 500,000 metric tons of heavy-fuel oil annually until the light-water reactor project is completed.
KEDO suspended the shipments in November 2002. The United States had provided the largest financial contribution for these shipments.
Assisted by Michael Goggin | <urn:uuid:655d69a5-16a4-4269-b9ba-574bfb869817> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.armscontrol.org/print/2598 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397428.37/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00023-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960365 | 2,006 | 3.078125 | 3 |
History, Language Arts, Vietnam War
Demonstrate their knowledge of events that occurred during the 1960s, specifically
through a soldier's life during the Vietnam War.
Make personal connections to the recipient.
Medal of Honor Focus
Clarence Sasser, Private First Class, U.S. Army, Headquarters Co.
3rd Battalion, 60th Infantry, 9th Infantry Division / Vietnam War | <urn:uuid:9ae6bd17-5144-4e83-a0b6-235645e6a755> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.cmohedu.org/sample-content/sample.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397111.67/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00039-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917592 | 83 | 2.671875 | 3 |
‘Like an octopus Mr. Mel covers all those around him. The living as well as the lifeless, knowingly or unknowingly are trapped. The oppressed are struggling to be free of him.’ These thoughts flow into my mind whenever I ponder over Bambara Walalla.
Before the film was released, in an interview with the director he said the film is about ‘men’s tears’, but in the film the tears of both men and women are portrayed in a balanced way; so the suffering of the ‘human’ is exposed. Podi Eka (played by Athula) is the leading character among the oppressed.
From his childhood he was misused by his stepfather for malpractices. He is not even sent to the school. Podi Eka was sent to jail for 17 years for murdering his stepfather. The story built around him cleverly analyzes social, political, cultural and psychological facets of human life.
The term Podi Eka (little one) itself symbolizes a huge meaning throughout the story. We usually say Podi ekek wage ahinsakai or kisideyak therennathi podi ekek (innocent like a little one or like a little one he/she does not understand anything). Even after he has grown up he is called Podi Eka. He always laments he cannot understand anything, which emphasizes his childish nature.
Podi Eka draws three crosses symbolizing his family at the beginning of the story. This indicates his lack of education. The symbols remind us of the cave pictography of the primitives. Thus via his character a social reality is conveyed: how the common folk live without much awareness of the outer world and how they are used by the able strata.
In a society ruled by able people, Podi Eka is a character who is expected to be neutral but he becomes a puppet for his uncle and later a cat’s paw for Mr. Mel. Society does not look kindly upon him. He loses his love and then his mother.
The uncle’s daughter spits into his face and then reminds him of his true position: “you are the cattle keeper”. This shatters his world. He has an impulsive nature and that is why he always reacts quickly without thinking about the consequences.
Even though Podi Eka is the main character it is Mr. Mel played by Mahendra Perera steals the show (see boxed story). Thus we feel that director Athula Liyanage should have enhanced his own character.
As a whole the actors portrayed their characters convincingly and with great depth. The audience is drawn into the story and will leave the theatre thinking about the hidden messages that are there if you look deep within.
The plight of women in this society is well portrayed overall. In the beginning it is shown how Podi Eka’s mother and sister suffer and how they are oppressed by his step father.
Then Podi Eka’s mother has to pay with her life for her son’s deed. Even Podi Eka shows dominative characteristics when the uncle’s daughter rejects his proposal. She has a right to do so but Podi Eka violates her rights by cutting her hair and humiliating her.
When Kumari’s (played by Damitha Abeyrathne) character is taken into focus, it shows how the women are cheated, oppressed and how they are used for men’s needs. Mr. Mel uses Kumari as a way of taming men. We might wonder ‘does he really love Kumari?’ Sometimes Mr. Mel’s character is a mystery.
After Kumari and Podi Eka run away, Mr. Mel says he loved them more than anyone else. However we are unable to find whether this is the truth or if there is any worthy reason for him to love them.
The cinematography of the film should be praised as the camera has absorbed the director’s vision and it is put before our eyes creatively. The characters in this film are trapped, oppressed, cheated and isolated by the huge society around them. Even Mr. Mel has faced the same situation.
Thus the abundant use of high angle shots which gives small images, relates the helplessness of the characters. Though the film is the debut for Athula Liyanage, it exhibits a maturity not usually seen in a first film.
By Madhubhashini RATHNAYAKA | <urn:uuid:27b566eb-573d-4846-b345-4394c9e573ac> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://lankaartdiary.blogspot.com/2010_10_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783399106.96/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154959-00141-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982231 | 937 | 2.921875 | 3 |
In 1994, the three
riparian countries of the Okavango River Basin – Angola, Botswana and
Namibia -- agreed to plan for collaborative management of the natural
resources of the Okavango, forming the Permanent Okavango River Basin
Water Commission (OKACOM). In 2003, through the Global Environment
Facility, OKACOM launched the Environmental Protection and Sustainable
Management of the Okavango River Basin (EPSMO) Project, fulfilling the
promise to create a base of reliable information to be used in the
Commission’s decision making.
The Okavango River Basin is unusual in that its waters and shores
are relatively pristine, protected for many years by low human
populations and, in its upper reaches, by a long war in Angola.
Experience throughout the world has shown that remedial action is
invariably more costly than wise management.
OKACOM designed the EPSMO Project to evaluate the condition of the
river basin, to identify possible threats posed by increasing demands
on the benefits of the river system and to develop a program of policy,
legal and institutional reforms – a Strategic Action Plan (SAP)-- to
meet and manage these demands.
In accordance with GEF methodology, development of the SAP will be
informed by a Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis (TDA), a scientific and
technical fact-finding analysis that seeks to identify the causal
chains and root causes of problems affecting (or with the potential to
affect) the integrity of the Okavango River Basin.
The long-term objective of the EPSMO Project is to achieve global
environmental benefits through concerted management of the naturally
integrated land and water resources of the Okavango River Basin. | <urn:uuid:217d374e-6ed8-4a83-bf5f-2c529b933469> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://epsmo.iwlearn.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393332.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00046-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.873324 | 364 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Propagating african violets is very simple
and lots of fun. They propagate quickly and don't need much to do it. One leaf
can give you from one to many babies that will become beautiful plants. Its also
a great school project for children.
There are many many ways to propagate.
Below I have explained my way to do it. This way works fine for me, I am sure
you will find the best way for you. If something works for you, please don't
change your method, we don't like to fix things that are not broken.
First you need to cut a leaf from a plant,
the leaves from the 3rd row are the best ones for the job. You count the rows of
leaves starting from the center. One row should have 3 leaves therefore the 7th,
8th and 9th leaf from the center should be good candidates for the job.
Plant the leaf in a light mixture. You
don't want to damage the angle cut of the stem by forcing it into the soil
because this is where the plantlets will grow so I like to use a pencil to press
a hole into the soil and then put the stem in the hole. Lightly press the soil
around the stem to hold it in position and don't forget to mark the leaf so you
will remember the name.
You can either place one leaf per
container or many leaves together. The choice is yours. Do not fertilize the
leaves in the first weeks. The leaves do not have roots to receive the
fertilizer. I usually give them a very light fertilizer after 3-4 weeks, by this
time, some roots will have grown for sure.
IT IS CRUTIAL THAT THE SOIL DOES NOT DRY
OUT AT THIS STAGE, the leaf doesn't have stored energy to live on without water.
The soil MUST be kept DAMP but NOT WET, if it is too wet, the stems might rot.
You can bag the pots if you like but if
you do, you will have to gradually open the bags to let the plant get use to its
new and dryer environement. Bagging a plant helps it keep a higher humidity.
In this photo, you can see the babies popping up
beside the stem. You will be the judge to decide when it is the time to seperate
the babies from the mother. You do this when you feel comfortable working with
the size of the plantlets. The time it takes for leaves to make babies varies
from one leaf to another. Normally after or 4 months, sometimes sooner, you will
see some little leaves piercing the soil.
When you are ready to seperate the
babies, delicately take the leaf and babies out of the pot. I like to use an
exacto knife to cut off the babies. Try to cut so to leave some roots on the
babies. Then delicately plant into a nice light mixture and don't forget to
nametag the plant. You can replant the leaf, it could produce new babies | <urn:uuid:35a108e2-c002-471f-89c2-d30d843d9d0c> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://stores.ebay.com/Bloomlovers-Violets | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393442.26/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00137-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951444 | 651 | 2.90625 | 3 |
He was a Northerner. He was an industrialist. He was a Jew. And a young girl was murdered in his factory.
ON DECEMBER 23, 1983, THE LEAD EDITORIAL IN THE ATLANTA Constitution began, “Leo Frank has been lynched a second time.” The first lynching had occurred almost seventy years earlier, when Leo Frank, convicted murderer of a thirteen-year-old girl, had been taken from prison by a band of vigilantes and hanged from a tree in the girl’s hometown of Marietta, Georgia. The lynching was perhaps unique, for Frank was not black but a Jew. Frank also is widely considered to have been innocent of his crime.Read more » | <urn:uuid:703bda63-cdf0-42f7-b990-816d8568d87b> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.americanheritage.com/category/article-keywords/anti-semitism | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403823.74/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00192-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.992839 | 153 | 2.734375 | 3 |
ATLANTA (CBS Atlanta) – Medical experts and officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta said that vaccination rates among American adults are far lower than they should be.
One such expert, Dr. Len Horovitz, even characterized vaccination rates as “depressingly low” while speaking with Web MD on the matter.
“This is a discussion I have daily with patients, who see vaccination recommendations posted in the examination room,” he was quoted as additionally saying.
The CDC issued a release on Thursday based on data collected in the 2012 National Health Interview Survey. Its findings showed that many American adults are declining to get inoculations for diseases such as hepatitis, pneumonia and influenza.
Some improvements were seen, however, especially in regards to the amount of people getting Tdap vaccinations to prevent against whooping cough. Young women were also said to be pursuing HPV vaccinations, and more seniors were protecting themselves against shingles through vaccines.
Still, those at the CDC urged for an increase in vaccinations among American adults.
“Improvement in adult vaccination is needed to reduce the health consequences of vaccine-preventable diseases among adults,” officials said, according to Web MD.
Their findings were published in a recent issue of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. | <urn:uuid:cadd7a18-025b-4c89-b86b-9a6d6338b4fa> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://atlanta.cbslocal.com/2014/02/11/medical-expert-vaccination-rate-among-american-adults-depressingly-low/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398869.97/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00124-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974109 | 270 | 2.65625 | 3 |
Chapter Four: Exploring new ground in mechanical design.
1The design process: Solving a puzzle that didn’t have a “right answer”.
- The complex internal structure and the sleek outer shell of the camera posed our team with twin challenges: ensuring maximum performance from the main components (sensor, lens, LCD, viewfinder, battery, etc.) whilst not compromising the camera’s shape, size and looks. When you are designing a high precision instrument, it is not simply a matter of assembling components into a unit. Mechanical design requires you to address a multitude of issues including the optimisation of electrical circuit paths and component arrangements whilst ensuring maximum performance as well as preserving operational integrity by considering how to insulate components from external shocks and changes in the environment.
