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Currently, tactile sensors comprise discrete miniature load cell like assemblies, arranged in matrices of force monitoring sites. Each is capable of monitoring STATIONARY applied forces. However, this advantage of being able to monitor several forces simultaneously is overweighed by the fact that these forces can only be STATIONARY and in locations where measuring sites exist. A new concept for a “more than a touch and less than a tactile” sensor is herein introduced. It consists of a rigid platform simply supported at four points on four load cells. Information obtained from these load cells determines both magnitude and location of any MOBILE force applied on the plate. The number of measuring sites here is infinite and the forces monitored do not have to be STATIONARY. This ought to attract more applications. Two designs are suggested and some applications visualized. | 006_6095357 | {
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Here in Canada, we are very familiar with how the Coast Mountains of BC influence the precipitation patterns of places along the west coast like Vancouver, Tofino and Ucluelet. It’s a classic case of moist, west winds from the Pacific being forced upwards by the mountains to cool, condense, form clouds and precipitate (CCCP* to my students) providing in excess of 3000mm of precipitation along the coast. So, it’s interesting to see a similar but quite different phenomenon occurring in Croatia as shown by this NASA Earth Observatory Image-of-the-Day. Instead of west winds from the sea (the Mediterranean, intros case), they are easterlies, so that the moisture is “dumped” on the east side of the coastal range as shown by the cloud. Have a look at the NASA EO IOTD page for a more thorough treatment of this: Of Mountains and Moisture.
* Of course, CCCP is only significant to old farts like me who remember the USSR and, in my case, their hockey jerseys emblazoned with CCCP. It does make for a good hockey story for my students, though. A little history mixed in with Geography never hurts. | 000_3999392 | {
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Biochar is a soil amendment made typically from bio-mass through a process called pyrolysis with low-oxygen. By using a low-cost, easy-to-make biochar stove, communities can arrange to turn common waste products into biochar. The vision behind this project is for healthy and resilient communities. This means that I prefer methods that promote local, DIY and community approach, so that it can quickly scale and adapt to different towns/cities. Most importantly, carbon being the element behind Life has tremendous versatility. It can be used to filter water and then used as a soil amendment. Or it can be mixed to make better concrete composites for roads (asphalt) and concrete. It can improve manufacturing by making carbon fiber alloys. Last but not least, it is done through a circular model of using waste such as wood sticks, bio-mass, paper, saw dust mills, anything with carbon, even plastics. The output heat can be captured for heating buildings and cooking stoves. The opportunities are endless. Sizes of stove vary in function of available supply/demand dynamics. For more information, check the biochar-international. org or Ithaka International.
PS: Stockholm, Sweden has achieved this recently. If the Swedes can do it, we can learn from them and improve together! Some guidelines for background and context | 010_6842339 | {
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- to support our efforts please browse our store (books, etc. ) -
Phragmites (Phragmites australis), aka the common reed, are considered an invasive species by many, yet it is edible and has other useful purposes! Duration: 7:42 Date Created: 2020-06-17
Thank you for watching, please consider sharing this video on social media! EdibleWildFood. com is informational in nature. While we strive to be 100% accurate, it is solely up to the reader to ensure proper plant identification. Some wild plants are poisonous or can have serious adverse health effects. We are not health professionals, medical doctors, nor are we nutritionists. It is up to the reader to verify nutritional information and health benefits with qualified professionals for all edible plants listed in this web site. Please click here for more information. | 003_5710901 | {
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Issue Date: October 10, 2011
The Real Tatooine, Manly Voices Spark Memories
Early in the first “Star Wars” movie, Luke Skywalker contemplates a future on his home planet of Tatooine while watching two suns set in the sky. Last month, astronomers announced that the film wasn’t too far from reality. For the first time, they observed a real-life Tatooine orbiting two stars. When astronomers discovered the planet, the iconic double-sunset scene popped into their minds, says Laurance Doyle, an astrophysicist at the SETI Institute. They even nicknamed it Tatooine: “It was easier than saying, ‘KIC 12644769,’ ” its name at the time, he adds. Doyle and his team spotted the planet—now called Kepler-16b—while analyzing data from the Kepler space telescope, which orbits Earth and snaps pictures of stars in the Milky Way. The telescope has helped astronomers pinpoint systems in which two stars orbit each other. They spot these star pairs by focusing on a point of light in the galaxy and looking for temporary dips in the brightness caused by one star passing in front of the other. When the researchers looked at data for one particular system that’s about 200 light-years from Earth, they saw additional drops. On the basis of the timing and magnitude of these blips, the astronomers concluded that they were watching a Saturn-sized planet cross in front of the two stars (Science, DOI: 10. 1126/science. 1210923). Life would be complicated on such a planet, Doyle says. Because the two stars constantly change their distances from Kepler-16b, the planet’s surface temperature fluctuates by 30 K every 40 days, the scientists estimate. “And we’re still calculating what the tides would do! ” Doyle adds. Not only is the double-sunset scene from “Star Wars” memorable, but Darth Vader, with his foreboding black suit and rhythmic respirations, is also unforgettable. New research suggests that his deep, manly voice probably makes him especially memorable to women. Kevin Allan, a psychologist at the University of Aberdeen, in Scotland, and colleagues study how evolution might have shaped the way our memories work today. One problem early females faced was picking a mate with good genes and with the desire to stick around to help raise children. Although hypermasculine features, such as a chiseled jaw or a deep voice, usually signal healthy genes, they also correlate with unappealing behavioral traits, such as a lack of interest in child rearing, studies have shown. Allan and his team proposed that women could have evolved to solve this trade-off problem by having heightened memories of men with highly masculine features. Physical cues, such as a deep voice, trigger a woman’s memory to store information about her interactions with a man, including his behavior and status. To test the hypothesis, Allan’s team showed 45 women a set of pictures of everyday objects one at a time while playing a recording of a person saying the name of the object. The researchers manipulated the recorded voices to either masculinize them by dropping the pitch or feminize them by raising it. Later, when asked to recall those pictures, women correctly remembered the objects accompanied by masculinized male voices significantly more often than those presented with feminized male voices (Mem. Cogn., DOI: 10. 3758/s13421-011-0136-6). But Allan warns that just adopting a deep voice won’t necessarily help a man on the dating scene. “If the woman remembers information that puts him in a bad light, the trick is going to backfire,” he says. - Chemical & Engineering News
- ISSN 0009-2347
- Copyright © American Chemical Society | 005_4455287 | {
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If, for whatever reason, our immune system was to weaken then illness would follow soon after. It may not necessarily be a serious illness, but we will become more susceptible even to mild illnesses. It will also make us more exposed to illnesses that can be very dangerous to us. The good news is that it is usually fairly simple to keep our immune system strong and healthy. There are plenty of foods that will help to keep our defenses as strong as possible thanks to certain nutrients they contain. Eat a reasonably healthy, balanced diet and you should hopefully have a strong immune system that will help keep disease at bay. This article looks at 10 foods that can boost your immune system. Immune System Boosting Food #1: Citrus Fruits
The word “limey” is a common slang nickname given to British people by Americans. The name originates from the days when British sailors made the trip across the Atlantic in sailing ships. The sailors were prone to developing scurvy through a lack of vitamin C in their diet. Therefore, they would stock up on limes before setting sail. In addition to limes, other citrus fruits like lemons, oranges, and grapefruit are also good sources of vitamin C. Not only does this mean they can help prevent scurvy, but they can also help to give our immune system a boost overall. Include them in your diet and you will be helping to keep illness away. | 000_1835967 | {
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What is illuminance? Illumination intensity, referred to as illuminance, is a physical term that refers to the luminous flux of visible light received per unit area. The unit of illumination is Lux (Lux or LX). Illuminance is the illuminance of an object’s surface, which can be detected by a Illumination Sensor.
Plant growth is achieved by storing organic matter through photosynthesis, and light intensity directly affects the strength of plant photosynthesis. Therefore, the light intensity has a great influence on plant growth and development. Different plants have different responses to the photoperiod. Plants that require 14 to 17 hours a day to flower buds are called long-day plants, such as rape, spinach, and radishes; plants that require 8-12 hours of light per day are called short-day plants. Such as chrysanthemum, rice, soybean, etc. But higher or lower light intensity will have a bad effect on plants. The number of hours of light and the intensity of light not only have an important impact on the photosynthesis of plants, but also affect their physiological functions through the visual organs of livestock and poultry, thereby having an important impact on their production performance such as milk production, egg production, and hair production. The importance of illumination
Chickens are very sensitive to light intensity. Under natural conditions, the egg production of laying hens has obvious seasonal changes, which are mainly caused by changes in the photoperiod. Generally, it gradually increases in spring, decreases gradually in autumn, and basically stops production in winter. Light acts on the pituitary gland through GnRH to promote the secretion and release of LH and FSH, thereby affecting egg production. When the light duration exceeds 17 hours/day, it will not only be useless but will reduce egg production. However, if short light is used during the laying period, the egg production will decrease, but the egg body will be larger and the feed utilization rate will be higher. Scientific research has found that whether plants or animals want to obtain their production performance, there should be a minimum light threshold or light saturation point and compensation point. Therefore, we need to use the light sensor to monitor the light intensity in real-time. What is the illumination sensor？
The illumination sensor is an instrument dedicated to detecting light intensity. It can convert the light intensity value into a voltage value. The illumination sensor is composed of a transmitter, a receiver, and a detection circuit. The transmitter is aimed at the target to emit a beam, and the beam continuously emits or changes the pulse width; the triangular reflector is a strong structure of the emitting device, which can make the light beam accurately from the reflector Middle return; the receiver is composed of photodiodes, phototransistors, and photocells; in front of the receiver, there are optical components such as lenses and apertures, and behind it is a detection circuit, which can filter out effective signals and send the signals. The illuminance sensor developed by JXCT is an optical precision photosensitive transmitter:
1, The measurement range of light intensity is 0~65535 Lux and 0~200,000 Lux. Other ranges are also available. 2, Adopt high-sensitivity photosensitive probe, wide measuring range, good linearity, stable signal, and high precision. 3, The light itself is high-speed, and the circuit of the illuminance sensor is composed of electronic parts and does not include mechanical working time, so the response time is extremely short. 4, The sensor outputs standard current signals, such as common 4~20mA, 0~5V, and 0~10V, including wired output. 5, In terms of the output type, it can be divided into two types: wired signal output (485 types, analog type (4~20mA current signal output,0~5V/0~10V voltage signal output) and wireless signal output. The application of illuminance sensor in agricultural planting and livestock and poultry breeding can help us accurately grasp the sunshine time law, light saturation point, and light compensation point of plant and livestock production and growth, and then adjust their illumination through artificial control technology. Preference, to control and improve the scientific growth of livestock, poultry, and crops to achieve the goal of high yield. | 003_3064167 | {
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by Donald Foster, Vassar College
First, what is it? SHAXICON is a lexical database that indexes all of the
words that appear in the canonical plays 12 times or less, including a
line-citation and speaking character for each occurrence of each word. (These are called "rare words," though they are not rare in any absolute
sense--"family [n. ]" and "real [ad. ]" are rare words in Shakespeare.) All
rare-word variants are indexed as well, including the entire "bad" quartos
of H5, 2H6, 3H6, Ham, Shr, and Wiv; also the nondramatic works, canonical
and otherwise (Ven, Luc, PP, PhT, Son, LC, FE, the Will, "Shall I die,"
et. al. ); the additions to Mucedorus and The Spanish Tragedy, the
Prologue to Merry Devil of Edmonton, all of Edward III and Sir Thomas More
(hands S and D); Ben Jonson's Every Man in His Humour (both Q1 and F1) and
Sejanus (F1); and more; but these other texts have no effect on the
12-occurrence cutoff that sets the parameters for SHAXICON's lexical
What SHAXICON demonstrates is that the rare-words in Shakespearean
texts are not randomly distributed either diachronically or
synchronically, but are "mnemonically structured. " Shakespeare's active
lexicon as a writer was systematically influenced by his reading, and by
his apparent activities as a stage-player. When writing, Shakespeare was
measurably influenced by plays then in production, and by particular
stage-roles most of all. Most significant is that, while writing, he
disproportionately "remembers" the rare-word lexicon of plays concurrently
"in repertory"; and from these plays he always registers disproportionate
lexical recall (as a writer) of just one role (or two or three smaller
roles); and these remembered roles, it can now be shown, are most probably
those that Shakespeare himself drilled in stage performance. SHAXICON electronically maps Shakespeare's language so that we can now
usually tell which texts influence which other texts, and when. Moreover,
when collated with the OED or with early modern texts in a normalized
machine-readable format, SHAXICON provides an incomplete record of
Shakespeare's apparent reading. The main value of this resource has less
to do with biographical novelties, however, than with problems of textual
transmission, dating, probable authorship of revisions, early stage
history, and the like. And because SHAXICON is a closed system, human
bias in measuring lexical influence of this sort is effectively
eliminated. The evidentiary value of supposed "verbal parallels" is no
longer a matter of private intuition or subjective judgment, but
quantifiable, using a stable lexical index (and measurable against a
virtually limitless cross-sample of machine-readble texts). In 1991, I published a 3-part report in SNL (see Summer, Fall, Winter
1991) about SHAXICON (the database was not then completed, and not yet
dubbed), in which I made (in a few cases, mistaken) projections concerning
Shakespeare's apparent stage roles (based on entries for about a third of
the final lexical sample). The few botched projections derived in part
from key-punching errors--e. g., "Pand" (Pandarus of TRO) was often being
entered for "CPan" (Pandulph of JN), and "QnElz" (R3) for QnEliz (3H6);
and in part from unavoidable limitations, explained in the SNL series,
concerning the variable "richness" of character-specific lexicons, which
could not be measured until the whole canon was indexed. These problems
have been eliminated. The following list represents a corrected catalogue of those roles that
Shakespeare is most likely to have acted. These assignments vary somewhat
in statistical significance, depending on sample size, etc. A fuller
report (with instructions on how to run cross-checks and fully automated
statistical analysis) will appear in my "SHAXICON Notebook" (a written
commentary that has yet to be completed). In the meantime, here follows a
list of Shakespeare's most likely stage-roles, as statistically derived. Keep in mind that this catalogue cannot be proven to represent historical
actuality. SHAXICON handily selects Adam of AYL and the Ghost of Ham as
probable Shakespeare roles, both of which are supported by hearsay
evidence from the 17th century; the remaining roles find no external
historical confirmation (although Davies mentions that Shakespeare played
some kings, and SHAXICON indicates that Shakespeare played king-roles in
AWW, 1H4, 2H4, HAM, LLL, PER, and probably MAC). Having studied the
evidence from every conceivable angle, I'd say that the assignments below
are good bets, even despite the lack of archival evidence to back them up,
for the disproportion in Shakespeare's persistent recall of these roles is
quite striking relative to other roles in the corresponding texts. There
are a few texts (principally ADO, MV, and Jonson's EMI) in which
Shakespeare may have played two different roles in two successive seasons
of the same theatrical "run. " But the statistical weight of Shakespeare's
selective recall of particular roles is in most instances pretty clear;
in fact, when multiple roles are identified by SHAXICON as probably
Shakespearean, they are in most instances roles that are easily doubled
(exceptions and problems are are noted below). MOST PROBABLE SHAKESPEARE ROLES, BASED ON THE POET'S PERSISTENT AND
MEASURABLE RECALL OF PARTICULAR CHARACTER-SPECIFIC LEXICONS:
- ADO: Leonato; later switching to Friar (Q version registers
higher lexical recall for Leonato, F1 version higher for Friar). This
could be viewed as a problem, since the same actor cannot have played both
roles simultaneously, yet Shakespeare clearly "remembers" both roles
(unlike all other principal parts in ADO, which he "forgets"). - ANT: Agrippa, Philo, Proculeius, Thidias, and Ventidius, probably
simultaneously [! ] (thus requiring some accommodation at 3. 2.1 for
Vntd/Agri), and probably with Proculeius taking Agrippa's lines in 5. 1
(hence the textual crux recently discussed on SHAKSPER). - AWW: King of France
- AYL: Adam; adding old Corin the Shepherd in two revivals of AYL. - COR: Shakespeare role uncertain. Shakespeare's writing after
Coriolanus registers disproportionate recall of the Sicinius role, but
without the hugely lopsided excess in lexical recall that obtains for the
designated Shakspeare roles in most other plays. - CYM: 1. Gent (I.i), Philario (I.iv, II. iv), and Jupiter (V.iv)
- EMI-F (Jonson): SHAXICON indicates that F1 may represent a major
Elizabethan revision of Q1, followed by a minor Jacobean revision (as per
established textual scholarship on EMI). SHAXICON also confirms that
Shakespeare probably knew the play in performance: in 1598, and again in
1604, words from EMI come pouring into Shakespeare's writing, forming very
distinct peaks of lexical influence just when we know that EMI was,
indeed, acted by the King's Men (and again in 1612-13). But lexical
influence by character (entirely independent of general lexical overlap)
gives mixed signals: after both Q1 and F1 EMI, Shakespeare's dramatic and
non-dramatic writing registers disproportionate recall of the
Lorenzo-Kno'well role (esp. the F1 Old Kno'well); but Judge Clement (esp. the Q1 Clement) seems to influence some of the post-EMI non-dramatic
texts; and the Thorello-Kitely role has an inexplicably high correlation
with Shakespearean texts both before and after the production of EMI. It
is possible that Shakespeare alternated roles in at least one version of
EMI, but the senior Lorenzo/Kno'well figure is the one showing the most
pervasive and persistent lexical influence on his own writing. One
suspects that Jonson's extensive and multiple revisions in EMI are
responsible for the slightly fogged picture presented by the
character-distributions for this play. - ERR: Egeon (I.i, V.i) and Dr. Pinch (IV. iv). - 1H4: King Henry.
- 2H4: King Henry (and perhaps Rumor, but only briefly). - H5: SHAXICON indicates that Shakespeare probably played the French
Constable and Exeter in the Quarto version (in 1599, while also playing
Exeter in a revival of 1H6). In F1 Henry V, Shakespeare appears to have
performed Bishop Ely and Montjoy, and probably, on some occasions, the
Chorus. (The influence of the Chorus-role is less strongly marked than
that of Ely and Mountjoy, but still pronounced than for other roles in the
play). The Chorus-role is easily doubled with Montjoy--but tripling with
Ely raises a problem at I.i.0, when the Chorus walks offstage and Ely
walks on. Shakespeare may possibly have performed Ely and Mountjoy in
some productions, the Chorus and Mountjoy in others. - 1H6: Bit parts only, most probably including Vernon or Exeter, but
possibly Bedford, Lucy, Mortimer, Suffolk, Warwick, or Winchester
(insufficient pre-1H6 sample, and uneven figures thereafter). - 2H6: Suffolk (also Suffolk in the "bad" 2H6-Q, which appears
certainly to antedate the F1 version, as has been argued by Steve
- 3H6 Warwick (Old Clifford in the "bad" 3H6-Q, which appears
certainly to antedate F1 version, as has been argued by Steve Urkowitz). - H8: Prologue and 1. Gentleman; or none (statistically uncertain,
due to insufficient post-H8 lexical sample). - HAM: Ghost, 1. Player, Mess-Gent. of 4. 5 (and perhaps also role in
the Mousetrap, most probably Lucianus). In F1 Hamlet, the Mess-Gent role
is partly folded into Horatio; but given Shakespeare's persistent recall
of the role even after 1601, it seems likely that the F1 variant in this
instance represents a casting-change made later than the bulk of
Shakespeare's F1 revisions. - JC: Shakespeare role(s) uncertain, due to apparent revision and
shortening. Most probably, Decius; and, somewhat less probably, Flavius.
Note: Decius-Flavius doubling is not possible in the F1 version unless
F1 has been shortened from an earlier version. In F1, at I.ii. 0, Flavius
and Decius enter as mutes; but the very text of JC I.ii offers some
evidence that the text has, indeed, been shortened at this point (e. g., in
the same scene, at I.ii. 285, Casca reports that "Murellus and Flavius, for
pulling scarfs off Caesar's images, are put to silence"; but, if we may
believe the F1 stage direction at I.ii. 0, Casca was on stage with Murellus
and Flavius moments earlier--from I.ii. 0 to at least I.ii. 214--and Casca
hasn't heard boo about Caesar's images in the interim). SHAXICON thus
seems to confirm the view that JC-F1 is a shortened text (albeit with some
added bits (e. g., the second account of Portia's death, which are indexed
in SHAXICON under JC-b). I am inclined to accept the assignments of both
Decius and Flavius to Shakespeare, but there is room for doubt. - JN: Cardinal Pandulph.
- LLL: Ferdinand (possibly with one brief stint as Boyet). - LR: Albany. (The Albany role reduced in the revised F1 version. This is one of several designated Shakespeare roles that appears to have
been cut or reduced ca. 1612. It is doubtful that Albany was performed by
Shakespeare subsequent to the 1612 revision. )
- MAC: Duncan (and perhaps one or two bit roles after Duncan's
assassination, including the nameless Lord of III. vi) -- but perhaps
Banquo. The evidence of Shakespeare's role in this equivocating play is
itself equivocal, probably as a result of late revision, but possibly
because Shakespeare alternated roles, playing Banquo in some productions,
Duncan in others. That MAC was revised ca. 1612 seems altogether likely from the evidence
of SHAXICON (principally in I.v.1-30,. I.v.71-3, IV. iii all, and
V.ix. 1-19, indexed in SHAXICON under MAC-b). Simon Forman's eye-witness
account of MAC as acted in 1611 suggests that the ur-MAC had a larger
Duncan-role than in the F1 version. It has recently been argued on
SHAKSPER that there was an Elizabethan MAC (not extant) on which the 1606
version was based; if these theories of revision are correct, even in
part, they would provide a satisfactory explanation for the irregularities
in the SHAXICON data for MAC. - MM: Escalus; possibly switching to Friar Peter in a late revival,
later than 1610. - MND: prob. Theseus, but with very irregular figures. SHAXICON
traces enormously high Theseus-"influence" on the post-1594 poems, but
relatively slight Thesus-"influence" on the post-1594 plays. Although
Shakespeare's post-MND writing registers lexical recall of the
Theseus-role that is significantly higher than for any other role in MND,
there is inexplicably high recall of the Helena role as well, especially
in texts written 1602-4. - MV: Shakespeare seems to have played Antonio in all productions;
but Morocco is a second "remembered" role, especially as manifest, albeit
intermittently, in the lexicon of the post-1594 poems and in the 1595-6
plays. No other role in the play comes close to these two parts in lexical
"influence" upon the poet's post-MV writing. Morocco is doubtful:
Shakespeare's averaged recall of the Antonio role, after 1594, is a full
55% higher than would obtain in an exact distribution, while his averaged
recall of the Morocco role is only 2% higher than expected. But Morocco
tends to register its strongest influence on Shakespeare's writing when
Antonio doesn't, and vice versa; perhaps Shakespeare alternated roles. He
cannot easily have played both simultaneously, at least not in the Q1 or
- OTH: Brabantio (and possibly a second small role after Brabantio's
farewell in I.iii; but this possibility has not yet been tested). The
Brabantio role is reduced in the Q1 version (as revised and cut from the
antecedent F1 version ca. 1612); this is one of several designated
Shakespeare roles that was cut, omitted, folded into another character ca. 1612, all of them evidently signalling Shakespeare's retirement from the
stage. SHAXICON identifies a final "run" of OTH in 1611-13, first in the
F1, then in the Q1 version; but it is doubtful that Brabantio was
performed by Shakespeare later than 1612. - PER: SHAXICON suggests that PER is a very early play (ur-PER), the
palimpsest of which is imperfectly represented by acts I-II of PER-Q. The
play was clearly revised by Shakespeare, with altogether new or greatly
re-written acts III-V. This revision may have taken place as late as
1606/7 (as customarily dated), but a date of 1600 appears more likely. SHAXICON offers no support for the view of the Oxford editors that PER-Q
represents a Wilkins-Shakespeare collaboration, yet it leaves open such a
possibility insofar as Wilkins could be shown to have tinkered some with
acts I-II. (This could be tested by indexing other texts by Wilkins, and
running lexical cross-checks. ) Shakespeare appears to have acted both
Antiochus and (at least when doubling was needed) Simonides, and he may
have performed or read Gower's part from time to time, most notably ca. 1608/9 (cf. notes on H5-F1, another script for which Shakespeare registers
sporadically high recall of the chorus-role, especially ca. 1608/9--perhaps the company was short-handed in that year). With a reduced
cast, he may have simultaneously performed Antiochus, Simonides, Cleon
(without the dumb shows) and Gower, all of which register higher than
expected lexical recall, the last two only intermittently. Because of its
episodic structure, Pericles can be performed with a small cast, and the
SHAXICON data suggest that Pericles was indeed performed, on occasion,
with at least one player performing multiple roles. - R2: Gaunt (in I.i - I.iii, II. i), the Gardener (III. iv), the Lord
(IV. i), and probably also the Groom (V.v). Troublesome dating: SHAXICON
seems to indicate that R2 derives from an earlier play, and that R2 was
revised immediately after 1H4 (but prior to publication of R2-Q1). This
finding is at odds with all past textual scholarship on the play, which
has been nearly unanimous in viewing R2 as a text begun and completed ca. - R3: Clarence (in I.i, I.iv, and V.iii) and Scrivener (III. vi). Possibly also Third Citizen (II. iii) in a late revival. - ROM: Friar Lawrence in ROM-Q1,-Q2, and -F1 versions, plus Chorus
in ROM-Q2 version (The Chorus-role was evidently omitted altogether in a
late revival of ROM, as is intimated by its lexical distribution in the
SHAXICON files, and confirmed by its omission from ROM-F1). - SEJ (Jonson): Macro (I.i, II. iii, III. i, IV. ii); probably also
(but less well-marked) Sabinius (I.i, II. iii, III. i, IV. iii), with some
accomodation for a costume change after IV. ii (but Jonson reports in F1
that he has revised Sejanus, which means that this problem at IV. iii. 0 may
not actually have come up in the performed text). - SHR: Lord, and perhaps also Pedant.
- TGV: Antonio and the Duke.
- TIM: Poet in TIM-a (representing ur-F1 version, the parts of
TIM-F1 customarily ascribed to Shakespeare); no role apparent in TIM-b
(widely supposed to represent Middleton or late-Shakespearean revision. SHAXICON suggests that TIM-F1 is a late, unfinished revision (ca. 1613) of
a play first acted in 1601. TIM-F1 appears not to be a collaborative text
- TIT: probably Aaron or old Lucius, or possibly alternating between
these roles (neither is as strongly marked statistically as most other
roles identified in this catalogue). - TMP: no Shakespeare role apparent; possibly Shipmaster or Antonio
(insufficient post-TMP sample). - TNK: no Shakespeare role apparent; possibly Prologue and Doctor
(insufficent post-TNK sample). - TNT: Antonio (later adding Valentine [I.i]). - TRO: Uncertain. Possibly, in a brief run of TRO-F1 ca. 1602/3,
the Prologue (perhaps also Agamemnon or Ulysses, or a second bit part; not
yet fully tested). The Q1 version may not have been acted until about
- WIV: In WIV-F1, Shakespeare appears to have played Ford, but only
in two evidently brief runs. In WIV-Q Shakespeare appears almost
certainly to have played the Host. Though one of the "bad" quartos, Q1
Wives appears certainly to antedate the F1 version; but SHAXICON casts
doubt on Shakespeare's authorship of Q1 Wives.
- WT: Shakespeare roles uncertain; probably Archidamus (I.i),
Antigonus (II. i, II. iii, III. iii), and 3rd Gentleman (V.i) in 1610/11,
switching to Polixenes in 1612; but the post-WT lexical sample is too
small to speak with confidence. WHAT YOU NEED TO USE SHAXICON:
In advance of publication we're drawing on the expertise of people in
various fields so that when it's finally distributed SHAXICON will be
fully intelligible even to those users without expertise in computers,
statistics, and/or textual scholarship. I'm shooting for 1996
publication, but cannot guess what technical problems may arise in the
interim. CD-rom may be too slow to be practicable, but disk-space may
otherwise be a problem for many users. - Disk space. In its present form, SHAXICON sucks up 40+ megs just
for the raw data, plus another 20 megs or so for the commentary, help
files, and graphics; plus another 20 megs or so for the software. But
don't start erasing those electronic games just yet in order to make room
for it. The main database for SHAXICON is now complete, purged of errors,
and generally usable; but it's not yet ready for prime time: SHAXICON now
runs on ETC Word-Cruncher, which is limited in its capabilities and
requires way-too-much manual labor (keying in lexical searches, etc. ). We're now using Excel for the summary figures and graphics, which is a big
time-saver--but we're likely to change over, prior to publication, to a
slicker and more fully automated database-management system so that
SHAXICON is more user-friendly in ALL respects. I'm inquiring after
Oracle, 4D, and Fox.
Address queries to Professor Donald Foster, email@example. com. Back to Shakespeare Authorship Home Page | 000_6651801 | {
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In 2000, the world's leaders met in New York and issued a ringing millennium declaration, promising to halve the proportion of people suffering from extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. They also pledged to halve the proportion of people without safe drinking water and sanitation; move toward universal and full primary schooling for children everywhere – girls as well as boys; reduce child mortality by two-thirds and maternal mortality by three-quarters; and combat HIV/Aids, malaria, and other major diseases. These pledges, reformulated as specific, measurable targets, became the millennium development goals (MDGs). Last month, 10 years on from that meeting, world leaders returned to New York for a UN summit that adopted a document called Keeping the Promise, which reaffirmed the commitment to meeting the goals by 2015. The UN press release called the document a "global action plan" to achieve the MDGs, but it is more an expression of aspirations than a plan. What chance do we really have of keeping the promises made in 2000? As the Yale philosopher Thomas Pogge has pointed out, the task has been made easier by moving the goalposts. Even before 2000, the World Food Summit held in Rome in 1996 pledged to halve the number of undernourished people by 2015. By contrast, the corresponding MDG was to halve the proportion of the world's people who are suffering from hunger (as well as of those living in extreme poverty). Because the world's population is rising, halving the proportion of people suffering from hunger (and extreme poverty) is not the same the same thing as halving the number. But worse was to come. When the millennium declaration was rewritten as a set of specific goals, the baseline for calculating the proportion to be halved was set not at 2000, but at 1990. That meant that progress already made could contribute to the achievement of the goal. And the goal became halving "the proportion of people in the developing world", which makes a big difference, because the developing world's population is growing faster than the population of the world as a whole. The net effect of all these changes, Pogge calculates, is that, whereas world leaders pledged in 1996 that by 2015 they would reduce the number of undernourished people to no more than 828 million, now they are pledging only to reduce the number in extreme poverty to 1. 324 billion. Since extreme poverty is responsible for about one third of all human deaths, this difference effectively means that – if the final promise is actually honoured – each year about 6 million more people will die from poverty-related causes than would have died had the original promise made in Rome been kept. In any case, according to a recent World Bank/International Monetary Fund report, we are not on track to meet even the scaled-back global target of halving the proportion of hungry people in developing countries. Rising food prices – possibly related to climate change – have reversed past progress and last year briefly pushed the number suffering from hunger above the 1 billion mark. That this should happen while developed nations waste hundreds of millions of tons of grain and soybeans by feeding them to animals, and obesity in the west reaches epidemic proportions, undermines our claims to believe in the equal value of all human life. The target of halving the proportion of people in extreme poverty is within reach, but mainly because of economic progress in China and India. In Africa, after economic stagnation in the 1990s, a decade of encouraging economic growth is reducing the proportion of the population living in extreme poverty, but not quickly enough to halve it by 2015. There is better news on achieving gender parity in education – a key to reaching other goals, including lower infant mortality, which often comes about because educated women have fewer children. We also have a good chance of meeting the target of reducing by half the proportion of people in developing countries without safe drinking water – but to achieve the same with sanitation is proving more difficult. On health goals, however, we are not even close. Maternal mortality is falling, but not fast enough. More people with HIV/Aids are getting inexpensive anti-retroviral drugs and their life expectancy has increased, but universal access is still far off, and the disease is still spreading, if more slowly than before. Progress has been made in reducing malaria and measles, and the rate of child mortality has fallen partly as a result, but the goal of a two-thirds reduction will not be met. For a long time, rich countries have promised to reduce poverty, but have failed to match their words with adequate action. Of course, some important progress has been made and millions of lives have been saved, but millions more could be saved. To make sustainable progress in reducing extreme poverty will require improvements in both the quantity and quality of aid. Just a handful of countries – Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden – have met or exceeded the UN's modest target of 0. 7% of GDP for foreign development assistance. But, without trade reform and action on climate change, more and better aid will not suffice. For now, it looks very much as if, come 2015, the world's leaders will have failed to keep their (watered down) promises. That means that they will be responsible for permitting the needless deaths, every year, of millions of people. • Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2010 | 005_2198153 | {
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Glass has always been one of the most appealing construction materials available to architects. And that’s not surprising when you consider that glass elements or glazed openings dictate how daylight enters and affects a building’s interior. In addition, every decision regarding the implementation of glass on a building is relevant for the energy balance. Both the creative and the technological development of glass remain fascinating – the possibilities are far from being exhausted. This magazine includes examples of architecturally successful uses of glass alongside articles about the technology used to bend or fix it. In light of DETAIL’s 50th anniversary, Christian Schittich looks back at a milestone in the development of glass technology with a ‘second review’ of the Broadfield House Glass Museum in Kingswinford, UK, which was completed in 1994. A further contribution comes from Spanish architect Enrique Sobejano – recent recipient of the Aga Khan Award – in an interview with DETAIL about his architectural approach. | 002_6988407 | {
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Pentas plants are semi-tropical shrubs grown as annuals that seem to be tailor-made for butterflies. The nectar-rich flowers grow in clusters over a long blooming season in the vibrant red, pink, and purple shades that act as a butterfly beacon. Clusters of many shallow blooms provide an easy access for the butterfly proboscis, allowing the insects to dip into many flowers in a short period. Bees like them too, so consider adding this plant to a landscape space you want buzzing with activity. The genus Pentas, species lanceolata, belongs to the Rubiaceae family, which includes other beloved ornamentals like gardenias, as well as plants with economic importance like coffee. You may see pentas described on plant tags by the common names star flower, Egyptian star flower, or star cluster. You can grow pentas anywhere as an annual; in growing zones 9 and warmer the plants may even perennialize. Get to Know the Egyptian Star Cluster
Pentas are a tropical import, and grow wild in East Africa. Plants are just the right size for the middle of the summer border: The average height of pentas is 24-36 inches, but plants that perennialize in frost free zones may reach four feet tall or greater. The dark green foliage of pentas plants is slightly fuzzy, and the five-petaled blossoms grow in 3-inch clusters similar to other butterfly favorites like sedum, lantana, and Queen Anne’s lace. Blossom colors include pink, purple, white, and red. How to Plant Pentas
Penta plants that receive at least three hours of direct sun will have the best blooms. Plants that don’t receive enough sunlight will stretch and become leggy. Plants prefer full sun, although some afternoon shade is tolerated. Pentas appreciate a mildly acidic soil pH, in the range of 6. 0. Amending the soil with compost or leaf mold can increase the acidity of your soil if it’s on the alkaline side. Many gardeners choose penta transplants to start in the garden, but you can try planting fresh pentas seed saved from last year’s flowers, or start softwood cuttings taken early in the growing season. Pentas seeds require light to germinate, so don’t cover them with soil. Care of Pentas
Penta plants can stay in bloom continuously under ideal growing conditions, so it's worth a bit of weekly care to keep the plants in optimum condition. Pentas need regular irrigation to stay healthy; keep the soil moisture about the same as a wrung out sponge. Pentas tolerate dry conditions, but drought stressed plants are susceptible to spider mite infestations. Avoid regular overhead watering to prevent unsightly brown spots on the foliage. In frost free growing zones, pentas will exhibit their shrubby nature and begin to grow leggy after one growing season. Prune the plants to six inches in January, when bloom production is at its lowest. After several seasons, the stems of the pentas may become so woody that it’s worth replacing them altogether. When growing as an annual for one season, no pruning is necessary, but regular deadheading will keep the plants blooming productively. Fertilize pentas once a month with a balanced flower fertilizer during periods of active growth. Timed release fertilizers are ideal, and will nourish plants throughout the growing season. A greater phosphorus content will encourage blossom formation, while nitrogen fosters leafy growth. Garden Design Tips With Pentas
Pentas thrive in containers or tubs, and they also look cheerful in the ground combined with other hot weather lovers. You can plant pentas alongside other vivid butterfly annuals, like zinnias, marigolds, cornflowers, or gomphrena. Gardeners with high indoor light levels can try their luck at growing the pentas as a houseplant, but whiteflies may plague plants grown indoors. Bring plants indoors before the first frost, or take cuttings from desired varieties. A cool room with bright light is an ideal spot to overwinter plants. Keep indoor plants vigorous by adding a supplementary light source, and by increasing the humidity with a gravel and water filled tray. Pentas Varieties to Try
New pentas cultivars feature disease resistance, as well as dwarf forms suitable for border edges and containers. The ‘Butterfly’ series is easy to grow from seed for gardeners who want to populate a large flowerbed on a budget. The ‘Graffiti’ series features compact mounding plants with large flower heads. ‘Kaleidoscope Appleblossom’ pentas are early bloomers with pale pink and rose on the same flower. Gardeners in rainy areas can succeed with the ‘New Look’ series, which produce upright plants that don’t flop. If your growing season is short, try ‘Northern Lights’, which continues to produce pale lavender flowers in cool temperatures. | 010_4606039 | {
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The municipal water distribution system, a modern miracle, would not be possible without chlorination or similar disinfectants. Chlorine is thought to destroy or deactivate disease-producing organisms by disrupting microbial DNA and RNA. Another benefit is the improvement of water quality resulting from the reaction of chlorine with ammonia, iron, manganese and organic substances, allowing the filtration and sedimentation processes to work smoothly. Chlorine can contribute some adverse effects however. Many consumers whose water source is chlorinated, wish to remove the chlorine taste and odors from their water. For many, its an aesthetic issue and having de-chlorinated or chlorine-reduced water tastes better, or is more pleasant to shower and bathe in. Some individuals however have sensitive skin and have allergic reactions to the chlorinated water, including reddening of the skin, skin rashes and other irritations. Tastes and odors from phenols and other organic compounds that are in water, can be intensified after chlorination. Potentially carcinogenic chloro-organic compounds such as chloroforms can be formed, and are strictly regulated by USEPA standards. If ammonia is present in the water to be treated, or is added as a part of the treatment process, compounds of chlorine and ammonia form chloramines, and can have very negative effects on aquatic life, including home aquariums. Chlorine is removed by activated carbon and certain other catalytic media if desired, although care must be taken so that the device removing the chlorine, and the downstream piping, does not become infected with bacteria. In some states, such as California, systems that claim to remove chlorine must be certified and the sales of such devices are strictly regulated. Need help selecting a system? Fill out our quick and easy Water System Designer Form and get a response in 24 hours or less. | 010_7238199 | {
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A Brief Synopsis of the Battle of Bentonville
Bentonville Battlefield State Historic Site
On March 19, 1865, Joseph E. Johnston organized his forces into a hook-shaped line at Cole's Plantation, blocking the Goldsboro Road. That morning William T. Sherman's Federal Left Wing stumbled into the Confederate trap, just as it was being set. After a Union probing attack failed, the Confederates launched a massive assault which drove Gen. William P. Carlin's XIV Corps division from the field. Morgan's division managed to hold on despite being surrounded on three sides by Confederate adversaries. Late that afternoon a strong Federal defense of the Morris Farm by the Left Wing's XX Corps managed to squelch the Confederate advance. The first day's fighting ended in a tactical draw. Another view of the XX Corps artillery. From Story of the Great March,
from the Diary of a Staff Officer
by Bvt. Maj. George Ward Nichols
Failing to completely crush the Union lines, Johnston's Confederates pulled back to positions held earlier in the day, and Sherman's Right Wing began arriving on the battlefield by midday on March 20. Sharp skirmishing prevailed, as the Confederates changed position to deal with the arrival of the Federal Right Wing. The junction of Sherman's divided army at Bentonville placed nearly 60,000 Union troops (including reserves) against Joe Johnston, who had brought to the field approximately 16,000 infantry and 4,000 cavalry with which to oppose Sherman. Despite receiving limited reinforcements, the Confederates were no match numerically for the powerful Union army. A portion of the Federal XV Corps
skirmish line, March 20, 1865. From a sketch by Harper's Weekly
artist William Waud
Johnston clung to a tenuous position guarding his army's sole escape route over rain-swollen Mill Creek, and began evacuating his wounded to Smithfield, 20 miles to the north. To Sherman's great irritation, he found the Confederate army still in position on March 21. The Union commander was anxious to reach Goldsboro, and was impatient for the Confederates to retreat. Johnston, outnumbered and no longer holding the advantage of surprise, could only hope that the Federals might be lured into a costly frontal attack on his small but well-entrenched army. For two days following the main battle of March 19, the opposing forces squared off in a severe and continuous skirmish fight. On March 21 Sherman's Right Wing moved to within a few hundred yards of the left half of Johnston's army. That afternoon, a "little reconnaissance" by Gen. Joseph A. Mower's XVII Corps division escalated into a full-scale push toward Mill Creek Bridge on the Confederate left flank. Mower's Attack on the Confederate
Left, East of Bentonville, March 21, 1865. Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper
Mower's charge overran Joe Johnston's headquarters, forcing the general and his entourage to beat a hasty retreat. At this critical juncture a well-orchestrated Confederate counterattack, led by Lt. Gen. William J. Hardee, quickly descended upon Mower's two brigades and forced them back. Sherman was furious with Mower's advance, fearing it would bring on the general engagement he wanted to avoid. The Union commander called a halt to the operation, but not before Mower's men were roughly handled by a combination of Confederate cavalry and infantry. Hardee's bold action assured Johnston the use of Mill Creek Bridge, his only means of egress from the battlefield. But the triumph of forcing the Federals back came at a personal cost to General Hardee. His only son, a youth of sixteen in the 8th Texas Cavalry, was mortally wounded in the charge against Mower. With no further advantage to be gained by holding a position at Bentonville, Johnston's weary troops abandoned their works during the night and withdrew toward Smithfield.
On March 22 Federal forces pursued the retreating Confederates as far as Hannah's Creek before giving up the chase. Sherman was content to let Johnston escape, fully expecting to have to deal with him again at a later date. But the Confederate withdrawal cleared the way for Sherman to occupy Goldsboro, which was foremost in the general's mind. His army needed rest and provisions, and Sherman also wanted to have the additional forces of J. M. Schofield and A. H. Terry before tangling with Johnston again. The armies of Sherman, Schofield, and Terry converged on Goldsboro and occupied the town for two and one-half weeks in preparation for the final leg of the campaign. On April 26, 1865, Johnston laid down Confederate arms on Sherman's terms at the Bennett Place near Durham, in the largest troop surrender of the American Civil War.
North Carolina Historic Sites - Bentonville
The battle which took place at Bentonville, North Carolina from the 19th through the 21st of March 1865 was the largest land battle ever fought in North Carolina. It was fought over an area of about six thousand acres of pine woods and fields. By the end of the fighting five hundred forty-three men were killed, over twenty-eight hundred were wounded and the missing numbered nearly nine hundred. Bentonville was the only significant attempt to stop Sherman on his march northward from Atlanta, and the last major Confederate offensive of the War Between the States.
In March of 1865 Union General William T. Sherman and 60,000 Federal troops under his command were in North Carolina. Sherman was marching his troops north from Fayetteville. His ultimate goal was to march to Virginia and join forces with General Ulysses S. Grant. The Union men were divided into two wings of 30,000 men each. Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston had assumed command of all Confederate forces from Florida to North Carolina on 23 February. In March Johnston's forces numbered about twenty thousand men and he hoped to stop the Federals and prevent them from linking forces with General Grant.
Early on 18 March General Johnston received a message from Lieutenant General Wade Hampton, the Confederate cavalry commander who later served as the first Governor of South Carolina after Reconstruction. The message told of making contact with one wing of Sherman's army. It was now clear Sherman was heading for Goldsboro where there were an additional 40,000 Union soldiers. Johnston began to move his troops south towards Bentonville and most of the Confederate troops were in place in the early morning of 19 March.
Johnston's troops charged the Federals left wing but they failed to overrun the Union line. Nightfall stopped the attack and the rest of Sherman's army, the right wing, arrived on March 20. There was a great deal of heavy skirmishing that day and that night both armies were drenched by a heavy rain which lasted until the morning of 21 March. Later that afternoon Union General J. A. Mower came close to cutting off Johnston's only line of retreat across Mill Creek, but Mower was so anxious to get to Mill Creek and moved so quickly that his troops found themselves exposed about three-quarters of a mile ahead of the other Union troops which were supporting them. Mower was forced to retreat to his original position. During the rainy night of 21/22 March Johnston learned that Union troops under the command of Major General John Schofield had reached Goldsboro. There was no chance of success now for the Confederates and Johnston began to withdraw his men towards Smithfield. By the morning of 22 March Johnston's men had left Bentonville. The Federals crossed Mill Creek and followed after Johnston for a few miles, but Sherman wanted to get to Goldsboro so there was no serious pursuit of the Confederates.
The Confederates had failed to halt the Union advance. The War in the Carolinas lasted for about another month, but on April 26 near Durham at the home of James and Nancy Bennitt, known today as Bennett Place, General Johnston agreed to surrender his army and the War was over in the Carolinas, Florida and Georgia.
