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While most children know how to spend money, few know the virtues of saving it.
But April is Financial Youth Literacy Month, which means it's as good a time as any to start talking to kids about money. Lori Mackey, the "Money Mama" and author of "Money Mama & The Three Little Pigs," a read-aloud book that teaches the basics of sound money management, visited "Good Morning America" to explain how to teach kids about saving and spending.
Mackey said it's never too early to start talking to kids about money.
"It's never too late, but if you can start early, you teach them to give, invest, spend and save wisely, they learn the habits of wealth," she said.
She advised that all children have an allowance so they can understand how money works.
"They make better choices if they are spending their money, and don't become materialistic," Mackey said. "If they want a toy, they have to spend their money. They don't want to waste theirs; you don't want to waste yours, so they don't get a sense of entitlement."
Parents can have children earn money to pay for non-essential expenses.
"Whatever you are spending on your child for things they don't actually need, allow them to earn it. That way it's not costing you any more money, you're just transferring it," Mackey said.
Teach Money Mangagement by Breaking Down Finances
Mackey suggested that parents have kids break down their finances into categories, which teaches kids to live within their means and gives them money concepts and vocabulary.
10 percent: Charitable contributions/giving back
10 percent: Investing (stocks, bonds, mutual funds) in things they use or people they go to so they can own a piece of a company and learn what that means
10 percent: Savings, like a 4 percent return on a savings account
70 percent: Spending
Family money night is another way to make money a topic of discussion.
"Play Life, Monopoly, talk about stocks, bonds, investing. It's a way to talk about their financial goals," Mackey suggested. "Or turn all the lights off and see how the electric bill goes down in a month. Make it fun, teach them how money compounds and grows."
Mackey said to find teaching moments in everyday activities, like when a child's toy breaks.
"They get mad when they buy something and it breaks, and they have used their money on it. So they learn how to make smart buys," she said. "They start to realize that when it's their money -- they realize the value more often. Money is a choice and we want them to make better choices."
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Bangor skyline, ca. 1938
Click on the image to zoom. Click and drag your mouse over the image to move it left or right. Use the small navigation window to select the area you wish to zoom on.
Purchase a reproduction of this item on VintageMaineImages.com.
A Tichnor Brothers postcard depicting a view of the Bangor skyline.
Though originally settled in 1769 Bangor did not become incorporated until 1834. Bangor's location on the Penobscot River resulted in it playing an integral role in the American Revolution, the Aroostook War, and the booming lumber trade of the 19th century. As of 2012 Bangor is still the county seat of Penobscot county.
The Tichnor Brothers printing company published this type of postcard circa 1938 as part of their Maine series. These, and other postcards, by the Tichnor Brothers Company are officially known as the Tichnor Gloss Series because the photographs were notoriously retouched on such a level that does not allow the postcards to be classified as photographs or paintings. The caption reads, "Bangor skyline from Brewer Shore across Penobscot River, Bangor, Maine."
Please post your comment below to share with others. If you'd like to privately share a comment or correction with MMN staff, please use this form.
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Cave and Area Geology
A pocket geologic history of Mercer Caverns
Mercer Caverns formed in a large lens of recrystallized limestone and dolomitic limestone of the Calaveras Group, a wastebasket of miscellaneous slabs and slivers of rock found throughout the Sierra Nevada. In the vicinity of the Caverns, these scraps of ancient ocean floors, tropical atolls, and long-vanished continents appear to date from the 280-million-year-old Permian Period. These rocks were originally formed in past seas and stitched onto the western edge of North America by plate tectonics until just before the Age of Dinosaurs. Conditions changed by the time of the Miocene Epoch, which arrived some 24 million years ago. It appears that by the waning of the Miocene some 6 million years ago, acid-charged ground water in the tree-dotted savanna had already seeped down the cracks and fissures of the limestone and dissolved out the cave. As adjacent San Domingo Creek scoured its channel deeper, the cave slowly drained and, deprived of the ground water’s buoyant support, large sections of the cave’s ceiling collapsed. The nearly two million years of the Ice Ages came and went, leaving their mark on the cave as a series of ocherous clay deposits interspersed with massive calcite flowstone cascades and stalagmites. With the final waning of the ice sheets some 10,000 years ago, the walls of the Caverns were covered with thick deposits of calcite dripstone of all shades of white, cream, orange, and brown.