- In the case of the X100, our engineers had to overcome the challenge of achieving uncompromising performance and maintaining a compact design. The X100 development process constantly demanded high levels of creativity to meet the challenges of incorporating brand new devices such as the Hybrid Viewfinder, and fitting the complex wiring and circuit boards into the restricted space available. The project required study and repeated prototyping on an unprecedented scale.
2First mock-up: A lot larger than the final model.
- The Hybrid Viewfinder, which occupies most of the upper right-hand side of the body (when viewed from the front), and the large APS size sensor both posed major problems that had to be overcome in order to reach our goal of designing the compact slim camera.
- The initial prototype camera created by the engineers ended up roughly twice their target size. Work immediately begin to reduce the size of the camera. First, the orthodox components were assembled and the required clearance between them was specified in units of tenths of millimetres. Where the clearance for wiring and circuit boards is tight, there is the risk of short circuits. To prevent this, insulating sheets were used more extensively than in conventional models.
- The 3D design was created on a PC and a variety of simulation were undertaken including the analysis of structural strength and temperature increases. Using FUJIFILM’s own prototyping facilities, samples were rapidly produced and evaluated, facilitating the refinement of the design in a very short time.
- As a result of intensive design studies and countless partial prototypes over a period of several months, the mechanical designers finally achieved their vision.
3Dial mechanics - Unique design behind the “torque” or pressure required to operate each dial.
- In order to produce the pleasurable “click” sensation of the shutter speed dial and exposure compensation dial on the control deck, our engineers came up with fresh ideas. Conventionally the click sensation is produced by a ball and a pressure spring working with the E-shape ring that is secured on the underside of the dial. In the X100, these dials are each supported by an independent base and incorporate a combination of 2 types of plastic washers made of different materials.
- This approach does not simply secure the dial, but also contributes to the balance of torque and smoothness, as well as the click sensation when the user turns the dial. During the development of this mechanism, considered by our designers as the optimum configuration, actual testing of a variety of materials and shapes was undertaken.
- In addition, each of the 4 rotating rings and dials incorporate a spring with the corresponding ideal strength to provide the user with click feedback in synch with the different circumferences and angles of rotation of each rotating part.
4Aperture ring design – Study began with the manufacturing process.
- The placement of the aperture and focus rings around the circumference of the lens enabled the incorporation of two control dials (aperture and focus) in this compact body and demanded engineering that facilitates high precision movement. In the beginning, our designers examined and explored a variety of factors, including changing the diameter (size) of each ring to achieve a minimum difference between them, and fabricating and adding a lever for ring control.
- The design of the aperture ring was an especially tough challenge, requiring satisfaction of both superb operability and a sense of premium quality. This led to the proposal of fabricating the main ring part and finger rest by machining them as a single piece. This consisted of turning the rim part from cylindrical material on a lathe followed by milling. A precision tool path (CNC programme) from drill cutting geometry to the faithful reproduction of the finest detail was developed.
- The resulting ring boasts curved lines of unprecedented beauty, the aesthetic appeal of quality metal (silver sheen) and precision machining, and most importantly, excellent operability.
5Step intervals of the aperture ring – Another subject for examination.
- Eight grooves have been cut in the inner circumference of the X100 aperture ring. By turning the ring, switches corresponding to the grooves are turned ON/OFF, and the signal is read, enabling aperture settings from F2 to F16.
- In response to the feedback received from professional photographers during the development process, the original aperture step rotation interval of 12° (total: 84°) was changed to 10.5° (total: 73.5°). In this way, the X100 provides a precise operational experience that responds to and reflects the expectations of the professional. | <urn:uuid:6ea21618-d1d7-4d2e-b166-0c099ee66565> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.finepix-x100.com/en/story/mechanical | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395546.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00010-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935865 | 1,095 | 3.28125 | 3 |
One hundred years ago, Yiddish theater producers in Warsaw and Moscow began filming their plays, to show them to Jews in far-off places. The technique was simple—they would mount a movie camera on a tripod and leave it there, unmoving, to record the drama; it was primitive, but effective. The films were financially successful, and the Yiddish cinema was born. It became a major artistic and cultural force in Jewish life until the start of World War II.
And, this week, Eve Annenberg’s Romeo and Juliet in Yiddish makes its North American premiere at the New York Jewish Film Festival. It’s a new, Yiddish-language, U.S.-made, full-length feature.
Annenberg’s film places the tragic Shakespearian love story in Brooklyn’s ultra-Orthodox community, and the filmmaker, who had little previous knowledge of Yiddish, decided that a film set there must use Yiddish as its primary language. For decades, Yiddish, like most foreign languages, didn’t appear in American movies; filmmakers believed American audiences disliked subtitles and portrayed foreign language-speaking characters with actors speaking accented English. But a new trend toward authenticity and realism is returning Yiddish, like other foreign languages, to the screen. In A Serious Man, released two years ago, Joel and Ethan Coen presented a 7-minute prologue set in 19th-century Poland; the characters in it spoke Yiddish.
Yiddish is used in movies to connect with memory, particularly by European filmmakers. French filmmaker Emmanuel Finkiel focused on the lives of elderly Jews who come together on the Promenade in Cannes in his Madame Jacques sur la Croisette (1996). “The Yiddish spoken by this age group is more than a language,” Finkiel said. His Voyages (1999) followed three Holocaust survivors, each with his own narrative, searching for some unambiguous closure. Though the film did not directly relate the horrors of the Holocaust, Finkiel’s approach to the events had the Yiddish world of the past collide and engage in a struggle with the Jewish world of the present, and it was clear that Yiddish held its own. Finkiel provided the setting for a Yiddish world that was dynamic and nuanced, but that teetered as the elderly generation died.
Yiddish movies are even being made in Israel, where, for much of the country’s history, the language was anathema—in 1930, there were riots in Tel Aviv when My Yiddishe Mame was screened. But over the last decade, student filmmakers have turned to the language to either faithfully portray ultra-Orthodox Jewish life or to tackle the divide that for years forced censure of Yiddish and deprived generations of Israelis of a rich Jewish language and culture. In Nava Nussan Heifetz’s The Cohen’s Wife (2000), set in the Yiddish-speaking ultra-Orthodox world, she dramatized a situation in which a Cohen must, according to Jewish law, divorce his wife because she has been raped. In My Father’s House (2006), Dani Rosenberg examined the birth of the state, when new immigrants, survivors of the death camps, were forced to shed their Diaspora personas in order to “properly” assimilate into the new society. “The film had to be in Yiddish,” Rosenberg said. “By Yiddish, I don’t just mean the language, but also the culture which the Israeli government tried to erase.”
Yiddish movies being made in America are set in communities where Yiddish is spoken in the home and on the street. Mendy and Yakov Kirsh shot their 2005 movie A Gesheft (“The Deal”) in the ultra-Orthodox community of Monsey, New York. Here, just as early Yiddish movie-makers saw Yiddish cinema as a way to combat the assimilationist message of mainstream American films, the Kirsh brothers were reacting to mainstream culture by creating what they called “kosher entertainment.” This is noteworthy, as for generations ultra-Orthodox Jews avoided the “corrupting influence” of Yiddish culture as too mainstream.
Eve Annenberg made Romeo and Juliet in Yiddish with exiles from the ultra-Orthodox community. Lazer Weiss and his wife, Malky, the actors who play the star-crossed lovers, spoke only Yiddish until they left the Satmar Hasidic community in their teens; neither had seen a movie when they left. The three are now developing ideas for a second Yiddish film. Meanwhile, there are reports that Topol, best known as Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, will star next year in a Yiddish-language Golem, and blogs are even suggesting Michael Chabon’s The Yiddish Policemen’s Union might be filmed in Yiddish.
It’s not just new projects. Old Yiddish films are being restored, Yiddish-cinema courses are being taught on campus, DVDs of the Yiddish film classics are easily found, and Yiddish short films can be seen on the Internet. Yiddish is not only a vibrant language but also a culture and lifestyle. Finally, its cinema is being introduced to a whole new generation of cineastes.
Eric A. Goldman teaches cinema at Yeshiva University. A new edition of his Visions, Images and Dreams: Yiddish Film Past and Present was recently published by Holmes and Meier. | <urn:uuid:0add5c4b-a27c-49e0-9665-af21cc944bb4> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/55927/mama-loshen-movies | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395166.84/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00127-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965021 | 1,201 | 2.640625 | 3 |
The transformers are connected in parallel when load on one of the transformers is more than its capacity. The reliability is increased with parallel operation than to have single larger unit. The cost associated with maintaining the spares is less when two transformers are connected in parallel.
The following conditions are to be satisfied while connecting three phase transformers in parallel.
i) The transformers connected in parallel must have same polarity so that the resultant voltage around the local loop is zero. With improper polarities there are changes of dead short circuit.
ii) The relative phase displacements on the secondary sides of the three phase transformers to be connected in parallel must be zero. The transformers with same phase group can be connected in parallel.
As the phase shift between the secondary voltages of a star/ delta and delta/ star transformers is 30o, they can not be connected in parallel. But transformers with + 30oand - 30ophase shift can be connected in parallel by reversing phase sequence of one of them.
iii) The voltage ratio of the two transformers must be same. This prevents no load circulating current when the transformers are in parallel on primary and secondary sides. As the leakage impedance is less, with a small voltage difference no load circulating current is high resulting in larger I2 R losses.
iv) The ratio of equivalent leakage reactance to equivalent resistance should be same for all transformers. If there is difference in this ratio, the phase angle of the two currents show divergence. One transformer will operate at higher p.f. while other transformer will operate at lower p.f. Due to this given load is not proportionately shared by them. | <urn:uuid:da413c6e-d185-479b-b794-4a1060785903> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://yourelectrichome.blogspot.com/2011/07/parallel-operation-of-three-phase.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783402746.23/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155002-00170-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.906038 | 342 | 3.015625 | 3 |
Reforma, the National Association to Promote Library and Information Services to Latinos and the Spanish Speaking (www.reforma.org ), opposes the banning of the children’s book Vamos a Cuba in the Miami-Dade Public School district and in any school district in the Americas. The recent action by the Miami-Dade School Board to remove the book from all Miami-Dade County school libraries will have negative repercussions for many librarians working in libraries in Latino communities in other parts of Florida, but also throughout the United States and beyond. Reforma opposes the censorship of this and other children's books.
Reforma, in existence for 35 years, has always been concerned with information access for Latino communities. Having open access to current, accurate, unbiased and relevant information about life in Latin America is essential for Latino youth in the United States. Books are an important source of information and understanding for our children, particularly as information about Latin American countries, including Cuba, is hard to come by in the media that saturates Latino children’s lives. All Latino children should have access to information about Cuba. Additionally, all children regardless of ethnicity, national origin, or languages spoken in the home should have access to this information in their native language.