Today the Bentonville Battleground is a North Carolina Historic Site administered by North Carolina's Division of Archives and History which is part of the State's Department of Cultural Resources. The Harper House, which was the home of John and Amy Harper and served as a field hospital during the battle, is still standing. The house has been set up as a field hospital of the period and is part of the Site. Most of the wounded cared for at Harper House were Federals, but some Confederate wounded were taken there after the battle as well. The Harper House is well preserved and furnished circa 1865. There is a also a Visitor Center, a Confederate cemetery and a section of Union trenches. Bentonville Battleground is open year-round and admission is free. Further information can be obtained at (910) 594 0789. Return to Bentonville | 001_3431466 | {
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How do we know that what we do to manage biodiversity is doing what we want? The sad truth is that a lot of the time we don’t. A lot conservation management is done in particular ways because of a mate once told the ranger a certain method was good or because they wish to maintain the status quo, but very little is actually based on evidence. The best way we have of understanding the effects of management on biodiversity is through properly controlled studies. Despite the increasing complexity in ecology, which is increasingly resembling a branch of applied mathematics, many conservation questions are about whether treatments a or b are better than doing nothing at all. This is one of the few ways we can attribute causation in ecology and is held as the gold standard for other disciplines. It bears repeating that correlation does not equal causation and most ecology is observational in nature, rather than manipulative. Although there is a push by some to answer these questions and compile evidence for particular management techniques (notably the excellent conservationevidence. com), much remains unevaluated. There is a feeling by some publishers that such experiments are boring and this stops researchers pursuing this type of research as well as reducing replication even when they are published. Though we sometimes have little idea about how to manage biodiversity at the site scale, environment policy can be equally difficulat to implement Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) have the potential to be powerful tools to aid this decision making. Many policy questions relate to how people interact with their environment. For example, is it best to pay up-front for agri-environment schemes or to pay based on the results they deliver? Questions like this could feasibly be addressed by a large RCT. However, these would need government backing and funding. Some people might see the use of RCTs, when government is cutting such large parts of it’s budget, as an unnecessary indulgence. However, without these trials we are fumbling around in the dark trying to find a sticking plaster when we might be in need of a visit to the hospital. It’s a clumsy analogy but without RCTs of such policy options we do not know whether what we are doing is the best thing to do, or even if it is working at all. This type of thing is being championed by Ben Goldacre and Tim Harford, who argue we should have RCTs for almost everything. Goldacre has also written a report for Cabinet Office in the UK, so it looks like this idea is gaining a bit of traction. RCTs have been identified as having potential for social policies such as the use of different teaching techniques in aiding reading. However, there is no reason why similar trials couldn’t be designed to test environmental policy. This big idea would put an end to uninformed policy making on the environment. It would mean that we wouldn’t have to guess at which policy delivers the best results. Politicians would still get it wrong some of the time but at least they’d be presented with good evidence to help them make these decisions. Politics would still however come first. Making decisions is a messy process and science doesn’t have the last say on such issues. As seen with the recent badger cull debate even the best evidence can have little value when faced with the might of industry lobbyists. But without this evidence, policy making will continue to fumble around in the dark. | 002_3196090 | {
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Ask The Applications Engineer–40
In addition, manufacturers specify absolute maximum ratings for every integrated circuit; these ratings must be observed in order to maintain reliable operation and meet published specifications. When absolute maximum ratings are exceeded, operational parameters cannot be guaranteed; and even internal protections against ESD, overvoltage, or latch-up can fail, resulting in device (and potentially further) damage or failure. This article describes challenges engineers face when designing analog switches and multiplexers into modules used in hostile environments, and provides suggestions for general solutions that circuit designers can use to protect vulnerable parts. It also introduces some new integrated switches and multiplexers that provide increased overvoltage protection, latch-up immunity, and fault protection to deal with common stress conditions. Analog Switch Architecture
A standard CMOS switch (Figure 1) uses both N- and P-channel MOSFETs for the switch element, digital control logic, and driver circuitry. Connecting N- and P-channel MOSFETs in parallel permits bidirectional operation, allowing the analog input voltage to extend to the supply rails, while maintaining fairly constant on resistance over the signal range. Figure 1. Standard analog switch circuitry. The source, drain, and logic terminals include clamping diodes to the supplies to provide ESD protection, as illustrated in Figure 1. Reverse-biased in normal operation, the diodes do not pass current unless the signal exceeds the supply voltage. The diodes vary in size, depending on the process, but they are generally kept small to minimize leakage current in normal operation. analog switch is controlled as follows: the N-channel device is on
for positive gate-to-source voltages and off for negative gate-to-source
voltages; the P-channel device is switched by the complementary signal,
so it is on at the same time as the
With a fixed voltage on the gate, the effective drive voltage for either transistor varies in proportion to the polarity and magnitude of the analog signal passing through the switch. The dashed lines in Figure 2 show that when the input signal approaches the supplies, the channel of one device or the other will begin to saturate, causing the on resistance of that device to increase sharply. The parallel devices compensate for one another in the vicinity of the rail voltages, however, so the result is a fully rail-to-rail switch, with relatively constant on resistance over the signal range. Figure 2. Standard analog switch RON graph. Whenever an analog switch input voltage exceeds the supplies, the internal ESD protection diodes become forward-biased, allowing large currents to flow, even if the supplies are turned off, causing ratings to be exceeded. When forward-biased, the diodes are not rated to pass currents greater than a few tens of milliamperes; they can be damaged if this current is not limited. Furthermore, the damage caused by a fault is not limited to the switch but can also affect downstream circuitry. The Absolute Maximum Ratings section of a data sheet (Figure 3) describes the maximum stress conditions a device can tolerate; it is important to note that these are stress ratings only. Exposure to absolute maximum ratings conditions for extended periods may affect device reliability. The designer should always follow good engineering practice by building margin into the design. The example here is from a standard switch/multiplexer data sheet. Figure 3. Absolute Maximum Ratings section of a data sheet. In this example, the VDD to VSS parameter is rated at 18 V. The rating is determined by the switch’s manufacturing process and design architecture. Any voltage higher than 18 V must be completely isolated from the switch, or the intrinsic breakdown voltages of elements associated with the process will be exceeded, which may damage the device and lead to unreliable operation. Voltage limitations that apply to the analog switch inputs—with and without power supplies—are often due to the ESD protection circuitry, which may fail as a result of fault conditions. Figure 4. Analog switch—ESD protection diodes. Analog and digital input voltage specifications are limited to 0. 3 V beyond VDD and VSS, while digital input voltages are limited to 0. 3 V beyond VDD and ground. When the analog inputs exceed the supplies, the internal ESD protection diodes become forward-biased and begin to conduct. As stated in the Absolute Maximum Ratings section, overvoltages at IN, S, or D are clamped by internal diodes. While currents exceeding 30 mA can be passed through the internal diodes without any obvious effects, device reliability and lifetime may be reduced, and the effects of electromigration, the gradual displacement of metal atoms in a conductor, may be seen over time. As heavy current flows through a metal path, the moving electrons interact with metal ions in the conductor, forcing atoms to move with the flow of electrons. Over time this can lead to open- or short circuits. When designing a switch into a system, it is important to consider potential faults that may occur in the system due to component failure, user error, or environmental effects. The next section will discuss how fault conditions that exceed the absolute maximum ratings of a standard analog switch can damage the switch or cause it to malfunction. Fault Conditions, System Stresses, and Protection Methods
Some stress may not be preventable. Regardless of the source of the stress, the more important issue is how to deal with its effects. The questions and answers below cover these fault conditions: overvoltages, latch-up, and ESD events—and some common methods of protection. 1. Loss of power with signals present on analog inputs (Figure 5). In some applications, the power supply to a module is lost, while input signals from remote locations may still be present. When power is lost, the power supply rails may go to ground—or one or more may float. If the supplies go to ground, the input signals can forward-bias the internal diode, and current from the switch input will flow to ground—damaging the diode if the current is not limited. Figure 5. Fault paths. If loss of power causes the supplies to float, the input signals can power the part through the internal diodes. As a result, the switch—and possibly any other components running from its VDD supply—may be powered up. 2. Overvoltage conditions on analog inputs. When analog signals exceed the power supplies (VDD and VSS), the supplies can be pulled to within a diode drop of the fault signal. Internal diodes become forward-biased and currents flow from the input signal to the supplies. The overvoltage signal can also pass through the switch and damage parts downstream. The explanation for this can be seen by considering the P-channel FET (Figure 6). Figure 6. FET switch. A P-channel FET requires a negative gate-to-source voltage to turn it on. With the switch gate equal to VDD, the gate-to-source voltage is positive, so the switch is off. In an unpowered circuit, with the switch gate at 0 V or where the input signal exceeds VDD, the signal will pass through the switch—as there is now a negative gate-to-source voltage. 3. Bipolar signals applied to a switch powered from a single supply. This situation is similar to the previously described overvoltage condition. The fault occurs when the input signal goes below ground, causing the diode from the analog input to ground to forward-bias and current to flow. When an ac signal, biased at 0 V dc, is applied to the switch input, the parasitic diodes can be forward-biased for some portion of the negative half-cycle of the input waveform. This happens if the input sine wave goes below approximately –0. 6 V, turning the diode on and clipping the input signal, as shown in Figure 7. Figure 7. Clipping.
the Best Way to Deal with Overvoltage Conditions? Resistors, to limit current, are placed in series with any switch channel that is exposed to external sources (Figure 8). The resistance must be high enough to limit the current to approximately 30 mA (or as specified by the absolute maximum ratings). The obvious downside is the increase in RON, ∆RON, per channel, and ultimately the overall system error. Also, for applications using multiplexers, faults on the source of an off channel can appear at the drain, creating errors on other channels. Figure 8. Resistor-diode protection network. Schottky diodes connected from the analog inputs to the supplies provide protection, but at the expense of leakage and capacitance. The diodes work by preventing the input signal from exceeding the supply voltage by more than 0. 3 V to 0. 4 V, ensuring that the internal diodes do not forward bias and current does not flow. Diverting the current through the Schottky diodes protects the device, but care must be taken not to overstress the external components. A third method of protection involves placing blocking diodes in series with the supplies (Figure 9), blocking current flow through the internal diodes. Faults on the inputs cause the supplies to float, and the most positive and negative input signals become the supplies. As long as the supplies do not exceed the absolute maximum ratings of the process, the device should tolerate the fault. The downside to this method is the reduced analog signal range due to the diodes on the supplies. Also, signals applied to the inputs may pass through the device and affect downstream circuitry. Figure 9. Blocking diodes in series with supplies. While these protection methods have advantages and disadvantages, they all require external components, extra board area, and additional cost. This can be especially significant in applications with high channel count. To eliminate the need for external protection circuitry, designers should look for integrated protection solutions that can tolerate these faults. Analog Devices offers a number of switch/mux families with integrated protection against power off, overvoltage, and negative signals. Prepackaged Solutions Are Available? The ADG4612 family offers power-off protection, overvoltage protection, and negative-signal handling, all conditions a standard CMOS switch cannot handle. When no power supplies are present, the switch remains in the off condition. The switch inputs present a high impedance, limiting current flow that could damage the switch or downstream circuitry. This is very useful in applications where analog signals may be present at the switch inputs before the power is turned on, or where the user has no control over the power supply sequence. In the off condition, signal levels up to 16 V are blocked. Also, the switch turns off if the analog input signal level exceeds VDD by VT. Figure 10. ADG4612/ADG4613 switch architecture. Figure 10 shows a block diagram of the family’s power-off protection architecture. Switch source- and drain inputs are constantly monitored and compared to the supply voltages, VDD and VSS. In normal operation the switch behaves as a standard CMOS switch with full rail-to-rail operation. However, during a fault condition where the source or drain input exceeds a supply by a threshold voltage, internal fault circuitry senses the overvoltage condition and puts the switch in isolation mode. Analog Devices also offers multiplexers and channel protectors that can tolerate overvoltage conditions of +40 V/–25 V beyond the supplies with power (±15 V) applied to the device, and +55 V/–40 V unpowered. These devices are specifically designed to handle faults caused by power-off conditions. Figure 11. High-voltage fault-protected switch architecture. These devices comprise N-channel, P-channel, and N-channel MOSFETs in series, as illustrated in Figure 11. When one of the analog inputs or outputs exceeds the power supplies, one of the MOSFETs switches off, the multiplexer input (or output) appears as an open circuit, and the output is clamped to within the supply rail, thereby preventing the overvoltage from damaging any circuitry following the multiplexer. This protects the multiplexer, the circuitry it drives, and the sensors or signal sources that drive the multiplexer. When the power supplies are lost (through, for example, battery disconnection or power failure) or momentarily disconnected (rack system, for example), all transistors are off and the current is limited to subnanoampere levels. The ADG508F, ADG509F, and ADG528F include 8:1 and differential 4:1 multiplexers with such functionality. The ADG465 single- and ADG467 octal channel protectors have the same protective architecture as these fault-protected multiplexers, without the switch function. When powered, the channel is always in the on condition, but in the event of a fault, the output is clamped to within the supply voltages. Figure 12. Parasitic SCR structure: a) device b) equivalent circuit. The fault and overvoltage conditions described earlier are among the common causes of triggering a latch-up condition. If signals on the analog or digital inputs exceed the supplies, a parasitic transistor is turned on. The collector current of this transistor causes a voltage drop across the base emitter of a second parasitic transistor, which turns the transistor on, and results in a self-sustaining path between the supplies. Figure 12(b) clearly shows the SCR circuit structure formed between Q1 and Q2. Events need not last long to trigger latch-up. Short-lived transients, spikes, or ESD events may be enough to cause a device to enter a latch-up state. Latch-up can also occur when the supply voltages are stressed beyond the absolute maximum ratings of the device, causing internal junctions to break down and the SCR to trigger. The second triggering mechanism occurs if a supply voltage is raised enough to break down an internal junction, injecting current into the SCR. the Best Way to Deal with Latch-Up Conditions? Switches with multiple supplies may have additional power-supply sequencing issues that may violate the absolute maximum ratings. Improper supply sequencing can lead to internal diodes turning on and triggering latch-up. External Schottky diodes, connected between supplies, will adequately prevent SCR conduction by ensuring that when multiple supplies are applied to the switch, VDD is always within a diode drop (0. 3 V for Schottky) of these supplies, thereby preventing violation of the maximum ratings. Prepackaged Solutions Are Available? For applications requiring a latch-up proof solution, new trench-isolated switches and multiplexers guarantee latch-up prevention in high-voltage industrial applications operating at up to ±20 V. The ADG541x and ADG521x families are designed for instrumentation, automotive, avionics, and other harsh environments that are likely to foster latch-up. The process uses an insulating oxide layer (trench) placed between the N-channel and the P-channel transistors of each CMOS switch. The oxide layers, both horizontal and vertical, produce complete isolation between devices. Parasitic junctions between transistors in junction-isolated switches are eliminated, resulting in a completely latch-up proof switch. Figure 13. Trench isolation in latch-up prevention. The industry practice is to classify the susceptibility of inputs and outputs to latch-up in terms of the amount of excess current an I/O pin can source or sink in the overvoltage condition before the internal parasitic resistances develop enough voltage drop to sustain the latch-up condition. A value of 100 mA is generally considered adequate. Devices in the ADG5412 latch-up proof family were stressed to ±500 mA with a 1-ms pulse without failure. Latch-up testing at Analog Devices is performed according to EIA/JEDEC-78 (IC Latch-Up Test). ICs can be damaged by the high voltages and high peak currents generated by an ESD event. The effects of an ESD event on an analog switch can include reduced reliability over time, the degradation of switch performance, increased channel leakage, or complete device failure. ESD events can occur at any stage of the life of an IC, from manufacturing through testing, handling, OEM user, and end-user operation. In order to evaluate an IC’s robustness to various ESD events, electrical pulse circuits modeling the following simulated stress environments were identified: human body model (HBM), field-induced charged device model (FICDM), and machine model (MM). the Best Way to Deal with ESD Events? Analog switch ESD protection is generally in the form of diodes from the analog and digital inputs to the supplies, as well as power supply protection in the form of diodes between the supplies—as illustrated in Figure 14. Figure 14. Analog switch ESD protection. The protection diodes clamp voltage transients and divert current to the supplies. The downside of these protection devices is that they add capacitance and leakage to the signal path in normal operation, which may be undesirable in some applications. For applications that require greater protection against ESD events, discrete components such as Zener diodes, metal-oxide varistors (MOVs), transient voltage suppressors (TVS), and diodes are commonly used. However, they can lead to signal integrity issues due to the extra capacitance and leakage on the signal line; this means design engineers need to carefully consider the trade-off between performance and reliability. Prepackaged Solutions Are Available? Switch/mux products, like devices mentioned here, are available with integrated protection, allowing designers to eliminate external protection circuitry, reducing the number and cost of components in board designs. Savings are even more significant in applications with high channel count. Ultimately, using switches with fault protection, overvoltage protection, immunity to latch-up, and a high ESD rating yields a robust product that meets industry regulations and enhances customer and end-user satisfaction. High-Voltage Latch-Up Proof Switches
High-Voltage Latch-Up Proof Multiplexer
Low-Voltage Fault-Protected Multiplexers
High-Voltage Fault-Protected Multiplexers
High-Voltage Channel Protectors
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How to Stage Greek Tragedy Today
In crisp and spirited prose, Goldhill explains how Aeschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles conceived their works in performance and then summarizes everything we know about how their tragedies were actually staged. The heart of his book tackles the six major problems facing any company performing these works today: the staging space and concept of the play; the use of the chorus; the actor’s role in an unfamiliar style of performance; the place of politics in tragedy; the question of translation; and the treatment of gods, monsters, and other strange characters of the ancient world. Outlining exactly what makes each of these issues such a pressing difficulty for modern companies, Goldhill provides insightful solutions drawn from his nimble analyses of some of the best recent productions in the United States, Britain, and Continental Europe.
One of the few experts on both Greek tragedy and contemporary performance, Goldhill uses his unique background and prodigious literary skill to illuminate brilliantly what makes tragedy at once so exciting and so tricky to get right. The result will inspire and enlighten all directors and performers—not to mention the growing audiences—of ancient Greek theater. 1 Space and Concept
2 The Chorus
3 The Actor’s Role
4 Tragedy and Politics: What’s Hecuba to Him? 5 Translations: Finding a Script
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First Photo of a Black Hole – The first picture of a black hole shows a monster hole 55 million light-years from Earth in the neighbouring galaxy M87. Nicknamed Pōwehi by some members of the team (it’s pronounced poe-vay-hee, a word from Hawaiian mythology meaning “embellished dark source of unending creation”), the object is 6. 5 billion times as massive as the sun and has a diameter of 24 billion miles. Its mass and powerful gravity cast a shadow against the bright, hot gas swirling around it, creating a distinctive donut shape. The image emerged from two years of computer analysis of observations from a network of radio antennas called the Event Horizon Telescope. In 2018, Columbia University researchers detected a dozen black holes surrounding the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way. This new evidence supports the theory that the supermassive black hole, called Sagittarius A*, is actually surrounded by roughly 10,000 other isolated black holes plus as many as 500 black holes paired with stars, according to Science Daily.
Most Remote Planets – Spitzer was the final of NASA’s four Great Observatories to reach space. In 2010, Spitzer helped scientists detect one of the most remote planets ever discovered, located about 13,000 light-years away from Earth. Most previously known exoplanets lie within about 1,000 light years of Earth. Even though scientists thought for a long time that they must exist, it was only in 1992 that the first exoplanet was discovered. And further work to look for other ones has turned up some exciting results more recently too. Earlier in 2015, scientists discovered the exoplanet Kepler-452b, which was described as ‘earth’s cousin’ because of its close similarities to our planet. Space experts say Exoplanets are really important because they raise the possibility that other life could exist in other solar solar systems. In late January 2018, a team of scientists led by Xinyu Dai claimed to have discovered a collection of about 2,000 rogue planets in the quasar microlens RX J1131-1231, which is 3. 8 billion light-years distant. The bodies range in mass from that of the Moon to several Jupiter masses. Access to Mars – In 1976, Nasa’s Viking mission became the first successful spacecraft to land on Mars. It returned amazing colour pictures, soil samples and extensive scientific information about the planet. The craft also carried out an experiment which, for the first time, suggested that life might be possible on Mars. Exploration on Mars has continued with the Curiosity Rover and more recently the announcement that liquid water was found on the red planet’s surface. Scientists say this raises the possibility that life could exist on the planet. In June 2018, NASA announced that the Curiosity rover found organic material preserved in rocks on Mars and methane in the planet’s atmosphere. While not necessarily indicative of life itself, the findings suggest the planet could have supported ancient life, according to NASA. Then, in late November, the InSight Mars lander arrived to dig deeper into the Red Planet to gather more data. Death of a Zombie Star – Scientists already have a strong understanding of what happens when a star dies and how supernovas work, but in 2018, astronomers discovered that iPTF14hls appears to have died and come back to life multiple times. What’s going on with this so-called zombie star? Normally, when a star dies, it emits a bright light for a short period of time while imploding during a supernova event. But, according to Space.com, even though iPTF14hls seemed like it died about 60 years ago, it now appears to be pulsing, with a brighter-than-normal supernova. | 003_5732672 | {
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Knowing the date is important to our daily lives. It tells us everything from when medication expires to when bills need to be paid and flights are scheduled. Whether it is a due date, expiry date, or the date a document was written, knowing the precise date keeps our lives running smoothly. But in Canada, understanding just what the numbers in a date mean isn’t easy. That is because there is no agreed upon order or format for listing the month, day and year. For example, the birthdate for your social insurance number is entered as day/month/year, but when applying for the Canada Pension Plan it is year/month/day. If you look at the expiration date on many foods it could say May 20, or 17 MA 20. When individuals and organizations do not use a common way to communicate the date it can lead to confusion and misunderstanding. But standards offer a solution to this problem. In 1988, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) launched ISO 8601: Data elements and interchange formats - Information interchange - Representation of dates and times to provide a standardized way to represent dates using numbers. Thirty years later, listing the date as the year/month/day has become the accepted standard in countries around the world. ISO 8601 eliminates uncertainty and confusion when communicating dates, which is critical in today’s global economy. But the full standard also covers how to write other things such as:
- Time of day
- Coordinated universal time (UTC)
- Local time with offset to UTC
- Date and time
- Time intervals
- Recurring time intervals
More information on this voluntary standard can be found on the ISO website. As the leader of Canada's standardization network, the Standards Council of Canada (SCC) has been working to promote the use of consistent all-numeric dates in Canada. We are here to provide Canadians with the information they need about standardization issues like this one—and, where appropriate, to advocate the use of specific standards—so they can make informed decisions. As providers of the standards development rules for the country, SCC makes it mandatory for its accredited Standards Development Organizations (SDOs) to use the required format in the standards developed for Canadians.
At SCC, we are committed to raising awareness about the standardization issues that matter most to Canadians and ensuring governments, industry and consumers understand the role that standards play in our lives. We are continuously collaborating with standardization organizations across the country and around the world to deliver value to Canada by developing and implementing innovative standardization solutions that promote trade, drive innovation, support small business and ignite the economy. | 005_2824660 | {
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The legal system spoke Saturday, to the shock and dismay of some and the relief of others, as a jury of six women found George Zimmerman not guilty of murdering Trayvon Martin.
While many refuse to believe the case was racially motivated, others fear for the lives of any persons of color who may be unlucky to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. But regardless of motivations or skin color, the killing of the 17-year-old who was walking back to a friend's house after buying iced tea and candy shows the need for communities to carefully consider just what their "Stand Your Ground" laws allow. Since before the United States was created, the "Castle Doctrine" has existed, as people in Great Britain believed a man's home was his castle and he had a right to protect it. In 1985, Colorado became one of the first states to enact a "Make My Day" law, shielding people from any criminal/civil suits for using force -- including deadly force -- against an invader of their home. Since then, 25 other states have taken the "Castle Doctrine" to a greater extreme, allowing people to take action, even deadly force, to defend themselves outside the home. But the Zimmerman verdict may show a need for states to carefully consider their laws and just what they allow, and the effects and unintended consequences. Reacting Tuesday, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said these laws "senselessly expand the concept of self-defense" and eliminate the commonsense requirement that people have a duty to retreat if they feel threatened outside their homes if they can do so safely. Holder said that by allowing and perhaps encouraging violent situations to escalate, the laws undermine public safety. Quite simply, the attorney general said, Americans should take a look at laws that encourage violence. Colorado's law is reasonable; others, like Florida's seem less so. A civilized society should not condone violence. Misunderstandings, especially among people who don't know each other or each other's motivations, can too easily arise. Attempting to sort out those misunderstandings peaceably is not easy but is the better path. The Zimmerman verdict may have been legally correct, given the Florida law, but that does not make the killing morally right. If someone, anyone, can get away with killing another person simply because they feel threatened, as the law states in Florida, no one among us is safe. | 004_1312083 | {
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Published: Jan 1992
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Decontamination of personal protective equipment requires knowledge of the contaminant, methods of detection for contamination, and use of effective materials and procedures for decontamination. Contamination can be of a surface, matrix, or pore type. Each must be handled differently to achieve effective decontamination. Tests for contamination range from simple visual methods to destructive, complex, and very expensive analytical protocols. Methods of decontamination can be either physical or chemical. In general, physical methods can be effective for surface contaminants that can be mechanically dislodged or dissolved. Heating and hot air washing can be effective for volatiles as surface and matrix contaminants. Chemical methods are usually effective for a limited number of surface contaminants. Pore contaminants are extremely difficult to decontaminate by any nondestructive method. The best approach to decontamination is to minimize the need to perform it. This is accomplished by minimizing workers and equipment in hazardous areas and avoiding the use of porous equipment and materials. Contamination, decontamination, matrix contamination, surface contamination, pore contamination, personal protective equipment
President, S.Z. Mansdorf & Associates, Inc., Cuyahoga Falls, OH
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That's all it takes for you to say 'thank you' for the articles you find useful! Use the buttons above to show us your love, we know you want to! Effective communication is a two-way street. ESL students must understand others when they speak English.
But they must also make themselves understood. For ESL students who struggle with pronunciation, this is easier said than done. Which is why it is absolutely essential for you as an ESL teacher to include pronunciation practice in the course syllabus, and not merely correct pronunciation mistakes on the fly. I know. I know. Pronunciation practice can be tedious. It’s hard! For you and for your students. But there are ways to make pronunciation practice a little more fun. Try any of these exercises! ESL Pronunciation Practice: 6 Fun Exercises
The pronunciation of verb endings is something that is particularly troublesome for some students. The two main problem areas are:
Present Simple – third person singular. There are three possible sounds for the verb ending – [s] as in talks, [z] as in sees and [iz] as in confuses
The Past Simple of regular verbs. There are also three possible sounds for the –ed verb ending: [d] as in stayed, [t] as in talked and [id] as in wanted. After going over the differences, divide the whiteboard into three columns. First practice the verb endings for the third person singular in Present Simple. Place each sound at the top of each column. Say a verb and ask a student to say it in the third person singular. Ask the student which column the verb belongs to. Finally, walk around the classroom and fire off one verb after another. Students must correctly pronounce the verb ending. If they make a mistake, they must try with a different verb till they get one right. Do the same with the –ed ending of regular verbs in Past Simple.
What’s the Word? Here’s a fun, challenging exercise for students who are familiar with the phonetic spelling of words, or those who are not, but are clever enough to figure it out. Give them a list of words spelled phonetically. Students must write the word each describes: /ˈmʌð ər/ - mother. To make it more fun, show each student a card with a word and its phonetic spelling and ask them to say the word out loud. The best way to go about this exercise is to practice words with a similar sound so that students start seeing a pattern. Letters vs. Sounds
One of the things students need to know is that although there are 26 letters in the English alphabet, there are 44 sounds, and that the number of letters in a word is not the same as the number of sounds. For example, the word bat has three sounds and three letters, but batch has five letters and three sounds (the “tch” is one sound). Divide the whiteboard into six columns and at the top of each write “2 sounds”, “3 sounds”, “4 sounds” and so on till “6 sounds”. Give students a list of words and ask them to place each in the correct column. Mimicking is an essential part of pronunciation practice, that is, you model a word and students repeat by copying the same stress and tone. But you can maximize the opportunities for learning by practicing two sounds at once. Have students repeat sentences like these:
Sit in your seat. Chips are cheap. Your niece is nice. Etc…
Which One Makes Sense? Present students with two sets of possible answers to a question, for instance: Hit it. /Heat it. Ask: The soup is cold. What should I do? He took the bait . /He took the bat. Ask: What did he take fishing? Tongue Twisting Fun
Tongue Twisters are fun and excellent for pronunciation practice. This is a great way to help students practice the longer ones. Let’s see one as an example taken from this worksheet, “Betty Botter”. Write the Tongue Twister on the board:
Betty Botter bought some butter, "But," she said, "this butter's bitter. If I bake this bitter butter, It will make my batter bitter. But a bit of better butter - That would make my batter better. " So she bought a bit of butter, Better than her bitter butter, And she baked it in her batter, And the batter was not bitter. So 'twas better Betty Botter Bought a bit of better butter. Now, erase some of the words and have students say it again, filling in the blanks. Betty Botter bought some _____, "But," she said, "this butter's _____. If I ____ this bitter butter, It will make my _____ bitter. But a bit of ____ butter - That would make my ____ better. " So she _____ a bit of butter, Better than her _____ butter, And she _____ it in her batter, And the _____ was not bitter. So 'twas better Betty _____ Bought a bit of better _____. Next, erase a few more words, and then again, till students remember and pronounce the Tongue Twister correctly. Though pronunciation rules are clear, pronunciation practice is not an exact science. Simply going over “the rules” is not enough. You have to give students some motivation and the element of fun always does the trick. What are some of your favorite ways to practice pronunciation? Share them in the comments below! Want more tips like this? Hear and Say: New Ways of Teaching Listening and Pronunciation:
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Members of the Weld family from Massachusetts were among North Haven Island’s early “rusticators. ” Dr. Charles G. Weld, a Boston physician and philanthropist, purchased Iron Point, on the southeastern corner of the island, and in 1898 built a large summer home. His windmill pumped water from North Haven’s first artesian well. Dr. Webb took great interest in local affairs and the well being of year-round island residents. He kept his dock open during very cold winters when the town ferry dock was unusable because of ice. To facilitate more frequent mail delivery and communication with the mainland, Dr. Weld had the steamer Sylvia built. Dr. Weld and his brother William were avid sailors. Charles attempted to sail around the world in his own yacht in 1886, but the boat was destroyed by fire in Yokohama harbor. That year William brought a new sailboat to the island aboard his schooner; it was the inspiration for the North Haven Dinghy, from which a whole racing class of gaff-rigged sailboats was born. North Haven boatbuilder James Osman Brown began building an improved version in 1888. Today North Haven Dinghies are the oldest continuously raced class of sailboats in the country, and J.O. Brown & Sons still builds boats on North Haven. | 004_4145628 | {
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Member of the ANC and MK, Deputy-Secretary General of the ANC, Deputy President of South Africa, President of South Africa and the African National Congress (ANC). Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma (Msholozi – his praise name) was born on 12 April 1942 at Nkandla in northern Natal (now kwaZulu-Natal). He is the first born of five children of his father Nobhekisisa Zuma and his second wife, Geinamazwi. His mother had three sons with his father, Jacob being the eldest. His father constructed the middle name Gedleyihlekisa from a Zulu phrase, which translated into English reads, “I cannot keep quiet when someone pretends to love me with a deceitful smile. ” His father’s first wife had four sons and three daughters. His father, a policeman, died when Zuma was a young boy. Following his father’s death, he and his mother left for his mother’s parental home in kwaMaphumulo, Natal. At the age of seven or eight, Zuma began herding his grandfather’s cattle while his contemporaries went to school. Zuma and his fellow herders would engage in traditional stick fighting, at which he allegedly excelled. His mother had wished to take him back to Nkandla but there was no school there so he was left tending the cattle and goats in kwaMaphumulo. When Jacob was still a youth, his mother for the port city of Durban where she found employment as a domestic worker, leaving her son behind. Back in kwaMaphumulo, Zuma taught himself to read by looking at the books of other children who attended school. He even arranged a night school for himself and his friends - eventually approaching a lady who had gone up to Standard Four (Grade six) to provide them with tuition. They paid her 25 cents to do this. In his teens, Zuma would visit his mother who was working in Cato Manor (uMkhumbane) but was not allowed in the home where she worked. Instead, he would walk around the city in search of work. At around this age, Zuma was politically influenced by stories of the Bambatha Rebellion which were retold by men who had lived through the period of the rebellion. However, perhaps the greatest influence came from his elder step-brother Muntukabongwa Zuma. His brother had been a soldier in World War II and later became a trade union activist and a member of the African National Congress (ANC). While visiting Cato Manor and Greyville, in Durban, Zuma saw ANC volunteers doing political work and consequently, he began attending the organisation’s meetings too. In 1959, he joined the ANC and the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) and the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU) and began attending ANC and trade union meetings at Lakhani Chambers in central Durban. He spent three years, from 1960 to 1963, attending political education classes there. Anti-Apartheid political Activities, Arrest and Imprisonment
The banning of the ANC in 1960 led to the formation of its armed wing, uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK). Zuma soon became involved with the armed struggle, and participated in sabotage actions in Natal. As was common for aspirant MK cadres at the time, he also planned to leave South Africa for military training abroad. During this period, he came under the influence of a relative, Obed Zuma, and Stephen Dlamini and Moses Mabhida who were leading figures in SACTU. Zuma began attending evening political classes under the tutorship of Mabhida and Dlamini over a period of three years. Eventually, in 1963, Zuma was recruited as an active member of MK by Mabhida.
A plan was conceived by MK to send 45 new recruits to Zambia aboard the ‘Freedom Ferry’ for military training. Zuma was part of this group. However, the plan was uncovered by the security police who organised an operation to arrest the group. In June 1963, as the group embarked on a journey to Botswana, Zuma, alongside others, was arrested in the Groot Marico area near Zeerust, in the Western Transvaal (now North West Province). Zuma was detained under the 90 day detention law in solitary confinement at Hercules police station before being transferred to the Hercules Police Station near Pretoria. He was interrogated and beaten, even though the police already had enough evidence to secure a conviction. Thereafter, he was held in solitary confinement for 90-days. The trial was held at the Pretoria Old Synagogue with Judge Fritz Steyn, presiding. On 12 August 1963, Zuma, at the age of 21, was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison for conspiring to overthrow the government. Along with some of his comrades, he was taken from Pretoria to Leeukop Prison outside Pretoria before being transported to Robben Island to serve his sentence. The vehicle stopped for an overnight sleep in Colesberg to collect other prisoners. It was here that Zuma met his long-time friend Ebrahim ‘Ebie’ Ebrahim. The handcuffed prisoners were also placed in leg irons for the entire journey, in a windowless van, with just a sanitary bucket for comfort. Zuma entered Robben Island on 30 December 1963, sharing a communal cell with a group of between 30 and 50 other prisoners, washing in cold water (prisoners only got hot water in 1973) and eating boiled mealies (maize) three times a day. African prisoners were given a different diet from the Coloured and Indian prisoners on the island. For the ten years that he was on Robben Island, Zuma never received a single visitor. His mother, on her domestic worker’s salary, was scarcely able to afford the fare. Cognisant of this fact, Zuma wrote to her, telling her to rather keep her income to look after his brothers and sisters. Together with other prisoners on the island, Zuma worked in the blue stone quarry digging and crushing slate for the construction of more prison cells. He was among the prisoners from Natal who initiated political study groups. He also served in a number of positions in ANC structures, which included being a group leader, a Public Relations Officer, cell leader and Chairman of the Political Committee, organising political discussions. After prisoners fought for more rights in prison, sport was eventually permitted. Zuma took advantage of this new dispensation and played soccer whenever he could; he even became captain of the Rangers, the Robben Island team for which he played. He was also part of a choral and traditional dance group, as well as playing table tennis and chess and participating in athletic events on the island. Release, Resumption of political Activities and Exile
On Zuma’s release on 29 December 1973, he was taken to Pietermaritzburg police cells where he was detained for another two weeks before being taken to Nkandla, where he was eventually released. After his release, Phyllis Naidoo, an attorney in Durban who was herself later banned and forced into exile, found work for Zuma in a pet shop in Durban. However, behind the scenes, Zuma resumed his political activities. He was, for instance, instrumental in the re-establishment of ANC underground structures in Natal between 1974 and 1975, where he helped to provoke industrial unrest, aiding some 160 000 workers there to go on strike. During this time, he also became part of an initiative, led by Harry Gwala, to recruit and send young people out of the country for military training. His primary responsibility was to ensure a safe passage for recruits into Mozambique and their re-entry into South Africa, with weapons and further instructions from the MK leadership in exile. In his private life, Zuma took advantage of being free from jail by marrying his childhood sweetheart, Sizakele Gertrude Khumalo in 1973. However, following Harry Gwala’s arrest at the end of a workers’ strike in 1975, Zuma left the country for Swaziland that December. His new wife decided not go with him, preferring instead to wait for his return as she had done while he was in prison on Robben Island. Their marriage did not survive the separation. Over the next few years, Zuma was based first in Swaziland and then Mozambique. In Swaziland, he met with other ANC comrades, among whom, future President Thabo Mbeki, who allegedly first taught Zuma how to use a gun. . Early in 1976, Zuma secretly entered South Africa to re-establish contact with activists in the Durban area. Then, in March 1976, along with Thabo Mbeki and Albert Dlomo, Zuma was arrested and held at the Matsapha prison in Swaziland but managed to avoid deportation. Two other ANC members were, however, kidnapped from Swaziland and imprisoned in South Africa. After the intervention of Oliver Tambo, who sent Moses Mabhida and Thomas Nkobi to assist, Zuma, along with his comrades, was released in April 1976 and deported to Mozambique, where he first served as the official ANC Deputy Chief Representative and later the Chief Representative.
During this period, Zuma was involved in underground work with Thabo Mbeki and others, supporting ANC structures operating mainly inside South Africa. Zuma was deployed to work largely within the Natal machinery. Later, whilst in Mozambique, Zuma dealt also with the thousands of young people that left South Africa after the Soweto uprising in June 1976. However, Zuma’s work remained largely focused on the internal underground of the ANC. After the formation of the Internal Political Reconstruction Committee (IPRC) in Mozambique, in 1977, Zuma, Indres Naidoo and John Nkadimeng were drafted into the ANC Maputo Regional Committee. Zuma was also co-opted as a member of the ANC National Executive Committee (NEC) in 1977. That same year, Zuma began working for the SACP, and in 1978 completed a three month leadership and military training course in the Soviet Union.
By 1984, Zuma had been elected the Deputy Chief Representative of the ANC, the year the Nkomati Accord was signed between Mozambique and South Africa. After this accord was signed, Zuma was appointed as Chief Representative of the ANC and remained in Mozambique. He was re-elected to the ANC’s NEC at the Kabwe Conference in 1985. Zuma also served on the ANC's Military and Political Committees after its formation in the mid-80s, and the Intelligence Department at the ANC Head Office in Lusaka, Zambia.
By 1986, Zuma commanded the Mandla Judson Kuzwayo (MJK) unit while he was still in Mozambique. Headed by Yunis Shaik (Mandla), together with his brother Moe Shaik (Judson) and Jayendra Naidoo (Kuzwayo), the unit infiltrated the Security police in Durban and were able to access information relating to informers that the Security Police used. Due to this, the South African government requested Mozambican authorities to expel six senior members of the ANC from Mozambique, including Jacob Zuma. In response, the ANC moved him to Lusaka, Zambia where he was appointed the Chief of Intelligence Department.
Along with Mbeki, Zuma formed part of the ANC President, Oliver Tambo’s negotiation team, which met with the South African government representatives in the late 1980s to early 1990s. Among the first of these meetings, in November 1987, Zuma, together with Mbeki, was present at a meeting arranged by Professor Willie Esterhuyse and a few of his colleagues. Several similar meetings would follow where Zuma would participate. Return to South Africa
After the ANC was unbanned in February 1990, Zuma clandestinely returned to the country in March, alongside Penuell Maduna and Mathews Phosa, to work as part of a steering committee tasked with identifying remaining obstacles to negotiations between the government and the ANC. Later he was involved in negotiations which resulted in the signing of the Groote-Schuur Minute, an agreement that outlined important decisions regarding the return of exiles and the release of political prisoners. Subsequently, in August 1990, when Mandela, Mbeki and Zuma were abroad, Cyril Ramaphosa, then the Secretary General of the ANC convened the ANC’s National Working Committee (NWC) axed Zuma from his position as head of intelligence and replaced Mbeki as head of the ANC’s negotiations with the Government. Nonetheless, in November 1990, Zuma was elected Chairperson of the ANC’s Southern Natal region. In 1991 Zuma, together with Frank Mdlalose, national Chair of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), set up the Peace and Reconstruction Foundation to rebuild the devastation following internecine battles between the ANC and the IFP. He is largely credited with weakening the IFP’s grip on power in kwaZulu-Natal and the diminishing support for the party. In December 1991, at the first ANC conference held in South Africa since 1959, Zuma was elected Deputy Secretary General and attended the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA), where he served as the chair of the ANC’s negotiations commission. By the end of 1990, Zuma had left the SACP as a member, dedicating himself fully to the ANC. In 1993 the ANC set up the Motsuenyane Commission to investigate human rights abuses that occurred in ANC detention camps from 1979 to 1991. It was chaired by Dr. S.M. Motsuenyane, and assisted by two other commissioners, the Hon. Margaret Burnham and Advocate D.M. Zamchiya. The Commission reported that the ANC was guilty of torture in its camps and that specific individuals were responsible for these abuses. The Commission was not happy with Zuma’s explanation of events that took place and condemned him for not exercising proper supervision. Another controversy with which Zuma’s name was connected was in relation to the death of Muziwakhe Ngwenya (MK name -Thami Zulu - TZ) in 1989. Whilst there was no direct reference to Zuma in the hearing, he was implicated in Zulu’s death. The ANC had asked the Truth Commission to help uncover whether former MK Commander Thami Zulu was an "enemy agent". The Commission had already been approached by Zulu's family to help find the truth behind his 14-month detention in exile under suspicion of being a spy, and his death a week after his release. In its written submission to the Commission, the ANC said Zulu, who had AIDS, had died of poisoning after his release, "and to this day it is a matter of conjecture as to who administered this poison and why this was done". They went on to add that "[t]he (ANC's) Department of Intelligence and Security has reason to believe that an agent or agents of the regime were responsible. "
Mbeki said an ANC internal Commission of Inquiry into Zulu's case had not made any conclusive finding about this. The ANC Commission's report was among the documents provided to the TRC in an appendix to the party's written submission. Mbeki denied that Zulu had been kept in an ANC detention centre under suspicion of being a spy. Mbeki also denied claims made by Zulu's family to the commission that it had not been informed of the circumstances of Zulu's detention and death in exile. The family had visited Lusaka twice, paid for by the ANC, and had been given the post-mortem report and other information. "He was never charged with being an enemy agent, nor was such a charge pending. Even if he was released on medical grounds, the fact is that once he was set free his status was the same as that of any other member of the ANC. In short, there was no irrefutable proof that Zuma was in any way responsible or linked to Zulu’s death, yet the accusation had been made. Another incident where Zuma was prominently involved related to a former police officer, Butana Almond Nofomela, who was due to hang for the murder of a farmer in 1989. On the eve of his execution he asked to speak to Lawyers for Human Rights. Nofomela gave an affidavit stating that he was part of a state assassination squad (based at Vlakplaas) and that he had been involved in the murder of leading political figures in the resistance movement. He won a reprieve. Journalist Jacques Pauw on the Vrye Weekblad broke the exclusive story, which Dirk Coetzee, a former commander of the hit squad based at Vlakplaas, confirmed. Coetzee agreed for the story to be published on condition that the ANC protect him. The ANC agreed. Zuma was placed in charge of this project. In the meantime Coetzee’s wife embarked on an affair with another Security Police plant. Coetzee was furious to learn about this whilst in Lusaka. Zuma arranged for Coetzee’s wife to be flown to Lusaka to help save the marriage, and Coetzee was always grateful to Zuma for this act of kindness. In January 1994, Zuma was nominated as the ANC candidate for the Premiership of Natal. This did not materialise since the ANC lost to the IFP in the provincial elections. Later that year, Zuma was appointed MEC of Economic Affairs and Tourism for the KZN provincial government, a position he would hold until June 1999. Following the 1994 general elections, at the ANC’s national conference, held in Bloemfontein, Zuma was elected both Chairman of the party and Chairperson of the ANC in Natal. An exception was made in the ANC constitution to allow Zuma to hold both positions. He was also one of the people who suggested Mbeki’s name for the position of the country’s Deputy President.
Five years later, at the ANC’s National Conference held at Mafikeng in December 1997, Zuma was elected as the ANC’s Deputy President. In 1999 he was appointed as the Deputy President of South Africa, a position he held until he was relieved of duties by then state president Thabo Mbeki in June 2005. Ascendancy to Power
On 18 December 2007, Zuma was elected as President of the ANC at the party’s 52nd national conference in Polokwane, Limpopo. Zuma polled 2 329 votes against his opponent, Mbeki, who received 1 505 votes. In his closing address to the conference, Zuma stressed the unity of the organisation as being paramount. He also paid tribute to Mbeki and the work that he had done over the years for the ANC and the country. This meant, in effect, that for a brief period, Mbeki retained the office of state President, but Zuma was the President of the ANC. After Zuma’s election, the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) served him with an indictment on charges of corruption, fraud and money laundering. On 12 September 2008, Judge Chris Nicholson, sitting in the Pietermaritzburg High Court, held, inter alia, that the corruption charges were unlawful on procedural grounds. Mbeki applied to the Constitutional Court to appeal the Nicholson verdict, which the NPA opposed. Zuma also stated that he opposed Mbeki’s application. On 20 September 2008, the ANC NEC resolved to recall Thabo Mbeki as head of state. He was replaced by Kgalema Mothlante who became the third president of the Republic of South Africa. He held office for approximately 7 and a half months (between 25 September 2008 and 9 May 2009). The NPA later withdrew all 16 charges (of racketeering, corruption, fraud and tax evasion) against Zuma in the Durban High Court on 6 May 2009, paving the way for Zuma to make a push for the office of state President.
After the charges were withdrawn, Zuma was elected President of the Republic of South Africa on 6 May 2009. He was inaugurated at the Union Buildings in Pretoria on 9 May 2009, stating at the time that he would prefer to serve just one term as President. In the event, however, he ran for the position twice, winning the majority of the national vote on both occasions. Zuma’s first term in the Presidency ran from 2009- 2014, during which time, Zuma’s long-time acquaintance and former financial advisor, Schabir Shaik was released from jail on medical parole, just 28 months into his 15 year jail sentence. This fueled speculation that the new President may have had a hand in negotiating his release, especially in light of comments Zuma had made prior to Shaik’s release indicating publicly that he would personally oversee Shaik’s acquittal. He also took over from Thabo Mbeki as mediator in resolving the Zimbabwe political crises under the banner of Southern African Development Community (SADC). On 14 January 2014, the ANC announced that Zuma would be their only candidate for the upcoming general elections. On 21 May that year, Zuma was again elected as President of the Republic, beginning a second term. Zuma’s next stint as Head of State continued in similar fashion, with more controversy seemingly following his every move. In February 2016 then Public Prosecutor, Thuli Madonsela, found Zuma guilty of having exceeded his powers of office by using state funds to upgrade his Nkandla homestead and ordered him to pay back R7. 8 million (see below). Socio-Economic Policy Changes under Zuma
In 2010, Zuma announced the adoption of the New Growth Path (NGP) during his State of the Nation address. The NGP replaced the ASGISA initiative which was introduced under Mbeki as the principal economic policy driver for South Africa.
Subsequently, at the Mangaung conference in 2012, the National Development Plan (NDP) was endorsed by the ANC and adopted as the long term strategic vision and blueprint for socio-economic development for the country. The NDP sets out the goals the country plans to achieve by 2030, builds consensus on the key obstacles to achieving these goals and what should be done to overcome those obstacles, as well as providing a shared long term strategic framework that allows for more detailed and effective planning and creates a basis for deciding how best to use limited resources. The realisation of the vision elucidated in the NDP has been hampered by the fact that certain underlying assumptions, especially those around economic growth, have not been realised. The ANC has stated that it will be reviewing the NDP at its 2017 policy conference. In 2015, during his State of the Nation address, Zuma unveiled his Nine-Point Plan, aimed at boosting economic growth and creating jobs in the medium term. The plan’s components included:
1. Resolving the energy challenge;
2. Revitalising agriculture and the agro-processing value chain;
3. Advancing beneficiation or adding value to the mineral wealth;
4. More effective implementation of a higher impact Industrial Policy Action Plan (IPAP); 5. Encouraging private sector investment;
6. Moderating workplace conflict;
7. Unlocking the potential of SMMEs, cooperatives, townships and rural enterprises;
8. Boosting the role of state-owned enterprises, ICT infrastructure and broadband rollout, water, sanitation and transport infrastructure;
9. Operation Phakisa, aimed at growing the ocean economy and other sectors. In September 2016, when answering questions in Parliament, Zuma appeared unclear on the plans points, responding to a question posed by an opposition MP by saying “We’ve talked about it many times in this Parliament. The honourable speaker is very much aware of the 9-point plan, we’ve talked about that. One of them is agriculture. There are many. ”
Combatting HIV/AIDs and other health gains
Life expectancy in South Africa has risen from 56. 8 years in 2009 to 62. 4 years in 2016 according to mid year estimates generated by Statistics SA. This improvement is largely attributable to changes in government policy under Zuma on combatting TB and HIV/AIDs. Policies in this regard have included improving access to and uptake of ARVs as well as a widespread HIV Counselling and Testing campaign. This ARV rollout has also had significant impact on the infant and child mortality rates, by reducing mother-to-child transmissions. Under Zuma’s administration, discussion around the introduction of National Health insurance has been ongoing, and a regulatory body has been set up to regulate compliance with norms and standards. The Office of Health Standards Compliance includes within its auspices the Health Ombud, and the first Ombudsman, Professor Malegapuru Makgoba, was appointed on 1 June 2016. His report on the death of psychiatric patients moved out of the Life Esidimeni Hospital by the Gauteng Health Department served as a scathing indictment of the apparent cost-saving measures adopted by the Department that resulted in the deaths of at least 94 people. The report concluded that the decision was “fundamentally flawed, irrational, unwise and inhumane". Nkandla homestead and other controversies
Zuma’s second term in the President’s Office has seen him embroiled in a number of polemic issues. One major controversy relates to costly upgrades to his private home in Nkandla, kwaZulu-Natal. Mail & Guardian journalists, Mandy Rossouw and Chris Roper accidentally stumbled on the Nkandla development in November 2009 while on a story in Nkandla. It was the late Rossouw who noticed the construction works and managed to get into the building area. She wrote a story which was quite a scoop. In May 2009, a security assessment of Zuma’s Nkandla residence in kwaZulu-Natal was done by state security. State security personnel recommend improvements of around R27. 9m. By June 2010, R77m from other programmes had been directed to the Nkandla security upgrades. These programmes included plans for city regeneration. There was approval for R38. 9m in 2010/11 but this is still subject to some controversy as to who actually approved this amount. By 2013, reports revealed that R203m of taxpayers’ money would be used in the revamping of the building. Public outrage ensued, with government issuing reports that impropriety was involved. On 1 October 2012 the Minister of Public Works, Thulas Nxesi issued a statement on the Nkandla Presidential Residence:
“Please be advised that Nkandla Presidential Residence, like all other presidential residences in South Africa, is declared a National Key Point in terms of the National Key Point Act 102 of 1980 (“the Act”). Therefore, any information relating to security measures of a National Key Point is protected from disclosure in terms of the Act, the provisions of the Protection of Information Act, the Minimum Information Security Standards (MISS) and other relevant security prescripts of the State Security Agency.”
In October 2012, the Public Protector Thuli Madonsela began an investigation into the publicly funded construction at Nkandla. Zuma addressed Parliament in November 2012 and claimed that the costs of Nkandla upgrades are due to the National Key Points Act. He further claimed that his family paid for the costs of the building. The state then filed a court order to prevent Public Protector Thuli Madonsela from releasing her report on Nkandla. Nonetheless, Madonsela was within the law and released her 450 page long and a 75-page executive summary report entitled Secure in Comfort, on the controversial upgrades to President Jacob Zuma's Nkandla homestead. Madonsela said Zuma must pay for the non-security upgrades at his home, which included a visitors’ centre, an amphitheatre, a swimming pool, a cattle kraal, a culvert, a chicken run and extensive paving. There was immense public outrage and opposition parties were united in their condemnation of the “Nkandla saga”. For example, the Democratic Alliance called for the impeachment of Zuma. According to Madonsela's report the final costs of Nkandla are “conservatively estimated” to amount to R246m, but could be higher. Recent newspaper articles claim that the costs maybe closer to R266m. In the second half of 2014, the Economic Freedom Fighters [EFF] began to challenge Zuma in Parliament on the Nkandla question, demanding that he respond to Parliament on questions about the payments for Nkandla. In August of 2014 the EFF began to use the slogan, ‘pay back the money’ in response to Zuma’s unwillingness to speak on the Nkandla scandal. President Zuma’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) on 12 February 2015 was marked by one of the most controversial breaches of Parliamentary law in recent South African history. Prior to the address, the EFF had been agitating the Zuma should ‘pay back the money’ spent on Nkandla and had warned that they were going to bring up the Nkandla question during Zuma’s State of the Nation address. During Zuma’s speech to Parliament a member from the EFF began to raise points of order. Members of the EFF were subsequently asked by the Speaker to leave Parliament, but they refused to do so arguing that they had the parliamentary right to raise a point of order during any parliamentary session. The Speaker then asked security officers to enter the building and the EFF members were forcefully removed from Parliament. In response to the belief that some of the security personnel were undercover policemen and the severe breach of parliamentary law in allowing for members to be forcefully removed from Parliament, the opposition DA party also walked out of Parliament in protest. This incident, coupled with an attempt to jam the signals of reporters in Parliament cast a dark shadow over President Zuma’s 2015 State of the Nation address. In Parliament debate continued for days over the occurrences at SONA with many Parliamentarians standing up to speak against Zuma and the actions of his government on the day. The leader of the DA, Mmusi Maimane, went so far as to tell Zuma, ‘you broke Parliament’. On 19 February 2015, Zuma responded to Parliament on the accusations and questions around his State of the Nation Address. In this address Zuma began by stating that 2015 was ‘the year of going the extra mile in building a united, democratic, non-racial, non-sexist and prosperous South Africa. It is also the year of rededicating ourselves to eradicate racism and all related intolerances in our country. ’ On the issue of the signal jamming Zuma said it was ‘an unfortunate incident and it should never happen again’. Uproar on Teen Pregnancy Statements
In late March 2015 President Zuma once again found himself at the centre of controversy when in an annual address to traditional leaders, Zuma argued that teen mothers should be separated from their children until they had finished school. He told the leaders, ‘they must be educated by government until they are empowered and they can take care of their kids, take them to Robben Island or any other island, sit there, study until they are qualified to come back and work to look after their kids. ’ Zuma acknowledged that his statements would cause controversy, but he felt that allowing teenage mothers to leave school in order to look after their children was proving an untenable burden on society and the state’s welfare bill. Zuma further stated, ‘in no way can you have young kids being mothers of other kids and young boys being fathers of kids, They know nothing of it. ’ Zuma’s statements caused a furore, especially amongst women’s rights activists who saw Zuma’s statements as an attack on women and the rights of young teenage mothers. In response to the furore, President Zuma’s office issued a statement which read that ‘President Zuma was emphasising the need for teenagers to focus on their studies and said children should not be raising children’. During his tenure as Deputy President of South Africa, Zuma was also involved in controversies, which resulted in major legal problems. In 2002, Zuma was implicated in a major corruption scandal, in connection with the trial of his close associate Schabir Shaik. The state alleged that Zuma used his position in government to enrich himself by benefitting from Shaik and companies involved in the procuring of arms for the state. It was further alleged that he violated ‘The Code of Conduct in Regard to Financial Interests’ to which all cabinet members are bound. In Shaik’s court case, Judge Hilary Squires said that Shaik, Zuma and Alain Thetard – the local director of an arms company involved, Thomson (later Thint) – met in Durban and agreed that Zuma would receive R500 000 a year in return for protecting the arms company from any investigation regarding its role in the arms deal acquisition, which became a serious issue for the country. Bulelani Ngcuka, then National Director of Public Prosecutions and Maduna, then Minister of Justice announced at a media conference that the National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) decision was not to prosecute Zuma for corruption; however Shaik was to be charged for fraud and corruption. Ngcuka had said that although Zuma was clearly involved, the NPA did not have a winnable case against Zuma. Shaik at his trial said that the financial relationship between Zuma and himself were loans made in friendship and not as a result of corruption. He had realised that Zuma was experiencing severe financial difficulties. Nevertheless, on 2 June 2005, Shaik was convicted at the Durban High Court on two counts of corruption and one of fraud relating to bribes he allegedly paid to influence Zuma in order to win government contracts for Shaik’s company, Nkobi Holdings.
On 6 November 2006, the Supreme Court of appeal (SCA) in Bloemfontein, Free State Province upheld Shaik’s fraud and corruption charges and he was set to begin his 15 year sentence at Durban’s Westville Prison. The five SCA judges agreed with Judge Squires findings that Shaik had made 238 payments to Zuma totalling R1. 2 million and that it was not because of their friendship. On 14 June 2005, President Mbeki relieved Zuma of his duties as Deputy President of the country, but he remained Deputy President of the ANC. This, in a sense, divided the ANC and there was groundswell of support for Zuma. At a meeting of the ANC’s leaders, Zuma offered to step down to clear his name, a move which was accepted. However, this was overturned by delegates at the ANC’s National General Council (NGC). However, he resigned his parliamentary seat, almost immediately after the sacking, although as an elected person he could have opted to stay on. On 20 June 2005, Vusi Pikoli, the National Director of Public Prosecutions who succeeded Ngcuka, announced through his spokesperson, Makhosini Nkosi that Zuma would be charged with corruption. On 29 June 2005, Zuma appeared in the Durban Magistrates Court on two counts of corruption, including bribery related to attempting to influence an investigation into the 1999 arms deal. He was released on R1000 bail. Nonetheless, Zuma’s legal woes increased. On 8 August 2005, Aubrey Thanda Mngwengwe, the acting investigating director of the Directorate of Special Operations (DSO or Scorpions) decided to extend an investigation to include fraud in connection with Zuma’s declarations to the Registrar of Parliamentary Members Interests and the South African Revenue Services (SARS) for benefits he received from Shabir Shaik.
On 20 September 2006 Judge Herbert Msimang struck the corruption case against Zuma in the Pietermaritzburg High Court in kwaZulu-Natal on the grounds that the State had charged Zuma before properly investigating and preparing its case against him. Further controversy arose in November 2005, when Zuma was accused of raping Fezekile Ntsukela Kuzwayo, on 2 October 2005 at his Forest Town, Johannesburg home. Fezekile was known as Khwezi during and after the trials (it is illegal to publish the names of a rape complainant). Fezekile’s father and Zuma were both members of MK and served prison sentence together on Robben. Fezekile laid a charge on 4 November at the police station in Hillbrow, Johannesburg. Questions arose whether then Minister of Intelligence, Ronnie Kasrils, had a hand in Fezekile laying a charge against Zuma, which Kasrils has denied, despite the fact that Fezekile did speak to Kasrils before she laid her complaint at the police station. Zuma informed the ANC NEC that allegations of rape had been made against him, but issued a denial through his lawyer Michael Hulley. He went on trial on 13 February 2006. Judge President of the Transvaal Provincial Division, Bernard Ngoepe withdrew on the grounds that Zuma’s legal team asked for his recusal as he had signed the warrant in 2005 to search Zuma’s homes. Judge Phineas Mojapelo recused himself on the grounds that he had worked with Zuma during the days of the struggle. Ngope’s Deputy, Judge Jeremiah ‘Jerry’ Shongwe was the brother of Minah Shongwe, the mother of one of Zuma’s children Edward.