The Cavern’s decorations have formed from seeping and dripping water that is highly charged with dissolved calcite, the primary mineral in the marble. Percolating ground water picks up carbon dioxide generated as a waste product by soil bacteria and slowly dissolves the marble as it traverses down into the bedrock. When these solutions seep out onto the cave walls, the entrapped carbon dioxide boils out of the solutions much like an uncapped soda bottle, dropping its calcite load to deposit the myriad of forms decorating the Caverns. In the lowest sections of the cave, ponded water saturated with calcite encrusted everything with spiky, orange dogtooth spar crystals upwards of 2 inches long. Higher in the cave, ground water pressure was fed through tiny imperfections in the calcite sheathing and formed twisted, medusa-like helictites ranging from a hair’s thickness to massive 2-foot-long “lobster claws.”
Other seeping water slowly formed popcorn or coral-like decorations called coralloids. Gently flowing water, agitated by imperfections on the Cavern walls, also expelled their dissolved carbon dioxide and dropped their calcite load to form sheets of flowstone that resemble frozen waterfalls. In some places, seeping water, again under pressure, formed hollow calcite cave blisters among the coralloids and stalactites that later were partly filled with clay and “opal”. An unusual type of stalactite is found in the cave, where roots penetrating the roof have been coated to form rootsicles.
In a final frosting of the Caverns, solutions rich in calcium carbonate deposited walls of delicate aragonite crystals in the far recesses of the cave. As the minerals concentrated in what little solution remained, uncommon, blue-white, cream cheese-like hydromagnesite moonmilk formed on cave passage walls and on the spiky aragonite crystals. Resembling miniature ice-sheathed trees, this showy display of aragonite is so outstanding that a special prize was awarded to the Mercers at the 1900 Paris World's Fair.
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How many "finished" or permanent draft complete genome sequences have been published?
How many of them are eukaryotes?
Here are the answers from: GOLD
(Apologies for the Three Domain influence.)
Why are there so few eukaryotes? Because many eukaryotic genomes are very large and it takes a lot more work to sequence that much DNA. Furthermore, many eukaryotic genomes are full of junk DNA and it's difficult to sequence and assemble repetitive regions in order to get a complete chromosome. The bottom line is money—for most labs it's too expensive to sequence the genome of their favorite eukaryote but it can be quite cheap these days to sequence a bacterial genome.
[Hat Tip: Jonathan Eisen]
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Welcome to Group 1-A of EDTF 200 section 3!! Our group chose the topic of Healthy Living because Brad Peterson, CJ Bond, and Sierra Shaheen are Health and Physical Education majors while Jordan McGregor is a Elementary Education Major. To encompass all of our majors with this group project, we decided to have our target population of students as Kindergarten through Fifth grade. This allowed all of us to have an equal interest in this project and something to gain from completing it.
What we completed for this class?
We, as a group, completed a concept map for our topic which allowed us to see exactly where our project was heading. Next we then completed our movie on Hygiene and the importance of making sure you keep you body free of germs and other bacteria. Then we we divided up who would complete the Booklet, Newsletter, Poster, and Power Point. We also used the concept map to make sure we touched on the four key aspects of Healthy Living; Hygiene, Stress Management, Nutrition, and Staying Fit. We then also, designed a lesson plan which allowed us to incorporate the booklet, newsletter, poster, and power point into the classroom setting.
Why is this an important topic?
The topic of Healthy Living is an extremely important topic for many reasons. First of all, it addresses ways that you can keep your body safe from harmful bacteria and germs as wells proper ways to clean your body. Secondly, it addresses how to eat properly. Obesity is a major concern in our society today and having the knowledge of what foods are harmful to your body as well as knowing what foods you should be eating is a key step in fighting this growing problem. Thirdly, staying fit, and keeping your body active will allow to continue the fight against obesity. We address techniques of how to exercise and efficient ways to stay active and have a healthy body. Finally, we address one of the most underrated aspects of a healthy life, stress management. Managing your stress is a huge part of your emotional health and your physical health. We go on to talk about the different ways you can manage your stress and steps to achieve a stress free life.