Some parents in Miami have suggested that the facts in the book are inaccurate, but this is not the case. Reforma members from various locations in the country, including Florida, have reviewed Vamos a Cuba and have found it sound, appropriate and informative for children. After evaluating the series, librarians in New York City purchased the books including the one on Cuba; they are popular among Latino children, who use them for school assignments. The book has also been reviewed and accepted by other school districts such as the Los Angeles Unified School District. According to one Reforma member and school librarian, “I was in Cuba in 2000, and visited many schools, institutes, libraries, and other such places. Everything in the book about Cuba is accurate as far as I could tell...†While there may be differences in interpretation of Cuban society based on social class origin or history, the facts in this book are accurate. Other interpretations of Cuban history and society may be added to the collections by supplementing other books, not by taking this one off the shelves of the school libraries.
Vamos a Cuba is a 32 page hardcover picture book written in Spanish and published by Heinemann Library, an imprint of Reed Educational & Professional Publishing in Chicago. It is part of a small series of books in Spanish about Latin American countries that includes Colombia, Puerto Rico, and Costa Rica, and fits within a larger series of mostly books in English that give young children information about many countries throughout the world. One of the highlights of the book are the 25 large full color photographs of contemporary Cuba, its landscapes and people. The book includes bibliographical references, a glossary, a list of basic facts, and an index.
Aguayo, Terry. “Miami-Dade School Board Bans Cuba Book,†The New York Times, June 16, 2006: 24.
Schreier, Alta. Vamos a Cuba. Chicago: Heinemann Library, 2001. | <urn:uuid:56b5a5e9-454b-4d22-a4fd-1c3cdc8b4a9f> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://reforma.membershipsoftware.org/content.asp?pl=52&sl=8&contentid=72 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397636.15/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00107-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959006 | 675 | 3.296875 | 3 |
March 18 is Oatmeal Cookie Day! Exactly what they sound like – oatmeal cookies are cookies made of ground oats, usually with the addition of nuts, raisins, or chocolate chips.
The origin of this day is unknown, but oatmeal cookies have existed as a tasty sweet snack since the 1800s. Oats themselves were first cultivated in 7,000 BC in ancient China, making them one of the earliest cereals known to man. The predecessor to oatmeal cookies – oatcakes – were carried and consumed by soldiers in the Middle Ages when they needed something to boost their energy before battle. Over the years, the recipe for oatcakes was tweaked and updated and made into the sweeter oatmeal cookies we know today.
Oatmeal cookies are considered healthier than most other cookies because oats are exchanged for most of the flour used in normal cookies, and only one egg is typically needed to bind ingredients together. The addition of other ingredients depends on your specific taste. Sometime honey or molasses is used in place of sugar to sweeten the treats. Other popular additions include nuts, raisins, and chocolate chips. Though oatcakes do differ from the modern-day oatmeal cookie, many of the same spices are still used. These cookies are also known for being a great source of iron and fiber.
To celebrate today, try some of these delicious oatmeal cookie recipes we’ve dug up:
- Soft Oatmeal Cookies
- Raisin Pecan Oatmeal Cookies
- Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Brown Sugar Oatmeal Cookies | <urn:uuid:26fdbf07-0ede-4254-9f98-a5653ebcbc7e> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://blog.calendars.com/tag/cookies/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397873.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00183-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961371 | 320 | 2.703125 | 3 |
1 Answer | Add Yours
In Life of Pi, the reader is introduced to Pi as he now lives his life in Canada, after his ordeal at sea, left to fend for himself for 227 days. We immediately hear of his "strange religious practices" as he begins to explain things about himself to the "Author." This is an example of direct characterization as is Pi telling us that he is a good student. In chapter two, the reader gets a direct description of Pi; a slim and small man, aged less than forty.
In chapter three, Pi tells the reader how he got his name and about his introduction to swimming as a "willing disciple." Direct characterization reveals factual details about the character without the reader having to make assumptions.
Indirect characterization comes about when a person's traits are assumed such as, we know Pi is learned and educated because of his "double-major Bachelor’s degree." We also know that Pi's exposure to the westernized culture of Canada makes him "faint into the arms of a nurse" as "The first time I turned a tap on, its noisy, wasteful, superabundant gush was such a shock."
In the very short chapter two, despite "mild fall weather," Pi still needs to wrap up warmly, indicating his feelings of cold, or even his insecurities.
Having learnt that Pi is keen to swim, we learn of his swimming efforts when, at first, he "looked like a child throwing a peculiar, slow-motion tantrum." However, he apparently loves swimming and becomes very good, although he doesn't actually say so. It is obvious when he says "the water turning from molten lead to liquid light."
Martel uses both these techniques to build Pi's character as it ensures a rounded character - even if the reader finds Pi's story-telling far-fetched.
We’ve answered 327,583 questions. We can answer yours, too.Ask a question | <urn:uuid:c4a232b4-6c6e-482f-8126-6dd064bd00dd> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.enotes.com/homework-help/how-does-martel-directly-characterize-pi-first-448725 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394414.43/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00156-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984211 | 406 | 3.25 | 3 |
A Study Guide
How to Cite This Study Guide.......
Table of Contents
Type of Work Dates of Composition and Publication Sources Settings Tone Characters Plot Summary
Climax and Conclusion Structure Themes Is Demetrius Tricked Into Loving Hermia?
Allusions and References to Mythology Nature and Animal Imagery Use of Couplets Figures of Speech
Superior Descriptive Passages Character Habitats Study Questions and Essay Topics
Iambic Pentameter and Blank Verse: What Is Iambic Pentameter? What Is Blank Verse? Origin of Blank Verse
A Midsummer Night's Dream is a stage comedy centering on the travails, pitfalls, and joys of love and marriage.
The Canterbury Tales—has an entirely different plot. But the setting and two of the main characters, Theseus and Hippolyta, are the same. Other sources Shakespeare used include The Golden Ass, by Apuleius (second century AD); Theseus, by Plutarch (46 BC?-AD 120?); and possibly King James the Fourth, a play by Robert Greene (1560?-1592). Pyramus and Thisbe, the play within the play, is based on passages in Metamorphoses (Book IV), by the Roman poet Ovid (43 BC-AD 17). The character Puck, a mischievous sprite in A Midsummer Night's Dream, appeared as Robin Goodfellow in a 1593 play, Terrors of the Night, by Thomas Nashe (1567-1601). Edmund Spenser referred to a devilish sprite called Pook in Epithalamium (1595), and Shakespeare may have adopted Pook and changed his name to Puck. Puck is also the name of a mischievous fairy in Celtic and English folklore.
Theseus: Duke of Athens. In Greek mythology, Theseus was a hero of many accomplishments, one of which was to kill the Minotaur, a monster that was half-man and half-bull. Another was to defeat the Amazons, a race of warrior women. Afterward, he married the queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta. In Shakespeare's play, he orders lavish festivities and merriment for his marriage to Hippolyta, telling her "I will wed thee . . . with pomp, with triumph and with revelling."
Hippolyta: Queen of the Amazons and the wife-to-be of Theseus. She was once a battlefield foe of Theseus, as the character description of Theseus points out.
Hermia: Strong-willed young woman in love with Lysander. She refuses to marry Demetrius, her father's choice for her. Her father asks Theseus to settle the dispute.
Egeus: Hermia's father.
Lysander, Demetrius: Young men in love with Hermia.
Helena: Young woman in love with Demetrius.
Philostrate: Master of Revels for Duke Theseus.
Bottom: Weaver who plays Pyramus in a play staged with his fellow Athenian tradesmen.
Peter Quince: Carpenter who plays Thisbe's father in the tradesmen's play. He also recites the prologue.
Snug: Joiner (cabinetmaker) who plays a lion in the tradesmen's play.
Francis Flute: Bellows-mender who plays Thisbe in the tradesmen's play.
Tom Snout: Tinker who plays Pyramus's father.
Robin Starveling: Tailor who plays Thisbe's mother.
Oberon: King of the fairies in the forest outside Athens.
Titania: Queen of the fairies.
Puck (also called Robin Goodfellow): Mischievous sprite who acts on behalf of Oberon. He can take the form of any creature or thing—hog, bear, horse, dog, and even fire. For more information on Puck, see Sources.
Nedar: Father of Helena. He has no speaking part in the play.
Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth, Mustardseed: Fairies.
Other Fairies: Attendants of Oberon and Titania.
Attendants of Theseus and Hippolyta
Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;
Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New-bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities. (1.1.9-13)
To prepare for the wedding, Theseus orders his master of revels, Philostrate, to “stir up the Athenian youth to merriments; / Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth” (1.1.15-16). After Philostrate leaves to go about his task, one of the duke’s subjects, Egeus, arrives with his daughter, Hermia, and two Athenian youths, Lysander and Demetrius. Egeus informs Theseus that he has ordered his daughter to marry Demetrius but that she has refused, vowing to marry Lysander instead. Egeus now wants Hermia to swear before the duke that she will marry Demetrius or suffer the penalty of an ancient law decreeing that a disobedient daughter shall either be put to death or banished. After hearing the full complaint, Duke Theseus reminds Hermia of her duty to obey her father, saying, “To you your father should be as a god” (1.1.51).
The duke then warns her that if she does not change her mind on this matter before the new moon, he will have no choice but to enforce the ancient law. Hermia and Lysander later decide to steal away to the woods the following night, and Hermia confides the plan to her friend Helena. Bad move. Helena is a blabbermouth who loves the man Hermia rejected, Demetrius. To gain favor with him, Helena informs him of Hermia’s plan.
Meanwhile, tradesmen in Athens rehearse for a play they plan to stage as part of the festivities celebrating the wedding of Theseus and Hippolyta. The tradesmen include Bottom, a weaver; Snout; a tinker; Snug, a cabinetmaker; Quince, a carpenter; and Flute, a bellows-mender. Their play is to be called The most lamentable comedy, and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby. (Thisby should be Thisbe. But the tradesmen, no scholars, misspell the word.) Although the men know nothing of play-making, they fancy themselves great wits and great actors. When Bottom learns that he will play Pyramus, a young man who kills himself after mistakenly thinking his beloved Thisbe is dead, Bottom predicts he will be a hit who will win the audience’s sympathy: “That will ask some tears in the true performing of it: if I do it, let the audience look to their eyes; I will move storms. . .” (1.2.14).
To avoid the scrutiny of curious eyes, the actors decide to rehearse in the woods the next day. In the woods are fairies who have traveled from India to pronounce their blessing on the bed of Theseus and Hyppolyta. But all is not well with fairykind, for the queen of the fairies, Titania, will not give her husband, King Oberon, a changeling boy he wants as a page. (A changeling was a fairy child left to take the place of another child.)
Oberon and Titania argue violently over the boy, so violently that the forest elves take refuge in acorn cups. But Titania stands fast. In revenge, Oberon orders his fairy mischief-maker, Puck (also called Robin Goodfellow), to harvest a magical flower whose juice, when squeezed on the eyelids of Titania while she sleeps, will cause her to fall in love with the first creature she sees upon awakening, perhaps a monster. Puck says he will circle the earth and, within forty minutes, produce the flower. After Puck zooms off, Oberon relishes his dastardly scheme, saying:
Having once this juice,
I’ll watch Titania when she is asleep,
And drop the liquor of it in her eyes.