The Judge President was unaware of this and when he came to learn about the relationship of Zuma and Minah Shongwe, he had the case stood down and another judge appointed in Shongwe’s place. Zuma argued that he had consensual sex with the alleged rape victim. He acknowledged making a mistake by having unprotected sex with an HIV positive woman and that he had taken a shower after sex with her to minimise the risk of contracting AIDS. The trial was heavily publicised in the media and on 8 May 2006, the presiding Judge, Willem van der Merwe, acquitted Zuma of the rape charge. He endured both negative and positive public response to the case. A few days after the trial, Zuma apologised to the nation and the complainant. After his acquittal, he was reinstated as ANC Deputy President.
Further controversy arose in 2010 when it emerged that Zuma had fathered a child with Sonono Khoza, daughter of Irvin Khoza, the Orlando Pirates football club chair, and former chair of the African 2010 Soccer World Cup local organising committee. The Controversy of 'The Spear'
In May 2012, the artist Brett Murray put on display a painting of President Zuma at the Goodman Gallery in Johannesburg entitled ‘The Spear’. The painting depicted President Zuma in the stance of Vladimir Lenin but with his genitalia exposed. On 17 May 2012, the ANC released a press statement expressing outrage over the painting as ‘obscene’ and ‘vulgar’. Zuma himself stated that the portrait, ‘has the effect of impugning my dignity in the eyes of all who see it. In particular, the portrait depicts me in a manner that suggests that I am a philanderer, a womaniser and one with no respect. It is an undignified depiction of my personality and seeks to create doubt about my personality in the eyes of my fellow citizens, family and children’. He also said that he felt ‘personally offended and violated’ by the portrait. Supporters of the President, who saw the painting as an affront on his dignity, marched to the gallery demanding the painting be taken down. On 22 May 2012, the artwork was vandalized by two men who covered the painting in red and black paint. The men were immediately arrested and one of the culprits was badly beaten by the attendant security guard. President Zuma threatened to go to court over the painting. The controversy around ‘The Spear’ sparked widespread debate in South Africa around questions of censorship, freedom of expression and racism, with many seeing the explicit portrayal of Jacob Zuma with his genitals exposed as a racist sexualisation of the African male. There was an attempt by the Film and Publication Board to place an age restriction on the painting but this was contested in court and so did not hold. President Zuma later said that he thought the painting ‘rather vulgar’, but added that ‘I don’t think in a country you can have people thinking and feeling exactly the same. I think it is [that] people have got their own ideas, they want to express them’. Awards and Recognition
Zuma has received several awards, including the Nelson Mandela Award for Outstanding Leadership in Washington DC, US (1998), and honorary doctorates from University of Fort Hare, University of Zululand, Medical University of Southern Africa, University of Limpopo (2001), University of Zambia (2009), American University of Nigeria, University of Abomey-Calavi of Benin (2011),Texas Southern University (2011), Honorary Professorship from the Peking University (PKU) of the People’s Republic of China (2012) and Honorary Doctorate of Leadership in Humanity from Limkokwing University, Malaysia (2013). On October 1998, Zuma received the Nelson Mandela Award for Outstanding Leadership for his role in ending political violence in KwaZulu-Natal, in Washington DC in the United States of America (USA). That same year he established the Jacob Zuma RDP Educational Trust Fund which is geared towards assisting children from impoverished backgrounds with education. In 2002, Zuma was involved in mediation with Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and between Rwanda. Zuma’s role in the Burundi conflict was roundly recognised and acknowledged as a resounding success. Zuma also launched the Moral Regeneration Movement to galvanise government and civil society. Resignation as President of South Africa
After several days of back and forth talks between Jacob Zuma and the ANC NEC, the party informed the public and Zuma that he would have until midnight on 14 February 2018 to step down or there would be a vote of no confidence in parliament the following day. The ANC and the opposition parties came to an agreement on the procedure of the vote and it was widely thought that Zuma would be voted out. | 007_4576519 | {
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Why should you conduct a needs assessment? - To learn more about what your group or community needs are. A good survey can supplement your own sharp-eyed observations and experiences. It can give you detailed information from a larger and more representative group. For example, you can gather information on the oral health needs of children in your community and determine oral health disparities and inequities in groups such as children from low socioeconomic households, rural children, undocumented children, disabled children and children in minority populations. - To get a more honest and objective description of needs than people might tell you publicly. - To become aware of possible needs that you never saw as particularly important or that you never even knew existed. - To document your needs as is required in many applications for funding, and as is almost always helpful in advocating or lobbying for your cause. - To make sure any actions you eventually take or join in are in line with needs that are expressed by the community. - To get more group and community support for the actions you will soon undertake. That’s because if people have stated a need for a particular course of action, they are more likely to support it. And, for the same reason…. - To get more people actually involved in the subsequent action itself. The Community Tool Box is a public service developed and managed by the KU Work Group for Community Health and Development and partners nationally and internationally. This tool provides excellent guidance for conducting assessments of community needs and resources. | 006_2671313 | {
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In this comprehensive exam students are tested on their knowledge of the play, its characters, and the background myths. The test also covers the Oedipus Complex and other related psychological terms by Sigmund Freud. There are also questions on Greek drama and Aristotle's Poetics. The format includes: matching of terms and definitions, multiple choice, short answer, quote identification, and bonus questions. There are 60 questions overall. | 007_6125025 | {
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If light exhibits both particle and wave behavior,
what about electrons - do they show a dual nature as well? If an electron acts like a wave, what is the wave, i. e.,
what is waving? What is meant by the "wavefunction" for a particle? What can be learned from the wavefunction? What is the significance of the wavelength of the wave
associated with an electron? What are the implications of the uncertainty principle
for the observation of electron position and momentum? Atomic electrons have specific allowed energy
If atoms occupy only certain allowed levels, how
do they get from one allowed level to another? Why do atoms emit or absorb only certain specific
colors of light? How can you tell that there is calcium in the atmosphere
of the star Betelgeuse, which is about 310 light years
away from the earth? Can an electron exist inside a nucleus? The
Schrodinger equation for a particle in a box
gives some insight. How does the Schrodinger equation give insight
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A Note from the Author.. . Mrs. Vidal-Cruz
The full "La Nueva Cartilla" series was created with my 19 years of teaching experience at a bilingual school. I was in a desperate need to help my non-Spanish speaking students and my Spanish speakers improve their fluency in Spanish and in some cases learning to read for the first time. This reading program is going back to the basics using phonetics and poetry in a fun, educational way. I created this POWERPOINT version as a continuation to build on the phonetics from lessons 1-5. Use the reading series as a supplement to your teaching materials. With the new technology now in the classrooms such as Smart Boards and Promethean Boards, "La Nueva Cartilla " is nicely displayed on the boards for the whole class to see. Then, just click on the audio and the whole class can hear the lesson! This resource includes. . . -Detailed easy to follow instructions
-Audio with each Lesson
-All lessons are Core Aligned
-Snowy printable to make pointers
-Leccion de Repaso- Alphabet and Vowel Review with Audio
-Leccion 6- na,ne,ni,no,nu with Audio
-Leccion 7-fa,fe,fi,fo,fu with Audio
-Leccion 8-da,de,di,do,du with Audio
-Leccion 9-ba,be,bi,bo,bu with Audio
-Leccion 10- va,ve,vi,vo,vu,vu, with Audio
-Poems to go along with each lesson with Audio
-Oral Evaluations and Rubrics with Each Lesson ( you can print)
-Flashcards with audio/ vowel song
-A leer- Reading Sentences
-A leer- Oral Evaluation and Rubric
Thanks for your interest in my product! 10% of all sales are donated to www. livelikebella. org for pediatric cancer research. Mrs. Vidal-Cruz :)
**Visit my store for level 1 lessons 1-5 or for the QR-code homework version of this product. Key Words: Promethean lessons, Beginner Spanish, learning how to read in Spanish, Smart board lesson, La Nueva Cartilla, La Cartilla, Flashcards in Spanish, A leer en Espanol, Back to school. | 009_6431399 | {
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Thanks to a decade of programs geared toward giving people access to the necessary technology, by 2013 some 85% of Americans were surfing the World Wide Web. But how effectively are they using it? A new survey suggests that the digital divide has been replaced by a gap in digital readiness. It found that nearly 30% of Americans either aren’t digitally literate or don’t trust the Internet. That subgroup tended to be less educated, poorer, and older than the average American.
In contrast, says Eszter Hargittai, a sociologist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, who was not involved in the study, those with essential Web skills “tend to be the more privileged. And so the overall story … is that it’s the people who are already privileged who are reaping the benefits here. ”
The study was conducted by John Horrigan, an independent researcher, and released 17 June at an event sponsored by the Washington, D.C.–based Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. Funded by the Joyce Foundation, the study of 1600 adults measured their grasp of terms like “cookie” and “Wi-Fi.” It asked them to rate how confident they were about using a desktop or laptop or a smart phone to find information, as well as how comfortable they felt about using a computer. Of those who scored low in these areas, about half were not Internet users. Horrigan believes that policymakers have ignored the problem of digital readiness while concentrating on providing people with access to the Internet and the necessary hardware. Relatively little attention has been paid to teaching people the necessary skills to take advantage of online classes and job searches, he maintains. The researchers recommend that the technology industry needs to understand that not all users possess the same digital skill levels and that they need to make accommodations for those with less knowledge. Hargittai cites the RSS feed, which alerts its user to updates from his favorite blogs or websites, as an example of a tool that failed to address digital readiness. “There were a few years when every website had this bright orange button, ‘RSS! ’ ” Hargittai says. “Web developers knew what it was, but consistently study after study showed that the average user has absolutely no clue what RSS is. ”
Libraries can act as hubs for online learning within a community, Horrigan says. Having young, Internet-savvy people who are willing to share their skills is another option for reducing the size of the digitally unready population. The lack of digital skills is a perennial problem, say researchers who have studied digital inequality over the years. In addition to those with few skills, someone who can function adequately today may fall behind as the technology continues to evolve. Grant Blank, a sociologist with the Oxford Internet Institute in the United Kingdom, believes that the community benefits just as much from good training programs as do the individuals themselves. “They’re more productive as citizens,” Blank says. “They’re able to participate better in social and political issues if they have effective online skills. ” | 004_2437471 | {
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Today, the program, which is jointly run by Fordham, the American Academy for Jewish Research, and the New York Public Library, continues to support these scholars, many of whom had to flee their homeland. When the program was conceived, Fordham offered a year-long fellowship to a student pursuing master’s level studies in the area of Jewish and Slavic studies. The others, a mix of Ph.D. students and scholars working in the same area, were provided stipends, access to electronic resources at Fordham and the library, and invitations to five remote workshops. Magda Teter, Fordham’s Shvider Chair in Judaic Studies and an administrator of the program, said the program will help scholars document this period in history. She said a source of inspiration for the project was the work of Samuel Kassow, who wrote about the efforts to document the experience of living in the Warsaw ghetto during the Holocaust in his 2007 book Who Will Write our History? (Indiana University Press, 2007). “I think it is important for the moment to gather, to collect, to preserve, to remember,” she said. “It is our duty to help these scholars in any way we can. Even small stipends mean a lot to them when their institutions have been bombed or are inaccessible. ”
Working Even When the Lights Go Out
When Tetyana Batanova delivered the lecture “Yiddish Sources and Resources: My Personal Path to Jewish and Yiddish Studies” virtually from her apartment in Kyiv in the lecture series “Scholars at War” on April 8, it was a welcome splinter of normalcy. Russian armed forces, which had occupied her Kyiv suburb of Bucha in the opening month of the war, had only retreated from the area a week earlier. Batanova, the acting head of the Judaica Department at the V. Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine, had been conducting research for her dissertation about the five Jewish political parties that participated in Ukraine’s national government in 1917-1918. At the time, Yiddish was one of four officially recognized languages in the country. Today only Ukrainian is officially recognized by the government. With her country facing an existential crisis, Batanova said she had serious doubts about the importance of her research. The fellowship has helped restore her faith. “Seven months later, I’m more confident in what we do, and that we should continue,” she said. “But in April, it was not that obvious for me at all. When I was invited to give my lecture, it was good that it was in April, because in March I was not able to speak at all. ”
Historical research is only as good as the original sources one can acquire, and having worked at the New York Public Library in 2006, Batanova knew what kinds of archival documents and journal articles she’d need. As a result of the fellowship program workshops, she was able to access new books from Fordham University Library online resources providing the context for her research, such as Stephen Velychenko’s book Life and Death in Revolutionary Ukraine : Living Conditions, Violence, and Demographic Catastrophe, 1917-1923 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2021). Her research focuses a great deal on Yiddish, a language intrinsically tied to the Holocaust and its victims. It was also the primary language of the 30,000 to 70,000 killed in anti-Jewish pogroms that swept Ukraine in 1919. Although it is still spoken in pockets around the world, its importance is not widely known, making it an ideal path for the average citizen to learn about Ukrainian history, Batanova said. “The story of Yiddish is quite similar to the story of Ukraine in the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. ”
Fleeing War for NYC
Andrii Pykalo was just beginning his graduate studies when the war began. He attended V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, in Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city just 25 miles from the Russian border. Feb. 24, the day that Russia attacked, will forever be cemented in his mind. “I will never forget the sky over my neighborhood. It was yellow, because of all the Russian rockets,” he said. “It was very, very noisy, and I remember the panic. It was a horrible surprise for all. ”
Continued study in Kharkiv was never an option; for starters, the university library was hit by a Russian missile. Pykalo said he tried to help save some of the books from the collapsed structure. He had to jump through numerous bureaucratic hoops to leave, but he was granted permission in May, and he arrived in New York City to attend Fordham on Aug. 23. He has been living in an off-campus apartment in Harlem and attending classes, such as one on antisemitism with Teter and another one about advanced research methods by history professor Grace Chen, Ph.D.
For his research project, “Soviet Jews and the History and Memory of the Holocaust in Ukraine,” he’s been able to use his time in New York to locate documents that show how Americans viewed Jews in the Soviet Union at that time. Apps such as Telegram and WhatsApp have made it possible for Pykalo to stay in touch with his friends and family, and he’s also connected with the Ukrainian diaspora in the East Village. But the decision to leave Ukraine was a fraught one. “I understood that I should have been in Ukraine defending my country. I should be with my family, I should be with my friends,” he said. “I was really afraid for my family, but they all told me that I must go because it’s my profession. This is my task. ”
Seeking Safety in Michigan
Yurii Kaparulin, Ph.D., an associate professor of history and legal scholar at Kherson State University in southern Ukraine, found himself on the wrong side of the border when war broke out. While his wife and son were home in the city of Kherson, he was in Bucharest, Romania. His family spent a month in Kherson while it was occupied by Russian forces before they were able to evacuate and reunite. In August, they moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where Kaparulin received a separate, “scholars at risk” fellowship from the University of Michigan’s Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia.
For Kaparulin, the Fordham fellowship, which he was offered after moving to Ann Arbor, has been invaluable for the completion of his book, “Between Soviet Modernization and the Holocaust: Jewish Agrarian Settlements in the Southern Ukraine (1924-1948),” which he began seven years ago. The war forced him to leave behind some of his own research, but more importantly, he lost access to his own university’s archives. “Before Russian troops left Kherson, they looted the biggest part of the Kherson State archive. So I needed to figure out where I would look for sources and get some of the newest articles and books,” he said. Through the Fordham fellowship, he’s been able to access resources such as the article Farming the red land: Jewish agricultural colonization and local Soviet power, 1924-1941 Jonathan L. Dekel-Chen, (Yale University Press, 2015), and “Men inspecting foals at an artel supported by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, Kherson, Ukraine” a black and white photo from 1924. His project addresses mass violence and wartime collaborators from the past–both of which have ties to the present. One of the reasons why Russian President Vladimir Putin has smeared Ukrainians as Nazis, he said, is because there were, in fact, Ukraine citizens who collaborated with the Nazi regime during World War II. However, Russian propaganda effectively ignores the contribution of millions of Ukrainians to the victory over Nazism, he said. That is, when it comes to examples of collaborationism, the Ukrainian origin of the accused is emphasized, he said, and when it comes to heroism and victory, “Soviet heroes” are mentioned without ethnic context. The phenomenon of collaborationism has also been observed during Russia’s current war against Ukraine. For example, during the occupation of Kherson from March to November 2022, some residents cooperated with the Russian occupiers. “Their motives are currently being established by law enforcement agencies. However, in general, we see that the majority of the city’s residents have maintained the Ukrainian position despite various risks, including to their lives,” he said. Providing Tools for Research
To help the scholars with their research, Shawn Hill, an instructional technologist in Fordham’s department of informational technology, delivered a workshop in November that walked participants through the reference tool Zotero. The bibliographic and citation tool makes it easier for scholars to organize papers, monographs, books, and articles. He also demonstrated Art Steps, a tool used by interior designers, art historians, and gallery managers to create virtual exhibits. “You may have a painting in Kyiv, a sculpture in Kharkiv, and something in Odesa. You can’t bring them together in the real world for obvious reasons, but you can create an Art Steps exhibition space and give the URL to a guest or a friend or the public as a whole. ”
My Soul Is Still There
Lyudmila Sholokhova, Ph.D., Curator of the Dorot Jewish Collection at the New York Public Library, grew up in Kyiv, and like Batanova, she worked at the V. Vernadsky National Library before moving to the United States.
In 1997, she was the recipient of a fellowship and spent time at the United States Library of Congress. Now she’s the point person for the fellows in the program working with New York Public Library.
The fact that she’s able to now help other scholars from Ukraine moves her deeply. “My soul is still there. I want to help my people in any way possible. I want to support them,” she said. “I know the value of access to all these enormous resources that these libraries can provide. When I was in Ukraine, I had access to the primary sources, but I didn’t have access to scholarship on the documents,” she said. “When you work on this subject, you really need the context. You really need access to a much larger corpus of resources. ” | 002_2599414 | {
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Crepe fabric is a kind of woven fabric with a unique appearance and texture. It has been widely used in the textile industry for years, but it was not until recently that its popularity increased significantly. The crepe fabric is made from two layers of yarns which are twisted together to form a single layer. This process creates a very soft feel and gives the fabric a distinctive look. In the article, we are going to discuss everything there is to know about crepe fabric, from the history of the fabric to the pros and cons of using it! What Is Crepe Fabric? Crepe fabric is a kind of woven fabric that has the appearance of crepe paper, which has a soft and light texture. It can be used in making clothing, furniture, bedding, etc. The main difference between crepe fabric and other woven fabrics is that it is made by weaving two layers of yarn together, instead of one layer as usual. This makes crepe fabric more durable than normal woven fabrics. Crepe Fabrics are also known as Crêpes or Crepe Paper Fabrics.
They are usually made from cotton, linen, polyester, or wool. The material is a type of woven fabric that has been made with a special process to create a soft, thin, and lightweight material. The name comes from the French word “crepe” which means “to fold” or “to crumple up”. It was originally used for making paper but it can also be used for many other things like clothing and even wallpaper. Crepe fabrics are very popular because they have many advantages over regular cotton fabrics. They are very lightweight and comfortable to wear, especially when compared to other types of fabrics such as denim jeans. Another advantage is that you don’t need any ironing to get them ready to use. You just put them in your washing machine and then hang them out to dry. This makes them perfect for people who hate ironing their clothes. Crepe fabric is a type of fabric that has creases in the middle and smooth edges on both sides. It’s usually used for making dresses, skirts, shirts, blouses, etc. The crease pattern is created by folding the material over itself several times. This process creates folds or creases in the material which makes it look like crinkled paper. The creases are not permanent; they can be removed with steam iron or water. This unique fabric gives an elegant appearance to your clothes. How Is Crepe Fabric Made? The first step in creating crepe fabric is to prepare the warp yarns (the lengthwise threads) and weft yarns (crosswise threads). Warp yarns are the long threads that run through the loom. Weft yarns are shorter threads that weave across the warp yarns. To make a crepe fabric, you will need at least three different colors of yarns: 1) the warp yarns, 2) the weft yarns and 3) the filling yarns. The warp yarns are placed parallel to each other and form a grid-like structure. The weft yarns are woven into the warp yarns and create a cross-weave pattern. Finally, the filling yarns are interwoven between the warp and weft yarns. Each color of yarn forms a distinct pattern in the finished product. There are four basic steps involved in the production of crepe fabric: 1) preparing the warp yarns, weft yarns, and filling yarns, 2) weaving the warp and weft, 3) finishing the fabric, and 4) dyeing the fabric. Most crepe fabric is produced using a shuttle loom. A shuttle loom consists of a large frame where the warp yarns are attached to the frame. The weft yarn is inserted into the warp yarns by a weaver called a heddle. Then, another weaver called a reed inserts the filling yarns into the weft yarns. The weavers move back and forth along the frame while inserting the filling yarns. When all the filling yarns have been inserted, the weaver pulls the weft yarns down and starts again. As the weaver moves forward, the filling yarns continue to be inserted. This continues until all the filling yarn has been inserted. After all the filling yarn is inserted, the weaver stops pulling the weft yarns so that the filling yarns remain in place. The next step involves weaving the warp and wefts. Once the warp and weft have been completed, the filling yarns must be cut off. Cutting the filling yarns removes the creases in the fabric. The final step is dyeing the fabric. Dyeing makes the fabric look its best. Different dyes give the fabric different colors. Some dyes may fade after repeated washings. This is why some crepe fabrics are better suited for casual clothing rather than formal ones. History And Origins Of Crepe Fabric
Crepe fabric is an ancient invention that dates back to the Middle Ages. It was introduced during this period by the Chinese.
During this era, the Chinese were masters of textile manufacturing. They developed techniques that allowed them to produce high-quality textiles that could withstand harsh weather conditions. One of these techniques was the weaving of silk and cotton cloth. Silk was imported from China and cotton came from India.
These materials were combined to create beautiful garments. However, silk and cotton do not hold up well when it rains or snows. To solve this problem, the Chinese invented the technique known as “creping”. Creping refers to the process of removing excess material from the surface of the fabric. The result is a soft, lightweight fabric that can be worn even under inclement weather. The Chinese used this technique on their clothing and also on their bedding. Eventually, the technique spread throughout Asia. By the 15th century, the Japanese had adopted the technique and began producing crepe fabric with great success. At this point in history, crepe fabric became popular among Europeans. The Italians and French were particularly fond of crepe fabric because they found it to be very comfortable. Over the years, European manufacturers improved upon the original design. Today, there are many types of crepe fabric available. Some are made of 100% cotton, others use blends of cotton and polyester. Still, others contain synthetics such as nylon. The most common type of crepe fabric is the satin crepe. Satin crepe is one of the most versatile types of crepe fabric. It comes in a variety of sizes and weights. It can be made in any color combination. Because of its versatility, satin crepe is often used for special occasions such as weddings and proms. Another common type of crepe is the sheer crepe. Sheer crepe is similar to a satin crepe, but it does not have the same amount of body. Instead, it is more like a lightweight taffeta. It is usually less expensive than a satin crepe. The last type of crepe fabric that I want to discuss is the napped crepe. Napped crepe is a unique type of crepe fabric. Unlike the other types of crepe fabric, it contains no fillers. Instead, it is constructed entirely of natural fibers. It is soft and smooth. It is perfect for making lingerie and nightgowns. Today, crepe fabric is widely used in the apparel industry. It is used to make everything from shirts to pants to dresses. Types Of Crepe Fabric
Crepe fabric is produced using two different methods. In the first method, the fabric is woven on a loom. This is called warp knitting. Warp knitting involves creating a continuous length of fabric that has rows of horizontal yarns. Each row represents a single thread. A second method uses a flat piece of fabric that is then rolled into a tube. This is called weft knitting. Weft knitting is done by inserting individual threads through holes in the fabric. Once all the threads have been inserted, the fabric is knitted together. Both warp knitting and weft knitting are used to create crepe fabric. There are many kinds of crepe fabrics. The most common ones include satin crepe, sheer crepe, and napped crepe. All three of these types of crepe fabric are commonly used for wedding gowns. Satin crepe and sheer crepe are both made of 100% cotton. Napped crepe, however, is made of 100% wool. As you may expect, each type of crepe fabric has its own set of advantages and disadvantages. For example, satin crepe has a nice drape while sheer crepe tends to cling to your skin. The napped crepe feels softer than either of the other two types. If you are looking for durable fabric, you should consider buying a satin crepe. It will stand up to everyday wear and tear. On the other hand, if you prefer something that is lighter weight, buy a sheer crepe. You might find yourself wearing it every day. When choosing between a satin crepe and sheer crepe, you need to decide what kind of look you want to achieve. If you want a dress that looks elegant, decide a satin crepe. If you want a casual dress, go with sheer crepe. Properties Of Crepe Fabric
Crepe fabric is extremely breathable. It allows air to pass through easily. It’s ideal for summer wear because of these qualities, and the fact that it is a very lightweight fabric. However, it is also quite strong. It holds up well against daily wear and tears. It is also easy to care for. Crepe fabric requires little maintenance. It can be washed at low temperatures. It dries quickly. It is also wrinkle-resistant. Crepe fabric is a wonderful choice for bridal gowns. It is incredibly comfortable. It is also easy on the eyes. It is soft and pretty. Crepe fabric is also a good choice for children’s clothes. It is soft and gentle on a baby’s sensitive skin. It is also fairly inexpensive. Crepe fabric is available in a wide range of colors. It is also available in a variety of patterns. Crepe fabric is perfect for those who enjoy dressing casually. It is also suitable for formal events. Crepe fabric comes in a wide array of styles – It is available as a solid color or patterned, like with most fabrics out there. Some examples of popular patterns include stripes, checks, polka dots, plaids, and floral prints. Crepe fabric is often used to make dresses, skirts, blouses, jackets, and more. Crepe fabric is versatile enough to work in almost any situation or event. Comfort – Crepe fabric is a great option for anyone who wants comfort when they’re working outside. Crepe fabric is breathable and lightweight. It doesn’t weigh down your body, making it easier to move around. It is also easy for people with back problems to wear. Crepe fabric is highly breathable, which means that it lets moisture escape from your body. This makes it an excellent choice for people who spend time outdoors. It is also great for people who need to stay cool during hot weather. Crepe fabric is not only comfortable, but it is also a great way to keep your body cool. It helps prevent overheating. It is also a great material for people who live in areas where the temperature fluctuates. Texture – The texture of crepe fabric varies depending on what it is made from, and how it is made. Usually, the fabric feels smooth and silky. But sometimes, it feels rough or coarse. Crepe fabric is typically thin and delicate. It can feel scratchy or stiff. This depends on whether it is made from 100% silk or 100% polyester. Silk crepe is smoother and softer than polyester crepe. Polyester crepe is rougher and coarser. It is also heavier than silk crepe. Silk crepe is much thinner than polyester crepe, so it is less likely to snag. Polyester crepe tends to be thicker, so it is harder to see through. It is also more durable. Softness – Crepe fabric is typically made from either silk or polyester. Both are known for their luxurious feel. Silk crepe has a smoother, silkier feel than polyester crepe does. It is also lighter weight. Polyester crepe has a slightly rougher feel. It is also a heavier weight. Washability – How easy is it to wash crepe fabric? Crepe fabric is generally machine washable. You should always check the washing instructions before you begin. If you do not follow the directions correctly, you may ruin your garment. When washing crepe fabric, use cold water and mild detergent. Always test a small area first to ensure that the fabric will come out cleanly. Do not over-wash crepe fabric. Over-washing can cause shrinkage and damage the fibers. Dry crepe fabric using low heat settings. Use a dryer sheet if needed. Don’t tumble dry crepe fabric. Tumbling causes excessive friction and can damage the fabric. Breathability – Does crepe fabric allow air to flow through it? Yes! Crepe fabric is extremely air-permeable. It allows air and moisture to pass through easily. This makes it a great choice for warm climates. It is also a good choice when you want to stay cool while wearing clothing. It is also a fantastic choice for people who spend a lot of time outdoors. Crepe fabric is an excellent choice for outdoor activities such as hiking, camping, gardening, and fishing. It is also a perfect choice for people who work at home. Because it breathes well, it keeps you cooler. Durability – How long can I expect my crepe fabric to last? Crepe fabric is very durable, even though it may seem incredibly delicate. It can withstand heavy use without breaking down. However, it is recommended that you avoid sharp objects. Crepe fabric is often used for baby clothes because of its durability. Cost – What is the cost of crepe fabric? Crepes are one of the most affordable fabrics available. They are inexpensive compared to other types of fabrics. But don’t let this fool you into thinking that they aren’t high quality. Uses of Crepe Fabric:
Crepe fabric is versatile and can be used in many ways. Here are just some of the things you can make with crepe fabric:
Formal Wear – Formal wear includes dresses, suits, coats, and blazers. These garments are usually made from crepe fabric. Crepe fabric works best for formal wear because it is lightweight and breathable. It doesn’t get too hot under all those layers. It is also comfortable to wear. Outdoor Wear – Outdoor wear includes jackets, shirts, pants, skirts, shorts, and swimwear. Crepe fabric is ideal for these items because it is lightweight and breathable. It dries quickly, so it won’t weigh you down. It’s also comfortable to wear. Baby Clothes – Crepe fabric is a wonderful material for making baby clothes. It is soft, breathable, and durable. It is also easy to sew. The only downside is that it tends to wrinkle more than other fabrics. Tote Bags – Crepe fabric is great for making bags. It is easy to sew and comes in a variety of colors and patterns. It is also lightweight and portable. Tips For Sewing With Crepe Fabric
Sewing with crepe fabric isn’t difficult. Just keep the following tips in mind:
Use a sewing machine with a narrow zigzag stitch. A wide zigzag stitch can cause the fabric to tear. Keep the needle thread tight. Make sure that there is enough tension on the needle thread. Too much tension can cause the fabric to rip. Keep the fabric flat. If you fold the fabric, it will take longer to sew. Also, crepe fabric tends to curl up if you try to sew it over something like a pillow or chair cushion. So, lay the fabric out on a flat surface before starting your project. Crepe Fabric and Environmental Impact
The environmental impact of crepe fabric depends on where it was produced. There are three main categories of production:
Fair Trade Production – Fairtrade production is important because it helps support small businesses. Small businesses create jobs and help protect the environment. It also makes sure that workers have fair wages and working conditions. Organic Production – Organic production is essential because it supports local farmers and helps prevent pollution. Local Production – This type of production is essential because it keeps money within the community. Money stays in the community when people buy locally grown products. It also prevents companies from shipping their goods across the country. There are two main reasons why we should care about the environmental impact of our clothing. First, climate change is affecting us every day. Second, we want to live in a sustainable world. We don’t want to destroy this planet for future generations. Advantages Of Crepe Fabric
Here are some advantages of using crepe fabric:
It’s Lightweight – Crepe fabric is very lightweight. You won’t feel weighed down wearing it. It is also easy for you to move around while wearing it. It’s Breathable – Crepe fabric breathes well. It allows air to pass through it easily. This means that you won’t be sweating as much as you would if you were wearing cotton. It’s Comfortable – Crepe fabric is extremely comfortable to wear. It feels nice against your skin. It doesn’t irritate your skin either. It’s Easy To Sew – Crepe fabric is easier to sew than many other types of fabric. Plus, it stretches nicely. Disadvantages Of Crepe Fabric
While crepe fabric has lots of benefits, it does have its disadvantages too. Here are some things to consider:
It Wrinkles Easily – Crepe fabric wrinkles easily. This means that it takes longer to iron it. But, once you get it ironed, it looks good. It Doesn’t Stretch As Much As Cotton – Crepe fabric doesn’t stretch as much as cotton. This means that it may not fit perfectly after washing. If you’re looking for a great way to make your clothes, then crepe fabric might be just what you need. It’s lightweight, breathable, and comfortable. It’s also environmentally friendly. And, it’s easy to sew! Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What Do I Use To Wash My Crepe Fabric? A: Use cold water and no detergent. Q: How Often Can I Wash My Crepe Fabric Without Ruining It? A: You can wash your crepe fabric as frequently as needed. Just remember to dry it properly afterward. Q: Can I Dye My Crepe Fabric? If So, How? A: Yes, you can dye your crepe fabric. Just follow the instructions on the package. - What Is Woven Fabric? All You Need To Know About Woven Fabrics - April 27, 2022
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- How To Tie Dye A Shirt With Food Coloring - April 27, 2022 | 001_3339110 | {
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Colin McDonald & Jane Scott. The Sage Handbook of Advertising. Sage Publications. 2007. “Studying a subject without an appreciation of its antecedents is like seeing a picture in two dimensions—there is no depth. The study of history gives us this depth as well as an understanding of why things are as they are. ” ~ Brink and Kelley (1963)
From as early as the first half of the 19th century, there has been public ambivalence toward advertising (Nevett, 1982). In 1958, Martin Mayer wrote that the advertising man’s work “subjects him every day to the worst kind of commercial, social and psychological insecurity. ” And more recently, William Phillips (1992) wrote: “In less than a hundred years, (British) advertising has run the gamut from the exuberant charlatanism of a cottage industry to the jitters of a world-beating big business which outgrew its financial strength. ” And yet it is also accepted that it is a key part of keeping us informed, stimulating demand, and thus the economy, and paying for services we enjoy such as newspapers and television. This chapter seeks to document how today’s advertising industry has evolved. We focus on how the advertising agent came to exist, what the early agencies were like and how they developed overtime. We introduce some of the people and agencies that have made a lasting impression on the industry. Finally, this chapter considers how the messages used to communicate to consumers have evolved. Therefore, the main objectives for this chapter are to:
- Show how advertising activity has evolved from the early ages to the present day. - Describe the development of advertising media. - Provide an overview of ad expenditure. - Discuss the origins and development of advertising agencies. - Describe the changing content and strategies used in advertising message design. - Discuss advertising today in the context of its history. In short, this chapter seeks to show how advertising got to where it is. How Advertising Has Evolved
We have divided the development of advertising into four periods. Advertising began with the earliest forms of commerce, but with the industrial revolution and mass production came the beginnings of mass marketing. The mid 19th century to the beginning of World War II saw the formalization of client, agency and media structures. Finally, modern times have witnessed fragmentation of agencies and media and greater sophistication by marketers and consumers in the uses of advertising. Those interested in the history of advertising should visit the website of the History of Advertising Trust: http://www.hatads.org.uk. This remarkable British organization in Norfolk houses acres of archives of advertising through the ages and acts as a repository for clients and agencies to lodge their advertising when they can no longer accommodate it. They also have a substantial library of old and rare books on advertising. Advertising began as soon as commerce began. Evidence of outdoor advertising (such as tradesmen’s signs and tavern signs) has been found from the early civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome, as have literary references to services ranging from booksellers to brothels (Nevett, 1982). Similarly, ads for slaves and household goods also occur in the written records of early civilization (Calkins, 1905). Town-criers read public notices aloud and were employed by merchants to shout the praises of their wares. One may consider these people as forerunners to voice-overs in radio or television commercials. Even political advertising is found in ancient times. An example is the Res Gestae, in which a carefully edited version of Augustus’ deeds was put up in the Roman Forum to help confirm his reputation. Advertising from its earliest days served to inform, persuade (sell) and remind consumers just as it does today. But it was less pervasive than today because of the limited media and the limited number of goods available for trading (Norris, 1981). Up to the industrial revolution, advertising and production remained primarily a local phenomenon. Items such as land, slaves, and transport (i. e., both goods and services) were advertised, with these messages being usually more akin to classified or outdoor ads than the elaborate electronic advertising of today. Furthermore, it was essentially local. The Industrial Revolution
Between 1760 and 1830, the Industrial Revolution transformed every aspect of the economy (and indeed, life in general) (Norris, 1981). The huge social and economic changes together with mass transportation resulting from the Industrial Revolution provided the need and means for mass, non-local marketing, which in turn led to mass advertising. People left subsistence farming and moved to the towns and the factories. As town populations rose, a middle class developed to provide government, professional, and business services in the new, more complex environment. For the producer, it meant that mass production, concentrated in a single factory, could produce enough to satisfy a new mass-market spread all over the country, spurred by the increasing urbanization. New transport methods, canals and railroads, could carry this produce to the distributors (directly or through wholesalers) in every town. Developments in mass printing made it possible to distribute the advertising message more widely, through handbills, posters, and later, newspapers. These national media grew with transportation systems, stimulating growth in mass marketing and communications. Advertising generated demanding consumers, who began to ask for the brands they knew. Retailers then stocked the advertised brands. Advertisers created economies of scale with pre-packaging giving consumers more confidence in quality compared to products sold loose and packaged by retailers. The Mid-19th Century Onwards
The American Civil War in the 1860s and the World Wars that followed in the first half of the 20th century created a need for vast amounts of military equipment and uniforms on short notice. This further stimulated the mass production of industrial goods but, perhaps more importantly, it took consumers away from their roots and, to some extent, homogenized societies. Consumers could now please themselves and not just conform to the local provision. This period saw a shift from commerce being dominated by the difficulties of production (supply)to the satisfaction, and perhaps creation of, demand. Tellis (1998) suggests that military employment meant that women did the shopping, leading to a change in what goods were demanded. Without the men at home to assist with the chores and production of homemade goods, women became more willing to buy ready-made products, such as food and clothes, rather than make them themselves. Innovations in production, combined with the increased responsibilities and independence now felt by women, created demand for new products that made life easier such as sewing machines, cameras, automobiles, and kitchen appliances. The improving transport infrastructure allowed for transportation of these mass-produced goods to more people. These conditions—low production costs from economies of scale, overcapacity from mass production, markets ready to absorb their offerings, and a still-fragmented distribution system were right for manufacturers to grow into industry leaders. In other words, markets shifted from local to national, and consumers were beginning to enjoy much more choice. Advertising sought to increase demand to absorb the rapidly increasing output from mechanised production (Nevett, 1977). The manufacturers who benefited most were those for whom variable production costs were low in relation to the fixed costs, or the profit margin per unit was high, or the product was frequently bought by the same customers, or ideally all three. In such conditions, high proportions of sales revenue could be put into advertising. Print media were now more established and perhaps more respectable, and advertising was increasingly cost effective relative to personal selling. Advertising helped increase the demand, the stores passed it back, and the salesmen became part of the distribution channel, selling to wholesalers and retailers rather than end users. Branding became increasingly important at this time, due to the range of products now competing for consumers. Consumers needed to know which particular item to ask for (based on which one seemed most appealing to them). So each item needed to be branded with a unique name, and its unique advantages communicated to the consumer (although how this was done was fiercely debated, as shall be discussed later in this chapter). Both packaging and advertising were key ways that branding was communicated (Tellis, 1998). Advertising regulation was triggered by the practices of the patent medicine industry, and the numerous outlandish and untested claims they made (Tellis, 1998). Not only were regulations enforced by the government (for example, the US Pure Food and Drug Act 1906), but advertisers themselves imposed self-regulation, recognizing that the outrageous claims of some medicine makers were giving all advertisers a bad name (Phillips, 1992). Post World War II
Although World Wars may seem to have little to do with advertising, all forms of commerce ossified while the populace was engaged in hostilities and a surge of development was released when they ceased. The post-WWII economic boom saw consumers making up for postponed purchases, especially in the US and Europe as economies were rebuilt. From an industry perspective, marketing began to be seen as a company function separate from the sales department, and industry was boosted by the arrival of television. Television made access to the mass market much easier, and was particularly beneficial for developing brand names and introducing new products. Furthermore, as shall be discussed later in this chapter, it changed the way advertising messages were structured and delivered. Technological development accelerated, and new kinds of media created new ways to reach and engage markets. The internet in particular is still evolving as a medium. The TiVo-ing of television has made it possible for viewers to skip commercials entirely, making advertisers justifiably nervous that the interruptive model is broken beyond repair (Samuel, 2004). Fragmentation has made it difficult for a single medium to capture large audiences within a specified target. Even if audiences are reached, media sophistication has increased viewers’ beliefs in their own ability to “see through” the tactics of advertisers (Bloxham, 1998). The Evolution of Advertising Media
“It has helped create a vast new audience of magnitude which was never dreamed of … This audience, invisible but attentive, differs not only in size, but in kind from any audience the world has ever known. It is a linking up of millions of homes. ”
To what new medium does this quote refer? The Internet? Digital television? It was actually radio, with this comment made by the chairman of General Electric in 1929 (cited in Sicart, 2000). While today, immense interest is centred on the internet, comparable levels of attention were devoted to the introduction of television, radio, telephone, magazines, and newspapers (Leckenby, 2004). History shows that, while each new medium may be proclaimed as a radical transformation in communications leading to the death of existing media, in reality the old adapt to and largely survive in partnership. Since wax tablets, we cannot think of any medium that has disappeared; they merely have a diminishing share of the growing cake. Sometimes the old medium melds into the new, making the new medium something other than it might have been, radio and the web for example (Leckenby, 2004). When a medium is in an early stage of development, it is still dependent on formats derived from earlier technologies instead of exploiting its own extensive power (Murray, 1997). So, although often they will assume less importance, old media continue to prosper, or at least exist, because they possess unique attributes that satisfy different audience needs (Coffee and Stipp, 1997; Leckenby, 2004). For example, radio did not replace newspapers, TV did not replace the movies or radio, and satellites and cable did not replace broadcast television (Coffee and Stipp, 1997). Instead, new media have facilitated interpersonal communication to a greater extent than their forerunners (Cathcart and Gumpert, 1983). The new media disrupted existing patterns and trends, appealing to new social groups (i. e., audiences) and encouraging new uses based on novel technological properties (Leckenby, 2004). The balance of this section considers the main media types, namely, posters or outdoor media which came first, newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, and the internet, the most recent mainstream medium. Of course, there are other media types such as cinema and sports clothing designed to be seen on TV. Almost anything that moves, and many things that cannot, now carry advertising but we confine ourselves to the main forms noted above. The early history of outdoor provided here is mostly drawn from Houck (1969), Bernstein (1997) and the US Association of National Advertisers (1952) but see also Nelson and Sykes (1953). The US history of outdoor is also from the Outdoor Advertising Association of America (2006). Outdoor advertising as a means of mass communication probably began in ancient Egypt when five-foot high basalt tablets were carved with hieroglyphics announcing laws, decrees, and warnings. The Rosetta Stone, held by the British Museum, bears a record of remissions of taxes and other dues owed bythe Egyptian people. Priests saw the advantage of circulating these messages to the public and placed copies of the stone in temples along the main highways bearing their desired messages to a wider audience. The Roman government made its laws known to the public via inscriptions on tablets, buildings, and monuments, often utilizing animals and objects to catch the eye. Soon advertising was circulated with the use of placards at gladiator contests and circuses to promote the event. This is the earliest known form of the sports advertising which now adds colour to professional sports stadia around the globe. Pompeii used almost every available public space to advertise—a goat was the symbol of a dairy, a flagon denoted the wine merchant, while a knife denoted the cutler. In the 1400s, handbills and poster bills appeared and 200 years later the outdoor sign emerged, dominating London’s streets. Many signs became works of art. Saturation bill posting was prevalent as was the competitor’s practice of tracking the poster sticker and slapping his own bill over the newly posted one. Bill posters painted their names on areas to make sites their own and eventually erected proprietary “fences” or “hoarding. ”
The large American outdoor poster (more than 50 square feet) originated in New York when Jared Bell printed circus posters in 1835. Early American roadside advertising was generally local. Merchants painted signs or glued posters on walls and fences to advise travellers of their wares. In 1850, advertising began to be used on streetcars/trams. Electric signs became possible in 1879, thanks to Thomas Edison, allowing advertising to glow through the night, changing cityscapes for ever. Times Square remains the apotheosis of neon, although some 21st century Asian cities may dispute that. Michigan formed the first state bill posters’ association in 1871 and a number of states followed suit with the Associated Bill Posters’ Association for North America created in 1891. Between 1900 and 1912, the billboard structure was standardized for America, allowing for national billboard campaigns. Big brands such as Kellogg, Palmolive, and Coca-Cola began mass-producing posters for use across the country. From 1913, the US industry has allowed public service advertising free use of unsold space. The prevalence of posters varies greatly by country partly due to regulation and local environmental considerations. Benelux countries, for example, have many small sites but few large ones, whereas Russia, Italy, and Greece have many large sites, but almost no medium-sized ones. Germany has by far the largest number of sites in Europe (355,208), with the UK having the second largest (141,744) (World Advertising Research Centre, 2006). Nowadays, outdoor advertising is ubiquitous and not necessarily out of doors. It covers massive billboards as well as trains, underground stations, buses, airports, phone boxes, tabletops, public bathrooms, and bus shelters. It may be decorating a tiny car-parking ticket or emblazoned across the sky, towed by a plane. Computer and digital technology has opened up the ability to display moving and still images on any surface. Soon ads will be instantly projectable anywhere in the world along with the ability to change the message at a moment’s notice according to current news and other factors. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, the development of advertising and of newspapers went hand in hand. In Europe, newspapers began to emerge in Germany, England, and France in the early 1600s. In 1625, London’s Weekly Relations News printed one of the first newspaper ads. In 1704, the Boston Newsletter was the first US newspaper to carry an ad which offered the reward for the capture of a thief (Wells et al. , 2000). Founded in 1785 and published daily in the United Kingdom, The Times is a national newspaper which was printed in broadsheet format for over 200 years until it switched to compact size in 2004. It is the original “Times” newspaper, although it does share its name with other papers such as The New York Times.