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How real is the threat?
Canine Influenza, or dog flu, is a new respiratory disease that is infecting dogs in the U.S. It was first identified in January, 2004 in racing Greyhounds in Florida. Since then it has spread across country infecting many dogs including show dogs and family pets.
Dog flu is caused by a canine influenza virus. Dogs become infected by breathing in the aerosolized virus coughed up by another dog or by contact with inanimate objects which have been contaminated by oral or nasal secretions from infected dogs. People can also carry the virus on their hands and spread it from dog to dog. The virus does not live well outside of the dog and can be destroyed by most common disinfectants.
If your dog is exposed to the canine influenza virus, he or she will likely become infected. Most dogs have a mild disease that may look a lot like “kennel cough”. They can have a low grade fever, nasal discharge and a persistent cough that may last for 10 – 21 days. Some dogs will develop a more severe form of the disease with high fever and signs of pneumonia and they will usually require antibiotics and might even need to be hospitalized.
How can you prevent your dog from being infected? The easiest way is eliminate exposure to other dogs. In many cases that precaution is just not possible. If your dog is going to be exposed to other dogs, use disinfectants
to clean cages, food and water bowls
and other inanimate objects. If you are working with or touching other dogs, wash your hands frequently and ask others to do the same before touching your dog. Coughing dogs or those who have been exposed to coughing dogs should be isolated so they don’t bring home canine influenza viruses to any other dogs in your home. The incubation period for this disease is two to five days.
At this time, there is no easy, rapid test for diagnosis and there is also no vaccine available to protect your dog from canine influenza. While “kennel cough” vaccines are not effective in protecting against dog flu, if your dog is going to be exposed to other dogs and at risk for canine influenza, then he or she is also at risk for kennel cough and should be vaccinated
We all hear about avian influenza and the risk that it may pose to people, so can canine influenza infect us? The risk of this virus infecting people is really low according to the Centers for Disease Control. However, health officials will continue to monitor this disease, just to be sure.
So how real is the threat to your dog? For most family pets that stay at home, the risk is very low. Exposure to other dog’s increases that risk; so boarding, grooming, showing or even playing in the park can increase the possibility for infection. But given the fact that the disease is fairly mild in most dogs, even if your dog does become infected, the threat of serious disease is still very low.
The materials, information and answers provided through this website are not intended to replace the medical advice or services of a qualified veterinarian or other pet health care professional. Consult your own veterinarian for answers to specific medical questions, including diagnosis, treatment, therapy or medical attention.
Return to Articles
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(Photo: Reuters/Andrew Kelly)
The national debt has surpassed $17 trillion, or about $53,765 for each U.S. citizen, including children. Total unfunded liabilities, what the federal government is projected to owe minus what the federal government is projected to receive in revenue, is over $126 trillion.
The U.S. Treasury Department posts the national debt, to the penny, on weekdays, not including holidays, at around 3 p.m. On Friday, Treasury reported the national debt at $17,075,590,107,963.57, the first time it has surpassed the $17 trillion mark. By Monday afternoon it was down slightly, at $17,074,260,390,144.95.
Part of that amount, about $5 trillion worth, is debt the government owes to itself, in the form of the Social Security trust fund. Since Social Security now pays more to beneficiaries than it receives in revenue, through a payroll tax, the program trades in its special Treasury bonds to make up the difference.
The national debt first reached $1 trillion in the early 1980's. By 1990, it was over $3 trillion. The national debt nearly doubled, from about $5.7 trillion to about $10 trillion during the eight years of the George W. Bush presidency, 2001 to 2009.
The nation is now on track to double the debt again, from 10 to 20 trillion dollars in Obama's two terms. Nearly $2 trillion was added to the national debt in Obama's first year as president, which was the start of the Great Recession. Over $1 trillion has been added each year since.
As part of last week's agreement to fund the government and raise the debt ceiling for a few months, a bipartisan conference committee was created to agree to a longer term government funding bill and debt ceiling increase. Many of those concerned about the national debt are hoping for a "grand bargain" that will both cut the growth in government spending through entitlement reform and increase government revenue through tax reform. Compromise legislation appears unlikely, though, with a deeply divided, deeply partisan, Congress.