The next thing then she waking looks upon,
Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull,
On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,
She shall pursue it with the soul of love:
And ere I take this charm from off her sight,
As I can take it with another herb,
I’ll make her render up her page [the changeling] to me. (2.1.183-192)
On the following day, Lysander and Hermia escape to the woods. Demetrius also enters the woods in hopes of encountering Hermia, ignoring the lovestruck Helena, who trails after him like a lapdog. After Puck returns with the magical flower juice, Oberon—feeling sorry for Helena—orders Puck to squeeze the juice on the eyelids of Demetrius to make him fall in love with Helena. Oberon then ventures forth and squeezes flower juice on the eyelids of Titania, who is sleeping peacefully in a bed of violets and thyme. Puck, meanwhile, mistakenly squeezes flower juice on the eyelids of Lysander while he is sleeping with Hermia at his side. Upon awakening, Lysander’s gaze falls upon Helena, who is wandering in search of Demetrius.
Lysander woos her. When she flees, he pursues her. After Hermia awakens, she wanders forth in search of Lysander.
As the tradesmen rehearse their play, they discuss having someone play the moon. And, because the play calls for Pyramus and Thisbe to talk through a chink in a wall that separates them, Bottom suggests someone also be recruited to play the wall: "Some man or other must present Wall: and let him have some plaster, or some loam, or some rough-cast about him, to signify wall; and let him hold his fingers thus [in the shape of a V], and through that cranny shall Pyramus. . . and Thisby whisper" (3.1.25). (The tradesmen think Thisbe is spelled with a y at the end instead of an e.)
When Puck happens by, he makes mischief by giving Bottom the head of an ass. Upon seeing Bottom with his new top, the other actors flee in terror. Bewildered, Bottom thinks they are trying to scare him, so he strolls about singing a song to demonstrate his fearlessness. The song awakens Titania, and the flower juice makes her fall deeply in love with Bottom, whom she escorts away. Demetrius encounters Hermia, who accuses him of murdering Lysander. When she runs away, he lies down to sleep.
Oberon, meanwhile, has discovered that Puck bewitched the eyes of the wrong man—Lysander rather than Demetrius. So he puts flower juice on the eyes of Demetrius while Puck fetches Helena. When she arrives, pursued by Lysander, Demetrius falls in love with her. As both young men compete for her attentions, she concludes that they are only ridiculing her. Hermia, attracted to the scene by the noise, then blames Helena for stealing Lysander.
The men go off to fight a duel. Helena, afraid of Hermia, flees; Hermia follows her. Oberon assigns Puck to restore order. Using magic, he causes the four young people to fall asleep near one another, then applies magical juice to Lysander’s eyes to undo the previous spell. Titania sleeps next to Bottom. Oberon, meanwhile, who has gained possession of the changeling boy, removes the enchantment from Titania’s eyes.
At daybreak, Theseus, Hippolyta, Egeus, and others enter the woods to hunt. Sounding horns, they awaken the four lovers. Egeus again demands that Hermia marry Demetrius. But Demetrius announces that he is interested only in Helena. Theseus, pleased with the outcome, sanctions the marriage of the two couples to coincide with his own marriage to Hippolyta. Theseus is amused by the activities of the lovers during their time in the forest and says:
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover and the poet.
Are of imagination all compact. (5.1.6-10)
In the evening, during the wedding celebration, the craftsmen put on their play, with Snout playing Wall and Bottom enacting his tour de force suicide scene as Pyramus.
Thus die I, thus, thus, thus. [Stabs himself.]
Now am I dead,
Now am I fled;
My soul is in the sky:
Tongue, lose thy light;
Moon take thy flight.
Now die, die, die, die, die. [Dies.] (5.1.277-283)
Thisbe, discovering Pyramus dead, then kills herself. Bottom gets back up and asks Theseus whether he would like to hear an epilogue or see a dance. Theseus opts for a dance, then says it is time for bed.
The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve:
Lovers, to bed; ’tis almost fairy time.
I fear we shall out-sleep the coming morn
As much as we this night have overwatch’d.
This palpable-gross play hath well beguiled
The heavy gait of night. Sweet friends, to bed.
A fortnight hold we this solemnity,
In nightly revels and new jollity. (5.1.322-329)
At midnight, the bridal couples retire to their chambers. Oberon and Titania dance and sing as they bless the blissful sleepers while Puck bids good night to the audience.
A Midsummer Night's Dream contains numerous poems and poetic passages, along with the traditional verse and prose passages, to make it one of Shakespeare's most poetic play.
verse is often used as a synonym for poetry. However, Shakespeare's iambic-pentameter verse contains no rhyming lines, as does his poetry. (An explanation of iambic-pentameter verse appears below.)
In a Shakespeare play, royal, noble, and upper-class characters usually speak in verse; commoners generally speak in prose. Be aware, though, that there are many exceptions. In Hamlet, for example, the title character speaks in prose as well as verse. Moreover, in some plays, commoners sometimes rise to the eloquence of verse.
In a verse passage in A Midsummer Night's Dream and other Shakespeare plays, each line begins with a capital letter and generally has about ten syllables. Here is an example, the first four lines in Act 1, Scene 1, of Midsummer. Each line has ten syllables.
Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace: four happy days bring in
Another moon; but O! methinks how slow
This old moon wanes; she lingers my desires.
In a prose passage in A Midsummer Night's Dream and other Shakespeare plays, the first line begins with a capital letter and each succeeding line with a lower-case letter (unless the first word of a line is a proper noun or the beginning of a new sentence). Here is a prose passage spoken by Bottom.
When my cue comes, call me, and I will answer: my next (next cue) is, ‘Most fair Pyramus.’ Heigh-ho! Peter Quince! Flute, the bellows-mender! Snout, the tinker! Starveling! God’s my life! stolen hence, and left me asleep! I have had a most rare vision. I have had a dream, past the wit of man to say what dream it was: man is but an ass, if he go about to expound this dream. Methought I was—there is no man can tell what. Methought I was,—and methought I had,—but man is but a patched fool, if he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man’s hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of this dream: it shall be called "Bottom’s Dream," because it hath no bottom; and I will sing it in the latter end of a play, before the duke: peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall sing it at her death.
Notice that the lines in the prose passage continue to the right margin and that the lines in the verse passage, because each has only ten syllables, do not.
A Midsummer Night's Dream, end rhyme occurs. So does a regular, rhythmic pattern, as in verse passages.
Here is a poetic passage in which Lysander confides to Helena that he and Hermia plan to steal away to the forest. The rhyming words are boldfaced.
Helen, to you our minds we will unfold.
To-morrow night, when Phoebe behold
Her silver visage in the wat’ry glass,
Decking with liquid pearl [moonlight] the bladed grass,—
A time that lovers’ flights doth still conceal,—
Through Athens’ gates have we devis’d to steal. (1.1-215-220)
And here is a poem recited by Puck as he stands alone on the stage. The rhyming words are boldfaced. Note that one of the rhyming pairs (moon and fordone) contains words with a similar—but not the same—sound. Such rhymes are called near rhymes, slant rhymes, or half-rhymes.
Now the hungry lion roars,Format: Verse, Prose, Poetry," you read that Shakespeare wrote his plays in verse, prose, poems, and poetic passages. You also read that he used a rhythm pattern called iambic pentameter in verse passages.
And the wolf behowls the moon;
Whilst the heavy ploughman snores,
All with weary task fordone.
Now the wasted brands do glow,
Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud,
Puts the wretch that lies in woe
In remembrance of a shroud.
Now it is the time of night
That the graves, all gaping wide,
Every one lets forth his sprite,
In the church-way paths to glide:
And we fairies, that do run
By the triple Hecate’s team,
From the presence of the sun,
Following darkness like a dream,
Now are frolic; not a mouse
Shall disturb this hallow’d house:
I am sent with broom before,
To sweep the dust behind the door. (5.2.2-21)
iamb (pronounced EYE am). An iamb is a unit of rhythm consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. Consider the words annoy, fulfill, pretend, regard, and serene. They are all iambs because the first syllable of each word is unstressed (or unaccented) and the second syllable is stressed (or accented): an NOY, ful FILL, pre TEND, re GARD, and ser ENE. Iambs can also consist of one word with a single unstressed (unaccented) syllable followed by another word with a single stressed (accented) syllable (example: the KING). In addition, they may consist of a final unstressed syllable of one word followed by an initial stressed syllable of the next word. The following lines from A Midsummer Night's Dream demonstrate the use of iambs. The stressed syllables or words are capitalized.
How NOW, my LOVE! Why IS your CHEEK so PALE?
How CHANCE the RO ses THERE do FADE so FAST? (1.1.133-134)
When a line has five iambs, it is in iambic pentameter. In the word pentameter, the prefix pent- means five. The suffix -meter refers to the recurrence of a rhythmic unit (also called a foot). Thus, because the above lines contain iambs, they are iambic. Because they contain five iambs (or five feet) they are said to be in iambic pentameter. (A line with five iambs, or five feet, contains ten syllables, as in the quoted lines immediately above.)
unrhymed iambic pentameter is blank verse.
Occasionally, a line in blank verse may have nine syllables, or perhaps ten or eleven, instead of the usual ten. The reason is that the importance of conveying the right meaning dictates veering from standard practice. At times, a passage mainly in blank verse may contain a line with even fewer syllables. Such a deviation may occur when a character ends a passage with a transitional statement, as in the following.
I wonder if Titania [pronounced ty TAN yuh] be awak’d; (ten syllables)
Then, what it was that next came in her eye, (ten syllables)
Which she must dote on in extremity. (ten syllables)
Here comes my messenger. (3.2.3-6) (six syllables)
Note that the first three lines each have five iambs, or ten syllables, but that the last line has only three iambs, or six syllables.
A deviation from iambic pentameter may also occur when a character responds to a question with a short reply, such as yes or no.
versi sciolti in Italian). Englishman Henry Howard, an earl of Surrey (1516-1547), first used blank verse in English in his translation of Vergil's epic Latin poem The Aeneid (19 BC). The first English drama in blank verse was Gorboduc, staged in 1561, by Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton. It was about an early British king. Later in the same century, Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare turned blank verse into high art when they used it in their plays. Marlowe used the verse form in Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine, and Edward II. Shakespeare used it in all of his plays. In Germany, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781) popularized blank verse in his long poem Nathan the Wise (Nathan der Weise), published in 1779.
Lysander sums up the main theme of the play when he tells Hermia, "The course of true love never did run smooth" (1.1.134). Even the relationship between Theseus and Hippolyta did not begin smoothly, as Theseus observes.