About 400 million people buy a daily newspaper and readership exceeds one billion people per day (World Association of Newspapers, 2005). Some analysts predicted the demise of the newspaper due to the rising popularity of television news and the internet. But this forecast was ill-founded and newspapers adapted with new products (e. g., free dailies), new formats (e. g., downsizing from broadsheet to a more compact size), new titles, and improved distribution, whilst embracing the internet to increase their online presence. In 2004, for example, the audience for newspaper websites grew 32%, and it has grown 350% over the last 5 years (World Association of Newspapers, 2005). Newspapers have, in the process, become less a source for news than comment on the news and entertainment. Advertisers continue to use the medium, with revenues predicted to continue rising and newspapers anticipated to remain the second most popular advertising vehicle behind television, attracting 30% of all main media advertising expenditure (World Association of Newspapers, 2005; Zenith Optimedia, 2006). These figures, however, combine two rather different types of advertising: display and classified. Display advertising is typically for national brands, whether retail or not, whereas the classified sections deal with the availability of individual opportunities in much the same way as advertising three millennia earlier. Classifieds are local and account for the strength of local and regional newspapers versus nationals. The range of classified advertising is as wide as human needs and wants: property for sale and rental, holidays, jobs, and lonely hearts are just a few popular categories. Classified advertising is usually seen as informational but, as any reader of the lonely hearts columns can testify, emotion and persuasive appeals exist too. By the mid 19th century, a few well-known magazines had launched, for example, Harper’s Illustrated Weekly in the US and Punch in the UK, but these magazines did not then contain advertising—they were primarily literary. Soon however, this untapped revenue opportunity was recognized, and by the end of the 19th century, magazine advertising accounted for two thirds of publisher revenues. Newspaper revenues soon reached a similar proportion, although regional and local newspapers and classified advertising meant that magazines carried a greater proportion of national advertising (Tellis, 1998). This trend has continued. Magazines were traditionally for the wealthy and well-educated. But in the late 1880s, this situation changed. Firstly, E.C. Allen introduced the People’s Literary Companion which appealed widely to US general readers. Secondly, Congress lowered postage rates for periodicals so publishers could economically mail their magazines to subscribers (Wells et al. , 2000). By 1900, magazines blanketed the United States the way television does now, with 3500 magazines in circulation, reaching 65 million readers (Rothenberg, 2005). Nowadays, magazines are created for every possible type of audience, with both, mass titles appealing to all (e. g., Readers Digest) and niche titles catering to very small audiences (e. g., Australasian Dirt Bike). Magazine publishers, like newspapers, are also embracing the web to ensure continued growth. The reach of the magazine industry can be illustrated by the following:
- The main publishing house in Europe, Axel Springer, has over 150 newspaper titles and magazines in 32 countries and over 10,000 employees (Axel Springer 2006). - The UK company EMAP (2006) claims to have “over 150 top selling consumer magazines in the UK, France and around the world. ”
- IPC Media, another UK company, claims to be “the UK’s leading consumer magazine publisher,” with an unrivalled portfolio of brands, selling over 350 million copies each year, and reaching over 70% of UK women and 50% of UK men (IPC Media, 2006). - Time Warner, the largest US magazine publisher, claims its 145 or so magazines “are read 340 million times each month worldwide by 173 million adults over 18 years of age, with two out of every three U.S. adults reading a Time Inc. publication every month. ” (Time Warner, 2006). Radio exemplifies the spike which new media types can inject, both causing, and being caused by, significant historical events (Leckenby, 2004). Radio in the US began in the 1920s and almost immediately started to take advertising (Berkman, 1987). During the Great Depression, progress in communication technology made radio available to most American households. Radio was the first national medium for mass marketing, and created a great opportunity for quickly introducing new products and developing brand names (Tellis, 1998). NBC President Merlin Aylesworth said that radio was “an open gateway to national markets, to millions of consumers and thousands of retailers” (Museum of Broadcast Communications, 2005). In other countries, such as the UK, radio was, for a long time, purely public service broadcasting. The first UK commercial radio station, London Broadcasting Company, was launched on 8 October 1973, 50 years after the BBC (BBC, 2006). Television broadcasting can be seen as an outgrowth of radio since it used similar technology but with additional visual images. The first US television commercial appeared on 1st July 1941, when the Bulova Watch Company paid $9 to WNBT for a 10-second spot before a baseball game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and Philadelphia Phillies. A Bulova watch was superimposed on a map of the US, with a voiceover of the company’s slogan “America runs on Bulova time! ” (Bulova, 2006). The close relationship between television and radio allowed television to draw substantially on the knowledge acquired from the evolution of commercial radio. In its early years, television did not have the same level of penetration as radio because of the high costs associated with producing (and purchasing) the sets. In the UK, the Television Act established commercial television in 1954 and set up the Independent Television Authority. In 1955, commercial television began, in the London area, with a live transmission from the Guildhall. Since 1936, TV had hitherto been limited to public service broadcasting from the BBC. The first commercial screened was for Gibbs SR toothpaste. The most popular programme was Sunday Night at the London Palladium (ATV) (Office of Communication, 2006). In 2005, there were an estimated 1. 7 billion television sets worldwide (Greene et al. , 2005). Television continues to be the largest source of worldwide advertising revenue, accounting for an estimated US$147 billion in 2005 (or 37. 2% of all major media expenditure) (Zenith Optimedia, 2005). However, television’s dominance of the advertising pie is being threatened by the introduction of new technology such as TiVo which enables the consumer to save programmes and skip advertisements. Product placement, programme sponsorship and advertainment are specific strategies that advertisers are using to reach audiences in light of these technological developments (Scott and Craig-Lees, 2006). Another strategy is designing ads that still work in fast forward mode. The Internet is the fastest-growing new medium ever (Leckenby, 2004). Internet advertising began in 1994 and early advertisers included AT&T, MCI, Sprint, Volvo, Saturn, Timex, Jim Beam, and Air Walk (EC2 @ USC, 2001). It continues to grow 27% each year, and is predicted to overtake outdoor advertising in 2006 (Initiative, 2006; Zenith Optimedia, 2006). From 2005-2008, Zenith Optimedia predicts that it will create US$15. 8 billion new ad dollars worldwide and grow 76% (Zenith Optimedia, 2005, 2006). The web is particularly well suited for search applications such as online local, directory, and classified ads which have been found by the Interactive Advertising Bureau to be efficient in profit terms (Interactive Advertising Bureau, 2006). More surprisingly, they also found significant branding benefits for those same categories. One of the major problems in pulling together international advertising expenditure data is that different countries produce different figures at different times and use different methods, definitions, and currencies to measure this expenditure (Dunbar, 1977; Green, 1990). Nevertheless, this section draws some of this research together to demonstrate the growth of advertising expenditure overtime and to identify emerging markets. The United Kingdom has traditionally been one of the world’s top markets, consistently spending, as a percentage of GDP, about 50% more than the other large EU countries (World Advertising Research Centre, 2006). However, the 1980s saw the other European markets grow due to the deregulation of television which helped grow the television stations’ revenues and the number of minutes of commercials shown each day (Green, 1990). By 1990, advertising had exceeded the growth in the economy in 16 European countries every year since 1980 (Green, 1990). However, recent years have seen the more mature markets of Northern America, United Kingdom and Western Europe lose share of worldwide advertising spend, as other markets in Asia and Central and Eastern Europe grow (Initiative, 2006). Indeed, Initiative (2006) predict that 2006 will see Asia overtake Western Europe to become the second largest advertising market in the world. To demonstrate this,
Since 1964, worldwide ad spending has grown from $23. 6 billion (Mandese, 2004) to $600 billion (Coen, 2006). The sectors have shifted their advertising shares. Traditionally, frequently boughtgrocery and pharmaceutical products accounted for the bulk of consumer advertising. More recently, these products are advertising less while other kinds of advertising have increased, with retail, automotive, telecommunications, and financial products in the top spending categories. Pharmaceuticals still continue to round out this top five (Zenith Optimedia, 2006). Furthermore, the relative importance of advertising has steadily declined as expenditures on other sales techniques have increased (not only price promotions, but sponsorship, in-store display, product placement, etc). Mayer (1991) comments that whereas in 1980 advertising absorbed approximately two-thirds of all marketing expenditures, by 1990 this share had reduced to one-third. Dawley (2006) suggests that in the US, the shift to non-media spending is happening faster than average, whereas in Europe and emerging economies, it is slower. Advertising Agencies: Their Origins and Development
Appearance of the Agent
By the mid-nineteenth century, manufacturers could deliver and advertise nationally. Newspapers were proliferating and hungry for advertisements. Manufacturers found that knowing where and how to place ads (especially outside their home location) was difficult. Newspaper circulations were unknown (or kept secret) and advertising rates were uncontrolled and varied. Gathering lists of newspapers in which ads could be placed was time-consuming and costly. This was responsible for a change in the role of the advertising agent from working primarily for the media to representing the consumer to the brand owner, i. e., working for the client. Agents traditionally represented newspapers (i. e., the media), compiling lists of newspapers and placing ads with them on behalf of advertisers. The newspapers negotiated with the agent to be on his list and the agent contracted with the newspaper for large amounts of advertising space at discount rates before reselling the space to advertisers at a higher rate. Hence, the advertising industry owes its survival to its ability to negotiate between media outlets and manufacturers needing to advertise (Lears, 1994). Although the advertisers still created the ads themselves, it was more efficient to deal with a single agent (or broker) instead of having to keep track of all the outlets. Because the agent worked explicitly for the media, the media outlet paid him a commission for the advertising he obtained for them. This is the origin of the unique commission system in advertising, in which the agent is paid not by the one who pays for the advertising but by the supplier (the media)—a system which is not yet dead, but is increasingly supplanted by service fees. The Role of Francis Ayer
In Philadelphia in 1841, Volney B. Palmer set up the first US ad agency. In 1869 Francis Ayer bought him out and founded N. W. Ayer & Son. By 1874, Ayer was issuing his own publications, the first of which was the Ayer and Son’s Manual for Advertisers, an annual publication listing newspapers from which the agency sought its business, the newspapers’ rates, and their circulation. The following year they established a printing department which offered typesetting. Other creative services were not offered in these early years, as Ayer believed the client knew its product best (Hower, 1949). The most significant decision made by this agency was to introduce the radical practice of open contract. This contract guaranteed clients the lowest possible rates the agency could negotiate with publications. Commission was later added and ranged from 8. 5% to 15%. By 1909, the open contract became known as “OC +15” by the agency, and the 15% commission later became an industry standard (Hower, 1949; Leiss et al. , 1997). This bound the agent and the advertiser for a period of time, usually a year, with the former taking a standard percentage of the billing as his commission. The agent no longer squeezed the advertiser to make a profit, but rather, acted on the latter’s behalf in finding the best group of journals for the advertiser’s needs. The percentage commission tied the agencies’ profits to the gross amount of billings they could win. They would grow only to the degree that new sources of advertising could be channelled through the agencies rather than conducted directly with the newspapers. This new arrangement helped make Ayer the number one agency of the 1890s (Leiss et al. , 1997). Although N.W. Ayer & Son (through Volney Palmer) has been seen as the original US agency through Volney Palmer, William James Carlton started to sell advertising space in 1864, founding the agency that later became J. Walter Thompson Company, which has also claimed to be the oldest American advertising agency in continuous existence. In the UK, advertising agencies certainly date back to the 18th century when Charles Lamb was a copywriter in England. The Mitchells agency was in business in 1811. Framework for the Modern Agency
As middlemen, agents such as N.W. Ayer initially developed great power, since advertisers depended on them for their knowledge of the rates. But soon they could no longer justify their commissions as their insider knowledge of media and purchasing skills were brought into the open. What they could leverage however, was their knowledge of how to do advertising. So as they gained in size and experience, and as manufacturers’ needs became more sophisticated, brokers began to offer more services than creating ads. These had always included planning the media mix, but extended to market research, promotions, and overall marketing strategy. In an age where few companies had marketing departments, ad agencies filled the gap and provided a consumer perspective for manufacturers. Thus, they evolved into what were called full service agencies, working on behalf of advertisers rather than publishers. However, their compensation remained the commission system, creating a conflict of interest: agencies worked for advertisers to maximize ad effectiveness, but their earnings were in proportion to the dollars spent on media space and production. However, this was not unusual: architects are still paid pro rata to costs even though they are supposed to be saving costs for their clients. But the commission system was also questionable given that it discouraged advertising agencies from proposing media neutral solutions (Lace, 2000). By 1990, the long-term pressure on agency rates of commission (the media commissions were shared, legally ornot, with major clients) and the conflict of interest noted above, led to remuneration shifting toward fees. This proved not to be wholly satisfactory: some sharp clients negotiated fees on the basis of spending a certain budget and then, once the fee was final, doubled the budget (and the work for the agency). Conversely, agencies would demand payment of the agreed fees even where the client had been forced to cut the ad budget. Fees were also promoted as being superior to commission by being fairer and giving agencies more certainty about their cash flows. However, problems soon emerged with this too as it was found that when economic conditions improved, agencies became prisoners of that guaranteed income (Lace, 2000). The main consequence of this remuneration pressure was to reduce agency headcounts and take them back from full service to simply creating ads. Their media role had already, from the 1980s, gone to specialist media buyers, far fewer in number, who could use their greater buying muscle to secure, allegedly, better deals for clients. We understand that not all clients have been satisfied with the transparency of the distribution of media commissions but the literature is silent on the matter. A final (so far) twist in the tail has been the introduction of Payment by Results. This has been promoted as “an enhancement in the advertising agency remuneration agreement, based on the achievement of mutually agreed targets or criteria for higher advertiser satisfaction, providing an equitable return to the agency” (ISBA, 1999), i. e., a win- win situation, with the advertiser being more satisfied and the agency receiving higher income and performing better. The theory of Payment by Results means that both sides can maintain a proper focus on truly important business issues. Objectives have to be quantified and having performance assessed against them, is in theory, good practice. This promotes proactivity, responsibility, efficiency, openness, honesty, accountability, transparency, and better and longer-lasting relationships (Lace, 2000). There are three types of “results” that can be used for this purpose: business performance such as sales or market share or incremental profit; intermediate (brand equity) metrics such as intention to purchase; and service criteria such as how prompt the agency is in returning phone calls. 2004 estimates suggest that 40% of creative agencies and 46% of media agencies in the US and UK are using this system (Beckett, 2004). Procter & Gamble is one company using this method, announcing in 1999 that they would be treating their ad agencies as partners and sharing the ups and down of profits whether the agency was responsible or not (Waters, 1999). However, the practical results from Payment by Results have not been as positive as enthusiasts hoped. Agencies are happy to accept bonuses, as they see them, when results are good but not penalties when they are bad because such failures are always the fault of the client—they say. Payment for agency service, particularly favoured in the US, is highly subjective and not “results” anyway. This section has reviewed the evolution of agency development and remuneration from a historical perspective. For a contemporary overview, we refer you to David Wethey’s (2007), Chapter 3. 1 covering client-agency relations. Mergers and Acquisitions
We do not have space for a full account of the hundreds if not thousands of major ad agency acquisitions over the last 150 years. This section highlights just a few to give a flavour of the evolution that has taken place. Whilst we have not seen definitive research, it seems that the aggregate market shares of the three tiers of agency firms by size (i. e., large, medium, and small) remains fairly constant. Given the regular acquisitions of agencies since the earliest times, this seems a little odd. The effect of acquisitions ought to increase the aggregate share of the largest agencies and yet it does not seem to do so. One reason is the departure from the largest agencies of star performers to start their own agencies. In the UK, the largest 10% of agencies by number represent about 85% of the market by value, and this seems to have been stable along with the market shares bytier. What has, however, changed since the 1960s, in the US, Europe and increasingly round the world is the growth of conglomerates, of which the two largest in 2005 were Omni comand WPP. The importance of conglomerates is illustrated by the UK market where in 2006, conglomerates had 82% of the billings of the top 30 agencies, whereas in 1996 they had 73%. In 2004, Omnicom, based in New York, had worldwide revenues of $9. 7 bn, of which 53% was in the US, whereas WPP, based in London, had worldwide revenues of $9. 4 bn, of which 60% was outside the US. These were followed by Interpublic (New York) ($6. 2 bn), Publicis (Paris) ($4. 8 bn), and Dentsu (Tokyo) ($2. 9 bn). Dentsu as a single agency has a large share of its parent conglomerate’s total revenue (68%) and McCann Erickson was 23% of Interpublic, but, for example, J. Walter Thompson and Ogilvy & Mather together were only 22% of WPP. A major stimulus of the global conglomerate movement was the founding of Saatchi & Saatchi in London in 1970, by brothers with international aspirations. Conglomerates existed before then with Interpublic being the largest at that time and still the largest in the UK in 1996. Conglomerates then saw the merits of multinational campaigns but often struggled with persuading both their local agencies and subsidiary management of multinational businesses to share campaigns. For example, Heublein sought to internationalize Smirnoff vodka advertising at that time but with limited success. The Saatchis saw advertising as a global business and were attracted to, and attractive to, global accounts such as British Airways. Favourable conditions in the London stock market, where the Saatchis listed their company in 1975, and increased cash flow, gave the brothers ready access to the cash needed to buy out the generation of US executives who were looking towards retirement. By 1986, the brothers had turned their original $40,000 stake into a global confederation of 80 companies with capitalized billings of $3. 2 billion (Rothenberg, 2005). Whilst some agencies such as Young and Rubicam and Ogilvy & Mather disagreed with the Saatchis’ actions, favouring their own integrated and co-ordinated approach, other agencies believed the Saatchis’ approach to expansion was right—or at least a response that was necessary to remain competitive. In late April 1986, three of the most prominent US agencies—BBDO, Needham Harper & Steers, and Doyle Dane Bernbach—announced their own three-way merger under the umbrella of a new company called the Omnicom Group. By mid-May though, Saatchi & Saatchi fought back for dominance, announcing its purchase of the world’s third-largest agency, Ted Bates Worldwide (Lears, 1994). A little more than a year after the Bates buyout, in 1987, Martin Sorrell (who as finance director of Saatchi & Saatchi had helped engineer its spectacular expansion), made a hostile offer for J. Walter Thompson. His successful $566m bid for Thompson and his hostile acquisition of the Ogilvy Group 2 years later in 1989 turned Sorrell’s WPP Group into one of the two largest marketing communications conglomerates. It also owned the world’s largest public relations agency, the largest direct-marketing specialist and about three dozen other subsidiaries. WPP acquired the other major holdout group, Young and Rubicam, in 2000 (Lears, 1994; Rothenberg, 2005; WPP, 2005). This world of high finance is a long way from the business of making ads to which we now return. Evolution of Advertising Content
Advertising Has its Roots in Providing Information
From the 1800s to the early 20th century, advertisements were nearly all classified, un-illustrated offers made to all citizens in order to sell something specific (Phillips, 1992). According to Phillips (1992) nearly all print ads were what we now call informational—what was for sale, the price, and where to find it—although others consider that the distinction between persuasion and pure information may be in the eye of the beholder. What is true is that the classified format of most advertising, then and now, limits the creative opportunities for the ad agency to thumb-nail-size illustrations, small type, and single-column width (Fox, 1984). Therefore, much advertising at the turn of the 20th century was focused on providing information, with prominent copywriters such as John E. Powers viewing the content as news (Beard, 2005). This approach was often referred to as the “tell” approach, which contrasted to the more persuasive hard sell, “salesmanship in print” approach, which provided the basis for the influential “reason-why” approach (Rowsome, 1970). Advertising agencies sought to disassociate themselves from the showy, aggressive humbug style used by the patent-medicine purveyors in the mid-late 18th century (Laird, 1998). However, a more artistic soft-sell was established by the early 1900s, following increased calls for enhanced originality and creativity, and the necessity for appealing to emotions (Beard, 2004). Marchand (1985) notes that advertisers increasingly viewed human nature as instinctive and non-rational with growing beliefs that audience members would respond more to emotional appeals than logical arguments and reasons. Advertising increasingly entertained without explicitly selling (Beard, 2005). In writing this type of history, authors are tempted towards separating evolution into distinct stages, whereas the reality is that they overlap. The rules for devising classified ads in the 17th century apply to classifieds today and the glossy emotional four-colour display ads we associate with the 20th century were in use a hundred years before. The main factors driving differences in content are the changing media discussed above and increasing consumer and advertiser sophistication. Indeed, Fox (1984) has suggested that hard and soft sell advertising has cycled back and forth throughout the 20th century according to the industry’s own rhythms and its perception of the public’s boredom level. Furthermore, the recognition that products have life cycles and can die, but brands, properly managed, can last forever (Rothenberg, 2005), coupled with the difficulty of maintaining product differences in an age with high production technology, shifted attention from product to brand differences which by their nature are more subtle. The Creative Revolution: Big Ideas, Big Personalities
Bill Bernbach (a founder of Doyle Dane Bernbach, now part of Omnicom), Leo Burnett (founder of the Leo Burnett agency) and David Ogilvy (who worked for Mather & Crowther which became Ogilvy & Mather, now part of WPP) came to prominence in the late 1950s and 1960s. Some of the key personalities of this era were:
- David Ogilvy said it was “brand personality” and not “any trivial product difference” that drew consumers to products. Ogilvy believed in research and copy testing, but also had a tremendous sense of style straddling both the hard and soft approaches to advertising (Wells et al. , 2000). His agency created clean, powerful ads marked by graceful, sensible copy and a palpable respect for the consumer’s intelligence (Advertising Age, 2005). - Leo Burnett believed in finding the inherent drama in every product and presenting it as believably as possible through warmth, shared emotions, and experiences (Advertising Age, 2005). The “Chicago-style” of advertising he introduced (i. e., sentimental ads drawn from heartland-rooted values) showed love and respect for the people; it perfectly understood and revolved around the consumer. Using strong, simple, and instinctive imagery, advertising produced at Burnett’s talked to people in a friendly manner (Advertising Age, 2005; http://ciadvertising.org, 1996). - Bill Bernbach’s creative philosophy was simple: “find the simple story in the product and present it in an articulate, intelligent, persuasive way” (Marshall, 1982). - Theodore F MacManus had a style that was influential, image-oriented, and atmospheric. His elaborate layouts and emotional appeals were a direct contradiction of the rational reason-why appeals, hence his moniker “the father of soft sell” (Beard, 2005; http://ciadvertising.org, 1999). - Rosser Reeves picked up where the no-nonsense “advertising must sell” preachings of Claude Hopkins left off, creating the Unique Selling Proposition concept that focused on driving home a central, research-based selling point (Advertising Age, 2005). Reeves believed that a basic dilemma in advertising was that few products were distinctly different. Reeves developed the USP concept in an attempt to distinguish one product from its competitors. The USP was an advancement over previous “reason-why” advertising in that it operated as a part of consumer identity (http://ciadvertising.org, 2000). - Jeremy Bullmore was the creative leader of what was arguably JWT’s golden era in the UK from the mid 1950s until the 1980s. One of his contributions was that the ad, or stimulus, was unimportant, but it was the consumer’s response that mattered (Bullmore, 2003). By the 1980s, clients increasingly wanted to measure results, meaning short-term financial results. Partly because sales effects were more obvious and partly due to the growing power of mass retailers, companies began shifting their marketing budgets away from television and radio to sales promotion (Belch and Belch, 2001; Coen, 2005; Wells et al. , 2000). Advertising in the Context of its History
Advertising adapts to current culture, pressures, and conditions. The extent to which advertising mirrors society or creates new culture is considered elsewhere in this handbook but plainly it does both. It is a craft, rather than a science just as it has always been but practitioners now intellectualize to a greater extent. There are awards for advertising creativity and effectiveness. Clients seek to pay only for measurable results. At the same time, advertising is more regulated and advertisers are expected to respect social goals, such as reducing childhood obesity or excessive consumption of products deemed dangerous. Advertising remains what it always was: a means of informing, persuading, and reminding customers and potential customers. At the same time, it has become vastly more complex as media and agencies have fragmented. Consumers are bombarded by ever more messages and have built mechanisms to cope. The main conclusions from this chapter are:
- Some aspects of advertising are much the same as they always were. Ads seek to gain attention to their brands and, for display advertising, use emotions and entertainment to build brand-consumer relationships. - Classified advertising, by contrast, seeks to find buyers for specific sales opportunities. - Media have proliferated bringing new techniques but also more confusion. - Advertising agencies became the experts from the mid 19th century in the more developed markets but, partly due to complexity, have returned to ad creativity leaving media and other forms of communication to specialist agencies. - In the last decades of the 20th century, mergers and acquisitions have created a handful of global media and communications giants led by WPP and Omnicom followed by a second tier of worldwide groups and partnerships. - At the individual agency level, however, the churn of individual talent and the need to avoid brand conflicts has kept the market shares of the large, medium, and small agencies, en bloc, relatively stable. - Despite the ups and downs, advertising continues to increase as a share of GDP. Traditional packaged goods brands however are less dominant advertisers whereas retailers, including web retailers, and public service advertisers have increased their share. - Measurement techniques have become more sophisticated partly in response to advertiser demands to see quantified results. - Ad content has increased in variety with more entertainment and appeals to emotion. - Regulation, much of it self-regulation, helps to ensure advertising meets the sensitivities of changing cultural demands. | 008_755162 | {
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The Economic Impact of Peanut Research on the Poor: The Case of Resistance Strategies to Control Peanut Viruses in Uganda
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Economic impacts of research that developed Rosette virus-resistant peanut in Uganda are estimated, including the impacts on poverty. The impacts of technology on the cost of production at the household level are determined. This information is used to compute aggregate benefits in an economic surplus model. A probit model is used to identify the determinants of adoption using household data. Information regarding the determinants of adoption is combined with impacts of technology on the cost of production to identify income changes for adopting households. Foster-Greer-Thorbecke poverty measures are used to project changes in poverty for households that adopt. It is estimated that the poverty rate will decline by 1. 3 percent as a result of the research. - Masters Theses | 001_6638863 | {
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HMS - Math 7 - Current Unit
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Thursday April 25th- Pledge Plans
We just covered looking at linear equations in terms of walking rates (distance and time variables). Today we will focus on pledge plans using the variables of distance (x) and money raised(y). Our goals for today's lesson were:
construct graphs and tables to model problem situations. translate information about linear relations given a table, graph, or equation. explore what a y-intercept means in an equation. Here is the graph for Investigation 1. 3 Problems A-C.
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Post Comments (Atom) | 006_1174156 | {
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Scientists have discovered a potential brain imaging predictor for dementia, which illustrates that changes to the brain’s structure may occur years prior to a diagnosis, even before individuals notice their own memory problems. The study, published in the Neurobiology of Aging, looked at older adults who are living without assistance and who were unaware of any major memory problems, but scored below the normal benchmark on a dementia screening test. Within these older adults, researchers also found evidence of less brain tissue in the same subregion of the brain where Alzheimer’s disease originates (the anterolateral entorhinal cortex located in the brain’s temporal lobe). This is the first to measure this particular brain subregion in older adults who do not have a dementia diagnosis or memory problems that affect their day-to-day routine. It is also the first study to demonstrate that performance on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) dementia screening test is linked to the volume (size) of this subregion, along with other brain regions affected early in the course of Alzheimer’s disease. The team studied 40 adults between the ages of 59 and 81 who live independently (or with a spouse) at home. All participants were tested on the MoCA. Those scoring below 26 — a score that indicates a potential problem in memory and thinking skills and suggests further dementia screening is needed — were compared to those scoring 26 and above. Scientists were able to reliably measure the volume of the anterolateral entorhinal cortex by using high-resolution brain scans that were collected for each participant. The strongest volume differences were found in the exact regions of the brain in which Alzheimer’s disease originates. The researchers are planning a follow-up study to determine whether the individuals who demonstrated poor thinking and memory abilities and smaller brain volumes indeed go on to develop dementia. Paper: “Anterolateral entorhinal cortex volume predicted by altered intra-item configural processing”
Reprinted from materials provided by Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care. | 004_2940720 | {
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One immutable rule of business and data storage states that as a business grows so do its storage needs. Not just in terms of capacity either, performance and reliability must also scale with the business. To meet those expanding needs, SMBs often implement RAID arrays since they can improve data storage performance and reliability. But which RAID configuration offers the most benefits for SMBs? Find out below. Short for redundant array of inexpensive/independent disks, RAID enables physical storage drives to be consolidated into a single or multiple virtualized drives. You can choose for the virtualized drive to execute read/write operations quicker, have data redundancy, or both. The type of RAID configuration used determines what the performance benefits will be. Standard RAID Configurations
- RAID 0 (Data Striping) – Data is written across all the drives in the array. Drive 1 gets one bit, drive 2 gets another, and so on. Each drive holds just one portion of a file, as files are segmented—or striped—across drives, hence the term data striping. With RAID 0 read and write performance increases because the drives work simultaneously to access data. So instead of one read operation happening, you have several at the same time. However, RAID 0 lacks data redundancy and if one drive fails, the data on that drive is lost. - RAID 1 (Data Mirroring) – The configuration synonymous with redundancy, all hard drives in the array store the same data. Data on one drive gets mirrored exactly to another, hence the term data mirroring. So if one drive fails, your files and folders are not lost. In RAID 1, read performance can increase because each drive reads different portions of a file simultaneously. However, write performance does not receive any benefits. - RAID 5 (Data Striping with Parity) – RAID 5 requires at least three drives. Data is striped across two or more drives like in RAID 0, with one drive being reserved for parity. Without getting overly technical, parity is a value calculated from the combination of two hard drives. When one hard drive fails, the data from that drive can be recovered by working backwards, like an algebraic equation. Written as an equation, it would be: x + y = z
x = drive 1
y = drive 2
z = parityProvided have two variables, you can always calculate for the third. RAID 5 features fairly quick read performance, but suffers slower write performance and rebuilding data because of a failed drive can be a slow process. The slower write performance results from the array having to calculate parity each time it writes data. Because RAID 5 offers some performance benefits and a degree of data redundancy, some network attached storage (NAS) and RAID appliances come from the factory preconfigured for RAID 5. Shawn Chu from QNAP recommends this setting for SMBs because it boosts read/write speeds while still being able to function when one drive fails, “SMB customers prefer using RAID 5 or RAID 6 over RAID10 for NAS RAID configurations. ” In a small- to medium-sized office, an NAS RAID array needs to be fast enough to serve multiple users simultaneously while offering a degree of data protection at the same time. - RAID 6 (Data Striping with Additional Parity) –. In a RAID 6 array, up to two drives can fail before data becomes unrecoverable. Like RAID 5, write operations and data rebuild times require more time. Compared to RAID, 5 rebuilding data lost in a RAID 6 array can be significantly longer. The main benefit of RAID 6 is that data can be recovered even when two drives fail, while RAID 5 only allows recovery if one drive fails. - RAID 10 (Data Striping and Mirroring) – RAID 10 is also known as RAID 0 + 1 or “One Big RAID 10” (OBR10). RAID 10 requires a minimum of four drives. The drives are grouped into two RAID 1 arrays, which are in turn both striped. RAID 10 offers both performance and data redundancy since data can be recovered from one group of drives if the other group fails. However, a RAID 10 array costs the most to implement and expand. In order to add storage space to your virtualized volume, you need to purchase drives for both mirrored sets. In a basic RAID 10 setup, you’ll need to purchase 4 storage drives in order to expand capacity. Which RAID Configuration Should a SMB Use? RAID 0 and 1 offer basic RAID functionality but typically do not meet the data needs of SMBs. RAID 0 does not offer any protection from failure while RAID 1 performs slower than RAID 5, 6, or 10. * Those three offer the most amount of benefits for SMBs as they perform quicker than RAID 1 and also offer protection from data loss unlike RAID 0. As for deciding between RAID 5, 6, and 10, the decision comes down to cost, performance, and protection. If cost of is a concern, RAID 5 and 6 are ideal. “Businesses with limited budgets can still enjoy increased read performance with RAID 5 or 6 configurations while keeping costs low,” Chu says. As a centralized office storage solution, those configurations perform very well. For big data operations such as server farms and data centers however, where budgets will be bigger and performance more important, RAID 10 still offers the most benefits. So if you plan to implement storage servers instead of desktop NAS appliances, RAID 10 will likely be the better solution. In addition, the prices of hard drives and solid state drives have dropped significantly in the last few years, so expanding a RAID 10 array can be accomplished at lower cost than ever before. So how do I set up a SMB RAID Configuration? Setting up a RAID array can be done one of two ways: hardware or software. You can purchase storage appliances, RAID expansion cards, and select motherboards specifically designed to support RAID arrays, and those often include additional features and functions that make management easier. The software route requires an operating system that supports RAID setup, such as Windows 7. Many SMBs opt for a hardware RAID solution as they typically have larger feature sets. For example, the QNAP TS-869L-US desktop NAS, as well as select models from Synology, Netgear, and more, allow for hot swapping of drives in RAID arrays. So when a drive fails, it can be quickly replaced without powering down the devices. From a user standpoint, there will be minimal downtime. In addition, setup and management of RAID configurations are made easier with a hardware solution—especially with desktop appliances and enclosures. Some cloud models feature management portals that can be accessed via IP from within the network or from an online management portal if outside the network. There you have it, RAID 5/6 for the budget minded and RAID 10 for big data and performance. RAID arrays will benefit any SMB planning to implement a network storage solution. What are your thoughts on SMB RAID configurations though? Let us know what RAID configuration you use for your SMB’s NAS devices. *Some IT professionals have pointed out that the performance difference between RAID 1 and RAID 5 can vary depending on the capabilities of the hardware controller, write speed especially so. | 006_6737224 | {
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Effects of polysaccharides isolated from Inonotus obliquus against hydrogen peroxide-induced oxidative damage in RINm5F pancreatic β-cells
Affiliations: Department of Bioengineering and Technology, Kangwon National University, Chuncheon, Gangwon 24341, Republic of Korea, National Institute of Biological Resources, Incheon 22689, Republic of Korea
- Published online on: September 22, 2016 https://doi.org/10.3892/mmr.2016.5763
- Pages: 4263-4270
This article is mentioned in:
Reactive oxygen species (ROS), including superoxide anions, hydroxyl radicals and hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), are generated in cells by environmental elements, primarily via mitochondrial respiratory cellular metabolism (1). Under normal conditions, ROS are efficiently neutralized by cellular antioxidant mechanisms. However, when the generation of ROS increases, the resulting imbalance can cause various cellular dysfunctions. This type of cellular damage, particularly in the pancreas, may lead to deleterious effects, and could potentially cause diabetes (2,3). Diabetes mellitus is a common metabolic disease that is associated with chronic inflammation, hyperglycemia, obesity, hyperlipidemia, hyperinsulinemia and insulin resistance (4). Individuals with diabetes have high blood sugar caused by β-cell dysfunction (5). H2O2 can inflict damage on vulnerable cell types, including RINm5F pancreatic β-cells, which may lead to apoptosis due to intracellular ROS generation (6,7). Mushrooms have been used as an effective medicinal food and traditional therapy for centuries; they contain several compounds, including polyphenols and polysaccharides (particularly beta-glucan), which provide health benefits due to their antioxidative effects (8–12). Among them, the mushroom Inonotus obliquus has been used as a traditional natural medicine with notable efficacy (13–15). Several studies have reported that I. obliquus does not induce any adverse side effects when used in drugs and food for the prevention and treatment of diabetes. In a previous study, a culture broth of I. obliquus had significant effects on alloxan-induced diabetic mice (16,17). However, it has been previously noted that while its effects on diabetes have been studied extensively in vivo, the number of in vitro studies is insufficient. Therefore, the present study aimed to confirm that the antioxidant potential of I. obliquus protects against β-cell death and may therefore prevent diabetes. The present study examined the preventive effects of polysaccharides isolated from I. obliquus on H2O2-induced oxidative damage in RINm5F pancreatic β-cells. In addition, polysaccharides from the fruiting body of I. obliquus (PFIO) and polysaccharides from a liquid culture broth of I. obliquus (PLIO) were compared, and the results of the study confirmed that they inhibit the destruction of pancreatic β-cells in H2O2-induced oxidative stress via the modulation of cellular signaling pathways. Materials and methods
RPMI-1640 media, fetal bovine serum (FBS), penicillin/streptomycin and trypsin-ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) were obtained from Gibco (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc., Waltham, MA, USA). Dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate (H2DCF-DA) and an apoptotic assay kit were obtained from Molecular Probes (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc.). 3-(4,5-Dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT), isopropyl alcohol, H2O2, Hoechst 33342, mitochondria isolation kit and the rat/mouse insulin enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kit (cat. no. EZRMI-13K) were purchased from Sigma-Aldrich (Merck Millipore, Darmstadt, Germany). Antibodies against c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK; dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 9252), phosphorylated (p)-JNK (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 9255S), extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK; dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 4695), p-ERK (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 9101S), p38 (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 9212), p-p38 (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 4631S), cleaved caspase-3 (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 9664S), nuclear factor (NF)-κB p65 (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. 3034), and horseradish peroxidase (HRP)-conjugated anti-rabbit immunoglobulin (Ig)G (dilution, 1:2,000; cat. no. 7074) were purchased from Cell Signaling Technology, Inc. (Beverly, MA, USA). Antibodies against β-actin (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. sc-47778), B-cell lymphoma 2 (Bcl-2; dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. sc-7382), Bcl-2-associated X protein (Bax; dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. sc-493), caspase-3 (dilution, 1:1,000; cat. no. sc-7272), apoptosis-inducing factor (dilution, 1:200; AIF; cat. no. sc-13116), cytochrome c (dilution, 1:200; cat. no. sc-7159), and HRP-conjugated goat anti-mouse IgG (dilution, 1:2,000; cat. no. sc-2005) were purchased from Santa Cruz Biotechnology, Inc. (Dallas, TX, USA). The RINm5F (CRL-11605; American Type Culture Collection, Manassas, VA, USA) cell line was a clone derived from the RIN-m rat islet cell line. The cells were kindly provided by Professor S. Y. Choi (Hallym University, Chuncheon, South Korea). All other chemicals were analytical grade. Preparation of samples
Dried fruiting bodies of I. obliquus (IO) were purchased from ChagaIn (Seoul, South Korea) and were pulverized in a blender. Ground mushroom (20 g) was subsequently extracted with distilled water (60 ml) at 121°C for 2 h. Extracts were centrifuged at 600 × g for 25 min at 4°C and were filtered through 0. 45 µm Whatman filter paper (Whatman 4) to remove insoluble matter prior to freeze-drying. The entire procedure was repeated three times. Polysaccharides were precipitated from the resuspended extracts using 95% ethanol, and were collected by filtration through 0. 45 µm Whatman filter paper. The supernatant precipitant was dialyzed using a dialysis tube (molecular weight cut-off, 12,400; Sigma-Aldrich; Merck Millipore) for 5 days to remove low-molecular-weight compounds. The extracted PFIO was then used for further experiments. The liquid culture broth of I. obliquus was filtered and centrifuged (600 × g, 25 min, 4°C) to remove fragments of debris. The supernatant was extracted in the same manner as PFIO. The extracted PLIO were then used for further experiments. RINm5F cells were maintained in RPMI-1640 medium supplemented with 10% inactivated FBS, 100 U/ml penicillin and 100 µg/ml streptomycin at 37°C in a humidified atmosphere containing 5% CO2. The cells were cultured to ~80% confluence and were harvested with 0. 25% trypsin-EDTA. The resulting cells were diluted appropriately for reseeding in culture petri dishes or in test plates. Cell viability assay
To determine the effects of PFIO and PLIO on cell viability the cells were treated with H2O2. Briefly, RINm5F cells were seeded in 12-well plates (2. 5×104 cells/well in 1 ml medium) and were incubated for 72 h. Subsequently, 300 µM H2O2 was added to the cells (for 2 h) that had been pretreated with or without PFIO or PLIO (1–100 µg/ml for 24 h). Cell viability was evaluated using the MTT assay. MTT solution (0. 5 ml) was added to each well, which was then incubated for 2 h at 37°C. The formazan crystals in each well were then dissolved in isopropyl alcohol, and the absorbance was measured at 595 nm using an ELISA microplate reader (model 550; Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc., Hercules, CA, USA). Intracellular ROS scavenging activity and image analysis
To determine the effects of PFIO and PLIO on oxidative stress-induced ROS generation, the cells were treated with or without PFIO or PLIO (1–100 µg/ml) for 20 h, and were then treated with 0. 3 mM H2O2 for 2 h. After 2 h, 5 µM H2DCF-DA solution in phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) was added to each well of the plate, which was incubated for 2 h at 37°C and the fluorescence was measured at excitation and emission wavelengths of 485 and 535 nm, respectively, using a microplate spectrofluorometer. Image analysis of intracellular ROS production was performed by seeding RINm5F β-cells in coverslip-loaded 12-well plates and treating in the aforementioned manner. After washing twice with PBS, the cells were mounted under glass coverslips using Vectashield (Brunschwig Chemie, Amsterdam, Netherlands) and the cells were observed. Images of the stained cells were captured using a fluorescence microscope (Nikon Corporation, Tokyo, Japan). Annexin V/propidium iodide (PI) staining
Cells undergoing apoptosis were identified using a fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC)-labeled Annexin V/PI apoptosis detection kit (Molecular Probes; Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc.) according to the manufacturer's protocol. PI can be used to differentiate necrotic, apoptotic and normal cells, since this agent cannot penetrate the membrane and is generally excluded from viable cells. Cells were pretreated with or without various concentrations of PFIO or PLIO (50 or 100 µg/ml) for 20 h, and/or were then treated with 0. 3 mM H2O2 for 2 h. Briefly, the cells were harvested with trypsin-EDTA, washed with PBS, and were centrifuged at 600 × g for 5 min to collect the cell pellet. The number of cells was adjusted to 1×106 cells/ml. The cells were then resuspended in binding buffer [10 mM HEPES, 140 mM NaCl, and 2. 5 mM CaCl2 (pH 7. 4)] and were stained with FITC-labeled Annexin V/PI at room temperature for 15 min in the dark. Flow cytometric analysis was performed using a FACSCalibur flow cytometer (BD Biosciences, San Jose, CA, USA). The percentage of apoptotic cells was calculated using Cell Quest software (version 4. 0.4; BD Biosciences). Cells in the early phase of apoptosis were Annexin V-positive and PI-negative; however, cells in the late stages of apoptosis were Annexin V-positive and PI-positive. The apoptotic index (%) was calculated as the sum of cells in the early and late phases of apoptosis divided by the total number of events. Hoechst 33342 staining
In order to examine the degree of nuclear condensation, the nuclear morphology of cells was evaluated using the cell-permeable, DNA-specific fluorescent dye Hoechst 33342. RINm5F cells were seeded in 24-well plates and incubated for 24 h. Cells were pretreated with or without various concentrations of PFIO or PLIO (50 or 100 µg/ml) for 20 h, and/or were then treated with 0. 3 mM H2O2 for 2 h. Cells were incubated for 30 min with 5 µg Hoechst 33342 (stock solution, 10 mg/ml), and were fixed for 20 min at room temperature in 4% formaldehyde. Images of the stained cells were collected using a Nikon fluorescence microscope in order to examine the degree of nuclear condensation. Cells with homogeneously stained nuclei were considered viable, whereas the presence of chromatin condensation and/or fragmentation was indicative of apoptosis. Measurement of caspase-3 activities
Caspase activity was determined with a fluorimetric assay using the enzyme substrate Z-DEVDAMC for caspase-3 (Molecular Probes; Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc.), which is specifically cleaved by the enzyme at the Asp residue to release the fluorescent group, 7-amino-4-methyl coumarin. Cells were pretreated with or without various concentrations of PFIO or PLIO (50 or 100 µg/ml) for 20 h, and/or were then treated with 0. 3 mM H2O2 for 2 h. Cells were harvested and processed according to the manufacturer's protocol. Fluorescence was measured continuously for a period of 60 min at multiple time points at 350 and 450 nm excitation and emission, respectively. Measurement of insulin secretion
To determine the amount of insulin secreted, cells were pretreated with or without various concentrations of PFIO or PLIO (50 or 100 µg/ml) for 20 h, and/or were then treated with 0. 3 mM H2O2 for 2 h. After incubation, 1 ml of Krebs-Ringer's bicarbonate buffer [115 mM NaCl, 4. 7 mM KCl, 2. 5 mM CaCl2, 1. 2 mM MgSO4, 1. 2 mM KH2PO4, 20 mM NaHCO3, 10 mM HEPES (pH 7. 4), and 0. 2% bovine serum albumin] was added for 30 min at 37°C, after which the cells were incubated in Krebs-Ringer's bicarbonate buffer containing 5 or 20 mM glucose for 2 h at 37°C. The cell culture medium was collected from the treated cells, and the level of insulin released into the medium was measured using a rat/mouse insulin ELISA kit according to the manufacturer's protocol. Preparation of subcellular fractions
After various treatments, the mitochondrial fraction was prepared using a mitochondria isolation kit (Sigma-Aldrich; Merck Millipore) according to the manufacturer's protocol. Briefly, after various treatments, cells were harvested and resuspended in 0. 65–2 ml lysis buffer. The homogenate was incubated on ice for 5 min, two volumes of 1X extraction buffer were added, and the solution was centrifuged at 600 × g for 10 min at 4°C. Following centrifugation, the supernatant was transferred to fresh 1. 5 ml tubes and centrifuged at 11,000 × g for 10 min at 4°C. The supernatant was removed, and the pellet was suspended in a CelLytic M cell lysis reagent with protease inhibitor cocktail (1:100; v/v). Nuclear extracts were prepared by lysing nuclei in a high salt buffer supplemented with protease and phosphatase inhibitors using a nuclear extraction kit (Affymetrix, Inc., Santa Clara, CA, USA) according to the manufacturer's protocol. Western blot analysis
The treated cells were washed in 1X PBS and were lysed in lysis buffer (10 mM Tris-HCl, pH 7. 5; 10 mM NaH2PO4/NaHPO4, pH 7. 5; 130 mM NaCl; 1% Triton X-100, 10 mM NaPPi; 1 mM phenylmethylsulphonyl fluoride; 2 µg/ml pepstatin A) for 30 min on ice. The lysates were centrifuged at 12,000 × g for 30 min at 4°C. The supernatant was collected, and protein content in the supernatant was measured using a Bio-Rad Protein Assay kit (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc.) prior to western blot analysis. The total or fractionated protein samples (50 µg per lane) were loaded and separated by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and transferred to polyvinylidene fluoride membranes. Membranes were blocked with 1. 5% skim milk in 1X Tris-buffered saline containing 0. 1% Tween 20 for 30 min, prior to incubation with the appropriate primary antibodies at 4°C overnight. Subsequently, the samples were incubated with HRP-conjugated secondary antibodies for 1 h at room temperature. An enhanced chemiluminescence kit (EMD Millipore, Billerica, MA, USA) was used to develop the luminescent signal. Experimental results are presented as the mean ± standard error of the mean, and were from at least three independent experiments. Statistical analysis was performed to evaluate significant differences using Student's t-test, or one-way analysis of variance and Duncan's multiple range tests (SAS version 9. 1; SAS Institute, Inc., Cary, NC, USA) for comparing multiple groups. P<0. 05 was considered to indicate a statistically significant different. Protective effects of PFIO and PLIO on H2O2-treated RINm5F cells
To determine the cytotoxic effects of PFIO and PLIO, cell viability was determined using the MTT assay. PFIO and PLIO did not cause any cytotoxicity at a 100 µg/ml concentration (Fig. 1A). Therefore, the maximum concentration of PFIO and PLIO used for follow-up studies was 100 µg/ml. In the present study, H2O2 was used to induce oxidative stress in RINm5F cells. To confirm the cytotoxicity of H2O2, it was added in various concentrations (10–700 µg/ml). H2O2 was able to induce oxidative stress in RINm5F cells, and decreased viability in a dose-dependent manner. Compared with the control group, the viability of RINm5F cells treated with 300 µg/ml H2O2 for 2 h was reduced by ~60% (Fig. 1B). Therefore, 2 h duration was selected for the exposure to 300 µg/ml H2O2. To evaluate whether PFIO and PLIO exerted protective effects on H2O2-treated cells, cells were pretreated with PFIO or PLIO. The viability of PFIO- and PLIO-treated cells increased; however, the protective effect of PFIO was greater than the effect of PLIO (Fig. 1C and D). Cell viability of RINm5F pancreatic β-cells. (A) To determine the non-toxic concentrations of PFIO and PLIO, cells were exposed to various concentrations of PFIO and PLIO (1–1,000 µg/ml) for 24 h. *P<0. 05 vs. the control group. (B) Cytotoxicity was examined following exposure to various concentrations of H2O2 for 2 h. *P<0. 05 vs. the control group. Protective effects of (C) PFIO and (D) PLIO in oxidative stress-damaged RINm5F pancreatic β-cells. Cell viability was determined by MTT assay. #P<0. 05 vs. the control group; *P<0. 05 vs. the H2O2-only treatment group. Data are presented as the mean ± standard error of the mean. C, control; N, H2O2 treatment alone; H2O2, hydrogen peroxide; PFIO, polysaccharides derived from Inonotus obliquus fruiting body; PLIO, polysaccharides derived from I. obliquus liquid culture broth. Inhibitory effects of PFIO and PLIO on ROS generation in H2O2-treated RINm5F cells
The inhibitory effects of PFIO and PLIO on H2O2-induced ROS generation in RINm5F β-cells was determined using the ROS-sensitive fluorescent probe, H2DCF-DA. H2DCF-DA is a cell-permeable dye that is diverted by intracellular esterase into its non-fluorescent form, DCFH. DCFH is not cell permeable and is oxidized by H2O2 to DCF. PFIO (100 µg/ml) exerted an inhibitory effect on H2O2-treated cells, as demonstrated by a decrease in intracellular ROS levels, which was similar to untreated controls (Fig. 2A). The inhibitory effects of PLIO on H2O2-treated cells were weaker compared with PFIO (Fig. 2B). Furthermore, the fluorescence intensity of H2DCF-DA was enhanced in the microscopic images of H2O2-treated RINm5F cells; however, the fluorescence intensity of cells pretreated with PFIO and PLIO was decreased (Fig. 2C). These data suggest that PFIO and PLIO may prevent H2O2-induced oxidative stress through the scavenging of intracellular ROS. In hibitory effects of PFIO and PLIO on H2O2-induced generation of ROS in RINm5F cells. Intracellular ROS scavenging activity of (A) PFIO and (B) PLIO. Data are presented as the mean ± standard error of the mean. #P<0. 05 vs. the control group; *P<0. 05 vs. the H2O2-only treatment group. (C) Intracellular ROS scavenging activity was investigated using the dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate method. ROS levels in RINm5F cells were determined by fluorescence microscopy. Magnification, ×400. C, control; N, H2O2 treatment alone; H2O2, hydrogen peroxide; PFIO, polysaccharides derived from Inonotus obliquus fruiting body; PLIO, polysaccharides derived from I. obliquus liquid culture broth; ROS, reactive oxygen species. Effects of PFIO and PLIO on H2O2-induced apoptosis of RINm5F cells
To evaluate whether the inhibitory effects of H2O2 on RINm5F β-cells were associated with apoptosis, double staining using FITC-labeled Annexin V and PI was performed by flow cytometry. The apoptotic rate was significantly increased to 35. 6% in RINm5F β-cells following treatment with H2O2 for 2 h; however, pretreatment with 100 µg/ml PFIO markedly inhibited H2O2-induced apoptosis in RINm5F β-cells, and the inhibitory effects of PLIO were also confirmed (Fig. 3A and B). To investigate DNA condensation and/or fragmentation in H2O2-induced apoptosis, chromatin in RINm5F β-cells was stained using Hoechst 33342. Only in RINm5F β-cells treated with H2O2 was microscopic DNA fragmentation detected. Pretreatment with 100 µg/ml PFIO or PLIO decreased H2O2-induced chromatin condensation, suggesting that PFIO and PLIO may exert protective effects on oxidative stress-induced apoptotic cell death in RINm5F β-cells by inhibiting DNA fragmentation (Fig. 3C). Effects of PFIO and PLIO on H2O2-induced apoptosis and inhibition of DNA fragmentation in RINm5F pancreatic cells. (A) Apoptotic cells were detected using Annexin V/PI double staining methods and were analyzed by flow cytometry. (B) Graph represents the percentage of apoptotic cells, quantified from the upper right plus lower right quadrants of (A). Data are presented as the mean ± standard error of the mean. #P<0. 05 vs. the control group; *P<0. 05 vs. the H2O2-only treatment group. (C) DNA fragmentation in RINm5F cells was determined by staining with fluorescent Hoechst 33342 dye. Magnification, ×200. C, control; N, H2O2 treatment alone; H2O2, hydrogen peroxide; PFIO, polysaccharides derived from Inonotus obliquus fruiting body; PLIO, polysaccharides derived from I. obliquus liquid culture broth; PI, propidium iodide. Effects of PFIO and PLIO treatment on the expression of mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) and apoptosis-associated proteins
A previous study demonstrated that the phosphorylation of MAPK proteins is associated with the regulation of mitochon-drial permeability-mediated activation of apoptotic proteins, including the Bcl-2 protein family and cytochrome c (18). To further confirm the effects of PFIO and PLIO on the H2O2-induced apoptosis of RINm5F β-cells, the present study detected the expression of phosphorylated proteins from the MAPK signaling pathway (ERK, JNK and p38) in RINm5F cells using western blot analysis. In cultured cells exposed to H2O2, the N group exhibited increased levels of p-MAPKs compared with the control. Conversely, pretreatment with 100 µg/ml PFIO or PLIO inhibited the H2O2-dependent phosphorylation of ERK. However, PFIO and PLIO did not alter the phosphorylation of JNK (Fig. 4A). Apoptosis is well known to occur via two pathways, the intrinsic and extrinsic pathways (18). The intrinsic pathway is associated with activation of the Bcl-2 family of proteins and the release of cytochrome c, whereas the extrinsic pathway is characterized by the activation of AIF, caspase-8 and caspase-10. The present study confirmed that pretreatment with 100 µg/ml PFIO or PLIO did not alter the activation of AIF compared with in the H2O2-only RINm5F cells (data not shown); however, treatment with H2O2 alone decreased the expression of Bcl-2 compared with the control, whereas treatment with H2O2 alone increased the expression of Bax compared to the control. Treatment with H2O2 alone increased mitochondrial release of cytochrome c into the cytosol compared with the control. However, treatment with 100 µg/ml PFIO or PLIO inhibited mitochondrial release of cytochrome c into the cytosol compared with the N group. Furthermore, pretreatment with PFIO increased the expression of Bcl-2 compared with the N group, whereas PFIO treatment decreased the expression of Bax compared to the N group (Fig. 4B). Effects of PFIO and PLIO on H2O2-induced apoptosis-associated protein expression in RINm5F pancreatic cells. Treated cells were harvested and lysates were prepared. (A) Expression levels of ERK, p-ERK, JNK, p-JNK, p38 and p-p38 were assessed by western blot analysis. (B) Expression levels of the Bcl-2 family of proteins and fractional Cyt. C were determined by western blot analysis. Equal loading of total proteins in each sample was confirmed by β-actin expression. C, control; N, H2O2 treatment alone; H2O2, hydrogen peroxide; PFIO, polysaccharides derived from Inonotus obliquus fruiting body; PLIO, polysaccharides derived from I. obliquus liquid culture broth; ERK, extracellular signal-regulated kinase; JNK, c-Jun N-terminal kinase; p-, phosphorylated; Bcl-2, B-cell lymphoma 2; Bax, Bcl-2-associated X protein; Cyt. C, cytochrome c; (C), cytosolic fraction; (M), mitochondrial fraction. Effects of PFIO and PLIO treatment on NF-κB translocation and caspase-3 activation
Caspase-3 is an important protein in the procession of apoptosis; therefore, the present study examined the activation of caspase-3 and its expression using a caspase-3 assay kit and western blot analysis. Initially, the effects of PFIO or PLIO on cleaved caspase-3 expression in RINm5F cells were determined. The expression level of cleaved caspase-3 in H2O2-treated cells was increased compared with the control. However, there were no marked differences in cleaved caspases-3 expression between the PFIO or PLIO groups and the N group (Fig. 5A). Caspase activity was also measured; treatment with 100 µg/ml PFIO or PLIO significantly inhibited H2O2-induced caspase-3 activity compared with the N group (Fig. 5B). NF-κB is involved in oxidative stress-induced cell death in several cell types (19). The present study examined the translocation of NF-κB from the cytosol to the nucleus, and demonstrated that H2O2 treatment of RINm5F cells increased the NF-κB p65 translocation from the cytosol into the nucleus. However, pretreatment with PFIO or PLIO in RINm5F cells prior to H2O2 treatment did not induce any change in the translocation of NF-κB p65 compared with the N group (Fig. 5C). Effects of PFIO and PLIO on the translocation of NF-κB and activation of caspase-3 in H2O2-treated RINm5F cells. Cells were harvested and the lysates were prepared. (A) Protein expression levels of caspase-3 and cleaved caspase-3 were determined by western blotting. Equal loading of total proteins in each sample was confirmed by β-actin expression. (B) To determine the effects of PFIO and PLIO on caspase-3 activity in RINm5F β-cells, preparation of cell lysates and measurement of caspase-3-like activity was performed using a caspase assay kit. Data are presented as the mean ± standard error of the mean. #P<0. 05 vs. the control group; *P<0. 05 vs. the H2O2-only treatment group. (C) Protein expression levels of fractional NF-κB were determined by western blotting. Equal loading of total proteins in each sample was confirmed by β-actin expression. C, control; N, H2O2 treatment alone; H2O2, hydrogen peroxide; PFIO, polysaccharides derived from Inonotus obliquus fruiting body; PLIO, polysaccharides derived from I. obliquus liquid culture broth; NF-κB, nuclear factor-κB; (C), cytosolic fraction; (N), nuclear fraction. Effects of PFIO and PLIO on insulin secretion of H2O2-treated RINm5F cells
To investigate whether PFIO and PLIO have potential for the prevention of H2O2-induced β-cell dysfunction in RINm5F rat insulinoma cells, the efficacy of insulin release was examined following pretreatment with PFIO or PLIO. Insulin secretion was measured using a rat/mouse insulin ELISA kit. Compared with H2O2-treated RINm5F cells, pretreatment with PFIO increased insulin secretion; however, pretreatment with PLIO did not increase insulin secretion (Fig. 6). Effects of PFIO and PLIO on insulin secretion in H2O2-induced RINm5F β-cells. After treatment, the supernatants were collected, and insulin release was measured using a rat/mouse insulin enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay kit. Data are presented as the mean ± standard error of the mean. #P<0. 05 vs. the control group; *P<0. 05 vs. the H2O2-only treatment group. C, control; N, H2O2 treatment alone; H2O2, hydrogen peroxide; PFIO, polysaccharides derived from Inonotus obliquus fruiting body; PLIO, polysaccharides derived from I. obliquus liquid culture broth. Increased exposure to H2O2 generates ROS, which induces exogenous stress in RINm5F cells. Excess ROS generation can be inhibited by natural antioxidants, as well as synthetic antioxidants, including butylated hydroxyanisole and butylated hydroxytoluene (20,21). However, synthetic antioxidants possess adverse side effects and toxicity compared with natural antioxidants (22). Therefore, there has been a gradual increase in demand for a safe substitute, such as antioxidants extracted from natural foods (23,24). Among natural foods, polysaccharides isolated from mushrooms have previously been reported to be bioavailable and non-toxic compounds that possess antioxidant activity (25–28). Therefore, the present study evaluated the anti-diabetic efficacy of a natural antioxidant isolated from I. obliquus on H2O2-induced generation of ROS in pancreatic β-cells. Treatment with H2O2 significantly decreased cell viability, which was restored by PFIO and PLIO pretreatment (Fig. 1C and D). Excessive ROS generation is associated with apoptosis, resulting in mitochondrial translocation of Bax, and the release of cytochrome c from the mitochondrial fraction to the cytosol. Subsequently, cytochrome c in the cytosol activates caspase-3, which has a crucial role in the apoptotic pathway. In the present study, H2O2 treatment of RINm5F cells increased the protein expression levels of the pro-apoptotic protein Bax and the release of cytochrome c from the mitochondria to the cytosol compared with the control, whereas H2O2 treatment in RINm5F cells decreased the expression levels of the anti-apoptotic protein Bcl-2 compared with the control, suggesting H2O2 treatment induced apoptosis of RIN5mF pancreatic cells (Fig. 4B). Among the various signaling pathways that respond to stress, MAPK family members are crucial for the maintenance of cells. It has been previously demonstrated that ERK is important for cell survival, whereas JNK and p38 are considered to be stress responsive and, thus, involved in apoptosis (29). The present study demonstrated that H2O2-induced apoptosis is prevented by pretreatment with PFIO and PLIO. According to the results of the present study, the H2O2-only group exhibited upregulation of MAPK phosphorylation and other distinct characteristics of apoptosis. However, pretreatment of cells with PFIO and PLIO reduced phosphorylation of MAPKs (Fig. 4A). Although the effects of the PLIO-treated group may seem insignificant, it did have efficacy. The translocation of NF-κB from the cytosol to the nucleus is associated with the phosphorylation of MAPK proteins. However, in the present study, H2O2-treated cells with or without PFIO and PLIO treatment did not induce marked changes in the levels of NF-κB nuclear translocation. The treatment of RINm5F cells with PFIO or PLIO would explain the effects on oxidative stress-induced cell damages independent of NF-κB activation (Fig. 5C). Finally, insulin secretion was significantly inhibited in RINm5F cells exposed to H2O (30,31). PFIO-treated cells exhibited a marked increase in insulin secretion compared with cells treated with PLIO (Fig. 6). In conclusion, the results of the present study demonstrated that PFIO and PLIO not only scavenged intracellular ROS but also downregulated the phosphorylation of ERK, which may lead to inhibition of cleaved caspase-3 in RINm5F pancreatic β-cells after H2O2-treatment. These effects may result in a decreased apoptotic cell rate. Therefore, these results indicated that since ROS scavenging in cells is important for cellular therapy, I. obliquus may be considered a potential therapeutic agent for the prevention of diabetes. The present study was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Biological Resources (NIBR), funded by the Ministry of Environment (MOE) of the Republic of Korea (grant no. NIBR201528101). 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OROVILLE — Butte County's Department of Public Health is launching a new campaign to identify Hepatitis C sufferers who may not even be aware they are infected. "Many cases of Hepatitis C go undetected because the person may be symptom-free for years," said Ellen Michels, county health education specialist, in a press release issued this week. "Our goal is to identify cases and help people get into treatment, as well as to teach prevention strategies to those who are at risk for infection," the press release continued. Hepatitis C is a viral illness that attacks the liver. It is spread through contact with infected blood. Injection drug users are at highest risk for new infections because they may share needles or other paraphernalia used for injecting drugs. The Department of Public Health is targeting drug treatment facilities for the HCV testing program in an effort to get the most "bang for the buck. " If infections can be identified and treated, transmission can be halted. Injection drug use is not the only way HCV is spread, however. The virus was not identified until 1989, and the blood supply was not screened until 1992, so anyone who received a blood transfusion or organ donation prior to that date could possibly be infected. It is estimated that 3. 2 million people in the United States have chronic HCV infection. For more information about the testing program call 895-6565 in Chico, or 538-7583 in Oroville. | 005_2934517 | {
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About 10 percent of electricity in the United States is fueled by enriched uranium originally produced in Russia for nuclear warheads, according to the National Nuclear Security Administration, which announced last week this fuel source will be used up this year. U.S. agents monitor Russian facilities that dilute highly-enriched uranium to low-enriched uranium suitable for use as fuel in the 104 operating U.S. nuclear plants. The U.S. then purchases the fuel under a 1994 contract that set aside $12 billion for the “Megatons to Megawatts” program. Russian agents monitor the U.S. use of the fuel. About half of the fuel now used in U.S. plants derives from dismantled Soviet warheads, according to NNSA, and about 95 percent of the fuel targeted under the agreement has been consumed. “By the end of 2013, NNSA will conclude transparency monitoring of HEU-LEU conversion activities in Russian nuclear facilities after having monitored the elimination of 500 MT of HEU—roughly equivalent to 20,000 nuclear weapons,” according to an NNSA press release. The U.S. is also blending down highly-enriched uranium from its own dismantled weapons, but is storing most of the resulting LEU, according to the World Nuclear Association. The expiration of imports of Russian fuel could affect the market for mined uranium. The “Megatons to Megawatts” program initially depressed uranium exploration, according to WNA, until the U.S. and Russia agreed on ways to handle the fuel so it would have less impact on uranium mining. Nuclear power met about 19 percent of U.S. electricity needs in 2011, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency. | 005_1117804 | {
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I was delighted when the Usability Professionals Association (UPA) chose sustainability as the theme for World Usability Day 2009 (WUD 2009). They even quoted the revised human-centred design standard, which I helped to draft, explaining how human-centred design can have a positive impact on sustainability. Recently we have been talking to some key people working in design and usability about how sustainability might influence design in the future. Human centred design can help promote sustainability
The sustainability theme is not completely my fault. But I was responsible for persuading my colleagues on the committee revising the human-centred design standard ISO 9241-210 to add the clause on sustainability, which was picked up by the UPA. Briefly, the standard explains how human-centred design can contribute to solving economic, social and environmental concerns:
- Economically, anything designed to match a users’ needs and abilities is more likely to be commercially successful. - Socially products designed using a human-centred approach are better for the wellbeing and engagement of their users, including users with disabilities. - Environmentally, human-centred design promotes a whole life cycle approach to design, including the longer term implications for users and therefore for the environment. Professor Ben Shneiderman, the user-interface guru from the University of Maryland, puts it another way:
There are two ways in which sustainability and Human Computer Interaction (HCI) cross over. The obvious one is in the design of technologies, whether it’s a power metre in your home or a display in your car that makes you more aware of your own energy consumption. And there is good evidence that those who are more aware of their consumption will change their patterns. The second way in which I think HCI bridges is through the social networks and media, for making people more aware of their energy consumption patterns. There is no particular device or technology, but we know that the theories of social contingent tell us that if I’m proud of my energy saving and I let people know in my social network, that idea will spread and spread and so people will change their behaviours. Sustainability in packaging design is now mainstream
Packaging is one area which has evolved dramatically over the last few years, and sustainability is now a mainstream concern. Excessive packaging is seen increasingly as negative, not only for retailers and consumers, but also for the environment. Or as Daniel Liden – Senior Designer at Chris Lefteri Design puts it:
Excessive packaging is really bad but you also have to understand I think that it’s a really crucial element of product design, which you can’t do without. But there are still a lot of things that you can do within packaging to make it better. Consumers are concerned but sceptical
Consumers now are more powerful than ever, the internet and social media have given them to tools to discover and share information more effectively than ever before. However, as Liz Edwards, Home Editor of the Consumers Association explains:
We know that people want very clear, substantiated evidence based green claims, and Green Wash so far, has really really hit peoples trust of green claims. So the first thing that needs to happen is companies need to stop exaggerating their green claims, because consumers are incredibly cynical already about them. What we need are accurate, evidence based green claims, in order to increase the amount of trust that consumers place in them. Companies that act now will gain competitive advantage
One of the interesting things about sustainability is that it is currently seen as an option, something good companies promote, but I think increasingly in the future there will be legislation to enforce suppliers to be more sustainable. Companies which start to view sustainability as integral to their business and their design process now will be ahead of the game when the legislation is enforced. John Thackara, Director, Doors of Perception and currently senior advisor on sustainability to the UK Design Council puts it like this:
I think companies that take the initiative in revealing the life stories of a product will be at a huge advantage in the future. The usability community could take the initiative and say that pretty soon now the total lifecycle of the product will be part of the information that the person buying it or procuring it will want to have. Where it came from, what materials were used to make it, how much energy it consumes, what happens to it when you no longer need it, all these things like recycling or reusing, they could be taken seriously before the client asks for it. World Usability Day reminds us that human-centred design provides a unique opportunity to change our approach to design and face up to our social, economic and environmental responsibilities. We’d love to hear what you think too, following the podcast there will be a short survey which we will analyse and report back on later this year. | 007_3621339 | {
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A single mutation helped last year’s flu virus gain an advantage over the vaccine
The 2014-2015 flu vaccine didn’t work as well compared to previous years because the H3N2 virus recently acquired a mutation that concealed the infection from the immune system. A new study reveals the major viral mutation responsible for the mismatch between the vaccine strain and circulating strains. The research will help guide the selection of viral strains for future seasonal flu vaccines. “Flu vaccines work best when they are similar to most circulating flu strains,” says senior study author Scott Hensley of the Wistar Institute.
“The World Health Organization recently recommended that a new H3N2 component should be incorporated into future formulations of seasonal flu vaccines. Our studies support this decision, since most circulating H3N2 strains are mismatched to the 2014-2015 vaccine strain. ”
Seasonal flu vaccines are designed to activate the immune system, but they are ineffective when viruses acquire mutations that help them evade the host’s defenses. Flu vaccines must be updated regularly because influenza viruses continuously acquire mutations in a surface protein called hemagglutinin, which is targeted by antibodies in the infected host. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, last season’s flu vaccine was less than 20% effective at preventing medical visits associated with seasonal influenza illness, compared with up to 60% effectiveness of other seasonal flu vaccines during the past 10 years. Although previous studies revealed a mismatch between the H3N2 vaccine strain and most H3N2 strains circulating in the Northern Hemisphere during the 2014-2015 season, until now, it was not clear exactly which viral mutations were responsible for this mismatch. To answer this question, Hensley and his team applied a reverse-engineering approach to convert the 2014-2015 H3N2 vaccine strain into a panel of H3N2 strains with hemagglutinin mutations that are present in currently circulating H3N2 strains. They then examined whether these viruses would be recognized by antibodies present in blood samples taken from ferrets and sheep that had been exposed to the H3N2 vaccine strain. They found that a single mutation in the F159S amino acid residue of hemagglutinin decreased antibody recognition by as much as 75% compared with antibody recognition of the unaltered H3N2 vaccine strain. The researchers then performed tests with blood samples taken from humans before and after immunization with the 2014-2015 vaccine. They found that vaccination was significantly less effective at increasing antibody recognition of the F159S-mutant strain compared with the unaltered vaccine strain. Taken together, the findings show that a single viral mutation could largely explain the ability of flu strains to get past the 2014-2015 flu vaccine. “We find that some human immune responses are heavily focused on single regions of the flu virus and that single viral mutations can evade these immune responses,” Hensley says. “Influenza viruses might have evolved in a way that promotes the generation of narrow immune responses that are easy to circumvent via single viral mutations. ”
Hensley and his team are now examining whether the new 2015-2016 H3N2 vaccine strain elicits robust immune responses to the different types of H3N2 strains that are currently circulating. To guide the design of subsequent vaccines, they are also attempting to predict how flu viruses might mutate in the future. In the meantime, Hensley urges the public to continue to get annual flu vaccines. “Most years, vaccine strains are well matched to most circulating strains, and seasonal flu vaccines are usually more effective,” he says. “The best way to prevent flu infection is by getting a flu vaccine. ”
Chambers, B., Parkhouse, K., Ross, T., Alby, K., & Hensley, S. (2015). Identification of Hemagglutinin Residues Responsible for H3N2 Antigenic Drift during the 2014–2015 Influenza Season Cell Reports DOI: 10. 1016/j. celrep. 2015. 06. 005 | 011_1268199 | {
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Pioneer graves help to create a sense of history when visiting the Original Maryborough site, known as the Wide Bay Village, it was first settled by Aldridge and the Palmer Brothers in 1848, although George Furber had set up a store and wharf on the opposite bank a year earlier. It was largely abandoned by the mid 1850s in favour of the deeper port downstream, the city’s current location. The town was renamed Maryborough in January 1849 after the death of the Governor’s wife, Lady Mary Fitzroy. Located on the banks of the Mary River, about four kilometres from the city centre, the 30 hectare site has interpretive signage, walkways and trails along the creek frontage, pioneer graves, picnic tables, barbecue facilities and toilets. Images courtesy Judy Sumner and Picturesque Maryborough | 000_4805671 | {
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Birds at Mingarry
The site has over 20 species of resident woodland and garden birds, including siskins, chaffinches, greenfiches, gold finches, bullfinches, treecreepers, coal tits, blue tits, great tits, redpolls, song thrushes, mistle thrushes, blackbirds, robins, wrens, greater spotted woodpeckers, jays, sparrowhawks, and tawny owls. Summer visitors included willow warblers, black caps, cuckoos and swallows. Brambling have also been recorded on site. Ravens and buzzards can be seen soaring overhead, and the evocative trills of curlew and dunlin and the ringing whistle of greenshanks drift in from the Moss. Hen harriers can sometimes be seen flying in the distance over the Moss. Occasionally, golden eagles can be soaring high over the surrounding hills. Moidart, Ardnamurchan and Beyond
The Ardnamurchan area is real birder’s paradise with its rich avifauna. In addition to golden eagle and hen harrier, raptors sightings include white-tailed eagle, osprey, buzzard, , peregrine falcon, kestrel, merlin, goshawk and red kite. Corvids include hooded crow, jackdaw, jay, magpie and raven. All three divers are represented, with red throated and black throated divers as summer visitors in the freshwater or sea lochs of the region. The great northern diver, although in greater numbers in winter, can also been seen along the coast in summer. Swans and geese include barnacle goose, Canada goose, greylag goose, Greenland white fronted goose (winter visitor), mute swan and whooper swan (winter visitor). Red breasted merganser and eider duck are common sightings in sea lochs and along the coast, whilst goosander are found mainly in freshwater lochs. Auks are represented by black guillemot, guillemot, puffin and razorbill, whilst the petrels include fulmar and manx shearwater. Gulls include black headed gull, common gull, great black backed gull, herring gull, kittiwate, Iceland gull and lesser black backed gull. Skuas include Artic skua, great skua and pomarine skua. Waders are represented by common sandpiper, green sandpiper, black-tailed godwit, curlew, dunlin, greenshank, oystercatcher, snipe, red necked phalarope, redshank, ringed plover and turnstone, Amongst the grebes, great crested grebe, little grebe and Slavonian grebe have been recorded. In addition to willow warbler and blackcap, other warblers include arctic warbler, chiffchaff, grasshopper warbler, sedge warbler, whitethroat and wood warbler. Bunting sightings include corn bunting, reed bunting, rustic bunting, snow bunting and yellowhammer. Chats and thrushes are well represent by stonechat, wheatear, whinchat and ring ousel in heath or upland habitats, whilst the redstart is found in oak woodland. Pigeons and doves include collared dove, rock dove, stock dove and wood pigeon, whilst the grouse family is represented by back grouse, ptarmigan and red grouse. Swallows, house martin and sand martins may be seen swirling across land and freshwater, whilst swift are occasionally seen screaming high in the sky with their distinctive fast and aerobatic flight. Add to these, crossbill, dipper, linnet, gannet, kingfisher, lapwing, little egret, nightjar, golden plover, skylark, spotted flycatcher, twite, waxwing and woodcock. These are just a few of the avian delights that await you. A trip to the Treshnish Isles, an archipelago of small islands and skerries, also affords the opportunity to experience breeding seabird colonies up close. A truly memorable experience. | 000_2792523 | {
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What’s the difference between concept mapping and mind mapping? These two types of visual mapping look very similar, which tends to cause a lot of confusion among people who are just learning about them. Here is a detailed comparison of these two popular types of diagramming and their uses in business:
Definition: A concept map or conceptual diagram is a diagram that depicts suggested relationships between concepts. It is a graphical tool that instructional designers, engineers, technical writers, and others use to organize and structure knowledge. Visual structure: A concept map typically represents ideas and information as boxes or circles, which it connects with labeled arrows in a downward-branching hierarchical structure. The relationship between concepts can be articulated in linking phrases such as causes, requires, or contributes to. One thing that makes concept maps different than mind maps is that a topic can have multiple parents and children. That makes it ideal for modeling complex relationships between pieces of information. The main application of concept mapping is knowledge representation. Characteristics of concept maps:
- Are commonly used to organize and represent tacit knowledge. - Usually contain general concepts at the top of the map, with more specific concepts arrayed hierarchically below. - Connector lines usually contains keywords or phrases that summarize the relationship between the topics they connect. Such as topic a “causes” topic B.
- Topics may be cross-linked with each other to depict more complex relationships between topics. Topics in mind maps may only have one parent; in a concept map, a topic may have multiple connector lines, each one representing a different relationship. NEW – Concept mapping resource list: Want to know more about concept maps and their use in business? I’ve created an information-packed resource list that includes:
- A selection of articles about business applications of concept mapping,
- A list of programs that enable you to produce concept maps,
- Examples of business-focused concept maps, and
- Books about concept mapping. Definition: A mind map is a diagram used to visually organize information. A mind map is hierarchical and shows relationships among pieces of the whole. It is often created around a single concept, drawn as an image in the center of a blank page, to which associated representations of ideas such as images, words and parts of words are added. Major ideas are connected directly to the central concept, and other ideas branch out from those. Visual structure: A central topic declares the subject of the mind map. First-level topics, sometimes known as “basic ordering ideas,” define the scope of the topic to be covered by the mind map. Sub-topivcs radiating from them are known as “child topics. ” A mind map may contain as many layers of topics and subtopics needed to met the mind map’s purpose. Topics may be embellished with shape colors, fonts, size and ciolor. In addition, icons and images can be attached to mind maps. Characteristics of mind maps:
- Tend to be more flexible and personal than concept maps. - Are used to slice and dice the map’s central topic or concept in multiple ways. - May contain images and color, to make them more visually stimulating
- Topics may only have a single parent
Related article: How to use concept mapping to represent business knowledge | 007_2190189 | {
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From the start of the HIV epidemic, it appeared that some of the people who were infected with the virus were able to ward off the fatal effects of the disease longer than others. Recent studies have begun to unravel the cause of this phenomenon, and new research suggests that African Americans with the disease have a unique survival advantage if they have both a low white blood cell count (known as leukopenia) and a genetic variation that is found mainly in persons of African ancestry. This study was prepublished online on July 20, 2009, in Blood, the official journal of the American Society of Hematology.
The research showed that African Americans with HIV who possess both a variation in the gene for the Duffy antigen receptor for chemokine (DARC) and leukopenia have slower HIV-to-AIDS progression rates than HIV-infected European Americans with leukopenia. Previous studies showed that the same DARC variant conferred protection for persons of African ancestry against a particular form of malaria, and that persons of African descent have, on average, lower white blood cell (WBC) counts than persons of European ancestry. Leukopenia is one of several blood conditions observed frequently in patients with HIV-1 infection, but its impact on disease course is relatively unknown. “Even though leukopenia is tied to both African ancestry and faster disease progression, we found that compared with European Americans, African American patients with HIV who have leukopenia do not necessarily experience this expected outcome,” said lead author Sunil Ahuja, MD, of the Veterans Administration (VA) Research Center for AIDS and HIV-1 Infection and the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio.
This study evaluated data from the Air Force subset of the U.S. Military’s HIV Natural History Study and included genetic and clinical data from 1,132 participants. The researchers tested for the presence of the DARC variation and evaluated patients’ WBC counts from diagnosis and throughout the course of the disease to determine the impact of different levels of WBC counts on survival rates. The prevalence of leukopenia at the time of diagnosis was significantly higher in African Americans (28 percent) than in European Americans (15 percent) or other ethnicities (13 percent). The average WBC counts were also significantly lower during the course of the disease in African Americans with HIV than in other ethnicities. The researchers found that leukopenia was generally associated with a faster disease progression from HIV to AIDS, independent of known predictors of AIDS development. “On average, leukopenic European Americans progressed nearly three times faster than their non-leukopenic African or European counterparts,” explained Hemant Kulkarni, MD, first author of this study. “However, leukopenic African Americans had a slower disease course than leukopenic European Americans, even though twice as many African Americans in the study had leukopenia. ”
The investigators found that the DARC variation, not race, explained the differences in WBC counts in African Americans with HIV. Among those who were leukopenic, only those with the DARC variation experienced a significant survival benefit. Additionally, this survival advantage became increasingly pronounced in those with progressively lower WBC counts, suggesting that the interaction between DARC and WBC counts was the primary influence on slowing HIV disease progression in African Americans.
“The results of this collaborative study highlight the importance of accounting for other factors, such as the white blood cell count, to uncover the full effects of genetic variations that may influence HIV disease course,” said Capt. Gregory Martin, MD, United States Navy, program director for the Infectious Diseases Clinical Research Program (IDCRP) and an expert on infectious diseases who was not involved with the study. “White blood cells are intricately linked to inflammation, and inflammation is known to fuel HIV disease progression. Thus, future studies will need to decipher whether the interaction between the DARC variant and low white blood cell counts results in a reduced inflammatory state,” said Vincent Marconi, MD, of the IDCRP. Source: American Society of Hematology
Explore further: The adaptability of pathogens | 004_2062266 | {
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It isn’t Spring until the cliff swallows (Petrochelidon pyrrhonota) return to Cabrillo, a community college located in the hills along the Central Coast. Like their famous counterparts, the legendary swallows of Capistrano, these winged harbingers of warmer weather regularly return to campus every March. Although their migration schedule stays the same, recent research shows some swallows that prefer to nest in man made structures—instead of the cliff-side dwellings they are named for—may be changing their wingspans to increase their survival rates. One of the people who await the campus arrival of the iridescent blue-backed birds is Michelle Merrill, an adjunct professor of anthropology. The “scouts” start showing up in early March to start building nests, says Merrill. They’ll stay through August, until the young are ready to make the long trek back to South America.
On the Cabrillo campus, Merrill points out the gourd-shaped nests found in clusters tucked under the second-story eaves of the library, bicycle co-op, and cafeteria buildings. The area is unofficially called the “Plaza de las Golondrinas,” says Merrill, the Spanish translation for plaza of the swallows. Each nest is made of mud, one almond-sized daub at a time, then lined with grass. The male and female of nesting pairs both contribute to building the labor-intensive structure, she says. At Cabrillo, the birds ferry their beaks full of mud from the well-watered football field nearby. The swallows may take hundreds of trips to complete a new nest. With that kind of work, it’s no wonder the birds reuse nests built in previous years—as long as their former homes haven’t hosted too many parasites in the meantime. “At a distance, I can tell the swallows apart from other birds by their flight pattern,” says Merrill. “They zip and dart, changing direction really fast. ” Those aerial maneuvers allow the birds to catch their insect meals in mid-flight. But, when these birds nest in bridges and highway overpasses, their flying skills may be no match for the vehicle traffic that shares the same habitat. Swallows that nest in these risky places often get recorded as roadkill. The nests are so commonplace in overhead roadway structures that CalTrans studied ways to prevent cliff swallows from building mud-dwellings there. The birds’ presence prevents repair work during nesting season. Even though cliff swallows aren’t an endangered species, their migration route across two continents makes them eligible for protection under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act; it’s illegal to remove their nests from February 15 to September 1 without a permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Although CalTrans tried construction with special slippery siding and broadcasting distressed bird calls, the swallows didn’t change their nesting spots. But, living in proximity to the cars may have changed their genes, say researchers Charles R. Brownand Mary Bomberger Brown in a 18 March paper published in Current Biology.
After following the cliff swallows for three decades and consistently logging data on roadkills in a specific area of southwestern Nebraska, the two scientists noticed a steady decline in the number of swallows killed by cars—despite an increase in the population overall. Moreover, the Browns discovered that among the dead birds they collected, those with longer wingspans were killed more often than their shorter-winged kin. The researchers noted factors other than short-wing selection could be at play, such as learned avoidance of cars, selection against risk-taking birds, or changes in food sources. But with thirty years of data, they theorized that survival of swallows with shorter wing spans could be creating a population shift. The short-winged swallows could be better able to accelerate straight upward or “pivot away” if threatened by a moving car; therefore, more short-winged birds would survive to reproduce and pass along their genes. If the cliff swallows are changing as a result of their urban nesting preferences, they’ll join other avians—such as the high-rise nesting peregrine falcons—adapting to man made environments and increasing their survival. That’s a Spring herald worth waiting for. | 000_6641247 | {
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The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has found elevated mercury levels in largemouth bass during routine testing of lakes on the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. The refuge has issued an advisory which warns people to limit their consumption of bass from these lakes. The advisory recommends that people over the age of seven should limit their consumption of largemouth bass from the refuge to two meals a month with serving portions not to exceed 8 ounces. Pregnant women and young children should not eat the bass. Tissue samples from largemouth bass taken from lakes on the refuge indicated that the mercury level exceeds recommended levels for human health consumption. Warnings are posted at the lakes and additional detailed information is being distributed at the refuge's Visitor Center.According to the Environmental Protection Agency, almost all fish contain some levels of mercury. Fish absorb mercury when they feed on aquatic organisms. The mercury in the bass causes no problem with safety of the water for drinking or contact with skin. The Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge has thirteen lakes open for public fishing. At this time, Service scientists do not know the source of the mercury. However, it may be from gold mining operations conducted in the late 1800's, natural levels in the geological formations at the refuge, or from atmospheric contamination. Follow Us Online
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Research gives sperm a boost
Dr. Kirsty Horey
Progress Educational Trust13 February 2006
Scientists in the US have discovered what gives sperm cells the burst of energy they need to be able to reach and penetrate an egg. Researchers at the Boston Children's Hospital and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute measured the electrical activity taking place in a single sperm cell. Reported in the journal Nature, the study, undertaken by Drs Yuriy Kirichok and Betsy Navarro, was the first to measure the currents that flow across the sperm's outer membrane. The ability to measure these electrical currents has also enabled the researchers to study the role of CatSper, a protein that is vital for male fertility. CatSper is only found in the tails of mature sperm, but it has never been proved what the protein was needed for or how it works. Previous studies have shown that mice lacking the CatSper protein were infertile because their sperm were poor swimmers and were unable to penetrate the protective outer membranes of the egg. The new studies, which directly measured electrical activity conducted by sperm, showed that CatSper is a key channel by which calcium ions enter the sperm's tail. Electrical activity has long been known to be important in sperm cells, and scientists have tried unsuccessfully to measure electrical currents for twenty years, said Dr Kirichok. The influx of calcium influx, measurable as an electrical current, was found to 'hyperactivate' the sperm, giving them a burst of power and energy needed in order for them to reach and penetrate the egg. The electrical current was detectable in sperm from normal mice, but not in sperm from mice that lacked CatSper. The chemical change was found to convert the steady undulating motion of the sperm's tail into a 'whip-cracking snap'. The findings suggest that future research could focus on using CatSper as a target for developing a male contraceptive. 'If they find something that blocks the current, it could be used as a male contraceptive', said Dr Navarro, adding 'before, people didn't know what the exact target was, and didn't have a system to test drugs'. However, the challenge, she said, would be to develop a drug that blocks only CatSper and not other calcium channels, which occur throughout the body. Further testing showed that CatSper is triggered by alkaline conditions inside sperm cells, which make it open its 'gates' to calcium. The next step for the researchers is to find out what causes these alkaline conditions, said Dr Kirichok, adding that 'quite possibly the sperm senses something released by the egg'. Previous attempts to measure electrical currents have failed, because it has proved to be too difficult to get a tight enough seal between the sperm's outer membrane and the pipette used. But the scientists found that they could use a bubble found just below a sperm's head - which enabled tight contact to be made with the pipette via a process known as 'patch clamping'. The ability to 'patch clamp' sperm and study its electrical activity will allow the scientists to measure other aspects of the sperm's behaviour, the functions of which are currently unknown. For example, other calcium channels may be involved in the process in which sperm releases enzymes that dissolve the barrier around the egg, said Dr Kirichok.
The research may also help in understanding and treating some forms of male infertility. Dr Allan Pacey, senior lecturer at the University of Sheffield, said that 'we know that hyperactivation is crucial to successful fertilisation, and we suspect that in some men this might be why they have difficulty in conceiving with their partners'. He added: 'if we could better understand the molecules involved in that process we might be able to diagnose the problem earlier and therefore save the couple both time and heartache'. Reproduced with permission from BioNews, an email and online sources of news, information and comment on assisted reproduction and genetics. | 007_3631148 | {
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How to Start a Woodfire
There is nothing quite like the crackling warmth of a wood fire. A blazing fireplace can add heat and ambiance to a room. Campers can rely on the bounty of dead wood in most forests to cook or heat with. Wood is a sustainable alternative to other fuels used for heating or cooking. Learning to utilize wood by building a woodfire is an important skill for anyone that wishes to move away from petroleum based fuel. It isn't hard to start a fire, though quite a few people become frustrated when their fires do not blaze instantly. With the right materials a fire can be started by anyone. A dry spot
Thin sticks (kindling)
(The directions for creating the fire will be the same for a fireplace, woodstove, or a campfire. A campfire will require a bit more work, as you will sometimes need to clear out the spot for the fire. This is accomplished by raking the area clear of leaves, pine needles, or other debris that is flammable. Clear at least a 5 ft by 5 ft area around the place you plan to build the fire. If possible, dig a small pit – it can be only a few inches deep. Try to have the pit at least 6 inches deep. Ring with dry stones, never use stones from a creek. As the rocks heat up the water content inside of them can cause the rocks to explode. When you have finished camping, you can use the stones to place inside of the small pit, covering your traces. )
My favorite method for setting up a fire is to use a 'tee-pee' type structure. Use the small sticks you have, called kindling, to build the first part of the tee-pee. Leave a small opening in one side, enough to place your tinder inside. Use larger wood to create a second tee-pee around the first, again leaving a small opening. Place your tinder inside of the opening. Tinder is fluffy, dry material that catches fire easily. This can be old punky wood, cotton balls soaked with vaseline, or any other dry, light material. (For a fireplace, do not place the larger wood in yet. Wait until the kindling is burning well and place larger wood on top of the fire. )
Using a match, light the tinder. You may light it in several places to speed along the burning. This will also help the fire burn evenly around the edges. As the fire becomes larger, feed small bits of kindling in through the opening until the fire becomes large enough to catch the tee-pee of kindling. Once the fire has reached the kindling and is burning well, begin to add large wood. For a campfire this will be thick branches (usually). Woodstoves and fireplaces will take split wood. Each time the fire catches the next level of wood size you may progress further. The last step would be to add log size chunks. If the fire seems to die down, you may always add small wood or kindling to feed the coals or small flames. Once you get the hang of it, these steps will go by very quickly. Enjoy your wood fires! More by this Author
When you have Lupus or any auto-immune disorder, you have choices for treatment. You can visit a doctor, multiple doctors is the most likely scenerio, or you can forgo the prescriptions and treat yourself. Earlier.. . SLE or systemic lupus erythematosus is an auto immune disease that attacks the system. The symptoms are many and varied, which cause SLE to often go undiagnosed for decades. Some people with the disorder are never. . . I'm not going to get into the whole Chick-Fil-A debate. I'm not even going to talk about the OMGABOMINATION of QLTBG rights. Oops, I may have show which side I'm on in that argument by referring to LGBT as QLTBG, a. . . No comments yet. | 010_5443884 | {
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The food police may find this hard to take, but chocolate has gotten a bad rap. People say it causes acne, that you should eat carob instead, that it's junk food. But these accusations are not only undeserved and inaccurate, they falsely incriminate a delicious food that turns out to have profoundly important healing powers. There is in fact a growing body of credible scientific evidence that chocolate contains a host of heart-healthy and mood-enhancing phytochemicals, with benefits to both body and mind. For one, chocolate is a plentiful source of antioxidants. These are substances that reduce the ongoing cellular and arterial damage caused by oxidative reactions. You may have heard of a type of antioxidants called polyphenols. These are protective chemicals found in plant foods such as red wine and green tea. Chocolate, it turns out, is particularly rich in polyphenols. According to researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, the same antioxidant properties found in red wine that protect against heart disease are also found in comparable quantities in chocolate. How does chocolate help to prevent heart disease? The oxidation of LDL cholesterol is considered a major factor in the promotion of coronary disease. When this waxy substance oxidizes, it tends to stick to artery walls, increasing the risk of a heart attack or stroke. But chocolate to the rescue! The polyphenols in chocolate inhibit oxidation of LDL cholesterol. And there's more. One of the causes of atherosclerosis is blood platelets clumping together, a process called aggregation. The polyphenols in chocolate inhibit this clumping, reducing the risks of atherosclerosis. High blood pressure is a well known risk factor for heart disease. It is also one of the most common causes of kidney failure, and a significant contributor to many kinds of dementia and cognitive impairment. Studies have shown that consuming a small bar of dark chocolate daily can reduce blood pressure in people with mild hypertension. Why are people with risk factors for heart disease sometimes told to take a baby aspirin every day? The reason is that aspirin thins the blood and reduces the likelihood of clots forming (clots play a key role in many heart attacks and strokes). Research performed at the department of nutrition at the University of California, Davis, found that chocolate thins the blood and performs the same anti-clotting activity as aspirin. "Our work supports the concept that the chronic consumption of cocoa may be associated with improved cardiovascular health," said UC Davis researcher Carl Keen.
How much chocolate would you have to eat to obtain these benefits? Less than you might think. According to a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, adding only half an ounce of dark chocolate to an average American diet is enough to increase total antioxidant capacity 4 percent, and lessen oxidation of LDL cholesterol. Why, then, has chocolate gotten such a bum reputation? It's the ingredients we add to it. Nearly all of the calories in a typical chocolate bar are sugar and fat. As far as fats go, it's the added fats that are the difficulty, not the natural fat (called cocoa butter) found in chocolate. Cocoa butter is high in saturated fat, so many people assume that it's not good for your cardiovascular system. But most of the saturated fat content in cocoa butter is stearic acid, which numerous studies have shown does not raise blood cholesterol levels. In the human body, it acts much like the monounsaturated fat in olive oil. Milk chocolate, on the other hand, contains added butterfat which can raise blood cholesterol levels. And it has less antioxidants and other beneficial phytochemicals than dark chocolate. Does chocolate contribute to acne? Milk chocolate has been shown to do so, but I've never heard of any evidence incriminating dark chocolate. Dark chocolate is also healthier because it has less added sugar. I'm sure you don't need another lecture on the dangers of excess sugar consumption. But if you want to become obese and dramatically raise your odds of developing diabetes, heart disease, cancer and Alzheimer's disease, foods high in sugar (including high fructose corn syrup) are just the ticket. Are chocolate's benefits limited to the health of the body? Hardly. Chocolate has long been renown for its remarkable effects on human mood. We are now beginning to understand why. Chocolate is the richest known source of a little-known substance called theobromine, a close chemical relative of caffeine. Theobromine, like caffeine, and also like the asthma drug theophylline, belong to the chemical group known as xanthine alkaloids. Chocolate products contain small amounts of caffeine, but not nearly enough to explain the attractions, fascinations, addictions, and effects of chocolate. The mood enhancement produced by chocolate may be primarily due to theobromine. Chocolate also contains other substances with mood elevating effects. One is phenethylamine, which triggers the release of pleasurable endorphins and potentates the action of dopamine, a neurochemical associated with sexual arousal and pleasure. Phenethylamine is released in the brain when people become infatuated or fall in love. Another substance found in chocolate is anandamide (from the Sanskrit word "ananda," which means peaceful bliss). A fatty substance that is naturally produced in the brain, anandamide has been isolated from chocolate by pharmacologists at the Neurosciences Institute in San Diego. It binds to the same receptor sites in the brain as cannabinoids -- the psychoactive constituents in marijuana -- and produces feelings of elation and exhilaration. (If this becomes more widely known, will they make chocolate illegal? )
If that weren't enough, chocolate also boosts brain levels of serotonin. Women typically have lower serotonin levels during PMS and menstruation, which may be one reason women typically experience stronger cravings for chocolate at these times in their cycles. People suffering from depression so characteristically have lower serotonin levels that an entire class of anti-depressive medications called serotonin uptake inhibitors (including Prozac, Paxil, and Zooloft) have been developed that raise brain levels of serotonin. Since I am known as an advocate of healthy eating, I'm often asked about my food indulgences. One of my favorite desserts is a piece of dark organic chocolate, along with a glass of a fine red wine. I do have a policy, though, to eat only organic and/or fair trade chocolate. This is because of what I have learned about child slavery in the cocoa trade. May your life be full of healthy pleasures. John Robbins is the author of many bestsellers including "The Food Revolution: How Your Diet Can Help Save Your Life and Our World," the classic "Diet For A New America," and "The New Good Life: Living Better Than Ever in an Age of Less." He is the recipient of the Rachel Carson Award, the Albert Schweitzer Humanitarian Award, the Peace Abbey's Courage of Conscience Award, and Green America's Lifetime Achievement Award. To learn more about his work, visit www. johnrobbins. info
Follow John Robbins on Twitter: www. twitter. com/johnrobbinsnow | 002_5584973 | {
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LOUNT, SAMUEL, blacksmith, surveyor’s assistant, businessman, politician, and rebel; b. 24 Sept. 1791 in Catawissa, Pa, eldest son of Gabriel Lount and Philadelphia Hughes; m. 1815 Elizabeth Soules, and they had seven children; hanged 12 April 1838 in Toronto.
Samuel Lount first came to Upper Canada when his father brought the family to Whitchurch Township in 1811, but he returned to Pennsylvania on business and spent the duration of the War of 1812 in the United States. Returning to Whitchurch in 1815, for the next three years Lount studied blacksmithing and he became an excellent craftsman. In the fall of 1818 he moved to Newmarket, where he kept a tavern for two years. During that time Lount, who was a skilled woodsman, assisted his brother George in the surveying of West Gwillimbury, Tecumseth, and Innisfil townships. He also explored the Nottawasaga River for the government in preparation for settlement. Lount next lived in Whitchurch for about a year and a half, and then moved to the Holland Landing area. He was primarily a blacksmith, helping to build the first steamboat on Lake Simcoe, the Sir John Colborne, but he also kept a store in partnership with George for several years, and during the last two years of his life he was a farmer. An extremely generous man, Lount was sought out by many who immigrated to the Lake Simcoe region. He provided advice and assistance without thought of compensation and became one of the most highly respected settlers in the area. This stature led to offers of public office and requests that he become a candidate for the House of Assembly, but Lount preferred to remain in the background. He turned down the position of registrar of lands for Simcoe County in favour of George, and when asked to run for the assembly in 1828 he declined and supported John Cawthra.
In 1834 Lount was persuaded to run for Simcoe County and was successful. With his strong concern for his fellow man, he gravitated to the reformers, and he became a friend and ally of William Lyon Mackenzie*. In the election of 1836 Lount was defeated by William Benjamin Robinson*, who was assisted by what the reformers felt were corrupt practices on the part of the provincial executive, and he became disillusioned with normal political processes. He thus participated in the political union movement of the summer and fall of 1837 which was designed to pressure the British government to effect reforms. In the fall Lount was one of the small number of locally prominent men whom Mackenzie approached with a scheme to replace the provincial government with one responsive to the needs of the people. Lount eagerly agreed to the plan, which involved a march on Toronto on 7 December, because he was assured by Mackenzie that it could be accomplished without bloodshed and would have the approval of prominent supporters of the government. He used his popularity in the area south of Lake Simcoe to influence many others to join the march. When a message from Dr John Rolph* urged that the uprising be advanced to 4 December to forestall rumoured preparations by the government, Lount led one of the first parties to reach Montgomery’s Tavern, north of Toronto, the headquarters selected by Mackenzie.
Lount was at the centre of activity until the rebellion failed on the 7th. However, the deaths of a rebel and a loyalist on the first night gave him strong misgivings about the venture. Despite Mackenzie’s opposition, he attempted to get medical aid for the dying loyalist, Colonel Robert Moodie. On 5 December, Lount and David Gibson* stopped Mackenzie from burning Sheriff William Botsford Jarvis*’s house as he had burned the home of Dr Robert Charles Horne.
When loyalist forces dispersed the rebels on 7 December, Lount tried to flee to the United States. He and another man attempted to row across Lake Erie but were blown back and arrested as possible smugglers. Accused of treason, Lount pleaded guilty and petitioned for mercy. Despite supporting petitions bearing thousands of signatures, Lieutenant Governor Sir George Arthur* and the Executive Council decided that some examples had to be made and condemned him to death. Lount and Peter Matthews were executed on 12 April 1838 in the courtyard of the Toronto jail. The government then confiscated Lount’s small amount of property. [One of the best sources of information on Lount’s life is a letter written by his wife Elizabeth. This appears in the Mackenzie–Lindsey papers, Mackenzie corr. , at AO, MS 516; it is to William Lyon Mackenzie and is dated 12 April 1850, from Pontiac, Mich. Another excellent source is A. F. Hunter, A history of Simcoe County (2v. , Barrie, Ont., 1909; repr. 2v. in 1, 1948). A small amount of biographical detail is also to be found in George Lount’s petition to the Executive Council, dated 2 Jan. 1840, in PAC, RG 1, E3, 46, file 38. Lount’s version of his role in the rebellion is contained in his petition in PAC, RG 5, A1: 107033–38, and his statement in RG 5, C1, 9, file 1209. For a broader discussion of Lount’s role and additional sources, see R. J. Stagg, “The Yonge Street rebellion of 1837: an examination of the social background and a re-assessment of the events” (phd thesis, Univ. of Toronto, 1976). r. j.s.] | 012_3788258 | {
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Frozen wild blueberries can provide better nutrition than imports that sit around in the produce aisle for too long. And the best part about this pie recipe? It doesn’t cook the goodness out of the berries because you make the base and then add the berries on top, preserving the fantastic vitamin C.
Five reasons why you should eat wild Canadian blueberries:
1. Blueberries can ease the pain of arthritis. Molecules in blueberries provide the building blocks for an antioxidant known as SOD, superoxide dismutase. SOD is important in disarming the most harmful of free radicals our bodies – specifically the nasty free radicals that like to break down the synovial fluid that lubricates our joints. 2. Blueberries improve your memory. Research show that flavanoids in blueberries decrease the risk of age-related memory decline by protecting the area of the brain that houses memory. Kaempferol is a specific flavanoid shown to exercise protection of neural tissue and may be helpful in the prevention of Alzheimer’s disease. 3. Blueberries are packed with pectin, a great soluble fibre. Science shows that pectin has an effect on cardiovascular health by preventing the thickening of arterial walls. It is the thickening of arteries along with plaque build-up that makes arteries narrow, which affects blood pressure and eventually leads to cardiovascular disease. 4. Blueberries are an excellent source of manganese. We need very little quantities of this mineral so we always get it from our food, but the small amounts do a big job! Manganese is necessary for bone growth and synthesis of new bone in growing children. It can also aid in repairing bones in cases of damage such as a break or fracture. 5. Blueberries are a great source of the always wonderful vitamin C: Blueberries can help our bodies resist the physical signs of aging such as wrinkles and saggy skin as Vitamin C is extremely important in the synthesis of collagen – the connective tissue that gives our skin its youthful elasticity. Blueberry and raspberry pie recipe
Raspberries and blueberries are all loaded with salicylic acid — the same heart disease fighter found in Aspirin.
2 cups (500 mL) apple juice
1/4 cup (60 mL) agar flakes
1/3 cup (85 mL) arrowroot flour
3/4 cup (180 mL) honey
4 cups (1 L) raspberries and/or blueberries (frozen works well)
1 1/2 cups (375 mL) crushed pecans
1. Bring apple juice and agar flakes to a rolling boil in an uncovered pot. 2. As soon as the juice comes to a boil, turn heat to medium and cook for 3 minutes to dissolve the agar. Meanwhile, whisk the arrowroot into the honey in a medium-sized bowl. 3. When agar is fully dissolved, pour the honey and arrowroot mixture into the pot. Whisk until thick, about 2 minutes. Remove from heat and add fresh or thawed raspberries or blueberries and allow to cool. 4. Line a 10 inch springform pan with crushed pecans. Pack with a spoon before adding pie filling. Refrigerate for 2 hours until set. Makes 8 to 12 servings. Click here for more superfood recipes. Julie Daniluk hosts Healthy Gourmet (OWN: the Oprah Winfrey Network), a reality cooking show that highlights the ongoing battle between taste and nutrition. Her first book, Meals That Heal Inflammation (Random House) is now available and will help people enjoy allergy-free foods that taste great and assist the body in the healing process. | 004_5287838 | {
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Neo-Medieval music is a modern popular music characterized by elements of Medieval music and early music in general. Music styles within neo-Medieval music vary from authentic performance interpretations of Medieval music (understood as Classical music) to crossover genres that blend Medieval instruments, such as bagpipe, shawm and hurdy-gurdy with electronic music and rock. In many cases, it is more or less overlapping with styles such as folk rock, electric folk and neofolk. Bands specializing in neo-Medieval music are particularly plentiful in Germany, although the genre also enjoys some popularity in North America, The Czech Republic, the Netherlands, France, Great Britain, Italy and the Scandinavian countries. HistoryIt is difficult to point to an exact beginning of neo-Medieval music. One could argue that all Medieval-sounding tunes written after the actual Middle Ages are in some way neo-Medieval music; this definition would include music from as early as the Renaissance and onwards. Other examples of early neo-Medievalism in music would also include a number of Romantic composers such as Niels W. Gade, Edvard Grieg, and Felix Mendelssohn (who often used Medieval- and folk-style tunes in their music), as well as parts of the Carmina Burana by Carl Orff, and many movie soundtracks from the 20th century. However, as a popular music form, the birth of neo-Medieval music is closely connected with the folk rock and roots music movement of the 1960s and 1970s. In many countries in Europe musicians sought to find their cultural roots, reviving music that had largely died out as a result of centuries of industrialization, and decades of exposure to United States music styles like jazz and rock. The founding of the German band Ougenweide in 1970 is particularly important in this respect. Ougenweide revived many distinctly German and European genres, such as the Minnesang, and other examples of courtly love poetry and music. It is interesting to compare Ougenweide's approach to music with that of their contemporary kraut rock bands, especially Kraftwerk. Both sought to recreate German culture which they felt had been compromised by Nazism and World War II. But whereas Kraftwerk took music creation to an entirely new level, Ougenweide would revive ancient music and play types of instruments that, at least in Northern Europe, had been out of use for centuries. In Great Britain, too, prog rock bands like Jethro Tull would often write songs with a Medieval touch to them. It was not until the late 1980s, however, that neo-medieval music would arise as an entire genre of its own, replete with a subculture following. The Australian outfit Dead Can Dance who released most of their most famous works in the latter half of the 1980s was another early influence on the scene. Dead Can Dance had a far more pompous and symphonic sound than previous acts, and, although never considering themselves to be a Goth band, were mostly popular among Goths. This formed the precedence of neo-Medieval music being particular popular in the Goth scene. 1989 saw the formation of the German band Corvus Corax, two members of which were on the run from the disintegrating East German regime. Throughout the 1990s Corvus Corax would go on to have a profound effect on the state of neo-Medieval music. Corvus Corax, along with other bands, started the now immensely popular strategy of combining medieval music with electronic music. More recently, the band Extra Life has combined aspects of early music with the modern genre of math rock. Neo-medieval or Neo-Renassiance qualities have also been featured in contemporary music composers like Mamoru Fujieda and Michael Waller, with their use of modal cells and subtle counterpoint. Neo-Medieval music by countryNeo-Medieval music enjoys popularity in many countries. GermanyGermany is by far the most active country in the neo-Medieval scene. Nowhere else in the world are the artists so plentiful and the styles of music so diverse. The country contains such acts as Ioculatores (traditional Medieval music), Corvus Corax, In Extremo (Medieval metal), Saltatio Mortis, Faun (medieval pagan folk) and more ambient oriented bands like Helium Vola, Qntal, Love Is Colder Than Death, Saeldes Sanc and Estampie to mention a few. A particularly popular line-up is a variation of a traditional pipe-and-drum band, consisting mainly of modified bagpipes and a davul drum, often backed up by shawms in a manner reminiscent of a Breton bagad. SwedenSweden is home to the legendary folk rock band Hedningarna whose music contains a fair share of Medieval influences, not least in their choice of instruments; their songs often contain hurdy-gurdy, bagpipes and nyckelharpa. Whether the band is actually neo-Medieval or not may be a matter of debate. One could argue that they are merely infatuated with everything ancient. They have even been known to use Danish Bronze Age lurs, as well as playing gigs in castle ruins. However, their influence on the neo-Medieval scene in Scandinavia is arguably enormous. Garmarna is another important Swedish band in this context, as well as the Dead Can Dance/Qntal inspired act Arcana.
DenmarkMedieval music in Denmark, and to some extent the other Nordic countries as well, has almost always been synonymous with Nordic dancing ballads. This particular type of ballad depends on cooperation between the lead singer and his audience. The singer narrates a story in song, to which the audience dances and falls in at the repeated chorus line which often predicts the end of the story (which is usually tragic). A song may last 20+ minutes. This tradition has been alive to the present day in the Faroe Islands where it is entirely a cappella, though this does not necessarily mean that it did not include instruments in its heyday. In Denmark the lyrics of most of the ballads, being always in the vernacular, were recorded by the landed nobility in the 16th century, and the melodies in the 19th and 20th centuries. Because of this vernacular ballad tradition, Danish and other Scandinavian neo-Medieval music is almost devoid of the Latin lyrics of e. g. the German scene. Probably the best-known neo-Medieval band in Denmark is Sorten Muld whose songs are primarily interpretations of the above-mentioned dancing ballads. Although their music does contain hints of medieval instruments like hurdy-gurdy and nyckelharpa it relies heavily on trip hop influences, and most of the Medieval elements are downplayed in favour of synthesizer sounds, double bass, and filtered breakbeats. In recent years other Danish bands playing in a more international (and more aggressive! ) Medieval style have sprung up. These include Gny, Virelai, Solhverv, Asynje, and Valravn. These bands may or may not integrate the ballad tradition in their largely instrumental music. PortugalPortugal is one of the older countries in the world. Situated in the Iberian Peninsula, it shares with Spain one of the biggest manuscripts found, the Cantigas de Santa Maria. The medieval culture is still very present nowadays. Almost every week there are reenactment festivals such as Viagem Medieval, the biggest medieval festival in Europe. The most famous medieval music band in Portugal is Strella do Dia. The band uses old iberian instruments and plays medieval music from the old Europe.
HungaryThe most famous medieval music band in Hungary is Anno Musica.