Hippolyta, I woo’d thee with my sword,
And won thy love doing thee injuries;
But I will wed thee in another key,
With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling. (1.1.19-22)
In Greek mythology, Hippolyta was the queen of the Amazons, a race of warrior women in Scythia, a country that was between the Black Sea and the Aral Sea. Theseus, a king of Athens and courageous adventurer, decided one day that he would marry Hippolyta, so he traveled to her country to woo her. But after she refused his proposal, he kidnapped her, precipitating a war with the Amazons. Theseus won the war and—according to Shakespeare's interpretation of the myth—the hand of Hippolyta.
For all the other lovers in the forest outside Athens, the course of love likewise does not run smooth. Oberon and Titania argue over the changeling boy. Lysander, who deeply loves Hermia, announces that he loves Helena after Puck enchants him with the magical juice of a flower. Helena, meanwhile, chases after Demetrius, who despises her. Demetrius, also enchanted by flower juice, chases after Hermia. In the end, all these lovers make up.
In the tradesmen's play, Pyramus and Thisbe are forbidden by their familes to see one another and limited to communicating through a hole in a wall separating their dwellings. After they run off to meet in the woods, Pyramus mistakenly thinks a lion has killed Thisbe, and he draws a dagger (or sword) and kills himself. When Thisbe comes upon his body, she stabs herself with the same weapon.
Love is elusive. Theseus had to go to war to win Hippolyta. Lysander, Hermia, Demetrius, and Helena have to chase through woods, endure confusion, and become victims of Puck's pranks before they can rest content at the sides of their true loves. For poor Pyramus and Thisbe, togetherness eludes them forever.
The Forest as a Magical Place
In A Midsummer Night's Dream, fanciful, irrational, magical things happen in the forest. Fairies sing and dance. The mischievous sprite Puck uses enchanted flower juice to alter the reality that the lovers see. The fairy king Oberon becomes invisible to eavesdrop on a conversation between Demetrius and Helena (2.1.193-194). Puck gives the tradesman Bottom the head of an ass. And the young lovers confuse the dream world with the real world. As Demetrius says,
Are you sure
That we are awake? It seems to me
That yet we sleep, we dream. (4.1.181-183)
The experiences of Lysander, Hermia, Demetrius, Helena, Oberon, and Titania appear to represent the trials that all couples undergo from time to time in courtship and marriage. Such trials test a couple's patience and faith in one another and cause the relationship to mature—and, in some cases, to disintegrate.
Seeing Through Differerent Eyes
After Bottom appears with the head of an ass, his friends see him as a beast. When Quince first beholds him, he says,
O monstrous! O strange! we are haunted.
Pray, masters! fly, masters!—Help! (3.1.51-52)
But when the bewitched Titania sees him, she says,
Mine eye [is] enthralled to thy shape;
And thy fair virtue’s force, perforce, doth move me,
On the first view, to say, to swear, I love thee. (3.1.70-72)
These scenes mimic real life, in which one person's perception of reality frequently differs from another's.
Dreaming the Impossible Dream
The tradesmen know little of acting and stagecraft. Yet they dare to dream the impossible dream: presenting a play before Theseus, the ruler of Athens. Though they bumble through their performance, they succeed in entertaining Theseus. Lysander and Hermia also realize an impossible dream—becoming husband and wife over the objections of Hermia's father, Egeus. Helena, too, realizes an impossible dream: winning the heart of Demetrius.
The play celebrates marriage with dancing, singing, and a joyous embracement of love. Theseus introduces this theme when he tells his Master of Revels,
Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth;
Turn melancholy forth to funerals;
The pale companion [death] is not for our pomp [celebration]. [Exit PHILOSTRATE.
Hippolyta, I woo’d thee with my sword,
And won thy love doing thee injuries;
But I will wed thee in another key [way, manner],
With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling. (1.1.14-22)
Oberon reinforces this theme when he says,
Now, until the break of day,
Through this house each fairy stray.
To the best bride-bed will we,
Which by us shall blessed be;
And the issue [children] there create
Ever shall be fortunate.
So shall all the couples three
Ever true in loving be;
And the blots of Nature’s hand
Shall not in their issue stand: (5.2.33-42)
Theseus, Hippolyta; Oberon, Titania (he tricks her); Demetrius, Helena (she chases him); Egeus, Hermia
Father Does Not Always Know Best
Egeus orders his daughter, Hermia, to marry Demetrius, a man she does not love. Hermia protests and runs away with her true love, Lysander. In the end, Theseus sanctions the marriage of Hermia and Lysander, and Demetrius vows his love for Helena. Egeus is proven wrong.
My good lord, I wot [know] not by what power,—
But by some power it is,—my love to Hermia,
Melted as doth the snow, seems to me now
As the remembrance of an idle gaud [passing fancy; mere trifle]
Which in my childhood I did dote upon;
And all the faith, the virtue of my heart,
The object and the pleasure of mine eye,
Is only Helena. To her, my lord,
Was I betroth’d ere [before] I saw Hermia:
But, like in sickness, did I loathe this food;
But, as in health, come to my natural taste,
Now do I wish it, love it, long for it,
And will for evermore be true to it. (4.1.151-163)
Acheron (3.2.379): River in the Underworld (Hades).
Aeneas (1.1.180): See Dido, below.
Apollo and Daphne (2.1.239): Apollo—god of poetry, music, medicine, and the sun—pursued the nymph Daphne, daughter of a river god. After she prayed for a way to escape Apollo, her father changed her into a laurel tree. Apollo later used the leaves of the laurel in wreaths with which victors of various contests were crowned.
Ariadne (2.1.84): Daughter of King Minos of Crete. She gave Theseus a thread that enabled him to find his way out of the labyrinth, a maze constructed to house the Minotaur, a creature with the head of a bull and the body of a man.
Cadmus (4.1.98): Son of the king of Phoenicia and founder of the Greek city of Thebes.
Cupid (1.1.175, 3.2.108)): Roman name for the Greek god of love, Eros, who shot arrows at humans to wound them with love.
Diana (1.1.94): Roman name of Artemis, goddess of the moon and the hunt.
Dido (1.1.179): Dido is not referred to by name but by the designation Carthage queen, meaning she was the queen of the North African country of Carthage. She appears in Virgil’s great epic poem, The Aeneid. Dido falls desperately in love with The Aeneid’s main character, Aeneas, after he stops in Carthage on his way from Troy to Italy. But after he abandons her, she kills herself by falling on a sword. At sea on his ship, Aeneas can see Carthage glowing with the flames of Dido’s funeral pyre.
Hercules (4.1.98): Greek demigod known for his feats of strength.
Jove (5.1.181): One of two Roman names for Zeus, the king of the Olympian gods in Greek mythology. The other Roman name is Jupiter.
Neptune (2.1.131): Roman name of Poseidon, god of the sea in Greek mythology.
Phibbus: (1.2.14): Mispronounced and misspelled reference to Phoebus, a name used for Apollo whenever he was spoken of in his role as the sun god.
Venus (1.1.177, 3.2.66): Roman name for the Greek goddess of love, Aphrodite. She was the mother of Cupid.
Here is an example of a passage, spoken by Hermia, referring to figures of myth and legend. They include Cupid (second line), Venus (fourth line), Dido (sixth line, referred to as the Carthage queen), and Aeneas (seventh line, referred to as a Troyan, meaning Trojan).
My good Lysander!
I swear to thee, by Cupid’s strongest bow,
By his best arrow with the golden head,
By the simplicity of Venus’ doves,
By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,
And by that fire which burn’d the Carthage queen,
When the false Troyan [false Trojan, Aeneas] under sail was seen,
By all the vows that ever men have broke,
In number more than ever women spoke,
In that same place thou hast appointed me,
To-morrow truly will I meet with thee. (1.1.174-184)
I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine:
There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,
Lull'd in these flowers with dances and delight;
And there the snake throws her enamell'd skin,
Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in. (2.1.259-266)
The song of the fairies is another example. It emphasizes the spooky creatures that inhabit the forest.
You spotted snakes with double tongue,
Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen;
Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong,
Come not near our fairy queen.
Philomel, with melody
Sing in our sweet lullaby;
Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby:
Nor spell nor charm,
Come our lovely lady nigh;
So, good night, with lullaby.
Weaving spiders, come not here;
Hence, you long-legg'd spinners, hence!
Beetles black, approach not near;
Worm nor snail, do no offence. (2.2.12)
Captain of our fairy band,
Helena is here at hand;
And the youth, mistook by me,
Pleading for a lover's fee.
Shall we their fond pageant see?
Lord, what fools these mortals be! (Puck: 3.2.116-121)
Now, until the break of day,
Through this house each fairy stray.
To the best bride-bed will we,
Which by us shall blessed be;
And the issue there create
Ever shall be fortunate. (Oberon: 5.2.33-38)
O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!
To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne?
Crystal is muddy. O, how ripe in show
Thy lips, those kissing cherries, tempting grow!
That pure congealed white, high Taurus snow,
Fann'd with the eastern wind, turns to a crow
When thou hold'st up thy hand: O, let me kiss
This princess of pure white, this seal of bliss! (3.2.144-151)
Alliteration is the repetition of a consonant sound at the beginning of words or syllables.
Turn melancholy forth to funerals;
The pale companion is not for our pomp. (1.1.17-18)
Fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
To fit your fancies to your father’s will. (1.1.122-123)
No night is now with hymn or carol blest. (2.1.106)
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose. (2.1.111-112)
Anaphora is the repetition of a word or group of words at the beginning of a sentence, clause, or phrase.
But I will wed thee in another key,
With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling. (1.1.21-22)
So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord. (1.1.84)
Over hill, over dale,
Thorough [through] bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,
Thorough flood, thorough fire. (2.1.4-7)
I’ll lead you about a round,
Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier:
Sometime a horse I’ll be, sometime a hound. (3.1.53-55)
A metaphor is a comparison between unlike things without the use of like, as, or than.
Pluck the wings from painted butterflies
To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes. (3.1.101-102)
Comparison of moonbeams to a physical object that a current of air moves
Thou lead them thus,
Till o’er their brows death-counterfeiting sleep
With leaden legs and batty wings doth creep. (3.2.385-387)
Comparison sleep to a winged creature
The eastern gate, all fiery-red,
Opening on Neptune with fair blessed beams,
Turns into yellow gold his salt green streams. (3.2.413-415)
Comparison of dawn to a fiery gate, comparsion of the ocean to yellow gold
An oxymoron is the use of contradictory words that occur together. Little giant and brave coward are examples of oxymorons. Following is an oxymoron from the play.
I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder. (4.1.103-104)
Personification is a form of metaphor that compares a thing to a person, as in the following example.
The moon methinks, looks with a watery eye;
And when she weeps, weeps every little flower. (3.1.116-117)
Comparison of the moon to a person. (The moon is a female who weeps.)
A simile is a comparison between unlike things with the use of like, as, or than. Here are examples.
The moon, like to a silver bowA Midsummer Night's Dream contains outstanding descriptive passages. In Characters of Shakespeare's Plays (London: C. H. Reynell, 1817), he said:
New-bent in heaven. (1.1.11-12)
Comparison of the moon to a silver bow
The starry welkin cover thou anon
With drooping fog as black as Acheron (3.2.378-379)
Comparson of the blackness of the fog to that of Acheron. In Greek mythology, Acheron was a river in the abode of the dead, Hades.