FinlandIn Finland, the rise of neo-medieval music has coincided that with history re-enactment and interest in living history. The best known Finnish neo-medieval band is Tarujen Saari. On the other hand, Finland is fairly well known of its heavy metal bands, and many bands such as Turisas have adopted Medieval-ish tunes and instruments, and Waltari has made also several neo-medievalish songs. Koistinen's electric kantele is widely employed on Finnish neo-medieval music. LatviaThe only one neo-medieval music band in Latvia is Obscurus Orbis, using wide variety of bagpipes and drums, they also uses hurdy-gurdy, shawns, bouzuki and Baltic national instrument kokle. ItalyThe well-known band Ataraxia from Italy has started creating music and live performances inspired by early (Medieval and Renaissance) music in the mid 80s. Their most significant albums inspired by this genre are Historiae (1998, CMI); Suenos (2001, CMI) and Kremasta Nera (2007). In Vino Veritasis the medieval and pagan folk band from Carrara (TUSCANY) active from 2010. fb official pageYT channel The band performed many shows in the most important medieval festivals in Italy, France, Germany, Czech Republic, Croatia, Swizerland and Denmark. In Vino Veritas was born to evoke a rather long period of time, exactly from the second half of the 12th to the end of the 15th century, which represents a charmful period for the European and Mediterranean folk and court music of Middle Age. The musicians, wearing eccentric clothes inspired by medieval jesters, bards and actors, transport their audience with ancient melodies personalized by a great energy, dynamism and harmony. People are catapulted into a bizzarre historical atmosphere and involved to dance. The band plays music taken from all the european traditions especially those concerning goliardic and pagan themes, and original compositions. instruments: bagpipes, recorders, flutes, gralla, bouzouki, celtic harp, hurdy gurdy, percussions, nyckelharpa, vocals. NorwayNorway is famous for its thriving metal culture, and it is mainly within metal genres that neo-Medieval music finds its outlet in a Norwegian context. Bands like Lumsk are known for incorporating Medieval and folk elements into their music. More traditional folk-oriented bands like Ym:Stammen and Gåte also exist. Many Norwegian bands, metal- or otherwise oriented, have a remarkable Neo-pagan slant. RussiaRussia, as well as Belarus and Ukraine, share the common East Slavic musical tradition. It include bands like Melnitsa, The Dartz, among others. BelarusStary Olsa is the best known neo-medieval music band in Belarus
MexicoIn Mexico, the medieval recreation have some years, and there are bands like Arquelon playing medieval neo folk music with recreations of early instruments and sometimes use lyrics of medieval texts on their original songs. United StatesRecently a very young band from USA has been very active in the neo-medieval field. Formed in 2011, Children Medieval Band has been playing at several Renaissance Faires in California. In the same time they have covered heavy industrial music and even got invited to open the concert for the German band Rammstein in Denver, Colorado. In April 2015 Children Medieval Band has released their first album - Treasure Underground - with 10 songs combining heavier rock with elements of medieval music. The CMB March song is the most representative by using a Susato melody and ending with a heavy riff. The members of Children Medieval Band are very young: Stefan, 13 years old, a multi-instrumentist who recently got videotaped playing the medieval piece Mohrentanz (Susato) on 12 instruments. He is assisted by his two sisters, Olga (11) on keyboards and Cornelia (9) on drums. | 005_3944559 | {
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Students Study Clonal Rainforest Tree in Belize
Coccoloba belizensis outwits a strangler fig by generating new sprouts outside the main stem that is being strangled! Basal sprouts arise from a lignotuber that continually generates new ramets over time allowing the clone to expand outward in a radial fashion. It is unlikely that the fig will ever be able to kill the entire Coccoloba clone. The power of clonality! Molly Mueller, Annie Corley and Levi Trumbore studied the importance of seedling establishment to population persistence in Coccoloba at Las Cuevas Research Station in the Chiquibul Rainforest of Belize last month in my Rainforests and Coral Reefs course. Molly Mueller with giant Coccoloba leaf. Molly is interested in joining our lab next year to work on the spatial genetic structure of Coccoloba populations. Annie Corley showing that Coccoloba also produces root sprouts in addition to basal sprouts. | 003_1596521 | {
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Northern Saudi Arabia hosts some of the most extensive sand and gravel deserts in the world, but modern agriculture has changed the face of some of them. This photograph from astronauts on the International Space Station presents an almost surreal view of abundant green fields in the midst of a barren desert. As recently as 1986, there was little to no agricultural activity in the Wadi As-Sirhan Basin. But over the past 26 years, agricultural fields have been steadily developed, largely as a result of the investment of oil industry revenues by the Saudi government. Crops grown in the area include fruits, vegetables, and wheat. The fields are irrigated by water pumped from underground aquifers. That water is distributed in rotation about a center point within a circular field—a technique known as center-pivot agriculture. The approach affords certain benefits compared to traditional surface irrigation, such as better control of water and fertilizer use. This so-called “precision agriculture” is particularly important in regions subject to high water loss due to evaporation. By better controlling the amount and timing of water application, evaporative losses can be minimized. For a sense of scale, the agricultural fields in active use (dark green) or fallow (brown to tan), are approximately one kilometer in diameter. While much of the Wadi As-Sirhan Basin shown here is sandy (light tan to brown surfaces) and relatively flat, low hills and rocky outcrops (dark gray) of underlaying sedimentary rocks are visible at image left and right. Astronaut photograph ISS030-E-90918 was acquired on February 21, 2012, with a Nikon D2Xs digital camera using a 65 mm lens, and is provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations experiment and Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by the Expedition 30 crew. The image has been cropped and enhanced to improve contrast, and lens artifacts have been removed. The International Space Station Program supports the laboratory as part of the ISS National Lab to help astronauts take pictures of Earth that will be of the greatest value to scientists and the public, and to make those images freely available on the Internet. Additional images taken by astronauts and cosmonauts can be viewed at the NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. Caption by William L. Stefanov, Jacobs/ESCG at NASA-JSC. - ISS - Digital Camera | 002_6287150 | {
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URBANA, Ill. - More no-till farmers are using cover crops to conserve soil and suppress weeds, but many vegetable producers are reluctant to get on board. That's because many small-seeded vegetable crops struggle to emerge through thick cover crop residues. However, the potential benefits of no-till cover crop systems compelled researchers to give it a try with snap bean. "There's interest in both cover crops and no-till vegetable production, but adoption has been slow," says University of Illinois and USDA-ARS ecologist Marty Williams. "We designed a study to look at a scenario that had a better chance of success. We used snap bean, which is relatively large-seeded, and planted later to allow sufficient time to grow and then kill a cover crop. "
In both Illinois and Washington, Williams and USDA-ARS agronomist Rick Boydston grew vetch, rye, and a combination of the two cover crops before killing them with a roller-crimper -- a machine that evenly flattens and crimps standing plant biomass -- or with a combination of the roller-crimper and a burndown herbicide. "The roller-crimper weighs about 2 tons. As it bends the stalks over, metal fins crimp the stalks in multiple places so that, in theory, the cover crop lays flat and dies," Williams explains. For organic growers, the roller-crimper offers a way to kill the cover crop without herbicides or tillage. The researchers tracked cover crop mortality, weed biomass, and snap bean yields during the experiment. Unfortunately, the roller-crimper did not effectively kill the vetch, even with an application of herbicide. Instead, vetch became weedy and caused yield losses in snap bean. Rye was easier to kill, but heavy plant residues complicated planting. "Timing of roller-crimping is very important," Williams notes. "In general, grass cover crops like rye need to be fully flowering when roller-crimped, or else the cover crop may not die. Vetch needs to be rolled a bit later, after pod development. A problem encountered with the cover crop mixture in this study was that rye reached the correct growth stage for roller-crimping before vetch. "Another issue was adequate seed-to-soil contact, which can become a challenge with excessive plant residues on the soil surface. Closing the seed furrow becomes difficult with increasing soil moisture, which isn't uncommon in central Illinois soils, especially during typical spring rainfall events, or with moderate to high levels of surface residues," Williams says. Ultimately, none of the cover crops or control methods offered any consistent yield advantages for snap bean. In fact, some of the greatest yields occurred in bare-soil treatments. When asked if he would tell farmers to avoid this method, Williams laughs and admits the results of this particular study do not look particularly promising in central Illinois. He points out that other researchers were successful with soybean in a similar system, but thinks different cover crops or management techniques may be more suitable for snap bean. Williams emphasizes the importance of balancing key elements to maximize the chances of success. "One needs sufficient cover crop biomass to aid weed suppression, yet it's important to avoid excessive surface residue, which can be detrimental to the crop. Using the roller-crimper certainly adds an additional challenge because the cover crop needs to be at an advanced growth stage to be successfully terminated," Williams says. The article, "No-till snap bean performance and weed response following rye and vetch cover crops," is published in Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems. | 007_1111117 | {
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Latino identity in the U.S. is complicated. So complicated that, even when the U.S. Census tried to add a separate "ethnicity" category to its surveys early last decade, the agency realized the change was inadequate, and the bureau is currently in the process of reforming its racial and ethnic categories again. In any event, these complications appear to have had an effect on measuring Latinos' academic success. In a new paper from two economists published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, Latino academic achievement (and overall quality of life) is shown to have been understated as a result of the way Latinos, especially second- and third-generation Latinos, self-identify on Census surveys. The economists call this phenomenon "ethnic attrition," which they define as later generations no longer identifying with their immigrant-parents' ethnicity, mostly thanks to intermarriage. From the Washington Post:
In fact, new immigrants may be assimilating a lot faster than than we had ever thought. A new study this week from economists Brian Duncan, of the University of Colorado, and Stephen Trejo of University of Texas, Austin finds that the descendents of immigrants from Latin-American and Asian countries quickly cease to identify as Hispanic or Asian on government surveys. According to the authors, these are mostly children of interracial couples that aren’t writing down their diverse heritages. Mixed marriages are increasingly common in America — Pew finds that about 26 percent of Hispanics marry a non-Hispanic these days, and 28 percent of Asians marry a non-Asian.
"Ethnic attrition generates measurement biases that vary across national origin groups in direction as well as magnitude," they write. "Correcting for these biases is likely to raise the socioeconomic standing of the U.S.-born descendants of Hispanic immigrants," they write. Here are the results, measured in years of schooling, comparing responses from second and third generation Latinos.
By contrast, this same ethnic attrition phenomenon may be overstating the achievement for people of Asian descent:
With these findings, it seems like statisticians might have to come up with better ways to measure success among minority groups. Rob covers business, economics and the environment for Fusion. He previously worked at Business Insider. He grew up in Chicago. | 001_1797533 | {
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The largest variety of citrus, pomelo or pummelo (Citrus maxima) can produce 25-pound fruits up to 1 foot across in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 9 through 11. Usually, however, the fruits remain about the size of an extra-large grapefruit (Citrus x paradisi, USDA zones 9 through 11). Similar to that fruit, of which it is a parent, pomelo has sweeter flesh and a thicker rind. Plants grown from seed may not look the same as their parent, are likely to be thornier, and will take much longer to fruit than those reproduced through grafting. Picture Your Pomelo Tree
A pomelo tree can reach 50 feet in height but is usually restricted to less than half that size, with glossy 2- to 8-inch leaves and fragrant cream-colored flowers which can appear year-round. In the U.S., a majority of the 4- to 12-inch greenish-yellow fruits ripen at some point between November and March. However, a tree grown from a seedling probably won't fruit until it is three to eight years old. Clean Your Pomelo Seeds
If possible, take your seeds directly from a pomelo fruit in early spring, as citrus seeds germinate best when fresh. After cleaning off any pulp that may remain on them, soak them for several hours in warm water and sow them immediately. If you can't plant the seeds right away, dry them on a paper towel after cleaning them and refrigerate them for up to 80 days, giving them the warm-water soak only when you are ready to sow them. Sow Your Pomelo Seeds
After filling a flower pot with a damp mix of 1 part peat moss or seed starting mix and 1 part sand, drain the seeds by pouring them into a kitchen strainer held over a sink. While they are still damp, plant them in the pot at a depth equal to twice their length. Cover that pot with plastic wrap, to keep the mix moist, and place it on a sunny windowsill or under a grow-light, where temperatures remain between 70 and 80 degrees Fahrenheit.
Care for Your Pomelo
The seeds should germinate within two to eight weeks if their mix isn't allowed to dry out. About three weeks after they have sprouted, transplant them into individual 4-inch pots filled with a cactus, palm and citrus potting mix. If you only want a single seedling of the self-pollinating pomelo, save the healthiest one and discard or give away the others. Once your seedling shows signs of new growth after being transplanted, you can begin to fertilize it every two weeks with a dilute plant food for acid-loving plants -- such as 30-10-10 -- mixing 1/4 teaspoon of the crystals with 1 gallon of water. Continue to grow the plant on a sunny windowsill or under the center of a grow light, moving it to larger pots as necessary. If you intend to transplant it into the ground, wait until it is 1 to 2 feet tall before you do so. | 007_1105504 | {
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GPS provides free of charge precise time and position information worldwide. In a world of instant communications, much of our global telecom infrastructure relies on GPS to provide precise time and frequency information. For instance, telephone companies take advantage of GPS to synchronize their global telecom networks with inexpensive timing receivers. But despite how much we rely on the Global Positioning System (GPS) for position information and as a time (and hence frequency) base, GPS remains vulnerable to natural and man-made obstacles. From receivers in poor geographic locations, to lost satellite signals, to jammed reception, GPS has at times been sensitive to interruptions. In this session we will focus on the vulnerabilities of GNSS systems and the Galileo programme. Galileo is to provide an indigenous alternative high-precision positioning system upon which European nations can rely, independently from the Russian GLONASS and US GPS systems, in case they were disabled by their operators. The use of basic (low-precision) Galileo services will be free and open to everyone. The high-precision capabilities will be available for paying commercial users. Galileo is intended to provide horizontal and vertical position measurements within 1-metre precision, and better positioning services at high latitudes than other positioning systems. | 011_1528514 | {
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¡Bienvenidos a nuestro salón de clases, estudiantes! Translation services appear in web browsers. These services make it easy to understand what those words mean; gaining a deeper understanding that connects to cultural schema can be tougher. Let’s explore a variety of tools that make language learning easier. Additionally, you’ll get access to a member-created Wakelet collection. This ensures that you, as an AP teacher will have access to quality language teaching resources. Teaching Advanced Placement (AP) Spanish
Concerned with teaching AP Spanish Language and Culture? You will find a wealth of tips online. Here are a few tips that jump out:
- Immerse yourself in the target language (e. g. Spanish, French)
- Incorporate audio (e. g. music, books) into your work with students
- Speak in the target language
- Read and study vocabulary
- Study and teach verb conjugation
As someone who has studied Spanish from a young age as a native speaker, there are many language rules to learn. The same is true for other languages. As a teacher, take advantage of language-focused, high-effect size instructional strategies. If you’re not sure which those are, let’s take a quick look. Literacy-Focused Instructional Strategies
Read my favorite book by John Hattie, Dr. Douglas Fisher, and Dr. Nancy Frey. That book is “Visible Learning for Literacy.” The book provides a primer on when to use what strategy. That is, distinguishing between strategies that fall into one of these buckets:
- Prior learning
- Surface learning
- Deep learning
- Transfer learning
If you’re familiar with the differences, you may want to read some of these blog entries. Needless to say, many strategies focus on prior learning and surface learning. Did You Know? Get a guided introduction to Hattie’s work via the TCEA Strategies That Work courses. Get powerful videos, a free TCEA membership (valued at $49), and CPE hours for the same or less than buying a book. You have fifteen courses to choose from, including the latest Evidence-Based Teaching course. Now let’s explore several incredible resources you can use to support AP foreign language learning and culture. Resource #1: Hablame
Need a quick way for students to audio record themselves and then submit to their teacher? Hablame takes four areas of interest and makes that possible. The four areas include:
- Interpersonal Speaking. This offers a recorded three-minute conversation modeled after the Interpersonal Speaking part of the AP Exam for students to answer. Students can then save the audio recording as an MP3. - Presentational Speaking. Modeled after the similarly named section of the AP exam, students record and save. - Reading Practice. This allows you to convert any Spanish article into an assignment. Then, that assignment includes components that address vocabulary building, comprehension, and discussion. This will require signing up for TextAssign which allows you to add reading comprehension questions, class discussions, and more. - Pronunciation Practice. In this, students read words from curated sets aloud. Hablame assesses pronunciation via machine learning algorithms. You can watch an overview of Hablame online:
The TextAssign tool, for which you will need to create a free account, makes it difficult to add content. I tried multiple sources online, as well as a Google Doc, to no avail. Resource #2: Drops
Want to learn a language? Drops may be something to consider. Not only will you have to fill out a short questionnaire, but you’ll answer more questions. Questions concern themselves with your familiarity with other languages. For example, “How many languages do you already know? ” You will also indicate how much time you can spend learning the target language. Options include five, ten, or fifteen minutes per day. One of the questions Drops asks you to respond to:
When you’re done answering questions, you’ll be prompted to set up your account. Drops presents a timeline. Unfortunately, you will have to enter payment information before getting access to content. To learn Spanish, I had to commit to payment information for the period ending two weeks after the trial ($18. 99). At that point, I ended my exploration of Drops.
Here’s a video overview of Drops. You can check out their YouTube channel for specific language examples:
Resource #3: Lingro
If you need a multi-language dictionary, Lingro is the tool for you. This free tool makes it easy to look up words and see the definitions. You can look up words in your first language, then see them in your target language. This simple, straightforward tool makes learning vocabulary easier for some. As you can see in the image below, you can add definitions as pop-ups:
The AP Resources Wakelet Collection
These are just three resources you can take advantage of. But you can find many more courtesy of Diana Fernández-Sullivan. Diana is Languages Other Than English (LOTE) Manager for Spring ISD and a TCEA member. Catch her on Twitter at @sullydatechie and @SISDWorldLang. Here’s a link to her Wakelet Collection, which she makes available for readers of TCEA TechNotes. | 012_215099 | {
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How Breathing Tackles Stress
There’s nothing more heartbreaking than seeing a loved one battle a life-threatening disease. Kathleen Hall’s father had a stroke a couple of years ago. Now this A&P employee strives to make living a healthy lifestyle more of a priority. “It’s become more important to me to be aware of whole-self and heart health,” Hall said. When Hall recently started working in A&P as an HR Administrative Associate, she saw an advertisement for a program called, “Give Biofeedback a Try.” It’s a half-hour session that helps people manage stress and build resilience through monitoring breathing patterns with biofeedback technology. “Finding out that there is a resource out there that helps staff learn to be more self-aware and how to build wellness and physical calm for oneself in such a simple way is beneficial,” she said. After signing up, she went to the Smart Lab located on the 4th floor of the Physical Activity and Education Services Building.
The process is simple:
- Participants sit down at a computer. - A health coach puts a clip on their earlobe to read pulse and heart rhythms. - The coach gives participants real-time feedback about their stress levels. Visual feedback is shown on the monitor in the form of graphs representing breathing patterns based on heart rate. It’s a relaxing experience, and you can sign up for a 30-minute sample session, once a week. “It is a great time to take a break in the middle of the day to just breathe,” health coach Amanda Fox said. “I think that’s what people like is they can just get away from the office and enjoy that time away. ”
Fox says it also helps people build awareness. “They start to notice that stress response a little more outside of the lab,” Fox said. “That’s when you can intervene on that and say 'let me slow my breathing down. What am I thinking about? Can I adjust my mindset to help with that? '”
The Smart Lab can accommodate up to seven people at a time. To sign up, visit linktohealth. osu. edu. “Having the ability to enjoy your day personally has such a positive impact on what you’re doing and how you’re sharing your experience with other people,” Hall said. | 004_5694622 | {
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Extreme Under-urination Causes Leprosy
However, a gross under-urinator who happens to be a gross under-eater as well would not develop leprosy since such person would not accumulate excessive calcium and other solids to an unbearable extent that requires forced removal from the body. Here again, chronic constipation that is characterised by defecation of small quantities of slimy stools twice or more daily seems to play a major role in the development of the disease. This is so because the faecal matter helps dispose a substantial quantity of calcium from the body and reduces the need for its disposal through leprosy. Strenuous sweat-out physical exercises or hard labour in the absence of sunshine tends to make the disease worst. Here the calcium stays within the body in a water-soluble state. Exposure to sunshine produces vitamin-D in a person that fixes the excess calcium in the soft tissues to give rise to cancer and not leprosy. The water present in gravy, vegetables and beverages provide the minimum water required for the basic needs of the body. Lepers do not seem to consume fruits, soups, diluted yoghurt and the like. HANSEN’S DISEASE IS NOT COMMUNICABLE
Hansen’s disease is erroneously recognised as a communicable disease because of the presence of a bacteria called Mycobacterium leprae. In reality it seems to be non-contagious for the following reasons:
Leprosy occurs spontaneously in grossly under-urinating persons even without any source of contact. Even family members living together with lepers but drinking plenty of water and urinating liberally do not seem to get this disease. Thus this bacteria M. leprae seems to be present in a leper only as a secondary invader and this is similar to the occurrence of H. pylori in the intestinal wounds of duodenal ulcer patients. LEPROSY IS COMMON AMONG PRISONERS
Prisoners punished for life with hard labour or on solitary confinement with almost no facility for liberal water consumption, urination and defecation appear to develop leprosy. It may be of interest to know that Frenchman Henri Charriere, nick-named Papillon, wrote in his autobiography in 1970 that a large number of fellow-inmates at the penal colony at Devil’s Island of the coast of French Guiana had developed leprosy. This must have been due to drastic reduction in water consumption, urination and sunshine, worsened by constipation. When water-soluble calcium, magnesium, sodium, aluminium and others accumulate to an unbearable extent within the body of an under-urinating person, the tissues at the distal ends in certain organs such as ear lobes, finger tips and toes begin to decompose and thick liquids containing this excess minerals ooze out. This saves the person from death and provides the symptoms for leprosy. Sodium excesses normally get removed through urinations, whereas under-urination enhances its retention within the body to a great extent. SUNSHINE CAN PREVENT LEPROSY
If a leper-prone person is exposed to abundant sunshine or is provided with vitamin-D supplementations, the person would develop heart blockages, tumours and cancers and not leprosy. This is so because the calcium excesses would get fixed within the cells of the soft tissues as insoluble crystals and a need for its removal as a oozing liquid does not exist any more. CAN LEPROSY BE CURED
Leprosy is curable. All it requires is a complete change in the lifestyle of the person who suffers the disease. The water consumption and urination should be substantially increased. The food should consist more of oil-fried carbohydrates, vegetables and fruits. Defecations should be made smooth with repeated intestinal cleansing using some strong herbal laxatives. Consumption of high fibre foods would help in smooth toileting subsequently. Drinking distilled or pure rainwater and eating acidic foods tend to help tremendously in the rapid removal of the calcium and other toxic excesses. Additional health-care requirements should include a regular body rubbing exercise, body towel massage and breathing exercise for enhancing a good flow of peripheral vascular blood supply. These methods and additional curative information can be read in the three books “Asthma, Bronchitis, Cough, Sneezing and Sweating”; “Obesity: Causes, Cure and Prevention” and “Human Diseases” by
Dr. V.M. Palaniappan. Dr. Palani can be contacted at (6-03) 62722284 / (6) 012-207 14 14 / e-mail: email@example. com. — BERNAMA — | 007_2018535 | {
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Today, a windmill report. The University of
Houston's College of Engineering presents this
series about the machines that make our
civilization run, and the people whose ingenuity
Every few years in this
series I need to go back and revisit
windmills. They first appeared in
the Arab world, maybe twelve hundred years ago. A
radically different form of windmill turned up in
Northern Europe around AD
1200. And it never left. The eighteenth century saw windmills with feedback
control systems. They kept the fan facing into the
wind and varied the pitch of the blades to
compensate for changing wind speeds. The American farm windmill was
perfected in the late nineteenth century, and we
still see it, everywhere. Now, as truly grand windmills promise to provide
significant electric power, even their name has
changed. Now they're "wind turbines. " They no
longer directly mill grain. And that word
turbine refers to rotating blades,
systematically designed to collect as much power as
possible from a stream of air or water. These aren't fundamentally different from windmills
and waterwheels. They're just far larger and more
efficient. Their complex designs better adapt them
to the unsteady and inconstant wind. They operate
in winds from roughly ten to fifty miles an hour,
and they do best in winds of about thirty miles an
The electrical output of a wind turbine has to
match the alternating current that flows in our
power lines. The propeller speed can be held
constant by varying the pitch of its blades and
controlling its speed electrically. Or the speed
can be allowed to vary and the power output
converted to sixty hertz AC. Either form is complex, but the payoff in renewable
power is huge. Medieval windmills generated maybe
six horsepower; wind turbines can reach a thousand
times that. Here in the United States, wind turbine
towers (some almost five hundred feet high) already
supply five billion watts of our total power usage. And yet . . . . An earnest young man, handing out literature on
wind power, recently stopped me. He did a fine job
until he told me that wind power did no
environmental damage. "Oh," I asked, "what
about manufacturing all that capital equipment? What about the vast land they occupy -- the birds
they kill? " He said he'd go get the answers and
have them the next day. Of course the only answer is that any large-scale
power production sullies our environment -- no
matter what kind. We need to quit looking for
panaceas and learn the ancient art of compromise. Those great blades, whirling in the sky, are ideal
in some places (like the wind-blown plains of La
Mancha), but they're a poor choice in others. Some
wealthy environmentalists have been alarmed to find
them rising near their own country estates. The wind turbine is a glorious machine. But we need
to mix and stir: photovoltaic cells; nuclear,
direct solar, wind, water, and tidal power; fossil
fuels along with energy conservation measures. What
we really need to remember is that no
one-size-fits-all technology will ever
solve our voracious energy needs. I'm John Lienhard, at the University of Houston,
where we're interested in the way inventive minds
For a great deal on wind turbines and other renewable
energy forms, see the January-February 2003 issue of
Renewable Energy World, Vol. 6, No. 1. See
especially pp. 30-40 and 83-89. K. Q. Seelye, Windmill Farms Sow Environmentalists'
Identity Crisis. New York Times, National
Report, Thursday, June 5, 2003, p. A22. Much material about wind turbines (including images)
is available on line. See, e. g.,
This page on large wind turbines. The venerable Aeromotor
farm windmill. The
tail vane roughly controls its speed. (Photo by John Lienhard)
The Engines of Our Ingenuity is
Copyright © 1988-2003 by John H. | 002_7036544 | {
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a) It is probable that future economic benefits associated with the item will flow to the entity; and
b) The cost of the item can be measured reliably. U.S. GAAP has similar rules. Examples of PPE include:
· Major spare parts that are expected to be used
during more than one period. · Major spare parts that can be used in connection
with an item of PPE. Examples of Expenditures to get an asset ready for its intended use include:
· Purchase price
Intangible are assets which do not have physical substance. Requirements under IFRS & U.S. GAAP include:
Intangible assets must be
· Under the control of the entity, and
· Generators of future economic benefits
· When assets are acquired as part of a business combination then each identifiable tangible and intangible asset is recorded by a company at estimated fair values. · If the purchase price > sum of the amounts allocated to identifiable assets and liabilities, then the excess is recorded as goodwill. Effects of capitalization of expenditure:
In the period of expenditure, an expenditure that is capitalized:
· Increases the amount of assets on the balance sheet. · Appears as an investing cash outflow on the statement of cash flows. · Higher profitability compared to expensing in the first year. · Higher Shareholders’ equity compared to expensing in the first year. · Results in higher ROA & ROE initially. · ROA and ROE will be lowered in subsequent years as net income is reduced by depreciation expense. · Results in lower Debt-to-equity and debt-to-assets ratio (lower leverage) due to higher assets and higher shareholders’ equity. · Results in greater amounts reported as cash from operations. · The profitability-enhancing effect of capitalizing continues so long as capital expenditures > depreciation expense. In subsequent periods,
· Capitalized amount is allocated over the asset’s useful life as depreciation or amortization expense. Note: land is not depreciated. Intangible assets with indefinite lives are not amortized. · Depreciation/amortization expense reduces net income (NI) on the income statement and the value of the asset on balance sheet. · Depreciation and amortization are non-cash expense and have no impact on the cash flow statement. · Lower profitability compared to expensing in the subsequent years. Effects of Expensing the expenditure:
When expenditure is expensed:
· No asset is recorded on the balance sheet in the period of expenditure. · Reduces net income by the after-tax amount. · The lower amount of NI is reflected in lower Retained earnings on the balance sheet. · Appears as an operating cash outflow on the statement of cash flows. (lower operating cash flow)
· No depreciation/amortization occurs in subsequent periods. · Lower profitability compared to capitalizing in the first year. · ROA and ROE will be lower initially but higher in subsequent years. · Higher profitability compared to capitalizing in subsequent years. · Lower EBITDA. · Higher Market Multiples…. . due to which a stock might appear overvalued. · Market-based ratios should be adjusted for capitalized costs in order to have a better basis for comparison. | 008_2272800 | {
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See what questions
a doctor would ask. Urinary hesitancy: A condition which is characterized by difficulty in passing urine. See detailed information below for a list of 40 causes of Urinary hesitancy, Symptom Checker, including diseases and drug side effect causes. The following medical conditions are some of the possible
causes of Urinary hesitancy. There are likely to be other possible causes, so ask your doctor
about your symptoms. Home medical tests possibly related to Urinary hesitancy:
Review causes of types of Urinary hesitancy in more specific categories:
Listed below are some combinations of symptoms associated with Urinary hesitancy, as listed in our database. Visit the Symptom Checker, to add and remove symptoms and research your condition. Review further information on Urinary hesitancy Treatments.
Real-life user stories relating to Urinary hesitancy:
Some of the comorbid or associated medical symptoms for Urinary hesitancy may include these symptoms:
Research the causes of these more general types of symptom:
Research the causes of related medical symptoms such as:
Research the causes of these symptoms that are similar to, or related to, the symptom Urinary hesitancy:
Read more about causes and Urinary hesitancy deaths. Interstitial cystitis an under-diagnosed bladder condition: The medical condition of interstitial cystitic is a bladder condition that can be misdiagnosed as various conditions such as overactive bladder or other causes of. . . read more »
Other ways to find a doctor, or use doctor, physician and specialist online research services:
Research extensive quality ratings and patient safety measures for hospitals, clinics and medical facilities in health specialties related to Urinary hesitancy:
Conditions that are commonly undiagnosed in related areas may include:
The list below shows some of the causes of Urinary hesitancy mentioned in various sources:
This information refers to the general prevalence and incidence of these diseases, not to how likely they are to be the actual cause of Urinary hesitancy. Of the 40 causes of Urinary hesitancy that we have listed, we have the following prevalence/incidence information:
The following list of conditions have 'Urinary hesitancy' or similar listed as a symptom in our database. This computer-generated list may be inaccurate or incomplete. Always seek prompt professional medical advice about the cause of any symptom. Select from the following alphabetical view of conditions which include a symptom of Urinary hesitancy or choose View All.
Ask or answer a question about symptoms or diseases at one of our free interactive user forums. Medical story forums: If you have a medical story then we want to hear it. This information shows analysis of the list of causes of Urinary hesitancy based
on whether certain risk factors apply to the patient:
Medical Conditions associated with Urinary hesitancy:
Urinary symptoms (1228 causes), Reduced urine (175 causes), Urinary problems (1033 causes), Bladder symptoms (1010 causes), Urinary difficulty (648 causes), Urine retention (198 causes), Lack of urine (210 causes), Weak urination (170 causes), Sexual symptoms (1838 causes), Urinary system symptoms (1228 causes), Urination symptoms (1228 causes), Digestive symptoms (5299 causes), Abdominal symptoms (5930 causes), Intercourse symptoms (258 causes), Lower abdominal symptoms (3048 causes)
Symptoms related to Urinary hesitancy:
Urinary urgency (48 causes), Urine incontinence, Urinary hesitancy (40 causes), Urine retention (198 causes), Urinary obstruction, Posterior strictures in males, Urinary tract infection (68 causes), Primary bladder-neck dysfunction, Neuromuscular problem e. g. spinal cord lesions, Bashful bladder syndrome
Doctor-patient articles related to symptoms and diagnosis:
These general medical articles may be of interest:
Medical research papers related to Urinary hesitancy include:
Search Specialists by State and City | 004_2435318 | {
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Clouds outside the core of tropical cyclones are often organized into banded structures of convection that spiral radially inward toward the storm center, and these features are often referred to as spiral rainbands. This study examines spiral rainbands in numerical simulations of tropical cyclones, which have become a useful research tool recently. Two types of numerical simulations of tropical cyclones that are popular in recent literature are considered: a realistic numerical simulation of Hurricane Bill (2009) that includes most of the physical processes that occur within real tropical cyclones, and an idealized, no-mean-flow numerical simulation of a tropical cyclone, where only a few essential physical processes are retained. The structures and propagation mechanisms of spiral rainbands will be examined in detail. In addition, why idealized no-mean-flow simulations of tropical cyclones may not be well suited to study spiral rainbands is discussed. Thursday, 29 November 2012, 3:30 PM
Refreshments 3:15 PM
3450 Mitchell Lane
Bldg 2, Large Auditorium Room 1022 | 001_6623750 | {
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College Planning Tasks
The college planning process takes time. To make the process more manageable, we have provided checklists of things to consider and when. 1. Discuss your graduation requirements. 2. Discuss your extracurricular activities and options. 3. Begin organizing the things you will need for college applications: grades, awards and scholarships, articles about you and your summer activities. 4. Keep a journal to help record memorable events. 5. Brainstorm college majors and career choices. 6. Make a list of colleges and universities:
e. Average SAT scores
f. Average GPA
7. Create a resume. 8. Begin researching financial aid options:
b. All About College.com
9. Plan summer opportunities to include satisfying the community service requirement:
1. Plan to take the PSAT/SAT by registering for a test prep course. 2. Create an account with CollegeBoard (click here). 3. Develop a list of your top ten colleges:
e. Average SAT scores
f. Average GPA
g. Application deadlines. 4. Request information from colleges. 5. Research financial aid, scholarships and deadlines:
a. U.S. Department of Education
b. National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators
6. Discuss with coaches the options of playing collegiate sports and National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) requirements. 7. Submit your activity sheet to the guidance office. 8. Submit college list. 9. Research summer jobs and programs. 10. Ask teachers and supervisors to write college recommendations. 11. Request college applications. 12. Plan summer college visits. 13. Draft college essays. 1. Submit your narrowed list of colleges:
a. Know deadlines and which ones you need to meet
b. Know application requirements
2. Request recommendation letters. 3. Make copies of all applications or submission confirmations for online applications. 4. Check college essay requirements. 5. Plan your interview. 6. Complete the Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) and college financial aid applications. 7. Write thank you notes. 8. Make the decision. Online College Resources
Take advantage of the many excellent resources that are available online to search for colleges. Visit their websites, explore financial aid and scholarship opportunities, and apply. Campus Tours This site offers virtual campus tours of many colleges and universities. CollegeBoard’s My Road Comprehensive college and career planning website. HBCUMentor A guide to America’s historically African American colleges and universities. Naviance A comprehensive college and career readiness solution that helps districts and schools align student strengths and interests to post-secondary goals, improving student outcomes, and connecting learning to life. New York’s Private Colleges & Universities Learn about independent colleges and universities in New York State: locations, academic programs, campus profiles, financial aid, and more. Peterson’s Excellent site with comprehensive information about colleges. Princeton Review Information about colleges, test preparation, scholarships, and more. Free Application for Federal Student Aid. This form is required by most colleges to determine need-based financial aid. Claims to be “the leading scholarship search provider” for students. This award-winning site is considered “the most comprehensive source of student financial aid information, advice and tools - on or off the web. ”
Pay for College
This section of the College Board website has information about college costs, scholarships, financial aid applications, education loans, and college financing. Student Aid on the Web
Federal student aid information including Pell grants, Stafford loans, etc. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in the provided links are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the New York Military Academy. They are to be used as a resource and not as official guidance from NYMA. Please contact the Academic Office with any questions. | 004_4556051 | {
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Today, Sunday, December 2, marks the first evening of Chanukah (Hanukkah) 2018. Chanukah, also known as the Festival of Lights, is an eight-day Jewish holiday commemorating the re-dedication of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt of the 2nd century BCE. Hanukkah is observed for eight nights, starting on the 25th day of Kislev according to the Hebrew calendar, and may occur from late November to late December on the Gregorian calendar. The festival is observed by the kindling of the lights of a special candelabrum, the nine-branched Menorah or Hanukiah, one light on each night of the holiday, progressing to eight on the final night. An extra light called a shamash (Hebrew: “guard” or “servant”) is also lit each night for the purpose of lighting the others and is given a distinct location, usually above or below the rest. The “shamash” symbolically supplies light that may be used for some secular purpose. A typical Chanukah menu sounds as though it were planned by twelve-year-olds: potato pancakes, fried, of course, in lots of oil, sweet cream cheese rugelach, strawberry-jam-filled doughnuts (sufganiyot) covered in powdered sugar, fried apple fritters, cheese-filled doughnuts fried in oil and dipped in honey, cheese blintzes, etc. Is it all just a ploy to keep kids lingering around the candles and enjoying a family meal? Not at all! Chanukah food traditions have their origins in the first years that the holiday was celebrated, and are meant to remind us of certain miracles associated with the events of Chanukah itself. And of course, remembering the miracles and the freedom that we're all celebrating adds a special flavor to everything that’s served. I am going to give you my donut recipe, actually they are really called donoughts as the hole in the middle resembles a zero and is surrounded by dough, simple isn’t it. Hanukkah donuts recipe
- 1-ounce active dry yeast
- 8 tablespoons warm water (98 degrees)
- 3 cups warm milk (30 seconds in the microwave does the trick)
- 10 tablespoons margarine or butter
- 4 eggs
- 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoon salt
- 10 cups all-purpose flour
Hanukkah donuts recipe: Glaze
- 5 1/3 tablespoons (1/3 cup) margarine or butter
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/3 cup hot water
In a medium bowl, dissolve the yeast in the warm water. Add the milk, margarine or butter, egg, sugar, and salt, and blend with an electric mixer until smooth. Add half the flour and mix for 30 seconds. Add the remaining flour and knead the dough with flour-dusted hands until smooth. Cover the bowl of dough and leave it in a comfy, warm place until the dough doubles in size, about 1 hour. You can tell that the dough has risen enough when you poke it with your finger and the indentation stays. Roll out the dough on a heavily floured surface until it's about 1/2 inch thick. When you've punched out all the dough (you should have about a dozen unholed donuts), it's time for the holes. Place the donuts on plates or cookie sheets, cover, and let stand in the same warm, comfy place until they nearly double in size. This will take 30 to 45 minutes. Heat the vegetable oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Bring the oil to about 350 degrees. It is easily tested with scrap dough left over from punching out the donuts. The dough should bubble rapidly. Fry each donut for about 30 seconds per side, or until light golden brown. Cool 5 minutes on paper towels. For either the plain or the chocolate glaze, combine the margarine or butter with the powdered sugar in a medium bowl and blend with an electric mixer. Add the vanilla and hot water. Mix until smooth. If you're making the chocolate glaze, melt the chocolate chips in a microwave-safe bowl in the microwave for 30 to 40 seconds. Stir, then microwave another 30 seconds and stir again until completely melted. Add to the plain glaze mixture. Blend until smooth. When the donuts have cooled, dip each top surface into the glaze and then flip over and cool on a plate until the glaze firms up, about 15 minutes. * Originally published in 2009. | 009_1408085 | {
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Grade 4 students learn important skills thanks to small creatures
As part of the grade 4 science curriculum, students spend significant time studying animal habitats and behaviors. The fourth-graders are doing so with the help of African dwarf frogs and fiddler crabs that have become residents in their classrooms. “We get the habitats to study animals and animal behaviors, including their survival and adaptation techniques,” said teacher Jennifer Meehan. “Students research the natural habitat of dwarf African frogs and fiddler crabs and can describe the differences between that at the manmade habitat. ”
The fourth-graders have spent the past few weeks observing each animal and its behavior. “The students look at the different body parts and draw detailed diagrams that include specific features of each type of animal,” Mrs. Meehan said. “They watch how the animals interact with each other. The students have noted that the crabs are super territorial and argue a lot. ”
The teachers explained that the science kits arrive with two male and two female crabs for each tank – and each male has a giant claw. “When the two males argue with each other, usually one will lose its claw,” Mrs. Meehan explained. From their observations and diagrams, the students are able to compare and contrast the animals, too. They learn how each body part functions, and how it helps the animal adapt and survive in the wild. “The students recognize that all creatures have certain body parts in common,” said teacher Jeanne Lance. “For example, we all have eyes, but the crab’s eyes protrude from its head on a pair of short stalks, and the frog’s eyes sit back on the side of its head. ”
The fourth-grade students each have jobs, including assembling the habitats, changing the water and feeding the creatures. The teachers discuss with students how best to care for the frogs and crabs. “It’s a little bit of a challenge because the students are so excited, and they all want to be in charge of everything,” Mrs. Lance said. “But the jobs have to be divided up, so we just hope the animals live long enough for everybody to have a turn. ”
Mrs. Meehan added, “Students know that they have to put on gloves when changing the water, and if we need to catch the animals for some reason, we use a net to avoid touching them with our bare hands because the oil on human skin can be harmful to the animals. ”
The students learn different skills by working together and sharing what they learn about the habitats. One such skill is observation. “The students have an easier time observing the crabs because the habitat is a mixture of sand and soil,” explained teacher Khalan Heid. “So when the crabs are burrowing under the sand, they make a trail that the students can easily follow to see where the creatures have been. ”
“The frogs are completely aquatic. They never come out of the water,” teacher Kathi Grill added. “And, maybe a third of the way into the unit, the water gets pretty cloudy making it difficult to really see the frogs anymore. ”
The teachers said that in addition to observation skills, students learn how to record and analyze data, make predictions and draw conclusions. The students learn about the various adaptations animals have specific to their environment, and the differences, for example of an animal that lives in the desert compared with one that lives in the Arctic. They also discuss the effects humans make on habitats through construction and hunting, for example. Frogs vs. fiddler crab? When asked which creature students seem to like better, the answer was pretty clear. “It depends,” said Mrs. Lance. “The boys in my class love that the crabs fight. ”
“The crabs because they are easier to see,” said Mrs. Meehan. “When my students walk over to reading group, they can watch them. ”
“The crabs are different, too. They can see frogs in their backyard,” Ms. Heid added. “To see this type of crab – small with a giant claw is special – especially for a child who has never been to the beach or ocean. ”
Want to know what career grade 4 educators dreamed of pursuing when they were in fourth grade? To learn the answer to that and a few other questions, click on the staff member’s name to reveal a short Q&A.
Plain or peanut M&M’s? Peanut.
What is your favorite thing about teaching fourth grade? Teaching the Native American unit and helping students find good books to read. Favorite book read in the upper elementary grades (4-5-6)? The Babysitter’s Club or any mystery novel. Coffee or tea? Depends on the day, usually vanilla coffee. Favorite color? Purple.
When you were in fourth grade, what did you dream of being when you grew up? A teacher. Plain or peanut M&M’s? Peanut.
What is your favorite thing about teaching fourth grade? The children and building relationships with families. Seeing students I taught in elementary school grow up, teaching their younger siblings. Favorite book read in the upper elementary grades (4-5-6)? Super Fudge.
Coffee or tea? Coffee.
Favorite color? Magenta.
When you were in fourth grade, what did you dream of being when you grew up? I loved my third grade teacher. She inspired me to want to be a teacher. Plain or peanut M&M’s? Both, but my favorite is actually the dark chocolate. What is your favorite thing about teaching fourth grade? The curriculum is fun. I also like that the students are old enough to be responsible, but young enough that they still love learning and being in school. Favorite book read in the upper elementary grades (4-5-6)? Peppermints in the Parlor. I have students come back to ask me if I still read that book in class. Mrs. Novatarski recently bought two more copies for the [elementary] library in my honor. Coffee or tea? Coffee, but I like tea, too, depending on the day. Favorite color? Green.
When you were in fourth grade, what did you dream of being when you grew up? I have always wanted to be a teacher. Plain or peanut M&M’s? Plain.
What is your favorite thing about teaching fourth grade? How inquisitive students can be. They always want to know more. Favorite book read in the upper elementary grades (4-5-6)? I loved reading The Hatchet.
Coffee or tea? Coffee.
Favorite color? Blue.
When you were in fourth grade, what did you dream of being when you grew up? I knew that I wanted to work with children. | 011_3992812 | {
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Release Date: 10 December 0090
Over 1. 5 million Canadians were on relief, one in five was a public dependant, and 70,000 young men travelled like hoboes. Ordinary citizens were rioting in the streets, but their demonstrations met with indifference, and dissidents were jailed. Canada emerged from the Great Depression a different nation. The most searing decade in Canada's history began with the stock market crash of 1929 and ended with the Second World War. With formidable story-telling powers, Berton reconstructs its engrossing events vividly: the Regina Riot, the Great Birth Control Trial, the black blizzards of the dust bowl and the rise of Social Credit. The extraordinary cast of characters includes Prime Minister Mackenzie King, who praised Hitler and Mussolini but thought Winston Churchill " one of the most dangerous men I have ever known" ; Maurice Duplessis, who padlocked the homes of private citizens for their political opinions; and Tim Buck, the Communist leader who narrowly escaped murder in Kingston Penitentiary.
In this #1 best-selling book, Berton proves that Canada's political leaders failed to take the bold steps necessary to deal with the mass unemployment, drought and despair. A child of the era, he writes passionately of people starving in the midst of plenty. This title is not held in stock & is ordered from suppliers, subject to availability. View other Pierre Berton titles like "The Great Depression: 1929-1939"
If you like this title please tell others:
Australian Bookshop. Established 2003 | 011_1628812 | {
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Courtesy of Goldenbooks.com
Did T-rex have a plant-eating relative? News story originally written on October 4, 2002
The scary meat-eating dinosaurs like Tyrannasaurus rex and raptors had a plant-eating relative! Scientists have found a new species of dinosaur in Chinese rocks that was related to the meat-eaters but ate plants instead of meat. The scientists named the new species of dinosaur Incisivosaurus.
Scientists can tell that Incisivosaurus ate plants by looking at its teeth. Meat-eaters like T-rex had sharp pointed teeth for ripping through meat, but Incisivosaurus had large front teeth and an overbite, like hamsters do today. The dinosaur’s teeth are worn down, which happens when animals grind plants between their teeth. This new species of dinosaur was discovered in sediments that were laid down 129 million years ago in China. Other fossils found in the area tell scientists what the environment was like a long time ago. Those fossils indicate that the Incisivosaurus lived in a forest filled with trees and shrubs. Shop Windows to the Universe Science Store! Our online store
includes issues of NESTA's quarterly journal, The Earth Scientist
, full of classroom activities on different topics in Earth and space science, as well as books
on science education! You might also be interested in:
Temperate forests are found all over the world, but they are not all the same. Some forests have trees that lose their leaves in the winter. These trees are called deciduous. Other forests have trees that. . . more
It was another exciting and frustrating year for the space science program. It seemed that every step forward led to one backwards. Either way, NASA led the way to a great century of discovery. Unfortunately,. . . more
The Space Shuttle Discovery lifted off from Kennedy Space Center on October 29th at 2:19 p. m. EST. The sky was clear and the weather was great. This was the America's 123rd manned space mission. A huge. . . more
Scientists found a satellite orbiting the asteroid, Eugenia. This is the second one ever! A special telescope allows scientists to look through Earth's atmosphere. The first satellite found was Dactyl.. . . more
The United States wants Russia to put the service module in orbit! The module is part of the International Space Station. It was supposed to be in space over 2 years ago. Russia just sent supplies to the. . . more
A coronal mass ejection (CME) happened on the Sun last month. The material that was thrown out from this explosion passed the ACE spacecraft. ACE measured some exciting things as the CME material passed. . . more
Trees and plants are a very important part of this Earth. Trees and plants are nature's air conditioning because they help keep our Earth cool. On a summer day, walking bare-foot on the sidewalk burns,. . . more | 005_1482393 | {
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What causes condensation in roof, attics and lofts? Part 2 in a series of guides about how to stop condensation in loft space, attics and roofs. This article focuses on:
Finding condensation in attic is surprisingly common. It is estimated that at least 1 in 5 homes are affected by this issue. First tell-tale signs include finding damp in loft or water accumulation on the inside of roof tiles or roof membrane. This can quickly escalate into unsightly black spots on the ceiling and walls. In advanced cases you may find mould spores on furniture, clothes, and linens stored in your loft space or attic. Fortunately, condensation in attic and roofs is normally easy and inexpensive to treat. In many cases you can often do so without employing the costly services of roofing professionals. It is however essential that you find the underlying cause of your condensation problem before establishing a treatment plan. Primary causes of condensation in attic:
Condensation in Loft after Insulating.
It is especially common in homes where modern loft installation has recently been installed. The benefits of loft insulation are well documented. You can save money on your energy bills. Your home will be warmer in the winter, and the Energy Performance Certificate rating of your home will improve. All these could add value to your property, and so it is a wise investment for any homeowner. However, loft insulation has one disadvantage in that it can restrict your property’s ability to ‘breathe’. Your house may be warm and cosy, but if the air doesn’t circulate properly, it is unable to get rid of excess moisture held in the air. When that moist air comes in to contact with your cold roof tiles or breather membrane, it will condense into water and cause condensation. Condensation in loft after insulating is a primary complaint. Homeowners and contractors need to ensure that loft insulation is installed correctly. Wet Trades Drying Out: New Builds
In newly built properties, wet trade building materials such as cement, plaster and mortar can cause condensation problems in the home. As wet trade materials are mixed with water, they release large amounts of moisture into the air during the drying process. When that moisture-rich air collides with a colder surface, be it a wall, a window or the roof, condensation appears. It is therefore essential that new builds are well-ventilated, especially in their first years of occupation. If you have just moved into a newly built property, and are already seeing signs of condensation, then wet trades could well be the cause. Un-insulated loft hatches
Poorly insulated or badly fitting cheap loft hatches allow moisture laden air to enter the loft space. If the loft space is unable to breathe this moisture laden air will accumulate. On contact with the cold roof slates or breather membrane, this warm air will condensate. Typically the water will then flow down the inside of the roof, and form pools of damp in loft space. Poor ventilation caused by poor design, over-filling the loft space or boxes too close to walls. Modern roof designs now incorporate ventilation along both eaves and ridge which encourages the free circulation of air. Water laden hot air (the primary cause of condensation) rises and is allowed to escape through ridge vents, whilst colder air (at the same temperature as the roof, replaces it through the eaves. Many older buildings may only use the odd tile vent to ventilate the roof space. Many roofs may not have any ventilation at all. In other cases, it may be the hhomeownerat fault. It is all too easy to fill the loft with so many boxes, that air is unable to circulate. Or it could be that one or two boxes are obstructing vents, effectively rendering them useless. How to Stop Condensation in the Loft Space.
Two processes must be in place to effectively stop condensation in the loft space. Firstly there must be adequate ventilation. Secondly , you must remove or reduce as much as possible warm moisture laden air rising into the loft. To prevent warm air rising into the loft, ideally, a vapour barrier would be fitted. This should be installed under the loft insulation. Don’t forget that poor fitting or cheap loft hatches also allow warm air to enter the attic. A well-insulated loft hatch does not cost the earth, and most are easily fitted. You will also need to ensure that your loft has adequate ventilation. First, remove any obstructions to the loft ventilation in your attic. Ensure that your loft insulation does not go all the way into the roof eaves. A gap should exist here to enable eaves ventilation, and the insulation should not contact the roof itself. Secondly consider moving boxes to ensure that there is a 5cm gap between them and the walls, and that they are not blocking any ventilation points. Simple roof vents, such as those by EasyVent and Manthorpe, are highly effective at ventilating roof spaces, and they start at just a few pounds each. Designed to improve ventilation, roof vents really do work, and they come in a variety of shapes, sizes and designs to suit every loft and project. Fascia vents, slate vents, soffit vents and roof tile vents are some of the many roof ventilation options available. Perhaps the easiest of all to install are Felt Lap Vents, which you can install yourself in seconds, without the use of tools, scaffolding, or machinery. Felt lap vents are compact plastic air ventilators that slot neatly between the overlap of your roofing felt. Once installed, they instantly improve air circulation, and prevent warm humid air being trapped under the roof. When the warm air is expelled, it takes any excess moisture with it, and condensation is no longer a problem. All loft vents come with easy-to-follow installation instructions, and they are available in multi-size packs to suit homes of every size. If you have damp in loft or attic and need advice, please contact the Roofing Specialist at Ashbrook Roofing Supplies. Alternatively, read our other articles in this series to find out more. - Article 1: What is Condensation? - Article 3: Felt Lap Vent, Loft Vents and other Loft Ventilation Products. | 010_7195235 | {
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It occurred to me this morning that I have never offered a definition or description of Targum and the Targumim on this site. Here is the entry I wrote for the Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible.
The Hebrew term “targum” (plural “targumim”) literally means “translation,” but in the rabbinic period (c. 1st century – 7th century AD) the term came to refer specifically to the written Jewish Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). Targumim exist for every book of the Bible except Ezra, Nehemiah, and Daniel, possibly because these books already contain significant portions in Aramaic. Like the Septuagint, there are actually several different textual traditions within the corpus of targumim. Thus there are three primary groups of targumim that are translations of the Pentateuch: Targum Onqelos, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, and Targum Neofiti. There are also fragmentary targumim to the Pentateuch of which there are at least five different groups in addition to the Cairo Geniza fragments. Targum Jonathan is the targum to the Prophets (within the Jewish canon these books include Joshua, Judges, 1-2 Samuel, 1-2 Kings, and the major and minor prophets, but not including Daniel). Finally, targumim exist for the Jewish canonical division of the Writings. These are often later translations (probably from the 6th-8th centuries AD) and different textual traditions are sometimes attested for individual books, e. g., there are two quite different targumim to Esther.