In the Midsummer Night's Dream alone, we should imagine, there is more sweetness and beauty of description than in the whole range of French poetry put together. What we mean is this, that we will produce out of that single play ten passages, to which we do not think any ten passages in the works of the French poets can be opposed, displaying equal fancy and imagery. Shall we mention the remonstrance of Helena to Hermia, or Titania's description of her fairy train, or her disputes with Oberon about the Indian boy, or Puck's account of himself and his employments, or the Fairy Queen's exhortation to the elves to pay due attendance upon her favourite, Bottom; or Hippolita's description of a chace, or Theseus's answer? The two last are as heroical and spirited as the others are full of luscious tenderness. The reading of this play is like wandering in a grove by moonlight: the descriptions breathe a sweetness like odours thrown from beds of flowers.
Titania's exhortation to the fairies [3.1.93-103] to wait upon Bottom, which is remarkable for a certain cloying sweetness in the repetition of the rhymes, is as follows:—
Be kind and courteous to this gentleman.
Hop in his walks, and gambol in his eyes,
Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,
With purple grapes, green figs and mulberries;
The honey-bags steal from the humble bees,
And for night tapers crop their waxen thighs,
And light them at the fiery glow-worm's eyes,
To have my love to bed, and to arise:
And pluck the wings from painted butterflies,
To fan the moon-beams from his sleeping eyes;
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.
The sounds of the lute and of the trumpet are not more distinct than the poetry of the foregoing passage, and of the conversation between Theseus and Hiopolita [4.1.89-113].
Theseus. Go, one of you, find out the forester,
For now our observation is perform'd;
And since we have the vaward of the day,
My love shall hear the music of my hounds.
Uncouple in the western valley, go,
Dispatch, I say, and find the forester.
We will, fair Queen, up to the mountain's top,
And mark the musical confusion
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.
Hippolita. I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear
With hounds of Sparta; never did I hear
Such gallant chiding. For besides the groves,
The skies, the fountains, every region near
Seem'd all one mutual cry. I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.
Theseus. My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flew'd, so sanded, and their heads are hung
With ears that sweep away the morning dew;
Crook-knee'd and dew-lap'd, like Thessalian bulls,
Slow in pursuit, but matched in mouth like bells,
Each under each. A cry more tuneable
Was never halloo'd to, nor cheer'd with horn,
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:
Judge when you hear.—
Shakespeare's characters are . . . dubious of rusticity. Valentine [in The Two Gentlemen of Verona] does not rejoice in his woodland life as head of an outlaw band; the lovers of A [Midsummer Night's] Dream find their woodland adventure unnerving, and mountain life seems rude to the characters in Cymbeline who are forced to endure it. Although Florizel [in The Winter's Tale] dreams of spending his life with Perdita in a cottage, she knows that pastoral bliss is only a dream; true content lies in Leontes' court, to which all the characters . . . return. Even Prospero [in The Tempest], who has no great desire to see Milan again, knows that he and Miranda must leave their island, which is as much prison as refuge to them. Although critics can idealize the pastoral experiences of Shakespeare's characters as renewing contacts with nature, that experience is often somewhat harrowing. (Shakespeare's Comedies From Roman Farce to Romantic Mystery. Newark: U of Delaware, 1986 (page 144). | <urn:uuid:b6e3cab8-f5c2-4949-b9fa-71b5e983a070> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://shakespearestudyguide.com/Midsummer.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783393997.50/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154953-00194-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.920629 | 9,487 | 3.5 | 4 |
Lincoln, the Great Emancipator??, by Henry A. Rhodes
Guide Entry to 85.05.03:
There were two major objectives I wished to accomplish with my unit. First, I discussed the factors that prompted Lincoln to draft the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. A discussion devoted to Lincolnís personality, life, and environment in which he was born and raised occurs in this part of my paper. This section also includes Lincolnís social and political beliefs as they pertained to slavery and race in the United States. In my research I discovered that some of the people who played an important role in emancipating the slave harbored some of the commonly held prejudices of the time against the Negro. I also deal with the issue of how racism could coexist with the drive for emancipation.
The second major objective of my unit was to examine the role played by the Radical Republicans during the Lincoln presidency. Who these Radical Republicans were and how they interacted with Mr. Lincoln will be focused on in my unit. I hope that, when students finish this unit, they will come to the conclusion that racist attitudes can be changed, but it is a slow and arduous process in which they can play an active role.
(Recommended for Social Studies classes, grade 8, and American History classes, grades 9 through 12)
Lincoln Presidency Slavery Afro-Americans History Emancipation Proclamation American Abraham Race Relations | <urn:uuid:66eb9901-226c-4db9-b392-b942bc41fe08> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/guides/1985/5/85.05.03.x.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396959.83/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00171-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970384 | 293 | 3.96875 | 4 |
NASA’s Hubble sees a horsehead of a different color
Scientists know a harsh ultraviolet glare from a bright star is slowly evaporating the nebula.
Astronomers have used NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to photograph the iconic Horsehead Nebula in a new infrared light to mark the 23rd anniversary of the famous observatory's launch aboard the space shuttle Discovery on April 24, 1990.
Looking like an apparition rising from whitecaps of interstellar foam, the iconic Horsehead Nebula has graced astronomy books ever since its discovery more than a century ago. The nebula is a favorite target for amateur and professional astronomers. It is shadowy in optical light; it appears transparent and ethereal when seen at infrared wavelengths. The rich tapestry of the Horsehead Nebula pops out against the backdrop of Milky Way stars and distant galaxies that easily are visible in infrared light.
Hubble has been producing groundbreaking science for two decades. During that time, it has benefited from a slew of upgrades from space shuttle missions, including the 2009 addition of a new imaging workhorse, the high-resolution Wide Field Camera 3 that took the new portrait of the Horsehead.
The nebula is part of the Orion Molecular Cloud, located about 1,500 light-years away in the constellation Orion. The cloud also contains other well-known objects such as the Orion Nebula (M42), the Flame Nebula (NGC 2024), and Barnard's Loop. It is one of the nearest and most easily photographed regions in which massive stars are being formed.
In the Hubble image, the backlit wisps along the Horsehead's upper ridge are being illuminated by Sigma Orionis, a young five-star system just out of view. Along the nebula's top ridge, two fledgling stars peek out from their now-exposed nurseries.
Scientists know a harsh ultraviolet glare from one of these bright stars is slowly evaporating the nebula. Gas clouds surrounding the Horsehead already have dissipated, but the tip of the jutting pillar contains a slightly higher density of hydrogen and helium, laced with dust. This casts a shadow that protects material behind it from being stripped away by intense stellar radiation evaporating the hydrogen cloud, and a pillar structure forms. | <urn:uuid:9653c0ed-11eb-4a32-b410-cf14b9c6bf98> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.astronomy.com/News-Observing/News/2013/04/NASAs%20Hubble%20sees%20a%20horsehead%20of%20a%20different%20color.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397865.91/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00098-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926989 | 454 | 3.453125 | 3 |
Reading with your Child
We are pleased to announce two further enjoyable workshops for parents of Foundation/Reception age school children.
Jo Hyde from Devon School Library Service will show you how to read with your children while helping them really enjoy their reading.
The first workshop is about reading TO your child, while the second is about reading WITH your child.
Jo Hyde will also suggest books your children might enjoy and also how to get the best from your school library.
The workshops are available at Kenn Primary School, Exminster Primary School and Gatehouse Primary School in Dawlish.
Full details below, contact schools directly to book your FREE place. Please note that spaces are limited.
This blog is for everyone interested in improving the lifelong learning experience within our Learning Community. This includes Teachers and anyone whose role supports learning, parents, carers and of course children and young people. It's your space, if you have any topics you would like to see discussed or questions that you would like raised, email us at [email protected].
This entry was posted on Thursday, March 10th, 2011 at 11:47 am and is filed under DLP Learning Blog, Exminster Primary School, Foundation Stage, Gatehouse ACE Academy, Kenton Primary School, Training for Parents, Working with Parents. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Leave a Reply | <urn:uuid:e785f053-1fc3-4ccd-a344-c200e3355fa9> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.mydlp.org.uk/reading-with-your-child/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397873.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00108-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970443 | 302 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Library Home || Primary || Math Fundamentals || Pre-Algebra ||
Algebra || Geometry || Discrete Math || Trig/Calc
|Geometry, difficulty level 3. How come you can fit a quarter through a hole the size of a dime? Find a pair of coins in another system of money that could be used as "magic coins" - the "biggest" and "smallest" coins for which this would work.|
|Please Note: Use of the following materials requires membership. Please see the Problem of the Week membership page for more information.|
© 1994-2012 Drexel University. All rights reserved.
The Math Forum is a research and educational enterprise of the Drexel University School of Education. | <urn:uuid:74586a1f-33cf-46e4-87bb-7fecaf21f658> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://mathforum.org/library/problems/view/15626.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783392099.27/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154952-00133-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.863439 | 155 | 3.0625 | 3 |
| Journal of Economic Perspectives
What Do Nongovernmental Organizations Do?
Nongovernmental organizations are one group of players who are active in the efforts of international development and increasing the welfare of poor people in poor countries. Nongovernmental organizations are largely staffed by altruistic employees and volunteers working towards ideological, rather than financial, ends. Their founders are often intense, creative individuals who sometimes come up with a new product to deliver or a better way to deliver existing goods and services. They are funded by donors, many of them poor or anonymous. Yet these attributes should not be unfamiliar to economists. Development NGOs, like domestic nonprofits, can be understood in the framework of not-for-profit contracting. It is easy to conjure up a glowing vision of how the efforts of NGOs could focus on problem solving without getting bogged down in corruption or bureaucracy. But the strengths of the NGO model have some corresponding weaknesses—in agenda setting, decision making, and resource allocation. We highlight three factors in explaining the increased presence of NGOs in the last few decades: a trend towards more outsourcing of government services; new ventures by would-be not-for-profit "entrepreneurs"; and the increasing professionalization of existing NGOs.
Keywords: Non-Governmental Organizations;
Growth and Development;
Welfare or Wellbeing;
Crime and Corruption; | <urn:uuid:df5cb7c3-f5c4-45bf-b722-e1053e22f7ad> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=32602 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394605.61/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00108-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.922997 | 277 | 2.703125 | 3 |
Regionalism, tribalism and religion permeated the road to independence for Nigeria, a British colony since the mid-19th century. Those influences affect the Nigerian struggle to achieve a prosperous, functioning civil society to this day.
One source for these influences was, of course, embodied in the attitudes and prejudices of the citizens of Nigeria. However, the impact of these corrosive influences was exacerbated by the colonial policies of the British, who sought to preserve the indigenous cultures while also introducing new technology and Western ideas of politics and civic culture. These policies, coupled with the in-grown biases of the citizens, prevented the development of a real pan-Nigerian national identity.