The origins of the targumim can probably be traced back to the liturgical practices in the synagogue. The Mishnah (c. 200 AD) states that the reading of the biblical text in a synagogue was to be accompanied with an appropriate translation so that all might understand the text being read (m Meg. 4. 4). Rabbinic texts make it clear that the meturgeman, the one who translated the biblical text into Aramaic during the synagogal service, was not allowed to read from a written text, so that the congregation would not confuse the translation with the actual holy, written word. This leads to the possibility that the physical texts that we study today may not, in fact, represent the actual targum as recited in the synagogue. Nonetheless, the written targumim that we can study share this same respect for the Bible as God’s word and exhibit this in the nature of the genre. The targumim are at once both translation and commentary. As translation a targum is engaged in the task of faithfully representing God’s word by rendering into Aramaic every word of the biblical text in its proper order. (This is contrast with midrash, which is rabbinic exegetical commentary, that often comments only upon select verses. ) Yet in the targumim commentary is also frequently woven into the translation and thus moves targum beyond what we might define in modern terms as a “simple translation. ” This is most often found as simple glosses or additional words and phrases added to the text for explanation, but occasionally larger sections of material will be spliced into the text. For example, Gen. 15. 1 reads, “After this, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision. ” In one targum tradition, Targum Onqelos, the text reads, “After these matters, the word of the Lord was before Abram in a prophecy. ” (The italics indicate material added to the base translation of the Hebrew text. ) Here the targumist has avoided referring to God’s revelation to Abram as a vision, possibly to avoid an anthropomorphic attribution to God, while emphasizing that the message that Abram received was indeed from God and was prophetic. Yet another targum tradition of the same passage, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, is much more expansive. I will offer only a small portion of it here. “After these words, when the kings had gathered together, and had fallen before Abram; and four kings had been slain, and nine hosts brought back, Abram reasoned in his heart, and said, Woe to me, because I have received the reward of my appointments in this world, and have no portion in the world to come…” In this targumic version several lines precede the actual translation of Gen. 15. 1 and place the biblical passage of God reassuring Abram that his own child shall be his heir in what the targumist understands as the proper context. Even this brief example illustrates that the exegetical activity of the targum is similar to that of midrash, but its mode is significantly different as it is confined within the context of translation. | 002_3467747 | {
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General Election 2017: a short guide
The Government intends to seek an early election. Here is our short guide to what it all means for Parliament.
How are early elections called? There will be a motion in the House of Commons tomorrow to trigger an early election using the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011. The Act set the date of the last general election on 7 May 2015 and set all future general elections for the first Thursday in May in every fifth year. The next election was therefore scheduled to take place on 7 May 2020. The Act states that an early election can be held if a motion for an early general election is agreed either by at least two-thirds of the whole House (including vacant seats) or without division (i. e. if it is agreed unanimously. ) So tomorrow’s motion will need 434 MPs to agree it to pass. Our Fixed-term Parliaments 2011 paper has more detail on the Act.
When will Parliament be dissolved for the election? Parliament has to be dissolved 25 working days before Polling Day. The Prime Minister has announced an 8 June election. This means that Parliament will be dissolved on Wednesday 3 May.
The House may Prorogue (suspend but not dissolve) before then. The Leader of the House has indicated today (18 April) that talks regarding prorogation will follow if the motion is passed tomorrow. What will happen to Bills currently before Parliament? Bills can’t be carried over through a dissolution. Any Bill before Parliament that has not received Royal Assent by dissolution will fall. To ensure that essential or non-controversial legislation is passed a ‘wash-up’ period takes place – when the Government and the Opposition reach agreements on the bills or parts of bills that should be hurried through their remaining parliamentary scrutiny. The wash-up procedure is enabled by motions, agreed by the House, which allow for the expedited progress of certain Bills.
How long does this take? Normally the House of Commons will spend most of a day (or more) on a stage of a bill. However, during the wash-up, when several bills need to be considered in two or three days this is not possible. After consultation with the Official Opposition, the Leader of the House makes a statement indicating how the Government wishes wash-up to proceed. However, the House has to agree to this timetable. Our briefing Wash-up – Election 2010 explains what happened before the 2010 election. There was no substantial wash-up period before the 2015 general election as the date of the election was known in advance. What is purdah? The term ‘purdah’ means the period of time immediately before elections or referendums when specific restrictions on the activity of civil servants and Ministers are in place. The preface to the General Election 2015 guidance for civil servants, issued on 30 March 2015, sets out the general principles:
- During an election campaign the Government retains its responsibility to govern and Ministers remain in charge of their Departments.
- Essential business must be carried on. In particular Cabinet Committees can continue to meet and consider correspondence if necessary, although in practice this may not be practical. If something requires urgent collective consideration, the Cabinet Secretary should be consulted. - It is customary for Ministers to observe discretion in initiating any action of a continuing or long-term character. - Decisions on matters of policy, and other issues such as large and/or contentious procurement contracts, on which a new Government might be expected to want the opportunity to take a different view from the present Government should be postponed until after the Election, provided that such postponement would not be detrimental to the national interest or wasteful of public money. When will purdah start and how long will it last? Purdah is likely to start on the day that Parliament is dissolved until after Polling Day on 8 June 2017. The purdah period before general elections is not regulated by law, but governed by conventions based largely on the Civil Service Code. Guidance is issued to civil servants ahead of the election. For the 2015 general election it was issued and took effect on 30 March 2015 – the day that Parliament was dissolved. Conversely, there is statutory guidance for local authorities about publicity during the period just before local elections, whilst the purdah period before referendums is regulated by the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. Our briefing ‘Purdah’ before elections and referendums (13 April 2017) provides further details. What about select committees? A 2017 election means that those select committee chairs who were elected on 10 June 2010 (a list is here) must, if still holding that position, cease to be chair of their select committee on 10 June 2018, unless the House orders otherwise. An early election and shorter 2015 Parliament means that some select committee chairs will have shorter terms than expected. Standing Order 122A states that: ‘no select committee may have as its chair a Member who has served as chair of that Committee for the two previous parliaments (of whatever length) or a continuous period of 8 years, whichever is the greater’. A 2015-2020 Parliament would have allowed those chairs elected in 2010 to have a 10 year term. Will the Manchester Gorton by-election go ahead? David Lidington MP, Leader of the House, said today in the Commons that he expected that the Returning Officer would cancel the by-election. As it was due on 4 May and Parliament is likely to be dissolved on 3 May, the new MP would be elected to a Parliament which no longer existed. Erskine May, the guide to Parliamentary procedure, indicates that there is “no statutory provision for cancelling a by-election when a general election is in progress”
The procedure for a by-election starts with a Writ being sent from the Clerk of the Crown (triggered by a Warrant from the Speaker) to the relevant Returning Officer. It is presumed that an acting Returning Officer would consider the Writ to have been superseded if the by-election were due to take place at a date when Parliament had been dissolved, since the MP could not be elected to a Parliament which no longer existed. Commons Library Briefing Election Timetables, March 2015 (p. 16-17) provides more detail. Will the local elections go ahead as planned? Yes, the local elections are on a statutory timetable (see our Election Timetables briefing for more info). Will new constituency boundaries apply? No. The four boundary commissions (England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland) are still working through the set cycles of consultation and analysis for their respective boundary reviews. They must complete their reviews and hand their reports to the Government by 1 October 2018. This process is explained in Commons Library Briefing Parliamentary Boundary Reviews: Public Consultation (November 2016) | 009_6289016 | {
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Massive vaccination programs and the consequences of such programs? SV40/Polio vaccine = increased cancer. A photo-op of the standard fatherly, book reading kind. . Where he announced that Ontario, Canada was launching a new vaccine program
How do they come to the above figure? How will this save $1400. 00 per child? The government is expanding the provincial immunization program to include: a new oral vaccine to protect babies against rotavirus, the most common source of stomach infections; a second childhood dose of varicella vaccine to protect against chickenpox; a new combined measles-mumps-rubella-varicella vaccine; and a lifetime dose of pertussis vaccine to protect children and adults alike against whooping cough. The province estimates the new subsidized vaccines would save Ontario families more than $1,400 per child. "
How much will this vaccine program cost? Notice there is no mention of that figure? Recap: 4 new vaccines, one, the rotavirus is an oral vaccine. Which means it has live virus contained in it. At least that is my understanding when it comes to Oral vaccines. Rotavirus- Canadian Institute of Child Health. Keep that name in mind, you will be hearing it again. “The virus is typically transmitted from person to person, through fecal-oral contact with contaminated hands and objects, so it is important for parents to monitor symptoms related to rotavirus. ”
Canadian parents become better informed about rotavirus and its prevention, including recognizing its symptoms and the signs of dehydration, as well as the importance of hand washing. Much like any other virus, the spread of which, is easily prevented by washing your handsLet's take a look at a pdf, you can read here, from the Ontario government
"The live vaccine form of the rotavirus can be in the stool
or feces of infants for up to 10 days after vaccination. To prevent the spread of the live vaccine virus, anyone
caring for the immunized baby should wash their hands
frequently especially after changing diapers"
Which means your child and you can become carriers and spreaders of rotavirus. Because if your child didn't have rotavirus before, they will certainly have it after the vaccination. Rotavirus causes diarrhea. The rotavirus vaccine causes diarrhea. "Your child may become irritable or have mild,
temporary diarrhea after getting a dose. "
A severe reaction can occur, but, of course it is stated that this is "rare". How rare? No figures given. Here is the reaction that can occur, but, it is "rare"-
Severe reactions are very rare and
may include a slight increased risk of bowel obstruction
I will let you read exactly what intussuception is at the PDF linked above
Why do these introductions come shortly after the VP of Pfizer Canada appointed to Canadian Institutes of Health Research ? Did you recall that name from above? December 2009 the VP of Pfizer Canada is appointed to the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and about one and a half years later. . . . . . . . 4 new vaccines. This appointment was opposed at that time for one big giant obvious reason- CONFLICT OF INTEREST! "Last week, bioethicists including Downie signed a petition opposing the appointment. As of Thursday, the petition had nearly 3,200 signatures. "
However apologist for government/corporate revolving door policies said-
"Prigent's appointment will bring a private-sector voice to the council and help ensure wise spending"
To which I say hardeeharhar! Problem number one out of the way- Now onto problem number two and it is a problem! A really big one! The rotavirus vaccine was contaminated with porcine DNA- March 30/2010- that is PIG virus, ok, virus from a PIG
GlaxoSmithKline notified the FDA on March 15 that an independent U.S. academic research team found, through novel methods, that the vaccine contains DNA from porcine circovirus 1 (PCV1), that is, components of a virus common among pigs. The FDA said there is no evidence at this time that this finding poses a safety risk, adding that "PCV1 is not known to cause illness in humans or other animals. "Some additional reading on the "harmless"(? ) porcine circovirus-
Additional testing has confirmed presence of the matter in the cell bank and seed from which the vaccine is derived, in addition to the vaccine itself. So the vaccine has been contaminated since its early stages of development. GSK says it is now reviewing how best to replace the cell bank and virus seeds used in making the vaccine, but it will continue Rotarix production using current methods. If the seed is contaminated, logically speaking all vaccine produced from the seed could be contaminated. This is identical to the problem of simian virus contaminating the polio vaccine. And the FDA has continued to this very day to cover up the contamination of the polio vaccine and the fact that it is carcinogenic, virulently carcinogenic to humans. The FDA cannot claim it is "harmless". They have no idea what the pig virus can do in the human body. Short term or long term. That claim from the FDA is pure spin. Why is the rotavirus vaccine going to be doled out like candy, when it could very well be contaminated, with unknown consequences? | 003_1508589 | {
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|Posted: Nov 29, 2016|
Inspiring images invite you into the world of engineering(Nanowerk News) Graphene is a sheet form of carbon that is a single atom thick, which can be produced by successively peeling thin layers off graphite using tape until an individual atomic layer is left. In the ink produced here, powdered graphite is mixed with alcohol then forced at high pressure through micrometre-scale capillaries made of diamond. |1st prize: graphene being processed in alcohol to produce conductive ink. |
|This was the first time that Macleod, a 32 year old technician at the Department, had entered the competition. His is one of more than 140 images that showcase the breadth of research taking place there. |
|The competition, sponsored by ZEISS, international leaders in the fields of optics and optoelectronics, has been held annually for the last 12 years. The panel of judges included Roberto Cipolla, Professor of Information Engineering, Dr Allan McRobie, Reader in Engineering, Professor David Cardwell, Head of Department, Dr Kenneth Png, Senior Applications Engineer at Carl Zeiss Microscopy and Philip Guildford, Director of Research.|
|2nd prize: Bacteria on a graphene coated carbon foam anodic surface. |
|Second prize went to Toby Call for his photo showing bacteria on a graphene coated carbon foam anodic surface. The bacteria (shown in red) produce conductive nanowires to connect to the surface. Also captured in the top left of the image is a ciliate (tiny protozoan) which either feed on the abundant electricity producing bacteria, or compete for resources. |
|Simon Stent was awarded third prize for an image showing a 2-km map of a power tunnel network in London. Due for completion in 2018, the network will channel up to six 400 kV electricity cables underground, doubling power capacity to the city. The image was captured and processed by a low-cost robotic device. Each of the 12 columns in the image spans a distance of 170 metres and shows the full 360 degree tunnel circumference unwrapped. |
|A zinc particle partially hidden underneath a graphene layer. |
|Mr Guildford says: "This year’s entries form yet another collection of incredible images that offer us an insight into the varied world of engineering. These photos show how some scientific applications and processes can convey stark beauty. From tiny particles and microscopic images, to sections of tunnel on the Crossrail project in London, these photos represent the full spectrum of engineering. "|
|Some of the images submitted to the competition are tiny, and can only be viewed properly through a microscope, while others are on a much grander scale. Behind them all lies a passion for the subject matter being studied by the photographer. |
|The winning images can be viewed online via the Department's Flickr pages, where they can be accessed alongside dozens of other entries. |
|Source: Cambridge University|
Subscribe to a free copy of one of our daily
Nanowerk Newsletter Email Digests
with a compilation of all of the day's news. | 001_4824691 | {
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If you’re wondering about the future of LED lights, it’s time to put away that crystal ball and turn to something a little more reliable: science. Haitz’s Law is a prediction about how LED technology and cost will improve over time, based on the systematic observations of Dr. Roland Haitz, a retired Agilent Technologies scientist. Haitz’s Law states that “every decade, the cost per lumen (unit of useful light emitted) falls by a factor of 10, the amount of light generated per LED package increases by a factor of 20, for a given wavelength (color) of light. ” Put simply, the law asserts that as LED functionality, quality and efficiency increase, the cost of producing and purchasing them will decrease. Haitz’s Law is considered to be the LED equivalent of Moore’s Law, which states that the density of transistors on integrated circuits (an integral component to computers, cell phones and most all electronic devices) doubles every 18—24 months. Moore’s Law was first described in 1965, and has so far proven accurate. Haitz’s Law was made public in 2000, and has also proven accurate. In fact, some sources report that LED technology is improving at an even faster rate than Haitz predicted (see LED Lighting Group for more info). The implications of Haitz’s Law for LED retailers and consumers are significant: LEDs will continue to get brighter and more efficient; LEDs will continue to get cheaper; and LEDs will continue to dominate the lighting market, over time completely replacing their less efficient counterparts, incandescent lights and CFLs. With scientific predictions like that, why would you use anything but stylish, eco-friendly and affordable LED lights? Thanks to Chinaxtz for the image. | 003_6318881 | {
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Jordan’s refugee experiment: a new model for helping the displaced in Jordan
Alexander Betts , Paul Collier
The Syrian refugee crisis has attracted Western attention largely because of its modest spillover into Europe. But this spillover represents a mere fraction of the misery caused by mass displacement today: only around 15 percent of Syria’s 5. 8 million refugees have attempted to reach Europe, and the Syrian refugee surge is itself only one of several around the world. The challenge of mass displacement is largely one of geographical concentration: nearly 60 percent of the world’s refugees are hosted by just ten haven countries, each bordering a conflict zone. It is in these countries—Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey, in the case of the Syrian civil war—where new approaches are most direly needed. In October, Foreign Affairs published our proposal for a new approach to the Syrian refugee crisis. By allowing displaced Syrians to work in special economic zones (SEZs) in Jordan, we argued, Amman could provide displaced Syrians with the jobs, education, and autonomy they need while advancing its own industrial development. Since our article was published, our idea has gained political traction. | 010_7075668 | {
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Ngapo Ngawang Jigme (right) at the Indian Mission in Lhasa in the 1950's
Ngapo has passed away in Beijing. He was the main Tibetan collaborator. Without his full support, the Chinese would have found difficult to 'peacefully liberate' the Roof of the World in the fifties. He was the signatory of the 17-Point-Agreement (in May 1951). Ngapo even agreed to have seals forged to affix at the bottom of the text. During the following decades he faithfully served his masters. The Chinese are obviously proud of him. Vitae of Ngapoi Ngawang Jigme
BEIJING, Dec. 24 -- Ngapoi once served as vice chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee from 1964 to 1993 and vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) for many years. He was also president of the China Association for Preservation and Development of Tibetan Culture, established in 2004. He was one of the founders of the Tibet Autonomous Region and the first chairman of the Regional Government.
He followed renowned scholars like Sherab Gyatso, who was strongly against an independent Tibet.
In 1949, Ngapoi urged the Dalai Lama and the local Tibetan Government to accept the Central Government's invitation and send a delegation to Beijing to negotiate the peaceful liberation of Tibet.
When he was designated governor of Qamdo, Ngapoi dismissed more than 8,000 militia soldiers who were deployed to fight the People's Liberation Army, paving the way for the peaceful liberation of Qamdo.
In 1951, the Dalai Lama sent Ngapoi and four other delegates to Beijing for negotiations. In Chongqing, Ngapoi met future Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping for the first time. In an article, he recalled that Deng dispelled his doubts about Tibet's future and that he regarded Deng as his first guide in the revolutionary cause. In 1951, the Central Government and local Tibetan authorities signed the 17-Article Agreement, heralding the region's peaceful liberation. During the rebellions of the 1950s, which were instigated by some Tibetan nobles and high-ranking religious figures, Ngapoi stood firmly against the wave, and personally protected many who stood up to the rebels. Ngapoi ushered in major milestones in Tibet, such as the democratic reforms and the founding of the Tibet Autonomous Regional Government.
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Recommend this gallery
Young Friends' Olympic posters
Did you know that the first modern Olympic Games were in 1896? The first record of the ancient Games was in 776 BC. However, the first poster for the Olympics only appeared in 1912. Using the colours of the Olympic rings and anything else that has inspired you over this Olympic season design a poster for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Some ideas might be:
- Use a design inspired by the Museum’s collection
- Focus on a particular sport and/or capture an important moment in that event
- Consider the Paralympic Games and what designs you might use
- Create a story like the 1948 poster, or make it abstract, full of colourful designs and patterns
How to enter
Email a photo of your poster to firstname. lastname@example. org
or send them to:
The British Museum Friends
Great Russell Street
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Wilde the Classicist
“He was a Grecian lad…” —A poetic pilgrimage
Proficient in ancient Greek and Latin, having read Classics at Oxford and achieving a double-first degree, Wilde’s ardent love of the ancient, particularly the Hellenistic world, remained with him long after his university education. It was not just a phase of his intellectual development, but became an inspirational and vital part of “his private codes of self-understanding and his incessant experiments in self-styling”: ancient Greece was “the foundation on which Wilde’s identity as aesthete, critic and writer [was] built. ” His career as a poet began with a classical subject, winning the Newdigate Prize in 1878 for his long poem “Ravenna”, an ancient city he had recently visited. As much as he had enjoyed his classical studies at Oxford, his holidays to Greece and Italy clearly surpassed reading Plato in tutorials, for he missed the beginning of term in 1877 while touring the Mediterranean (“I hope you will not mind if I miss ten days at the beginning: seeing Greece is really a great education for anyone and will I think benefit me greatly”), and was threatened with suspension by irritated college dons. Many of the works in Poems were written on or inspired by these travels. The appeal of both Christianity and Greek paganism, and the opposition between papal Rome and pagan Greece fixated Wilde during his spiritual and geographical pilgrimage, where “the pagan and the Christian worlds had thus been placed before him in swift succession in their most intense form. ”
The poetic sequence “Rosa Mystica” tracks his personal experiences and revelations during his Mediterranean tour, in which he “set down his religious history”, from his initial attraction to Roman Catholicism, strengthened after a private audience with the Pope in Rome, to inevitably succumbing to the allure of Hellenism. Written in Florence, “Ave Maria Gratia Plena” (“Hail Mary, full of grace”) wonders upon the humility of Christ’s conception, compared with the spectacular, violent scenes of classical mythology:
Was this His coming! I had hoped to see
A scene of wondrous glory, as was told
Of some great God who in a rain of gold
Broke open bars and fell on Danaë:
Or a dread vision as when Semele
Sickening for love and unappeased desire
Prayed to see God’s clear body, and the fire
Caught her brown limbs and slew her utterly:
With such glad dreams I sought this holy place,
And now with wondering eyes and heart I stand
Before this supreme mystery of Love:
Some kneeling girl with passionless pale face,
An angel with a lily in his hand,
And over both the white wings of a Dove.
At the outset of the sonnet, the speaker expresses disappointment with the Christian story of divine conception. The octave is then entirely devoted to Greek myth, the decorum of the Christian scene contrasted with the “wondrous glory” he was expecting, such as the Greek god Zeus breaking through bars as a violent gilded storm to the imprisoned princess Danaë to conceive the hero Perseus, and instantly incinerating his mortal lover princess Semele, the mother of Dionysus, by revealing his true blazing form to her. The first two lines of the sestet then shift the focus from the fiery splendours of Zeus to the speaker standing before a painting or sculpture of the Annunciation. Enjambment is used consistently throughout the octave, offering a gushing retelling of the destruction wrought by terrible divine power, which continues until the last quatrain, when suddenly the enjambment finally ceases completely, and the poem ends in strict, metrical iambic pentameter with no caesuras to break the lines, mirroring the stillness and tranquillity of the Annunciation scene before him. Wilde adopts a very ingenuous tone in his surprise and disillusionment at the Christian story. This also works to the effect of diminishing any grandeur the Annunciation might have. The traditionally beautiful, demure face of the Madonna is reduced to a “passionless pale face”, and the Virgin herself is only “some kneeling girl”, “some” achieving a dismissive, even disdainful effect. But the understated depiction of the Annunciation – the dove’s white wings, the white lily, symbol of purity and innocence –conveys a cool chasteness in contrast to the whirling pagan scenes described in the octave. The soft white wings of the dove are in opposition to Zeus’s “rain of gold”, and the Virgin’s “passionless pale face” contrasts with Semele’s swarthy “brown limbs”, suggesting that the Christian Annunciation possesses the charm of an austere, sedate and composed aesthetic, which the heavy-handed, destructive pagan god and his swarthy princesses lack. Overall, the poem is ambiguous: in the end, it is uncertain which world, the pagan or the Christian, the speaker decides has more appeal. Rather, the two worlds are merged and confused. No divinities are mentioned by name, and even Zeus is referred to simply as “God”. The naivety of the speaker also casts doubt on his view of things, such as when he rather callously remarks, “With such glad dreams I sought this holy place”, directly after describing how Zeus revealed himself to Semele and “slew her utterly”. “Ave Maria Gratia Plena” is ultimately a dalliance with the aesthetics of Catholicism and paganism by a naïve and uncertain mind, in which many suggestions and comparisons are made, but no definitive conclusion is reached. After reading the poem, the ironic title, “Hail Mary, full of grace”, drawn from the traditional Catholic prayer to the Virgin, becomes an empty, ritualistic phrase, as the final static image of the Annunciation hardly stirs the speaker to reverent praise. It does, however, reveal Wilde’s uncertainty and ambivalence towards religion of any kind. In the example of Semele, Wilde realises that praying for a vision of the divine does not always end so well for mortals, a sentiment he expresses in a more conventionally devout way in “San Miniato”: “Mary! Could I but see thy face / Death could not come at all too soon. ”
The contemplation of religion, and particularly the aesthetics of religion, is a dominant theme of the “Rosa Mystica” sequence. The poetic tug-of-war between Catholicism and Hellenism which preoccupied Wilde during his travels gave him opportunity for displaying his knowledge of the classics, along with his genuine search for faith and meaning. The “Sonnet written in Holy Week at Genoa”, unlike “Ave Maria”, truly prefigures the inevitable triumph of Hellenism over Catholicism in the battle for Wilde’s ideological, aesthetic and poetic preferences:
I wandered in Scoglietto’s green retreat,
The oranges on each o’erhanging spray
Burned as bright lamps of gold to shame the day;
Some startled bird with fluttering wings and fleet
Made snow of all the blossoms, at my feet
Like silver moons the pale narcissi lay:
And the curved waves that streaked the sapphire bay
Laughed i’ the sun, and life seemed very sweet. Outside the young boy-priest passed singing clear,
“Jesus the Son of Mary has been slain,
O come and fill his sepulchre with flowers. ”
Ah, God! Ah, God! those dear Hellenic hours
Had drowned all memory of Thy bitter pain,
The Cross, the Crown, the Soldiers, and the Spear.
One of many poems which express “Wilde’s conception of himself as a soul trembling between two waves not of thought but of feeling”, the speaker ultimately returns to the Christian wave, but “out of a surge of pity rather than of awe. ” Happily losing himself in the intoxicating beauty of the landscape (“those dear Hellenic hours”), he is suddenly reminded of Christian sobriety and chides himself for temporarily forgetting his sense of Christian guilt. The poem sets up the Christian world view in opposition to the Romantic appreciation of nature. His delight in natural splendour echoes Wordsworth’s daffodils: Wilde’s description of “the curved waves that streaked the great green bay / Laughed i’ the sun, and life seemed very sweet”, evokes the famous Romantic imagery of Wordsworth’s sparkling, dancing waves, and the poet “In such jocund company”. Wilde’s lines, “Some startled bird with fluttering wings and fleet / Made snow of all the blossoms” recalls the daffodils “fluttering and dancing in the breeze”. The association is complicated with Wilde’s description of the flowers themselves: “at my feet / Like silver moons the pale narcissi lay”, the narcissus being the older horticultural name for the daffodil, as well as representing the famous character of Greek mythology. Contrary to being golden and gay, “tossing their heads in sprightly dance”, Wilde’s narcissi are pale and moonlike, possessing a haunting stillness and solemnity. A possible interpretation is that the narcissi come to represent their mythological roots. They lay forlornly by the lake, just as their namesake, the original Narcissus, lies pining for his own reflection in the River Styx for all eternity. The solemn narcissi foil the Romantic notion of joy and freedom in nature, for Wilde uses their ancient associations to introduce a Greek gravity to the scene to reflect another side of nature, of inherent and profound sadness. This note of graveness in the otherwise charming scene foreshadows the turn of the sonnet at the sestet, when the speaker’s remorse takes over. Even in the final quatrain, classical allusions are still prominent. “Hellenic” is used to describe the beauty and delight of nature, and the phrase “drowned all memory” – a reminder of the joyous lake from the octave – alludes to the River Lethe, the waters of forgetfulness. So although an obvious contrast to draw would be between the Hellenistic gaiety of the octave and the Christian sobriety of the sestet, the presence of the narcissus flower and all its associations suggest that the pagan world also possesses the gravity of Catholicism. In comparison with the subtlety and allusion – both to classicism and to Romanticism – seen in the octave, the “remembering” of Christian theology, “The Cross, the Crown, the Soldiers and the Spear”, seems somewhat forced and mechanical, devoid of the refinement and poetic finesse of the descriptions in the octave. The last line’s chant-like listing evokes a sense of enforced guilt, a pathos which the speaker imposes on himself in an act of figurative self-flagellation. The capitalised words heighten their sense of importance without offering any poetic embellishment. The Christian aesthetic is portrayed as more grave and solemn, but the Hellenistic world with its Romantic associations and rich mythology proves ultimately more appealing and, for Wilde, the richer subject for verse. Wilde would come to fully embrace the Greek spirit over the Christian, as seen most prominently in his creation of Dorian Gray, the embodiment of classical Greek beauty, whose initial unspotted purity represents the purely “aesthetic” morality of the Greeks, untainted by the Christian fixation with sin. These two poems are examples of the two very different cultures Wilde was drawn to, and they seem to assert that Wilde the proud, unshakable Hellenist did not spring into being from the Classics classrooms at Oxford, but was developed over this phase of his life, a cultivation tracked in verse. Inevitably, the gifted classicist was intellectually and aesthetically, as well as for obvious more personal reasons, irresistibly drawn to ancient Greece. Although the poetry Wilde produced in Italy does show a reverence for Roman Catholicism, “there was a creed older than Christendom to which the divided Wilde had also pledged allegiance. ”
Stefano Evangelista, “The Greek Life of Oscar Wilde”, British Aestheticism and Ancient Greece: Hellenism, Reception, Gods in Exile (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009) p125. A letter written from Oscar Wilde to his disapproving tutor at Magdalen College. He also added that his experiences and company were “quite as good as going to lectures”. (Raby, p14. )
Ellmann, Oscar Wilde, p74. Raby, p15. Ellmann, p70. Arthur H. Nethercot, “Oscar Wilde and the Devil’s Advocate”, PMLA, Vol. 59, No. 3 (Modern Language Association, 1944) p835. Ellmann, p69. Evangelista, p152. Ellmann, p71. | 001_6641960 | {
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10 Times More Thimerosal in Canadian
Non-Adjuvanted H1N1 Vaccine
According to this Public Health Agency of Canada website, the
non-adjuvanted vaccine [ie: the H1N1 vaccine without the ASO3
(otherwise known as squalene-oil-water adjuvant)] will contain
10 times the amount of Thimerosal as in the adjuvanted vaccine
presently being distributed. This, they want to give to young
kids and pregnant women. The excuse for this allowable mercury in the vaccine, is that
it is different from the mercury you get in food, like tuna fish;
and, it amounts to less than the daily allowable limit (from food). I suggest anybody who wants to learn more about how the type
of mercury in Thimerosal is more toxic than the mercury from consuming
fish, please read the book Evidence of Harm by David
Kirby. By the way, when you eat the fish, you only absorb a very
small portion of the mercury. When you inject it into your muscle
of course, you have absorbed 100% of the dose. Q4. Is it true that there is mercury in the vaccine? How
Both vaccines contain a small amount of thimerosal. Thimerosal
is a form of mercury used in the H1N1 flu vaccine to stabilize
it and maintain its quality during storage. Thimerosal is a different
form of mercury than the mercury known to cause health problems. The amount in the H1N1 adjuvanted flu vaccine is much less than
the daily limit recommended for environmental exposure to mercury. For example, there is significantly less mercury in the vaccine
than you would find in a can of tuna fish. Q5. Is it true that there is 10 times more mercury in the unadjuvanted
vaccine? How can that be safe for pregnant women? Yes, the unadjuvanted vaccine does contain 50 ug of thimerosal
while the adjuvanted vaccine has only 5 ug of thimerosal. The
50 ug remains within the daily limit recommended for environmental
exposure to mercury. Theres significantly less mercury in
the vaccine than you would find in a can of tuna fish. Thimerosal is approximately 50% ethyl mercury by weight. 50 ug
(micrograms) of Thimerosal equals 25 micrograms mercury. full list of h1n1 vaccine ingredients, alerts and warnings. Reference Sources: 183
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Last year, both the European Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (ECDC) and the British government warned about the dangers of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This week, the World Health Organization (WHO) became the latest institution to join in this increasingly ominous chorus with the release of a list of antibiotic-resistant priority pathogens – the first in the organization's 69-year history. Marie-Paule Kieny, WHO's assistant director-general for health systems and innovation, told reporters at a press conference that the list, which catalogs the 12 families of bacteria posing the greatest threat to human health, "is not meant to scare people about new superbugs, but to signal to researchers and pharmaceutical companies what their priorities should be. "
Given that a superbug – immune to all 26 antibiotics available in the US – has already claimed a life, a wait-and-see attitude looks no longer adequate, given that it takes anywhere from between 10 and 15 years to develop a treatment. And the longer governments drag their feet, the costlier the potential repercussions. According to the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance that was commissioned by the British government, if left untreated, superbugs could inflict the global economy with a US$100 trillion deficit alongside a death toll of up to 10 million a year by 2050. "Antibiotic resistance is growing, and we are fast running out of treatment options," said Kieny. "If we leave it to market forces alone, the new antibiotics we most urgently need are not going to be developed in time. "
The list, which was compiled by researchers at the University of Tübingen in Germany, shares similarities with a document published by the CDC back in 2013, which zeroed in on 18 antibiotic-resistant threats. Many of the bacteria that were highlighted then, including the three it deemed critical – Acinetobacter, Pseudomonas and various strains of Enterobacteriaceae – appear on the WHO list. Where the lists differ is that the WHO has chosen to focus exclusively on bacteria that can cause fatal infections. The WHO list is divided into three categories – critical, high and medium – which are based on the bacteria's resistance to treatment, how commonplace they are, whether they can still be treated, and the toll they exact on the healthcare system. While the presence of these pathogens might vary from country to country, air travel has made it easier for them to cross national borders and wreak havoc worldwide. Given this state of affairs, according to Hermann Gröhe, federal minister of health in Germany, it is time for governments to work together to put in place policies that spur the development of new antibiotics. One of the problems contributing to the current dearth of solutions, as Kieny pointed out during the press conference, is the fact that developing antibiotics is not a lucrative venture for pharmaceutical companies since they are meant to be taken only for a short period of time, unlike drugs for chronic diseases. An idea being floated to address this is to change the way companies are compensated by awarding them a cash prize or paying them an upfront fee for each new antibiotic that is developed so that profits are not dependent on product sales. On another note, boosting R&D in this sector is just one part of the solution. Stopping the superbug onslaught also requires better efforts at communicating the role and use of antibiotics. According to the WHO, there is a lot of misunderstanding about what antibiotic resistance actually is and what can be done to prevent it, which in turn exacerbates the problem. In a previous WHO survey conducted among 10,000 people across 12 countries, including China, India and Russia, 64 percent of respondents believed antibiotics could be used to treat colds and flu (they can't – antibiotics have no impact on viruses); 32 percent believed they should stop taking antibiotics when they feel better, rather than completing the prescribed course of treatment; and 76 percent said that antibiotic resistance is what happens when the body becomes resistant to antibiotics. A US poll conducted among more than 2,000 adults earlier this month by HealthDay/Harris Poll revealed that not only do many Americans share similar misconceptions, 69 percent of those surveyed admitted they know little to nothing about the problem. Clearly, there is a need to improve understanding about this subject otherwise the problem will continue to persist even if new antibiotics are developed in future. WHO's list of priority pathogens
Priority 1: Critical
Not only are these gram-negative bacteria resistant to multiple antibiotics, including last-resort carbapenems, they also have the ability to develop new methods of drug resistance and pass this information along to other bacteria. Elderly patients as well as those with compromised immune systems are particularly vulnerable, making these pathogens a deadly threat in hospitals and nursing homes, where they can colonize devices such as ventilators and blood catheters. Priority 2: High
These bacteria can cause infections that are hard to treat but they are not as deadly as the first group of pathogens - yet. Priority 3: Medium
While these pathogens are immune to certain antibiotics, they can still be treated. However doctors caution that these strains could evolve into those that are drug-resistant. Want a cleaner, faster loading and ad free reading experience? Try New Atlas Plus. Learn more | 003_4955585 | {
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President or prinz? That was the question facing Norddeutscher Lloyd (NDL) officials in 1907 when it was time to name their newest ocean liner. They eventually decided on the latter, naming the vessel Prinz Friedrich Wilhelm.
The liner Prinz Friedrich Wilhelm was originally going to be named Washington, but NDL officials, perhaps feeling some pressure from the Kaiser (who was keenly interested in boosting Germany’s naval and maritime fleets), changed their minds and gave the vessel a Hohenzollern name. The 590. 1-foot-long, 68-fo0t-beam, 16,992-ton liner, launched on 21 October 1907, featured two funnels and a service speed of 17 knots. She offered accommodation for up to 46 first-class, 338 second and 1,726 third-class passengers. To continue, click the NEXT button on the top of this page. | 001_894097 | {
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|Bedside Pansies = thinking of you|
A deep cleansing breath is composed of three parts. The first step is to inhale, smelling the air,
filling up the diaphragm and allowing the air to travel up
to the base of the lungs, expanding the rib cage until
the clean air reaches the uppermost regions of the lungs. At this point some may hold their breath, especially if afraid. The cleansing has been trapped, on hold, paused. If held for too long one collapses to the floor -
The natural next step in a cleansing breath is to exhale. This is done to allow the now old, stale air
to exit either through the nostrils or through the mouth. Both have there uses depending on the individual's needs. If in severe pain or under duress might I suggest
the best course of action is to exhale through the mouth -
Forcefully if necessary. The final part of the breath is subtle. It is a small, quiet pause,
the space between. | 012_6094614 | {
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Siksa, Vyakarna and the subjects I have yet to deal with -Chandas and Nirukta-are Vedangas-(limbs of the vedas)connected with language. After I said that I would deal with matters basic to our religion, I have been speaking about linguistic studies and grammar. Next I am going to deal with prosody. By works on religion we ordinarily mean those[directly] relating to God, worship, devotion, jnana, dharma and so on. Would not the right thing for me then be to speak about such works? When we dealt with the vedas a number of matters cropped up, matters regarded as germane to religion. Religion will find a prominent place in the subjects that I have yet to speak about, Kalpa, Mimamsa, the Puranas and Dharmasastra., But in between has arisen the science of language that has apparently no connection with religion. In the vedic view everything is connected with the Lord. There is no question of dividing subjects into "religious" and "non-religious". Even the science of medicine, Ayurveda, which pertains to physical well being, is ultimately meant for Atmic uplift- or for that matter, military science(Dhanurveda). That is why they were made part of traditional lore. So too political economy which is also an Atma-sastra. Why are works belonging to these fields held in great esteem? All subjects, all works, that teach a man to bring order, refinement and purity in every aspect of his life and help him thus to take the path to liberation are regarded as religious in character. Sound is the highest of the perceived forms of the Paramatman and language is obviously connected with it. It is the concern of Siksa and Vyakarana to refine and clarify it and make it a means for the well-being of our Self.
Grammar is associated with Sabdabrahman. Worship of the Nadabrahman which is the goal of music is a branch of this. If sounds are well discerned and employed in speech they will serve not only the purpose of communication but also of cleansing us inwardly. The science of language is helpful here. I have already mentioned that Pathanjali's commentary on Panini's Sutras is called the Mahabhasya. The prefix "Maha" in the name of the work is an indication of high degree of importance given to grammar in our tradition. Illustrious teachers have written commentaries on the Vedas, on the Brahmasutra, on the Upanisads, on the Bhagavadgita, and so on. But none of these has "maha" prefixed to it. There is a saying that a scholar derives as much happiness from learning the Mahabhasya as from ruling an empire. Mahabhasyam va pathaniyam
maharajyam va sasaniyam
I recently came across another piece of evidence like the Vengi inscription to prove how in the old days our rulers nurtured and propagated the science of grammar. Dhar was a state in the formal Central Provinces(now a part of Madhya Pradesh). It is the same as Dhara which was the capital of Bhojaraja who was a great patron of arts and who made lavish gifts to poets and artists. There is a mosque in the town of Dhar now. Once a cave was discovered in the mosque which on examination revealed some writings in Sanskrit. But the department of epigraphy could not carry out any investigations until some years after freedom. Then, with the permission of the authorities of the mosque, they studied their finding. To their amazement they saw a wheel inside with verses dealing with grammar inscribed on it in the form of a chart. The mosque stands today where a temple to Sarasvati stood during Bhojaraja's time. The idea behind the wheel is that the science of language (grammar)must form part of the temple to Sarasvati, the goddess of speech---and grammar is the Vedapurusa's mouth. They say that grammar could be learnt at a glance from this wheel. It is because the science of language is worthy of worship that the wheel inscribed with grammar was installed in the temple. With the blessings of Vagdevi(Sarasvati) we have obtained the wheel, though long after the mosque was built at that site. The department of epigraphy has published the text of the inscription with an English translation. We learn thus that sastras like grammar were not regarded merely as of worldly interest but in fact considered worthy of worship. That is why rulers promoted them. For a general background, please see here | 000_6410764 | {
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This column was originally titled, “Do you have chronic inflammation? ” I decided to go ahead and provide the presumptive answer. All of us do have this fateful condition to some degree. Why do I call it a “fateful condition? ” Read on. Inflammation is a great thing … at times. If it weren’t for inflammation, minor injuries and simple infections might kill us. Inflammation is the cascade of events that occur when our body’s immune system mounts a defense to injury or invading pathogens. You already know what inflammation is. It’s the process of tissues turning red, becoming swollen, warm and painful when injured. In many cases there will be secretions of some sort of fluid as a result of inflammation, and often decreased function of the affected tissue. Acute inflammation is a necessary event that represents a healthy response to an injury or infection. During this inflammation process, immune system chemicals and infection-fighting cells are released in the area to immediately begin to destroy cells and microbes that are foreign to our body. Thankfully, most of us have healthy immune systems that will initiate a robust inflammatory response to an acute threat. After the threat has been diminished, the inflammatory response is no longer appropriate, and a perfectly healthy body activates a “stand down” order to discontinue the inflammatory activity. Chronic inflammation is a different story. Chronic inflammation is the long-term, low-grade inflammatory activity that may be responsible for the disease that ultimately ends your life. Chronic inflammation has been linked to arthritis, heart disease, stroke, Alzheimer’s, asthma, high blood pressure, bowel disease, cancer and practically every other fatal disease or condition. Most disease processes that could end your life will have their origins from a chronic inflammation condition. Chronic inflammation has become the subject of a growing amount of medical research in recent years. As one recent article from Harvard Medical School begins, “The notion that chronic inflammation causes cancer is well documented, but exactly how the disease unfolds is not always clear. ” There is much to be learned about the process by which chronic inflammation manifests into deadly diseases. What a paradox. Acute inflammatory response is often necessary to save your life, and yet chronic inflammatory response could lead to your death. In order to increase our level of health and decrease our chances of illness and early death, decreasing chronic inflammation is essential. Interestingly, some of the choices you and I make each day contribute to the amount of chronic inflammation that will affect us. Research has shown with certainty that there are several steps we can take to decrease our level of chronic inflammation. Based on medical literature, here are five steps that have been shown to have documented positive effects in reducing chronic inflammation. 1. Make revisions in your diet. Choose foods that have fewer carbohydrates and trans-fats. Add more fresh fruits, vegetables and healthy fats, such as olive oil. 2. Eat less fast food and convenience foods. The explanation for why this is critically important is too long for this article. The short explanation is that these types of foods contribute heavily to chronic inflammation and eventually deadly consequences. 3. Get more sleep. Less sleep means more chronic inflammation. Earlier bed times might improve your health substantially. 4. Take a high quality nutritional vitamin and mineral supplement. You know that plants grow better when they are fed Miracle Grow. Your body needs nutritional supplementation, too. Chronic inflammation is lessened with good nutritional support. Unfortunately, you are extremely unlikely to obtain ideal nutrients from your diet alone. 5. Enjoy sensible exercise. If you are not sure that you are exercising enough, you probably aren’t. Start from where you are and gradually increase healthy, fun exercise activities. The information above is culled from a review of recent articles in well-respected medical journals. After reading the above steps, were there any surprises? Although our federal government is debating multi-billion-dollar plans to “educate” you and I about the steps we can take to improve our health, in reality, isn’t this is the same advice our grandmothers would have given us? Next week: A doctor’s stunning confession! Dr. Mark Kestner | 005_2739174 | {
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Welcome to Scholastic Booktalks where we recommend brand new Scholastic books that we think you will love. Today's booktalk: Bones: Skeletons & How They Work by Steve Jenkins.
Skeletons are creepy and scary, but what do you really know about them? Here is an interesting fact: there are 206 bones in a human adult skeleton. But babies have 300 bones where they are born. Why does the amount shrink when you get older? This book will tell you! Did you know that the largest bone ever found was 10 feet long? What kind of creature would a bone like that belong to? And what about the smallest bone? What animal does that belong to? You'll find out when you read this book! You will learn how a skeleton works and be able to compare bones belonging to different animals. Arm bones, leg bones, neck bones and skulls are discussed. You can compare your own bones to those of an elephant, rhinoceros and a fruit bat! You will even learn about dinosaur bones. Can you guess which animal has the most rib bones? Here are three possibilities: a bird, a human or a snake. Which one is correct? Read Bones to find out. — Jen, Scholastic Booktalker | 006_2935514 | {
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Weddings make some people happy and others get cold feet thinking maybe they’re not ready. Women usually plan their wedding from childhood and dream about being princess for a day while men want to tie the knot with the women they love. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religion, countries and social class. The bride and groom either exchange wedding wows, present a gift to each other such as ring, symbolic item, flowers, money or property and the marriage is proclaimed by an authority figure or religious leader. The wedding can take place anywhere from home, garden, beach or hotel saloons. Some couples over decorate while others chose to keep it simple but food and drinks are always served to the guests. Music, poetry, prayers and readings from Holy Scriptures are read in the ceremony. Special clothing is worn but this varies from country to country. Many countries have adopted the tradition with the white wedding dress and veil for the bride and suit for the groom. This tradition is derivates from Queen Victoria and has influenced the world. Her choice of the white wedding dress and veil symbolized the purity of the female before marriage. The tradition with wedding ring has a long history but the origin of the tradition is unclear. Wedding in Islam
Holy Prophet Muhammad (saw. ) says, “No house has been built in Islam more beloved in the sight of Allah than through marriage. ”
A marriage is not valid unless the bride and the groom both are willing to get married and many hadith’s (narrations of the words and deeds of the Prophet Muhammad) advises to encourage the groom to visit the bride before the wedding. However these visits must be supervised so that they ensure the purity of action between the couple. The ceremony called “Khutbah-tun Nikah begins with the praise of Allah for His help and guidance with the Muslim confession; “there is none worthy of worship except Allah and Muhammad is His servant and messenger”. Last, the 3 Quranic verses (4:1, 3:102, 33:70-71) and one hadith form the main text of the marriage. 1) Mutual agreement by the bride and the groom
2) Two adult and sane witnesses
3) Mahr (marriage-gift) to be paid by the groom to the bride either immediately
1) Legal guardian (wakeel) representing the bride
2) Written marriage contract signed by the bride and the groom and witnesses by two adult and sane witnesses
3) Qadi (State appointed Muslim judge) or Ma’zoon (a responsible person officiating the marriage ceremony)
4) Khutba-tun-Nikah to solemnize the marriage
After the consummation of the marriage, the groom holds a banquet called a walima. The relatives, neighbors, and friends are invited in order to make them aware of the marriage. Both rich and poor of the family and community are invited to the marriage feasts. The Mahr is considered as an essential part of the marriage contract and paid in cash, property or movable objects to the bride. The amount of mahr is not legally specified, however, moderation according to the existing social norm is recommended. The mahr may be paid immediately to the bride at the time of marriage, or deferred to a later date, or a combination of both. The deferred mahr however, falls due in case of death or divorce. “And give the women (on marriage) their mahr as a (nikah) free gift” (Quran 4:4). The Afghan marriage custom
An Afghan wedding is a happy and loud affair for outsiders to experience. What is famous with the Afghan weddings, are the hospitality and that the family of the bride and groom use most of their time to serve the guests and make sure that they are satisfied. When a young man wants to marry a young lady who is from an unknown family, first his parents do some kind of background check about her, trying to know more about her morals, beauty, and other family affairs. Many factors are taken into consideration such as; family status, financial security, and the personalities of the bride and prospective grooms. If they are happy with what they find, the groom’s parents will send a female family member or a relative to her house in order to understand, indirectly or directly, and would disclose the proposal. This consultation process takes some time, and a date is usually fixed to announce the decision among the relatives, if both sides are satisfied with this deal. Every girl dreams about falling in love, get married in a beautiful dress and have their own family, but for many Afghan girls, and also millions across Asia, Africa, marriage happens before their either old enough or with a man they hardly know. For the most extreme cases, some girls takes the step by harming themselves to try to get out of the situation by using gasoline and set fire on themselves. This doesn’t help anyone but destroys more for the girl since she has to suffer from deep burns, pain and scars for the rest of her life if she survives. The reasons for these marriages are mainly poverty where families have difficult time feeding their family members. In many other countries across Asia and Africa, families look at their daughters as a burden or a possibility for dowry that can hold for a while. From now on the girls will be in he care of the husband. Another burden for the girls is that they get pregnant and due to poor healthcare or none, the risk of dying during pregnancy or childbirth is very high, putting Afghanistan on highest ranking in the world. Many girls are unfortunately married in a very young age and they are not able to even remember their own wedding ceremony and isn’t ready for the new life at the husbands home. In some rural villages, it’s actually considered dishonorable for the families if the daughter would meet or date a boy and some parents marry their children to avoid such thing. There is also instability when it comes to security in the country and man girls are vulnerable to be kidnapped as well, but due to poverty, many families except dowry for the girl and the cost of wedding and new home with furniture makes the wedding plans difficult. What’s the price? Mahr is allowed in Islam, but the walwar isn’t, it has become a cultural practice and now in poverty it has become a necessity. Many young men who wants to get married but can’t afford it, has asked help to the local mullahs and elders. The big obstacle is “walwar”, the bride price that is paid to the bride’s father. The money is supposed to be spent on household goods for the newlyweds but is often needed of the girls family. The recent years, level of walwar has raised sky high because of the last decades of war and drought leaving many girls single unless a much older man who can afford the walwar comes along. There is also the dilemma that in many rural areas, if the father doesn’t ask for walwar, many other villages will start gossip that there might be something wrong with the girl. The amount of walwar is between 10,000 – 15,000$ in the north and the elders claim that the commanders and gunmen’s involved with guns and other illegal work has the blame for bringing inflation and scaring the villagers. They have a lot of money and can ‘buy’ anything they want. If they can’t buy it, they simply take it by force. Because of the high price, many young men can’t get married when their salary is only 100$ a month and girls lack of potential grooms. The potential grooms in another hand, tries to get the necessary money together by leaving the country in search for better paid jobs but some does not return back. The village elders now has taken the case in their hands and set the walwar to 3000$ and the decision has been supported by everybody even the “Ulamah” (Council of Religious Scholars) and asked to be adopted in the country. The announcement will happen through the local mosques and if anyone violates the decision, will be fined with 3000$. The Afghan government has also changed the legal age for marriage from 16 to 17 but if the girl is under 17, they have to obtain a legal marriage certification, but many doesn’t. The solution for this problem is the leading corruption and poverty in the country. The government has to do more than only change the age for marriage. The life standards have to be improved and the young men must get the opportunity for job possibilities. Education and self determination is also important. Leaving the burden only to the bachelor makes the new start for the life hard and marriage becomes impossibility. | 003_2888795 | {
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Everyone has been affected by cancer. In 1900, only 3 out of 100 deaths were attributed to cancer. Breast cancer was unheard of in the first 50 years of the 20th century. Across the board, cancer was so rare that it wasn’t listed as a cause of death in the government statistics. So what’s happened since 1950 to send the incidents of cancer through the roof? In 2012, for breast cancer alone, 290,000 women were diagnosed and of those diagnosed, 45,000 will die. WHAT IS GOING ON? ! Oncologists tout the meme that cancer is a genetic disease … but if it’s genetic disease, why wasn’t anyone getting cancer at the turn of the century a hundred years ago? Cancer is an epi-genetic disease that is triggered primarily by environment mismatches. If you use modern technology or eat a standard American diet, you are at risk of getting cancer. Cancer is a disease of altered cellular signaling caused by inflammation. In this webinar, we’re going to discuss:
– The dietary deficiencies that contribute to the epi-genetic phenomenon
– The chemo prevention of breast cancer using nutra-genomics
– Genetics and epi-genetics, and all the things that affect whether your genetic profile makes you vulnerable
– A 30-foot view of breast cancer to help you understand your risk factors and how you can cure yourself | 005_2195693 | {
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Laser scan model of one of the last-standing structures at Honouliuli Internment Camp. Archaelogists believe this structure was the internment camp’s fire station as the foundation includes a ramp. Designated as a new unit of the National Park Service in February 2015 by Hawaiian-born President Barack Obama, the physical remains of the Honouliuli Internment Camp serve as a tangible reminder that during World War II, the U.S. government, under Executive Order 9066, forced over 120,000 people of Japanese heritage to leave their homes and businesses and live in confinement camps. Mid-Pacific Institute began working with CyArk through a National Park Service Japanese American Confinement Sites (JACS) grant awarded to CyArk in 2014. The JACS Grant Program was established by Congress in 2006, “To provide for the preservation of the historic confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II… in order that present and future generations may learn and gain inspiration from these sites. ” | 003_2278701 | {
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It has been known for many years that drinking alcohol while pregnant can cause serious and irreversible damage to the fetus. However, new research exploring memory deficits in children diagnosed with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) or fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) may be able to aid in the creation of new therapies and treatments. The results will be published in the January 2011 issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and are currently available at Early View.