The political opposition to colonial rule often took on religious dimensions. The northern region was Muslim, while other regions were Christian or animist and much more nationalistic. Interestingly, the influences for the nascent nationalism in the south included American political figures like Marcus Garvey and W.E.B. DuBois. | <urn:uuid:fbd84868-5798-4273-98be-e47e821c1d2d> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.pbs.org/weta/myjourneyhome/faith/faith_bg.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397864.87/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00178-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953917 | 200 | 3.796875 | 4 |
If the value or cost of something is entered in one of the empty boxes (for a particular year), then its comparable value for all the other years will be given.
This evaluation is based on the Consumer Price (General) Index of the country named at the head of the calculator. A detailed explanation of what that is can be found in the separate notes (see below).
Limits on input values are from 1 to a billion.
Values are given to 2 decimal places, ONLY so as to look like a currency.
Given the wide-ranging assumptions on which all this is based, (see notes), this is an accuracy which is certainly NOT justified.
Remember, it is not properly a Cost of Living Index (see notes).
Since the Index is historic (based on what has happened) and not predictive, future years are blanked out. They will neither accept nor give values. | <urn:uuid:1d807413-722e-42c0-a3f8-bd212a3b2165> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.cleavebooks.co.uk/scol/calcoluk.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783396538.42/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154956-00190-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935071 | 183 | 2.828125 | 3 |
1. Explain in detail the various accounting concepts and discuss the application of these concepts in the preparation of financial statements.
2. Fairdeals Ltd. presents the balance sheets as at 31.12.2009 and 31.12.2010 as follows:
|Fixed Assets at cost||31,30,000||36,05,000|
|Cash and Bank||1,20,000||1,40,000|
|Reserve and Surplus||4,20,000||4,70,000|
|Profit and Loss Account||3,80,000||4,00,000|
|13.5% Debentures (Convertible)||10,00,000||8,00,000|
You are informed that during 2010
(i) Rs. 2,00,000 of debentures were converted into shares at par;
(ii) Rs. 1,00,000 shares were issued to a vendor of fixed assets;
(iii) A machine costing Rs. 50,000 book value Rs. 30,000 as at 31st December, 2009 was disposed off for Rs. 20,000;
(iv) Rs. 30,000 of marketable securities (cost) was disposed off for Rs. 36,000.
You are required to prepare a schedule of working capital changes and funds flow statement of the company for 2010.
3. An Analysis of S Ltd. cost records give the following information.
|Variable Cost||Fixed Cost|
|(% of Sales)||Rs.|
Budgeted sales for the next year is Rs. 18, 50,000. You are required to determine:
(a) Break even sales value
(b) Profit at the budgeted sales volume
(c) Profit if actual sales: (i) drop by 10% (ii) increase by 5% from the sale.
4. Briefly explain the following
a) Rolling budget
b) Performance budgeting
c) Zero base budgeting
d) Measures of financial beverage
5. What is capital structure? Explain the features and determinants of an appropriate capital structure. | <urn:uuid:57ae7864-3117-4a45-b4cd-42e0ea325097> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://ignoumbaassignments.com/ms-4-june-2013-accounting-and-finance-for-managers/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395039.24/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00139-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.847918 | 446 | 3.015625 | 3 |
Monday, July 29, 2002
Abandoned subway could save
light rail plan
Tunnels in right spots and still usable,
By James Pilcher [email protected]
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The musty smell and graffiti are definitely there, as is the long-standing reputation as one of the city's biggest embarrassments. But that's not what transportation planners see when they look at the 80-year-old subway tunnels underneath Central Parkway.
In fact, the 2.2 miles of concrete tubes - never used for the purpose for which they were designed - could eventually become the savior of the effort to bring light rail to the region.
Engineering techician John Luginbill looks over the unfinished subway station beneath Central Parkway at Race Street.
(Glenn Hartong photos)
| ZOOM |
| ZOOM |
They not only enable officials to easily connect the east side to the west side of the proposed system (thereby allowing a pitch for a countywide plan instead of just a line along Interstate 71), but they could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars in savings if the project is ever approved.
That investment that the city initially made could be worth 40-50 times that now, and I would imagine people would take that, says Paul Jablonski, chief executive officer and general manager of Metro. They're there, so why not use them?
Metro has proposed the new $2.6 billion light-rail system for all of Hamilton County and could put a new tax levy on the November ballot to pay for it.
The tunnels were originally built in the early 1920s as part of a plan that would have brought a 16-mile transit system to Hamilton County. The original proposal, passed by voters in 1916 who approved a $6.1 million bond issue, called for a loop from downtown to the west along what is now Interstate 75 and then across what is now the path of the Norwood lateral and back into Cincinnati along what is now Interstate 71.
Cincinnati historian Dan Hurley says the Norwood lateral was built where it is now because much of the right of way had already been bought for the previous transit system.
Luginbill climbs out of the subway through an access door in the median of Central Parkway.
(Glenn Hartong photo)
| ZOOM |
He also says the idea of underground train was originally pitched to the public in an illustration in 1884 in a local newspaper, The Cincinnati Graphic.
That plan called for the removal of the canals that had become health hazards.
Eventually, the entire process fell prey to corrupt Cincinnati politics.
After World War I, costs eventually doubled, but that didn't stop the political machine 1/2ndash 3/4 they had a pot of money to spend, and they would spend it by giving contracts to their friends and family, says Mr. Hurley, president of Clifton-based Applied History Associates.
They built about a third of it, but then the money ran out. And the idea was that they would tie into other interurban rail systems throughout the system, but five of those went bankrupt.
Construction stopped in 1924, and a 1927 report said the cost to complete the project would be $10.6 million.
Construction began in the early 1920s and stopped in 1924.
| ZOOM |
By then, the Depression hit, and cars became popular, and then we had World War II, Mr. Hurley says. But that report pretty much put the nail in the coffin.
The bonds were not paid off until 1966 and cost the city an additional $6.9 million in interest.
Parts of the tunnels were later used as Cold War bomb shelters, and one report from the 1950s states that some youths were sneaking into the structures from the nearby YMCA to smoke and drink.
Officials in charge of putting the new regional rail plan together immediately thought of the existing tunnels when designing the new system several years ago. They say the double tubes are strategically located, starting at Walnut Street and running north under Central Parkway until just short of Straight Street.
They also say that in addition to being wide and high enough to fit modern light rail cars, the tunnels are structurally sound 1/2ndash 3/4 the city has been maintaining the tunnels as functioning bridges since they support traffic on Central Parkway.
The city actually renovated several key portions of the tunnels throughout the 1990s, fixing several areas that had been deteriorating.
They are basically concrete boxes, and they built them in the same way we would build them now, says Fred Craig, vice president for Ohio for engineering firm Parsons Brinckerhoff, which prepared the regional rail plan for Metro and the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments. We might as well take advantage and build within them and keep the disruption to the surface traffic to a minimum.
A recent visit to what would have been a station at Central Parkway and Race Street finds that the concrete is indeed in good shape, and the oak ties laid down for what would have been rail tracks have not even rotted.
Mr. Craig said the water main that was laid in the northern tunnel (there are two tunnels) was made redundant when another such main was installed in the transit center during the Fort Washington Way construction, adding that the older water line could be easily moved.
This one also worked out in terms of position, Mr. Craig said. A lot of times, you want to use existing infrastructure, but it's in the wrong place. But the fact is that these were in the right place, and they are of sufficient quality that we can use them.
Officials say the tunnels could also serve another key purpose - bringing down the bottom line.
Under the current federal funding program, the worth of any existing local infrastructure counts toward a local community's contribution to a proposed project.
Mr. Jablonski says local officials have yet to come up with an estimate for the existing tunnels. But Mr. Craig says the going price for a new tunnel, with just one tube, is about $1,000 a foot. In addition, stations go for about $30 million to $40 million, and the existing structures include the makings of at least three stations.
That could make Cincinnati's dual-tube structures worth more than $100 million, although Mr. Craig says that figure could be higher when the final tallying is done.
If we could get just $100 million out of it, that would be the local match for the entire west line, which we expect to cost $400 million, Mr. Jablonski says. For an initial investment of under $13 million, that would be a trade I'd be willing to make.
And then there's the remaining role the tunnels could fill. When Metro officials unveiled MetroMoves, the 30-year plan that calls for the light-rail system and revamped and improved bus service, they touted it as something for the entire region.
Without the tunnels, the west lines would not be able to connect cheaply to the rest of the system, and transit officials acknowledge they would be pushing a system to Hamilton County that would serve only the east side.
We want everyone to realize that this plan has something for everyone, and without those tunnels, that might not have been possible, says Mr. Jablonski, whose first incarnation of MetroMoves was criticized last year because it contained a light rail line only along I-71. The new plan contains lines throughout the county, including an east/west line that runs between Dent and Eastgate and one that runs from Dent to downtown, both of which would use the tunnels.
Local political analyst Gene Beaupre says that move alone could eventually save the effort.
It would have been political suicide to try and pitch a new tax to the entire county for something that only the east side will use, says Mr. Beaupre, who teaches urban administration and campaign politics at Xavier University.
Mr. Craig says the fact that the tunnels could eventually be used for an actual rapid transit system is a sign that the guys who designed and built these things over 100 years ago really knew what they were doing.
Sure, we can look at the fact that it never got finished, but we'd rather look at the positives out of what we can get out of it. And we can get a lot.
Metro: Plan getting positive feedback
Abandoned subway could save light rail plan
Professor's slaying has neighbors in shock
Ex-officer on trial for mall rape, kidnapping
Small towns making comeback on Main Street
State fair expands music range
States tackle elusive spam
Newborn's death spurs 'haven' alert
Too-large elephant dies during birth
Showier Norwood police cruisers could replace fleet
You Asked For It
Good News: Church's $2,600 gets good returns
Lakota has vision for athletics
Award-winning volunteer has hugs for all
Carrollton bus crash spurs mother's candidacy
Rural, urban shootings different | <urn:uuid:51c8a828-d9ab-4050-8731-ebe96e3ce7ba> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2002/07/29/loc_abandoned_subway.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783403826.29/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624155003-00142-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974372 | 1,872 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Search the Health Library
Get the facts on diseases, conditions, tests and procedures.
I Want To...
Find a Doctor
I Want To...
Find Research Faculty
Enter the last name, specialty or keyword for your search below.
First Medical Class - 1897
More than a century ago, Baltimore merchant Johns Hopkins left behind $7 million after his death, along with a mandate that would change the face of medical education throughout the United States and beyond. The money should go to build a hospital and a university of the highest stature in the heart of Baltimore, a place where all patients — rich or poor, black or white, male or female — could receive care.
From the institution’s beginnings in 1876, Hopkins leaders have understood that to practice medicine, young physicians need frontline training alongside veteran physicians whose knowledge and experience provides the best means of fighting disease.
Facts & Figures
- Founded in 1893
- Located in Baltimore, Md.