Joseph Jacobson, one of the studys authors and Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences at the Wayne State University School of Medicine, said that the mechanisms associated with the deficits in children with FASD and FAS are still not well understood. Therefore, the researchers decided to focus on the mental difficulties that the children experience to help determine the specific mechanisms that cause them. "FASD is associated with learning problems in children, including having difficulties in response inhibition and memory," says Jacobson. "Additional understanding of the nature of these problems has the potential to help develop more effective remediation programs for children with fetal alcohol-related learning problems. "
The deficits associated with FASD and FAS are varied said Jacobson, and the myriad of possible causes underlying these problems are still not widely understood. What is known, he added, is that, "prenatal alcohol exposure affects many different aspects of brain development, including brain size, neuronal development, and development of white matter tracts. "
Data for this research was collected from 217 Inuit children that were placed in either the alcohol-exposed group, where mothers reported binge drinking while pregnant, or the control. The data was recorded using electroencephalography (EEG) to observe the changing voltage of the brains electrical activity during the memory and coordination trials. This allowed the researchers to explore the differences in the brains electrical activity, called event-related potentials, which change in specific ways depending on what task was presented, between the alcohol-exposed and control groups. The researchers discovered that the alcohol-exposed group, while similar to the control in accuracy and reaction time, showed a statistically significant decrease in understanding the meaning of a stimulus, attention dedication to a specific task, and memory processing. "The study demonstrates that there are alterations in this group of children on their processing of information related to these functions," said Claire Coles, a Professor of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science and Pediatrics at the Emory University School of Medicine. "Hopefully, such information can be used to develop more effective teaching methods for children affected by prenatal exposure. "
Jacobson agrees that this research is only the first step in helping the children affected by fetal alcohol disorders. "These findings help specify in greater detail the deficits associated with fetal alcohol exposure, which can then be informative in the development of remediation programs for children with FASD. "
Funding for this Addiction Science Made Easy project is provided by the Addiction Technology Transfer Center National Office, under the cooperative agreement from the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment of SAMHSA. Articles were written based on the following published research:
Matthew J. Burden, Alissa Westerlund, Gina Muckle, Neil Dodge, Eric Dewailly, Charles A. Nelson, Sandra W. Jacobson and Joseph L. Jacobson. (January 2011). The effects of maternal binge drinking during pregnancy on neural correlates of response inhibition and memory in childhood. Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research (ACER). 35(1): 69-82. | 004_1383951 | {
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This subject is suitable for all levels of students. Cambridge Nationals in Creative iMedia are media sector-focused, including film, television, web development, gaming and animation, and have IT at their heart. Students will develop:
- Understanding of current and emerging technologies. - Acquire and apply creative and technical skills, knowledge and understanding of IT in a range of contexts. - Providing suitable evidence and documentation to support skills used. - Develop the skills to work collaboratively. - Evaluate the effectiveness of computer programs/solutions and the impact of, and issues related to, the use of computer technology in society. KS4, New Cambridge Nationals Creative iMedia (OCR)
Written – 25% Assessment – 75% | 008_2547410 | {
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Racism as a persistent cancer of the American system, infecting the blood that runs through its democratic veins, is an idea that is not readily accepted by the White status quo. The dominant culture sees racism as some inconsequential strange and unique appendage of the Republic that can be severed, ignored, or accommodated with special considerations for the handicapped. So when Derrick Bell, a cerebral, Harvard legal scholar admired by President Obama, identified racism as a terminal disease that is permanent, many Whites went all Farrakhan on him. The media tied Obama to Bell in his Harvard years and pilloried the President with slurs that he is a racist. Derrick Bell, deceased author and civil rights hero, is co-founder of a 1970s Critical Race Theory Movement that states:
l. “Racism is ordinary, not aberrational;"
2. "Our system of white-over-color ascendancy serves important purposes, both psychic and material. ”
Although the suggestion that racism persists as a permanent condition of American life is an anathema to most Whites, it resonates for many Black people who feel history’s long lash of slavery’s sting more than Dr. King’s moral arc of justice. The injustice of racism is ironically swept behind bars. Its victims are the criminalized poor with the noose of the criminal justice system around their necks. Draconian drug laws, racist Supreme Court decisions, and predatory police have put over two million American prisoners behind bars. Seventy percent of those inmates are People of Color. Every 36 hours a Black person dies by the hand of the law’s loaded legal gun. Racism in the 21st century is not only persistent, if not permanent, it’s lethal. Relief from Jim Crow injustice with the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and other civil rights victories did not preclude the thought that for the ex-slaves of the Republic, racism was not a permanent fixture. It did not mean that the front doors of the Massa’s house were fully opened. An end to institutional racism, a criminal economic and legal enterprise, is not about opening doors. It is about chipping away at the columns of White superiority and privilege, to bring down the entire mansion. If that house had been dismantled in the 20th century, in the 21st century we would not be revisiting the validity of the Voting Rights Act in a mixed-race Supreme Court which invites the fantasy of post-racial justice. On the heels of the presidential election of 2012, where the attempt at voter suppression, particularly disenfranchisement of the Black vote, was sizzling headlines, we are actually considering that we no longer need Section Five of The Voting Rights Act. Section Five allows for fast-track justice to remove procedural voting impediments that could not otherwise be challenged in a timely fashion to overturn election tampering. Voter suppression in 2012 was such an issue that Alternet.org reported:
For all of the efforts that Republicans put into suppressing Democratic votes in the presidential election of 2012, the result may prove to be the greatest turnout of African American voters ever. Exit polls show that the Black vote in this election appears to have exceeded the record high turnout of 2008, despite the fact that this year even more people had to wait on lines for hours, endured confusion at polling places, were told to produce IDs that the law does not require, and made to cast provisional ballots because of snafus at election sites. And when Republicans’ policies made them the poster party for regressive rights and Confederate-style tantrums, rather than bring 19th century politics into the 21st century, they just decided to revert to that tried and true American way. Lies, trickery and theft. Since they couldn’t earn the votes of the multi-racial rainbow dominating the political landscape, they decided to tamper with the Electoral College to just rip them off. In the year of the State of the Union where the president’s biggest applause line was for a 102-year-old Dessaline Victor who single-handedly faced down Republican attempts to disenfranchise her vote by standing in line for three hours, the Supreme Court justices are actually debating whether she needs the court to protect her fragile voting rights. This is a country that is reminding Dessaline that she doesn’t necessarily have to go around to the back-door of Massa’s house anymore, but if she goes to the front-door it opens to a carnival of fun-house mirrors. How can Dessaline take heart in the re-election of an African American president who invited her to the State of the Union in a time when Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor spoke out against a racist comment made in a Texas court by a prosecutor. He said: “You've got African-Americans, you've got Hispanics, you've got a bag full of money. Does that tell you–a light bulb doesn't go off in your head and say, ‘This is a drug deal? ’”
Seriously, are we really having to go to the land’s highest court to make sure that states with a racist history dating back to…well, this past election, have had a come to Jesus moment about immigrants and ex-slaves (not to mention ill-bred progeny). Ask Dessaline Victor standing tall like a beautiful sentinel of justice, if states don’t still need legal oversight to help pave her way to the voting booth. After Obama’s reelection attended by secessionist/nullification/impeachment rhetoric, I was having Gone with the Wind flashbacks and picnic lynching with postcards palpitations. That is so 2013. And now I have to go back over 50 years to reconsider the Voting Rights Act to see if we still need to babysit racial animus trying to turn back the hands of time. As an African American living in the era of technological wizadry and Tarantino’s Django, I have to deal with being reduced to welfare “entitlement” cheat, drug-guzzling lazy ne’er do well, and affirmative-action-intellectually-inferior-baby-mama stealing educational slots for “well-deserving,” “hard-working Americans” (means White people, even if unemployed). I have to listen to Supreme Court Justice Scalia weigh in on the Voting Rights Act as a “racial entitlement” and Mitt Romney tell me that my Black president is giving me stuff. So I reflect on Derrick Bell. I reflect on the permanence of racism. White people drunk on The Lone Ranger (Johnny Depp notwithstanding), manifest destiny, the enlightened rhetoric of the Bill of Rights, Obama’s “hope” mantra, and hey, the Ravens won the Super Bowl, get all nervous that Black people will finally give up on them. That we will just stop trying to be “equal” and just start being ourselves (really Chris Dorner pissed). That we won’t want to break the glass ceilings and rather want to break down the prison walls. That we’ll stop waiting for that invitation into White suburbia and take a day off working for Bank of America to hang out on Greenmount Avenue. I’m just saying…if racism is not permanent then it sure lasts a really long time. Auset Marian Lewis has been writing and doing art most of her life. She was the first black female columnist for a Gannet newspaper in Wilmington Delaware, has won writing awards, has given political/social commentary on radio and t. v., has performed her poetry in venues from Yale University to homeless shelters in Baltimore, has been guest speaker at many events, and has given workshops on race relations and male/female relationships. Her written work reflects her political, social, and spiritual views. Adolph Hitler said, "What a great advantage for leaders that the people do not think. " Auset tries to make them do just that. Her personal blog is "Words for Life." | 003_690756 | {
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JULY 2016 PATENT OF THE WEEK
In 1899 RUDOLPH SORENSEN of Nebraska patented an idea to utilize the wind to naturally power a bike. To accomplish this, the user attached a small mast and sail onto the rear of the bike. The mast and sail is positioned to capture wind when riding in the correct direction. The rider unleashes the sail bound around the mast taking full advantage of nature’s free resource. | 000_4082433 | {
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Cite this as: Oniszczuk, A. and Makowska, A. 2017 Archaeological Data in the GIS Portal of the National Heritage Board of Poland, Internet Archaeology 43. https://doi.org/10.11141/ia.43.5
The National Heritage Board of Poland (NHBP) is a state agency established by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage. In the decentralised system of heritage management in Poland, comprising sixteen Voivodeship Monuments Protection Offices (See Box) with rather theoretical supervision of the Ministry, it is the only central organisation dealing with heritage in all its forms. The main objective of the NHBP is to implement the State's policy concerning the protection of cultural heritage and preserve it for future generations in accordance with the strategy for sustainable development. Thus, the Board gathers and disseminates knowledge on heritage, sets standards for its protection and conservation, and works to increase social awareness of the value of Polish cultural heritage (http://www.nid.pl). The Board also keeps the documentation of the register and the record of monuments (see section 3). With regard to digitisation, the NHBP has been the Centre of Competence in digitisation of monuments since 2009 (Sejm Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej 2010, 39). As such, the Board's objective is to implement technological changes in digitisation and digital data storage, coordinate data gathering and storage, and share the digital content (Anon 2009, 49). * Poland has a three-degree administrative division comprising 16 voivodeships (PL: województwo), 380 provinces (PL: powiat), and 2478 communes (PL: gmina)
We would like to describe here a digitisation project of the NHBP initiated in 2010, resulting directly from the INSPIRE directive. The course of the project, seen from an archaeological perspective, is the focus of our article. The INSPIRE directive was the starting point for the creation of a monuments database and the map portal of the National Heritage Board of Poland. The Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community (INSPIRE) came into force in May 2007. According to its provisions, the spatial data infrastructure is to enable environmental spatial information to be shared among public sector organisations and facilitate public access to this information across Europe. The extensive data are to help in informed policy-making across boundaries. The directive is all about efficiency and compatibility of the data. The information should be collected on many levels of detail, and its scope, as well as conditions of the data re-use, should be explicitly formulated and easy to find (see About INSPIRE). On a national level, in Poland the directive was followed by the Act of 4 March 2010 on spatial data infrastructure. According to its provisions the Minister of Culture and National Heritage is responsible for protected sites in the part referring to immovable monuments (Rada Ministrów 2010, Art. 3, par. 7, pt c). In 2010 the implementation task was assigned to the National Heritage Board of Poland.
The entire cultural heritage sector in Poland, at least as far as various public bodies are concerned, generally lags behind with digital technologies. It is enough to say that binding regulation on the register of monuments, issued in 2011 (Minister Kultury i Dziedzictwa Narodowego 2011), specifies which colour of ink has to be used to separate entries in the book of the register (black) and which to cross them out (red). The use of green and blue is also specified but, needless to say, a digital version of the register is not. In 2010 our organisation was no different and a large-scale digitisation was regarded as an earthquake. The implementation of the INSPIRE directive was not only about digitising thousands of documents but also about the change in our approach to archives, including the archaeological ones. Until then, access to the documents in our possession was mainly limited to archaeologists (including archaeology students), professionals involved in spatial planning and public developments, and landowners, which was justified with the need to protect archaeological heritage against detectorists. Their number is estimated at about 50,000 people across the country, and the overwhelming majority operate illegally (Makowska et al. 2016). On the other hand, however, there never was any straightforward legal backup to enforce such limitations. The digitisation project began with the identification of the datasets we should deliver within INSPIRE. Protected sites are defined by the directive as areas 'designated or managed within a framework of international, Community and Member States' legislation to achieve specific conservation objectives' (see Annex I, pt 9) and the binding Act on the Protection of Monuments and the Guardianship of Monuments from 23 July 2003 specifies several forms of legal protection of monuments in Poland (see article 7):
Register of monuments includes the most valuable monuments recorded in the register by Voivodeship Monuments Protection Officers. Since 2004 it has been divided into three books: A – for immovable monuments, including architecture, parks and garden, urban and rural spatial layouts, B – for movable ones, and C – for archaeological monuments. Spatial dimension makes 'A' and 'C' suitable for digitisation within the demands of INSPIRE. First entries of archaeological sites into the register were made in 1929, soon after the introduction of the first legal regulations. Thus, the register of archaeological monuments has been created by several generations of monuments protection officers, working under changing laws and changing administrative divisions of the country. In the absence of national guidelines and policies, different, sometimes personal, criteria for the assessment of the value of monuments have been used. The register was also influenced by political reality. In the 1960s and 1970s the work of Voivodeship Monuments Protection Officers was centrally controlled and the number of administrative decisions on the entry of monuments into the register was one of the main quantitative indicators. As a result, over these two decades just over 30% of the sites were inscribed in the register each December, which raises doubts as to the actual value of those sites (Figure 1). According to the data of the National Heritage Board of Poland the current number of registered archaeological sites is 7748 (c. 10% of all registered monuments) (see http://www.mapy.zabytek.gov.pl).
Pomniki Historii (Monuments of History) can be regarded as the best of the best. They have been recognised by separate ordinances of the President of Poland since 1994. These monuments are of transregional significance, are important for Polish cultural heritage, have great historical, scientific and artistic value, are fixed in the public consciousness, and are the source of inspiration for future generations (see http://www.prezydent.pl/aktualnosci/pomniki-historii/). Currently there are 60 such monuments. Cultural parks are areas protected because of the unique features they possess (cultural landscape with immovable objects characteristic of local traditions). In order to protect them, land use and development within such parks is subject to restrictions. Parks are established by Commune Councils. There are currently 30 cultural parks. Monuments included in the spatial development plans are disclosed by communes obliged to create such plans. There are no specific rules concerning the presentation of the monuments or the transfer of information in this regard to the National Heritage Board of Poland. The National Heritage Board keeps the record of the first two forms of protection, which is why they were the ones to be delivered within INSPIRE. In addition, the Board is a national UNESCO Focal Point, so 14 World Heritage Sites were also added to the list. However, the archives of the National Heritage Board of Poland also include the so-called record of monuments. With regard to archaeological sites, it comprises the documentation of over 455,000 archaeological sites recorded within the fieldwalking projects of Polish Archaeological Record (Polish abbrev: AZP). The Record, while being the main source of information for archaeological heritage management in Poland, is not mentioned as one of the legal forms of monuments protection, which is why at first we decided not to digitise the archive within INSPIRE (see section 6. )
Having defined the resources to be digitised, we, the NHBP archaeologists, approached the project with two basic premises. INSPIRE 'forced' us to digitise according to very precise demands but we wanted to create a database adjusted to our needs. We were to present only the register of archaeological monuments, but we would prepare tools for eventual presentation of the entire Polish Archaeological Record. To summarise, archaeological heritage management must have come first. The project developed simultaneously in several directions. We had to verify our archive, create the data model compliant with the demands of INSPIRE and prepare the tools for its implementation. The work was not easy, because from the very start heritage experts responsible for all categories of immovable monuments had to find common ground (and a common language) both with the digitisation and the GIS team and each other. The use of reliable, detailed, and up-to-date source data is essential for the creation of European spatial information infrastructure (Bielawski et al. 2013, 144). And not only had our archive not been digitised, it had never even been verified at a national level (Kołodziej 2013, 119). Filling the gaps in the documentation of the register of archaeological monuments lasted throughout the entire scanning phase, which meant that the number of documents to be digitised remained an estimate until the very end of the process. To illustrate the scale of the problem, it is enough to say that during this verification some archaeological heritage inspectors were asked to create digital lists of all registered sites in their voivodeships for the first time. The digitisation itself was carried out with the use of a tool called Scan Manager, designed specifically for our project. It is a web-based application enabling rough geocoding of scanned documents during the creation/editing of metadata. The user simply assigns them to respective units of territorial division of the country (voivodeships, provinces, communes and localities). Metadata describe also the type of document, its author and the date of issue, as well as the number in the register, which allows an easy identification of the monument. A fuller description of the features of the application was given in articles by Arkadiusz Kołodziej, the project manager (Kołodziej 2012, 122-26; Kołodziej 2013, 264-67). This tool is now integrated in the entire system of data management and is used for retrieval of digitised documentation in desktop solutions. It is also accessible online for authorised users. Our data model for the register of archaeological monuments was prepared on the basis of D.18. 104. 22. 168 INSPIRE – Data Specification on Protected Sites – Guidelines version 3. 1. A characteristic of a site is described with the set of components: geometry, documentation, general function, specific function, and field verification of the register (Kołodziej 2012, 127-29). The general INSPIRE information about a site is completed with country-specific forms of designation (historical monuments, site number in the Polish Archaeological Record). During the implementation of the INSPIRE regulations, we made a preliminary assumption that on the map we would mark only legally protected areas as shown in graphic annexes attached to almost every administrative decision on entry into the register of monuments. In a perfect situation it would mean the use of polygons accurately reflecting the geometry. The situation, however, is far from perfect, especially in case of older decisions that often do not specify site location at all. Graphic attachments are often informal (not mentioned in the decision, unauthorised by stamp and signature). Sites are sometimes marked only by a cross or a dot. What is more, instead of map fragments or cadastral plans, most annexes are usually simple sketches drawn without scale, with a subjective choice of characteristic elements of landscape, e. g. a slaughterhouse which, 30 or 40 years later, no longer exists. Sometimes the sketch is missing and the site location is described on the basis of the simplest distinctive features, such as a 'ridge' (which might subsequently be levelled), or the 'last house in the village' (that could subsequently be demolished or is no longer the last house). In some voivodeships names of landowners were the most frequently chosen identifier. We therefore have the entire collection of landowners with interesting last names (see the translation below), whose addresses we have to determine in order to locate a site, e. g: 'a site located on the fields of Stephanie Guts and Mary Tootsie, between their houses, north of the road in the eastern part of the village'. That is why we have decided to use compound geometry with polygons, points and lines (in practice the latter are used very rarely). Furthermore, in our system it is obligatory to mark geographical precision as 'accurate', 'approximate' or 'uncertain'. The location of the vast majority of objects is defined as 'approximate'; the percentage of uncertain locations is unfortunately also large. Varied reference data were needed for the proper digitisation of site location. We obtained the following from the National Geodetic and Cartographic Resource:
The data are stored in our repository and managed by the computer application for the acquisition of the spatial data (Kołodziej 2012, 124). Owing to outsourcing of the digitisation process, we had to predict all the possible problems in all their variations and prepare digitisation strategies for non-archaeologists. Verification of the work of the digitising company has revealed another crucial issue. The company and its individual employees were paid by the record, and unclear administrative decisions were used to unnecessarily multiply their number (i. e. the number of the sites), whereas, obviously, we needed the correct data for heritage management. Documentation scanned using Scan Manager accompany the site record. They are ordered hierarchically and organised around the first decision when entered into the register of monuments, to which the remaining documents (such as official explanation of the decision, instruction for a landowner, contour plan, cadastral plan, hand sketches of the location) are relationally linked (Kołodziej 2012, 124). Values listed in the INSPIRE data specification for protected sites are compliant with the National Monuments Record classification scheme. Nineteen categories do not match Polish terminology for the description of an archaeological site's primary function. If the database was to be of use to archaeological heritage managers in Poland, it had to put the emphasis on actual terminology. For that reason we ascribed the INSPIRE general function to specific entries after the creation of the thesauri (see section 5. 4). In order to include the terms used in Poland in the database, we created the Specific function section. It contains information on archaeological cultures, types of site, chronology and settlement phases. The three major hierarchical thesauri we created (archaeological culture – 3 levels, chronology – 2 levels, and site function – 4 levels) use Polish terminology, as well as chronological and cultural divisions. We wanted them to reflect the content of the documentation and not to discuss it; hence, they contain some obsolete or imprecise terms, as they encompass almost 90 years of archaeology and reflect continuous development of science, with cultures 'degraded' to groups or 'promoted' to technocomplexes, groups becoming cultures, etc. For the same reason, no valuation of various coexisting systems of classification was intended and, e. g., the Bronze Age can be described with numbers (I-V), letters (A-D), or as early, older, middle, younger or late. Since 2009 the National Heritage Board of Poland has conducted field verification of the register of archaeological monuments (Figure 2). Its aim is to set the register in order by identifying objects that no longer exist or have lost their value as monuments. Lists of such sites will be delivered to the Minister of Culture and National Heritage, who has the authority to officially remove them from the register. The verification is also to demonstrate which decisions are incomplete or incorrect and do not guarantee adequate protection for monuments. Defining current threats to heritage and the description of their state of preservation is also crucial for establishing a coherent strategy for archaeological heritage management. Activities carried out within the verification project include: analysis of documents concerning specific monuments, archive query, field visits, during which the site questionnaire is completed and photos are taken. Resultant conclusions concerning further heritage management are also based on the latest results of scientific research of the site. The verification data are added to the database using a dedicated application called Smart Client. The application, prepared by the NHBP, is accessible for authorised users and it does not require any additional GIS software. The data we collect include among others: updated information on function and chronology of sites; description of the current state of research; evaluation of the correctness of the territorial range of legal protection given in the administrative decision and the correctness of the decision as a whole; description of the current land use and the state of preservation together with cultural landscape; evaluation whether the entry into the register of monuments was well founded, as well as the resultant conclusions. In the latter we point out what should and should not be done on the site, and suggest additional methods of documentation. Geometric data of sites can also be edited with the Smart Client. New, updated, geometry does not change the limits of legally protected areas, but the NHBP and Monuments Protection Officers will be able to use it for heritage management. The verification data we gather in the system are to enable further analysis and the preparation of the Report on the State of Monuments in 2017, encompassing books A and C of the register (Dąbrowski 2014, 62). The production of the report is part of the National Program of Protection of Monuments and the Guardianship of Monuments for 2014-2017. Its conclusion will serve as the basis for more efficient heritage management. The above data model was implemented with dedicated software using Geomedia Professional 6. 1 environment and the Geointegrator (GI3) application by Intergraph (Kołodziej 2012, 127). To summarise, so far the system includes the source documentation tool, spatial data acquisition tool, and the field verification application. The data are published in the map portal of the NHBP, which is our visually attractive answer to grey polygons, lines and points specified by INSPIRE. The concept of visualisation of our spatial data in the GIS portal of the National Heritage Board of Poland was created in co-operation with Warsaw University of Technology. The project began with the analysis of existing paper maps and map portals on monuments in terms of cartographic signs and symbols, as well as the resulting legibility of the maps. The results were the basis for conclusions regarding the classification of objects and the reference data; good practices were also identified as a prospective basis for visualisation of the data and the creation of the coherent system of icons. We wanted to keep the map legible and achieve the resemblance to paper atlases of monuments. The criteria were set for the symbolisation of monuments (type and chronology in the case of archaeological monuments) and the symbols for general categories of monuments: registered monuments, UNESCO World Heritage Sites, monuments of history, archaeological monuments, and other immovable monuments. For the first three we applied already existing symbols. Basic map compositions (including the reference data) were also prepared. The next step was to discuss the aggregation of objects and visualisation of the data in scale ranges. As a result the icons are first aggregated to administrative units (voivodeships, provinces, communes). On the level of localities the symbols appear by the name of a city, a town or a village. When zoomed in, they appear in the actual location of a monument. At the moment, there are three profiles for the presentation of monuments: monuments, immovable monuments and archaeological monuments. The first one, including all types of object, is the default setting. Initially, the authors of this concept argued for abandoning the general profile, because of too many different icons disturbing the clarity of presentation. For us, the archaeologists, it was unacceptable from the point of view of heritage promotion and education on archaeological monuments and their significance for cultural heritage in general. In order to reduce the number of icons, we decided to distinguish only the most important sites or the ones that are the most attractive for non-professional users: hillforts, mounds, ramparts, settlements, barrows, other burial grounds, and caves. The remaining sites are marked with an icon for 'others' (Figure 3). Just as in the case of general symbols, we used symbols from older printed atlases where possible. In cases where monuments were both architectural and archaeological (castles, or their relics, palaces, mansions, churches and monasteries), two icons represent one monument on the map in the general profile. One is filled and the other – for archaeological monuments – is an outline (Figure 3). Numerous discussions were related to the set of colours for denoting chronology regarding whether there should be a common time scale for archaeological and other monuments. We finally opted for such a solution, so that it was clear to the users of the portal that a church or a castle had functioned at the same time as a hillfort or a settlement registered as an archaeological monument. The issue of data sustainability makes any digitisation project a never-ending story. We need to keep adding new sites as they are entered into the register. We should not forget about regular reviews of the thesauri, so that the metadata are similarly accurate for all the resources. In order to keep the data secure our digital environment is fully virtualised with full server backup, and the digitised source documentation is stored on a server in an outer data centre (Kołodziej 2012, 126). The field verification project is almost finalized, and the database has already been completed with approximately 90% of the resulting data. Internal legal analysis of our archive has recently shown that within INSPIRE we should also digitise the entire Polish Archaeological Record. Legal opinion from November 2015, concerning the legal status of the record of monuments, was to establish whether the monuments included in the AZP belonged to the theme of spatial data mentioned in the Act of 4 March 2010 on spatial data infrastructure – Protected areas (Rada Ministrów 2010, Art. 3, par. 7, pt c). The analysis demonstrated that the above-mentioned provision referred also to part or all of a property, or the complex of property fitting the definition of a monument, as understood in the Act on the Protection of Monuments and the Guardianship of Monuments from 23 July 2003 (Sejm Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej 2003, Art. 3, paras 1 and 4), and not only the monuments covered with four forms of legal protection listed in that act (see section 3). Digitisation of the Polish Archaeological Record is a pressing need, hence the positive, even enthusiastic response from the NHBP archaeologists. The only shadow is cast by our fear of giving the detectorists easy access to information on archaeological sites. At the moment the NHBP is trying to obtain funding for this huge project. The present state of our portal and the underlying repository leaves many options for system development. We definitely need more levels of access, because regardless of the visually enjoyable presentation of the data, the portal in its present state is suitable only to 'naively query and view protected sites' (INSPIRE 2010, 67). According to the data specification, such a scenario is typical for 'non-expert/public user' searching for information regarding local, regional and Europe-wide context (INSPIRE 2010, 67). A portal without language versions other than Polish does not fully meet their needs. Higher levels of access (Figure 4) require the download option for the source documentation. To introduce such functionality we have to mask personal data in all the documents regarding all types of designation, which is one of the biggest challenges for the immediate future (Kołodziej 2012, 126), and it has to be done within the INSPIRE timeframe. In the meantime, the source data and the full version of the portal (containing ranges of archaeological sites instead of popular icons) should be made accessible to other authorised users, such as employees of Monuments Protection Offices and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. For the sake of current heritage management we must think of introducing an online system of editing and verification of new data, so that the decisions on paper and books of register written with four colours of ink were only an addition to an otherwise fully functional digital system. Development towards the interaction between professionals creates an opportunity for a wider social involvement; e. g: let us imagine dog walkers reporting threats to their local heritage. Some of the possible directions for the development are required by INSPIRE and are on the way, others are still on our wish list, but all of them are necessary for heritage management in an open information society. Anon 2009 Program digitalizacji dóbr kultury oraz gromadzenia, przechowywania i udostępniania obiektów cyfrowych w Polsce 2009-2020 2009. Warszawa. http://www.kongreskultury.pl/library/File/RaportDigitalizacja/Program%20digitalizacji%202009-2020.pdf [Last accessed: 16 May 2016]
Bielawski, B., Kołodziej A., Olszewski, R. & Gotlib, D. 2013 'Wykorzystanie B.10k do tworzenia zbiorów danych zgodnych ze specyfikacjami dyrektywy INSPIRE' in D. Gotlib and R. Olszewski (eds) Rola bazy danych obiektów topograficznych w tworzeniu infrastruktury informacji przestrzennej w Polsce, Warszawa: Główny Urząd Geodezji i Kartografii. 141-55. Dąbrowski, J (ed) 2014 Krajowy program ochrony zabytków i opieki nad zabytkami na lata 2014-2017, Ochrona Zabytków, Dodatek specjalny, Warszawa: Narodowy Instytut Dziedzictwa. http://bip.mkidn.gov.pl/pages/legislacja/programy-wieloletnie/krajowy-program-ochrony-zabytkow-i-opieki-nad-zabytkami.php
European Union 2007 Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community (INSPIRE), OJ 2007/2/EC. http://eur-lex.europa.eu [Last accessed: 16 May 2016]
Fiedukowicz, A., Głażewski, A., Koszewski, K., Kowalski, P. J., Latuszek, K., Olszewski, R. & Włochyński, L. 2014 Opracowanie koncepcji i realizacja wizualizacji kartograficznej zabytków w portalach informacyjnych NID. Raport końcowy, Unpublished report. INSPIRE 2010 D.22. 214. 171. 124 INSPIRE – Data Specification on Protected Sites – Guidelines v. 3.1 http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/2 [Last accessed: 18 May 2016]
Kołodziej, A. 2012 'Wykorzystanie danych referencyjnych oraz usług danych przestrzennych w projektach informatycznych dotyczących popularyzacji dziedzictwa narodowego Polski', Roczniki Geomatyki [Annals of Geomatics] 10(4), 119-32. Kołodziej, A. 2013 'Zasilanie systemów dokumentacji obiektów zabytkowych' in D. Gotlib and R. Olszewski (eds) Rola bazy danych obiektów topograficznych w tworzeniu infrastruktury informacji przestrzennej w Polsce, Warszawa: Główny Urząd Geodezji i Kartografii. 264-76. Makowska A., Oniszczuk A. and Sabaciński, M. 2016 'Some remarks on the stormy relationship between the detectorists and archaeological heritage in Poland', Open Archaeology 2(1)https://www.degruyter.com/view/j/opar.2016.2.issue-1/opar-2016-0013/opar-2016-0013.xml [Last accessed: 26 October 2016]
Minister Kultury i Dziedzictwa Narodowego 2011 Rozporządzenie Ministra Kultury I Dziedzictwa Narodowego z dnia 26 maja 2011 r, Dz.U. 2011 nr 113 poz. 661. http://isap.sejm.gov.pl [Last accessed: 16 May 2016]
Rada Ministrów 2010 Program Wieloletni Kultura +, Annex to the resolution of the Council of Ministers no. RM nr 176/2010. http://www.nid.pl).0 [Last accessed: 16 May 2016]
Sejm Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej 2003 Ustawa z dnia 23 lipca 2003 r. o ochronie zabytków i opiece nad zabytkami, Dz. U. 2003, no. 162, item 1568. Sejm Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej 2010 Ustawa z dnia 4 marca 2010 r. o infrastrukturze informacji przestrzennej, Dz. U. 2010 nr 76 poz. 489 http://isap.sejm.gov.pl [Last accessed: 16 May 2016]
Internet Archaeology is an open access journal based in the Department of Archaeology, University of York. Except where otherwise noted, content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3. 0 (CC BY) Unported licence, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that attribution to the author(s), the title of the work, the Internet Archaeology journal and the relevant URL/DOI are given. Internet Archaeology content is preserved for the long term with the Archaeology Data Service. Help sustain and support open access publication by donating to our Open Access Archaeology Fund. | 000_236784 | {
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Most of you must be familiar with terms IP Address and Router but, do you really know what 192. 168. 0.254 IP Address or Router is actually? Like “how do router works with IP addresses? ” or “how IP addresses are assigned to every different device? ” or “how do they function? ”, in this article, we are about share and answer the answers to such questions that might pop up in your mind, in case if you are hearing about these terms for the first time. IP Address stands for Internet Protocol Address; these are more of like a numerical label assigned to devices. Each IP Address is consisting of numbers separated by a point and are always written in the human-readable form, e. g. 192. 168. 1.1, 192. 168. 254. 254 and 192. 168. 1.254. On the other hand, Routers are devices to which IP Addresses are assigned, and their primary function is to forward data packets between different computer network using internet protocol for communication. What is 192. 168. 0.254 IP Address? 192. 168. 0.254 is assigned private address by Internet Assigned Number Authority which means 192. 168. 0.254 IP address can only be used within the private network as in a home or local network. 192. 168. 0.254 IP Address belongs to class C private IP address and is used as a default IP address for various brands of routers, e. g. Linksys, Netgear, Cisco etc. 192. 168. 0.254 is also known as the starting Ip address as it is often the first IP address to be assigned to various devices. Features of 192. 168. 0.254 Default IP Address
192. 168. 0.254 IP address is the most common IP address used as the default for various devices and the reasons is that it is filled with so many features which are worth to look out for:
1. 192. 168. 0.254 IP address can be used inside any private network irrespective of the type of router user have. 3. 192. 168. 0.254 IP Address is assigned as the first IP address to the various router because it belongs to IP Addresses within the range of 192. 168. 0.0 – 192. 168. 255. 255, which gives around 65,535 possibilities of IP Addresses to be assigned to devices connected to the router with 192. 168. 0.254 as its default IP Address.
192. 168. 0.254 IP Admin Login
Logging in to your router’s administrative panel allows you to perform so many functions like changing your router’s IP address or changing its default username and password or for instance you can also improve your routers security functions. You can log in to your router’s administrative panel using steps provided herewith:
Step 1 ⇒ Power on your device and connect it to your router’s network so that the device stays inside the vicinity of the router’s network. Step 2 ⇒ Open a web browser of your choice and in its address bar type http://192.168.0.254 and then hit Enter.
Step 3 ⇒ Next, you will be redirected to a new window requiring your router’s login credentials, i. e., router’s default username and password and hit login/enter button. How to Find your Router’s IP Address? Some of you might not be aware of your router’s default IP address s default IP address, or maybe you forgot it. Well, in either case, there is nothing to worry about as you can find your router’s IP address simply by following a few steps given below:
How to Find your Router’s IP Address in Windows
Step 1 ⇒ Switch on your device and press the start button or either Windows + R key. Step 2 ⇒ Then in the search bar type cmd and hit the enter button. Step 3 ⇒ Next, select command prompt → type ipconfig and hit enter button. Step 4 ⇒ You will see a prompt window with your router’s IP address mentioned as the default gateway. How to Find your Router’s IP Address in Mac OS
Step 1 ⇒ Switch on your Apple device and then press the apple icon. Step 2 ⇒ Then select System Preferences and then select Network and Internet settings. Step 3 ⇒ Next, select Advanced settings, under TCP/IP section you will find your router’s IP address mentioned as a Router.
Other than the ways mentioned above you can find your router’s IP address by checking its documents that come along with your router or its instruction guide. However, you can also check the bottom of your router; it might have a sticker on which the router’s default IP address. How to Change your Router’s IP Address? Most of the companies use the same IP address as default for their router models, and sometimes when you buy more than one router of the same brand, they might have the same IP address. Having two routers with the same IP address can create confusion, to solve this confusion one might need to change the default IP address of their router. Changing your router’s IP address can be done in a few simple steps, which are given below:
Step 1 ⇒ Switch on your device and then connect it to your router’s network. Step 2 ⇒ Open a web browser and in the address bar type your router’s current IP Address.
Step 3 ⇒ Then log in to your router’s admin panel using your routers default username and password. Step 4 ⇒ Then select LAN and DHCP settings under the administrative panel of your router. Step 5 ⇒ Then make changes to LAN and DHCP settings and hit the submit button to save the changes. Lastly, wait for few seconds or a minute so that the router can restart, after that disconnect your devices and then reconnect them back to your router’s network using the new IP Address of your router. - 192. 168. 8.1 IP Login, Router Username, Password and Settings
- 192. 168. 15. 1 IP Login, Router Username, Password and Settings
- 192. 168. 100. 1 IP Login, Router Username, Password and Settings
- 10. 0.0.1 IP Login, Router Username, Password and Settings
IP addresses are an integral part of a router network as it allows the router and also helps in connecting with various other networks. 192. 168. 0.254 is a class C private IP address and is the most common IP address used as default in various router brands, e. g. Linksys, Netgear or etc. IP addresses also allow you to perform various functions such as changing its username and password or improving its security settings also, from the administrative panel of the router. | 003_5712329 | {
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The Ethiopian government says it is happy with plans to return an obelisk that Italian troops took from Ethiopia 66-years ago. Italian workers are in the process of dismantling the obelisk, estimated to be two-thousand years old, which now sits in Rome. Italian troops stole the landmark from the northern city of Axum in 1937, when dictator Benito Mussolini ordered an invasion of Ethiopia.
The obelisk's return has been the subject of a bitter feud between Ethiopia and Italy for at least 50 years. Agreements to return the obelisk were made, and not honored, several times. But now the obelisk, which was originally carved from one stone, is being taken apart in the same sections as it was transported in 66-years ago, in preparation for its journey back to Axum.
A spokesman for Ethiopia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Kinfe Nidaro, says the obelisk's return is deeply significant. "It means just gaining back its (Ethiopia's) heritage, its history, its culture. It is just finding back what is lost, what is taken from it unjustly. "
Mr. Nidaro says it was a long struggle for Ethiopians to get the obelisk back. He says he does not know the exact date the obelisk will arrive in Axum.
The return of antiquities is a big issue in many countries, as conquerors and former colonial powers are coming under pressure to return items to several countries in Africa and elsewhere. | 003_7220611 | {
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- What can a 1000x Microscope see? - Can you see sperm at 100x? - What happens to the image if you try to magnify it using 40x or 100x? - At what magnification can you see sperm? - Can you see yeast under a microscope? - Can you see bacteria yogurt under microscope? - What microscope Do I need to see bacteria? - Can you see bacteria at 40x? - What kind of microscope can see cells? - Why can’t I see anything through my microscope? - Can bacteria be seen with the eye? - What is the smallest we can see with a microscope? - Why do you start on the lowest magnification? - What can you see at 2000x magnification? - How do you see hair under a microscope? - Can you see bacteria under a microscope? - What can be seen under a compound light microscope? - Can you see bacteria at 1000X? - What can you see under a microscope? - How can you see water under a microscope? - What kind of microscope should I buy? What can a 1000x Microscope see? 180 micronsAt 1000x magnification you will be able to see 0. 180mm, or 180 microns. . Can you see sperm at 100x? Sperm would be hard to see at 40x. At 100x it should be visible. most likely you will not be able to focus on a sample at even moderate magnification (~40-60x) if it is between two glass slides- this is because you’ll need to bring the objective closer to the sample than the thickness of the slide will permit. What happens to the image if you try to magnify it using 40x or 100x? 5. What happens to your image if you try to magnify it using 40x or 100x? It could blow up your iage if you do not adjust the stage accordingly. At what magnification can you see sperm? 400xYou can view sperm at 400x magnification. You do NOT want a microscope that advertises anything above 1000x, it is just empty magnification and is unnecessary. Can you see yeast under a microscope? Yeast can be viewed under the microscope through two different microscopy techniques- bright field microscopy and fluorescence microscopy. For one thing, yeast and buds can be seen under a high magnification (1000x) bright field microscope, such as a compound microscope. Can you see bacteria yogurt under microscope? Under low power, find a section where the yogurt is pretty thin; this is where you will find the bacteria. Switch to high power (400X for most microscopes) for a better view of the bacteria. If you have a microscope with an oil immersion lens, it will give you an even better view of these small organisms. What microscope Do I need to see bacteria? In order to actually see bacteria swimming, you’ll need a lens with at least a 400x magnification. A 1000x magnification can show bacteria in stunning detail. However, at a higher magnification, it can be increasingly difficult to keep them in focus as they move. Can you see bacteria at 40x? Use the 40x objective: With the 10x eyepiece you get 400x total magnification. This is enough to see them. Of course you have to start focusing with the 4x and 10x objective first and then work your way upwards. … Otherwise the bacteria can float vertically and go out of focus. What kind of microscope can see cells? CompoundDescriptionCompound microscopes are light illuminated. The image seen with this type of microscope is two dimensional. This microscope is the most commonly used. You can view individual cells, even living ones. It has high magnification. However, it has a low resolution. Costs$150 – $10,0009 more rows
Why can’t I see anything through my microscope? The Microscope Won’t Focus The height of your condenser may be set too high or too low (this can also affect resolution). Make sure that your objective lenses are screwed all the way into the body of the microscope. On high school microscopes, if someone adjusts the rack stop, the microscope will not focus. Can bacteria be seen with the eye? Yes. Most bacteria are too small to be seen without a microscope, but in 1999 scientists working off the coast of Namibia discovered a bacterium called Thiomargarita namibiensis (sulfur pearl of Namibia) whose individual cells can grow up to 0. 75mm wide. What is the smallest we can see with a microscope? 500 nanometersThe smallest thing that we can see with a ‘light’ microscope is about 500 nanometers. A nanometer is one-billionth (that’s 1,000,000,000th) of a meter. So the smallest thing that you can see with a light microscope is about 200 times smaller than the width of a hair. Bacteria are about 1000 nanometers in size. Why do you start on the lowest magnification? When using a light microscope it’s important to start with the low power objective lens as the field of view will be wider, increasing the number of cells you are able to see. This makes it easier to find what you’re looking for. What can you see at 2000x magnification? 30 things you can see with a 2500x microscope. by Kimberly Beckett. … Bacteria cells. Close up view of light blue pen shine round zoom lens pointed at bacteria cells. … Nematodes. Nematodes can be observed under a 2500x microscope. … Nail fungus. … Fungi Cells.Water Beetle. … Old plantar warts. … Cancer cell. More items…•Dec 10, 2020
How do you see hair under a microscope? ProcedurePlace a drop of water at the center of a microscope glass slide. Using a pair of forceps, place a few strands of hair onto the drop of water (or any other mountant used)Place the slide under the microscope and observe under low and high power. Compare different types of hair under the microscope. Can you see bacteria under a microscope? In order to see bacteria, you will need to view them under the magnification of a microscopes as bacteria are too small to be observed by the naked eye. … At high magnification*, the bacterial cells will float in and out of focus, especially if the layer of water between the cover glass and the slide is too thick. What can be seen under a compound light microscope? Using Stained Prepared slides you should see:bacteria,chromosomes. organelles. protists or metazoans. smears. blood. negative stained bacteria. thick tissue sections. Can you see bacteria at 1000X? Bacteria are too small to see without the aid of a microscope. While some eucaryotes, such as protozoa, algae and yeast, can be seen at magnifications of 200X-400X, most bacteria can only be seen with 1000X magnification. What can you see under a microscope? Here are 50 easy-to-find things to view under a microscope. Salt (including different types)Sugar.Sand (compare from different beaches, if possible)Bird seed. Different colors of human hair (be sure to look at dyed and natural, and roots)Fur from various species. Whiskers.Onion skin. More items…•Jul 5, 2016
How can you see water under a microscope? Place 1 drop of water on the microscope slide and place it under the microscope to examine it. If more than one group member brought in water samples, take the time to look at all of the samples under the microscope and decide which has the most interesting objects to look at. What kind of microscope should I buy? You will need a compound microscope if you are viewing “smaller” specimens such as blood samples, bacteria, pond scum, water organisms, etc. … Typically, a compound microscope has 3-5 objective lenses that range from 4x-100x. Assuming 10x eyepieces and 100x objective, the total magnification would be 1,000 times. | 006_1771616 | {
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Find The Cause and Treat Any Dandruff
Joannie has been struggling with dandruff for years. She's tried brand name dandruff shampoos but the flakes keep coming back. The embarrassment and frustration are driving her crazy. And forget about wearing black! Why do some people get dandruff and others not? And what can they do about it? There are different types of dandruff, and they're caused by different things. For example, dandruff can be caused by scalp that's either too dry or too oily; it can come from shampooing too often or not often enough. No wonder it's such a tough condition to conquer. But that's what we'll try to do here by looking at the causes and the cures. What Causes Dandruff
- Dried Out Scalp. Dry weather and shampooing too often can cause a dry scalp, the most common cause of dandruff. - Dirty Hair. Obviously, but lets mention it anyway. Not shampooing often enough (Or not rinsing correctly after shampoo) leaves deposits of scalp oils and skin cells that turn into dandruff. - Oily Scalp. Seborrheic dermatitis can leave your scalp and other areas of skin greasy and irritated, leading to sticky white or yellow dandruff. Sometimes called wet dandruff
- Over-Treated Hair. Some hair care products can irritate the scalp and cause dandruff, especially if they're used too often or allowed to build up on the hair. - Scalp Conditions. Psoriasis and eczema form dead skin cells that flake off as dandruff. - Scalp Fungus. A yeast-like fungus called malassezia can cause an overgrowth of skin cells on the scalp, especially if the hair is very oily. The cells multiply, die and fall off as white, flaky dandruff. - Lack of Sun and UVA. Certain types of yeasts naturally produced by scalp are controlled by safe level of UVA we receive from sun. Sometimes lack of sun in long periods makes these yeasts to become more active and cause dandruff. The good news is dandruff can usually be brought under control. The first step is to determine what's causing it. If you aren't sure, look above and look into your hair care regime and the products you use - what was changed or what is new? The solution could be as simple as changing shampoos or using them more or less frequently. Clean the hair and scalp with a deep cleansing shampoo. This removes all the built-up hair products, oils and dead skin cells so the dandruff treatment you choose can do its work. Treatments that Works
Mild dandruff can be treated or be brought under control with a weekly deep cleansing shampoo. Stop using alcohol-based styling products as they can dry out the scalp and speed up the skin cell shedding that appears as dandruff. Brushing your hair more often distributes the hair oils from roots to ends and removes dead skin cells before they become dandruff flakes. Many people that cutting their hair short think they no longer need brushing and when they start experiencing dandruff, they blame it on hair cut. If your hair is very oily, it's more prone to fungal dandruff so you need a shampoo that reduces the excess scalp oils. Try an over-the-counter shampoo with the active ingredient selenium sulphide, such as Selsun Blue Dandruff Shampoo or L'Oreal Elvive Intensive Anti-Dandruff. But be warned selenium sulphide can discolor hair that's blond, gray or chemically dyed. See also solutions to get rid of oily hair
Anti-dandruff shampoos that contain salicylic acids effectively scrub away the scales but may cause dryness. A good conditioner or other scalp treatment can restore the moisture. Examples are: Kérastase Bain Gommage, Kérastase Bain Divalent or Clarifiant, and Alto Bella Betaclar. Some professional grade products already have conditioners built in to counteract the drying effect. Not everyone happy using anti-dandruff shampoos. There are some proven natural treatments that effective against dandruff. Choose the one possible or available to you. Tea tree oil
a powerful antifungal, and it can be used to treat any underlying fungal infections that may be causing your dandruff. Add a few drops of tea tree essential oil to carrier oil, such as sweet almond or avocado oil, and massage the mixture into your scalp. Leave the oil on your scalp for one to two hours before shampooing and rinsing out with plenty of clean water. Cider Vinegar (Apple)
Contains antifungal properties, and can also help to restore the PH balance in your hair and scalp. Wash your hair with a mild shampoo, then rinse thoroughly. When all traces of the shampoo are gone, and the water runs clear, use one or two cups of apple cider vinegar dilute it with water 1:4 as a final rinse for your hair. This treatment also gives your hair a beautiful shine. Does it smell afterwards? Yes slightly! But you can finish with a scented mild conditioner and it will disappear. Grapefruit seed extract
Another powerful antifungal that can be used to treat dandruff. For best results, add a few drops of the extract to a mild shampoo, such as natural baby shampoo, and massage thoroughly into your hair and scalp. Leave the shampoo mixture for two or three minutes before rinsing out thoroughly. Grapefruit seed extract can be bought from most good health food shops. An old natural remedy for treating dandruff. Apply the juice of a freshly squeezed lemon to your scalp, taking care to avoid your face. Leave the juice on your scalp for five minutes before shampooing and rinsing out. Pure lemon juice works best on oily or greasy scalps, and might not be suitable for dry scalps. If in doubt, first treat a small area before applying to a larger area. For dry scalp you can mix small amount of warm coconut oil! Another old natural remedy to treat dandruff. Soak some fenugreek seeds in water for twelve hours, and then use a pestle and mortar to grind the seeds into a fine paste. Apply the paste to your scalp and leave for half an hour. Wash out thoroughly using a mild shampoo. This treatment works best for dry or scaly scalps and it can treat most causes of dandruff. Yes Aloe Vera can also help to completely resolve the problem of dandruff due to its fantastic ability to moisture the hair and scalp. Its an effective cure for dandruff caused by dryness. Learn more about the wonders of aloe vera for your hair. Fungal Type Dandruff
If your dandruff is caused by yeast fungus, you may have to try products that their effectiveness goes beyond natural treatments and find the one that works best for you. Shampoos like Selsun Salon or Head & Shoulders contain the antifungal agent zinc pyrithione that can control the dandruff, including seborrheic dermatitis. These products are suitable for normal or dry hair. Other brands with zinc pyrithione are Pureology Dandruff Scalp Cure, Kérastase Bain Gommage, Pantene Pro-V Anti-Dandruff, Neutrogena T-Gel Daily Control Dandruff Shampoo, Redken Scalp Relief and Dandruff Control, and Matrix Biolage Anti-Dandruff.
Coal tar shampoos aren't the most pleasant smelling products but they are strong anti-fungals that can alleviate tricky dandruff caused by seborrheic dermatitis and psoriasis. They work by slowing down the growth rate of skin cells. Examples: Neutrogena T/Gel Therapeutic Shampoo or Neutrogena T/Gel Stubborn Itch Control, DHS Tar Shampoo and Philip B. Anti-Flake Relief Shampoo. (Note: Tar based shampoos can also stain hair color. )
When all else fails and the flakes keep falling, try ketoconazole anti-dandruff shampoos. The active ingredient kills the fungi that live on the scalp and cause the flakes. Two brands are Dandrazol and Nizoral.
Some users find a dandruff shampoo will work great for a while then the problem comes back. In that case, you can alternate between different shampoos. And remember to follow the directions carefully, letting the suds sit on your hair for few minutes so the medicine can really work. Did you find an effective treatment that worked for you and you like to share? Use the form below and share your insight. | 000_5038505 | {
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A new test efficiently detects virtually any virus that infects people and animals, according to research at Washington University School of Medicine, where the technology was developed. Two new studies explain why some parasite infections, such as those common in developing countries, sometimes can’t be cured with standard treatments. The research shows the parasite Leishmania — which infects 12 million people worldwide — often harbors a virus that helps the parasite survive treatments. Antibiotics aren’t supposed to be effective against viruses, but new evidence in mice suggests they may help fight norovirus, a highly contagious virus that causes severe gastrointestinal illness, scientists at the School of Medicine report. The same viruses that make us sick can take up residence in and on the human body without provoking a sneeze, cough or other troublesome symptom, according to new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.
The Ebola virus, in the midst of its biggest outbreak on record, is a master at evading the body’s immune system. But researchers at the School of Medicine and elsewhere have learned one way the virus dodges the body’s antiviral defenses, providing important insight that could lead to new therapies. Scientists at the School of Medicine have produced the first detailed images of a protein important to viral infection. The images, from Phyllis Hanson, MD, PhD, and her colleagues, are of molecular scissors that let viruses such as HIV bud from infected cells. A multi-institutional campaign to harness a newly recognized cellular defense against infection is being led by researchers at the School of Medicine. A $32 million grant from the National Institutes of Health is funding the collaborative, which could lead to drugs with unprecedented versatility in fighting different infections. Washington University’s Herbert W. Virgin IV, MD, PhD, is the principal investigator. Researchers have shown they can distinguish between viral and bacterial infections in children with fever by profiling the activity of genes in a blood sample. Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have identified the molecular signal that triggers the development of immune cells that patrol the skin and brain. Researchers have identified the primary player of the biochemical bugle call that musters the body’s defenders against viral infection. Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown that a key molecule, MDA5, is essential for producing enough interferon (the bugle call) to rally virus-fighting cells during certain viral infections. | 002_148775 | {
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Subsets and Splits