- 2,448 full-time faculty
- 1,249 part-time faculty
- 9,504 employees
- 482 medical students
- 85 percent of students receive financial aid
- Consistently ranked among the top medical schools in the country
1893: The School of Medicine is Founded
With the opening of the Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1889, followed four years later by the School of Medicine, Hopkins ushered in a new era marked by rigid entrance requirements for medical students, a vastly upgraded medical school curriculum with emphasis on the scientific method, the incorporation of bedside teaching and laboratory research as part of the instruction and integration of the School of Medicine with the Hospital through joint appointments. The new model also created standardized advanced training in specialized fields of medicine with the creation of the first house staff fellowships and post graduate internships.
Endowed through the philanthropy of Mary Elizabeth Garrett and the Women's Medical Fund, it was the first graduate school of medicine in the United States and the first to admit women on equal terms as men.
Learn more about how Hopkins revolutionized American medicine.
1897: First medical school class graduates
1905: The Four Founding Physicians
Every one of the "Big Four," as they are known at Hopkins, was a character, a larger-than-life personality: pathologist William Henry Welch, a stout bachelor whose favorite pastime was a week of swimming, carnival rides and five-dessert dinners in Atlantic City; surgeon William Stewart Halsted, whose severity with students masked an almost debilitating shyness; internist William Osler, king of pranks; and gynecologist Howard Kelly, snake collector and evangelical saver of souls.
As Hopkins' most famous medical school professors, they sat in John Singer Sargent's London studio in 1905 for a portrait that now hangs in the Welch Medical Library. Learn more about the "Big Four."
Remembering Osler: Ralph Hruban, Med '85, professor of pathology and oncology in the School of Medicine and an avid chronicler of Hopkins Medicine’s history, has posted a series of “Osler Minutes.” The vignettes feature quotes from Sir William Osler, Hopkins’ first physician in chief and director of the Department of Medicine. Considered perhaps the greatest physician of the 19th and early 20th centuries, Osler was renowned for his exceptional medical skill, wisdom, humanity and wit.
1910: The Flexner Report
In 1910, Abraham Flexner, A&S 1886, wrote and published a report entitled "Medical Education in the United States and Canada" for the Carnegie Foundation. Today, the report is known as the Flexner Report and is credited with giving rise to modern medical education as it triggered much-needed reforms in the standards, organization and curriculum of North American medical schools.
Many of the colleges that were severely criticized by Flexner closed soon after the publication of the Flexner report; others initiated extensives revisions of their policies and curricula. Flexner found only five schools that he thought adequate, and he held up the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine as the model.
Flexner was a secondary school teacher and principal for 19 years in Louisville, Kentucky. He later completed graduate work at Harvard University and the University of Berlin and joined the research staff of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
1911: Art as Applied to Medicine
Art as Applied to Medicine, one of the most unlikely medical specialties, achieved its greatest national development at Johns Hopkins. Founded in 1911, the Hopkins Department of Art as Applied to Medicine is the oldest medical illustration program in the country.
Max Broedel, the father of Hopkins' medical art program and the father of modern medical illustration, was a mostly self-taught medical illustrator from Germany, who always aimed to draw a picture that would show more than any photograph could. This required an exquisite understanding of anatomy that could be gained only by dissection or watching surgery.
"Copying is not medical illustrating," Broedel said. "In a medical drawing, full comprehension must precede execution." Learn more about the history of Art as Applied to Medicine.
1929: Resources for a Medical Campus
The William H. Welch Medical Library opens its doors to jointly serve the Johns Hopkins Hospital, the School of Medicine and the School of Hygiene and Public Health.
1932: First Ph.D. student graduates
1956: The Age of Genetic Medicine
Victor McKusick, Med ’46, links single gene defect to symptoms of Marfans syndrome, ushering in the age of genetic medicine. | <urn:uuid:757c2124-91d1-41ed-adf1-35b10ef54156> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/som/alumni/news/history.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395620.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00101-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953725 | 1,151 | 2.78125 | 3 |
More carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, coupled with rising temperatures, is making rice agriculture a larger source of the potent greenhouse gas methane, according to a study published today in Nature Climate Change by a research team that includes a University of California, Davis, plant scientist.
The authors note that relatively simple changes in rice cultivation could help reduce methane emissions.
"Together, higher carbon dioxide concentrations and warmer temperatures predicted for the end of this century will about double the amount of methane emitted per kilo of rice produced," said Chris van Kessel, professor of plant sciences at UC Davis and co-author of the study, published in this week's edition of Nature Climate Change. "Because global demand for rice will increase further with a growing world population, our results suggest that without additional measures, the total methane emissions from rice agriculture will strongly increase."
Rice paddies are one of the largest man-made sources of methane, and rice is the world's second-most produced staple crop.
Van Kessel and his colleagues gathered findings from 63 different experiments on rice paddies, mostly in Asia and North America. They used a technique called meta-analysis, a statistical tool for finding general patterns in a large body of experimental published data.
The experiments measured how rising temperatures and extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere affect both rice yields and the amount of methane released by rice paddies.
"Our results show that rice agriculture becomes less climate-friendly as our atmosphere continues to change," said Kees Jan van Groenigen, research fellow at Trinity College Dublin, and lead author of the study.
As more carbon dioxide enters the atmosphere, rice plants grow faster, the experimental data showed. This growth, in turn, pumps up the metabolism of methane-producing microscopic organisms that live in the soil beneath rice paddies. The end result: More methane.
Overall, the rice paddy experiments revealed that increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere boosted rice yields by 24.5 percent and methane emissions by 42.2 percent, increasing the amount of methane emitted per kilo of rice.
Unlike carbon dioxide levels, rising temperatures were found to have only small effects on methane emissions. However, because warming decreases rice yield, it effectively increases methane emissions per kilo of rice.
The authors point out several options available to reduce methane emissions from rice agriculture. For instance, management practices such as mid-season drainage and using alternative fertilizers have been shown to reduce methane emissions from rice paddies. By switching to more heat-tolerant rice cultivars and by adjusting sowing dates, yield declines due to temperature increases can largely be prevented, reducing the effect of warming on methane emissions per yield.
The researchers, who also include Northern Arizona University Professor Bruce Hungate, said the findings underscore the importance of mitigation efforts to ensure a secure global food supply while keeping greenhouse gas emissions in check.
The research was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy's National Institute for Climatic Change Research, the National Science Foundation, the Irish Research Council, and Marie Curie Actions.
About UC Davis
For more than 100 years, UC Davis has engaged in teaching, research and public service that matter to California and transform the world. Located close to the state capital, UC Davis has more than 32,000 students, more than 2,500 faculty and more than 21,000 staff, an annual research budget that exceeds $684 million, a comprehensive health system and 13 specialized research centers. The university offers interdisciplinary graduate study and more than 100 undergraduate majors in four colleges -- Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Biological Sciences, Engineering, and Letters and Science. It also houses six professional schools -- Education, Law, Management, Medicine, Veterinary Medicine and the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. | <urn:uuid:50fbd6e8-9f47-43e7-a4eb-4c363d322f21> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-10/uoc--raa101912.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783398209.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154958-00049-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92748 | 759 | 3.75 | 4 |
Garlic's use dates back thousands of years as both a traditional medicine and a seasoning. Traditionally, garlic has been an integral part of the Mediterranean diet and many Asian cuisines. Garlic supplements are marketed to lower cholesterol, as well as fight cancer, hypertension, diabetes, arthritis, Alzheimer’s disease and infections, including the common cold.
Garlic: allicin wonderland
Garlic contains many interesting compounds that have been linked to a host of proposed health benefits. One of the key components is allicin, a sulfur compound formed in raw garlic after a clove is cut or crushed. Allicin is the major source of the bioactive compounds that provide garlic’s strong taste and smell. But not all scientists agree that allicin itself is the main beneficial ingredient, since it breaks down quickly into other compounds. In fact, no one knows which, if any, component is most important; different ones may have different effects in the body.
Lab and animal studies suggest that garlic (or compounds from it) has a range of benefits. For example, it keeps blood platelets from sticking together, which reduces the risk of blood clots, and may have anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory and cholesterol-lowering effects.
But what happens in people is unclear. Nearly all human studies have been small, short and/or poorly designed. Plus, they have used different garlic preparations and doses, making comparison difficult.
Here are some main areas of interest:
- Cholesterol: While some studies (many using supplements) have found that garlic reduces LDL (“bad”) cholesterol slightly, others have shown little or no effect. A well-designed 2007 study from Stanford University found no benefit when it tested raw garlic and two popular supplements (one containing powdered garlic, the other an aged-garlic extract) for six months in people with high LDL. More recently, two analyses concluded that good clinical trials have not shown consistent or significant improvements. Regardless of its effect on cholesterol, there’s no evidence that garlic actually prevents heart attacks.
- Blood pressure: Some small, short-term studies have found that garlic can lower blood pressure slightly in people with hypertension. But various garlic preparations may have different effects on blood pressure.
- Cancer: The evidence is mixed, at best. Some, but not all, population studies have found that people who eat a lot of garlic have a lower risk of certain cancers. But there have been few large, long-term randomized trials, which are needed to prove that it’s really garlic, and not something else about garlic eaters, that affects cancer risk. Two such studies, done in China, reached opposite conclusions about the effect of garlic pills on the risk of stomach cancer.
- Colds: Despite a common belief that garlic can prevent colds, there has been remarkably little human research on this. In 2012, a study published in Clinical Nutrition found that an aged garlic extract taken for three months did not reduce the incidence of colds or flu but did reduce their severity when they occurred.
- Other claims: For other conditions, such as upper respiratory infections, diabetes and arthritis, there’s no good evidence of benefit.
Garlic: supplemental problems
Garlic supplements vary widely, depending on the age of the garlic and how it is processed. There’s debate about which form—powder, oil or aged “deodorized” garlic extract, for example—if any, is best. There is no accepted standard dose. Some products give “alliin” amounts; alliin is the substance that is converted to allicin. But claims such as “allicin-rich” or “high potency” don’t mean much. Testing of garlic supplements has found that nearly half have problems.
Some garlic supplements may reduce blood clotting, which could theoretically be a problem if you have a bleeding disorder, are planning to have surgery or are taking a drug that affects blood clotting, such as warfarin (Coumadin).
The supplements also may interact with some medications for diabetes, HIV, hypertension, cancer and high cholesterol. Their effect on many drugs has not been studied. Like raw garlic, supplements may cause nausea, heartburn, stomach upset, bad breath and body odor.
Bottom line: There is no clear evidence that garlic supplements are beneficial. Even if they do lower blood cholesterol or blood pressure or thin the blood, which is uncertain, the effect is small, so the supplements can’t replace medication. In any case, no one knows what form or dose would be best. Still, there’s no harm in eating more garlic in your food, if you like it.
Originally published January 2012. Updated February 2014. | <urn:uuid:40a76128-b59c-4ea4-ac1f-acbc63e7afbe> | CC-MAIN-2016-26 | http://www.berkeleywellness.com/supplements/herbal-supplements/article/power-garlic | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397111.67/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00030-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95273 | 985 | 2.890625 | 3 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.