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There is no doubt that continuation of unmanaged coconut crab exploitation as it now occurs on Niue will result in disaster. Two basic forms of remedial management/conservation measures have been proposed. The first is promotion of the concept of self-regulation through making Niueans aware of the problems facing the crab, informing them of the measures they can take to help, and explaining the consequences of complacence. The second is government imposed hunting and export restrictions. Unfortunately, as explained in the previous section, there is reluctance on the part of the Niue Cabinet to endorse the proposed coconut crab legislation. As such the immediate future of the coconut crab on Niue rests on the success of the public awareness/education programme in promoting effective self-regulation.
Regular monitoring of the size and size-frequency distribution of the coconut crab population on Niue is required to evaluate the success, or otherwise, of the conservation measures instigated, particularly in light of the fact that government legislation may not eventuate for some considerable time, if at all, leaving only the process of self-regulation to ameliorate current exploitation to sustainable levels. Immediate feedback on the effect of self-regulation on hunting practices/levels is required in order that the situation is not permitted to degrade past a point of no return. If follow-up surveys indicate no, or minimal, improvement, additional measures could be employed, such as strong representation to the Niue Cabinet for immediate introduction of the coconut crab legislation.
A cornerstone of the coconut crab management problem faced by Niue is the calculation of a meaningful sustainable yield. Unfortunately the scope of the present study was insufficient to quantify directly the effect of current levels of exploitation on the size and size-structure of the coconut crab population. Quantification of the relationship between the magnitude of exploitation and changes in the population dynamics of the coconut crab can only be accomplished via a programme of regular annual, or possibly biannual, small-scale coconut crab population surveys. Such regular surveys will also provide data on temporal patterns of larval recruitment which is vital in development of meaningful long-term coconut crab management strategies.
As such the data from regular surveys of the coconut crab population on Niue are not only important to Niue but to all countries with coconut crabs. Niue could be used as a precedent setting case study in which the effectiveness of different conservation approaches in combating the decline in coconut crab numbers could be used as a reference by other countries as they attempt to develop their own coconut crab management strategies. The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) coconut crab project in Vanuatu (1985–1987) was similar in many respects to the present study, however the effectiveness of conservation measures implemented in Vanuatu is impossible to ascertain as no adequate programme of follow-up surveys is in place. In effect much useful data has been lost. The same mistake should not be made in relation to Niue. The small size of Niue makes it possible for small-scale follow-up coconut crab population surveys to yield much useful data. A proposed follow-up research programme for Niue is presented below.
Investigating the effect of exploitation on the population dynamics of the coconut crab requires monitoring of both exploitation levels and changes in crab population dynamics.
Exploitation of the coconut crab on Niue occurs at 3 levels and each must be monitored.
1 Subsistence-Based Exploitation
Monitoring of subsistence based exploitation will require the honesty and co-operation of crab hunters in completing hunting ‘information’ sheets. It is proposed that simple pro-forma data sheets be regularly distributed (Eg. monthly) to all hunters with the request that they complete the questions on the sheet and return it to DAFF. The sheets could include questions such as a) The number of days during the previous month coconut crab were hunted, b) The number of crabs caught over the previous month, c) The main area in which hunting was conducted, d) The number of crabs sent to market during the last month and e) The number of crabs captured for export over the last month.
If necessary the forms could be completed on an anonymous basis if hunters consider that the questionnaires could be used to monitor individuals. Alternatively a small inducement (a small sum of money or any other form of reward) could be used to encourage hunters to complete and return the forms. However, as was discovered when such a system was trialed in Vanuatu, there are ‘dangers’ associated with use of an incentive-based system and care needs to be exercised to ensure the system is not abused. It is suggested that a member of staff from DAFF could be made responsible for the distribution and collection of the forms and possibly entering the collected data into a computer database.
By cross-checking information on the number of crabs sold at the market or exported collected from the questionnaire sheets with the results from the direct methods outlined below, a ‘confidence level’ for the questionnaire data could be established.
2 Export-Based Exploitation (Air)
Quarantine Officers from DAFF are currently on duty at the airport for all flight arrivals/departures to inspect foodstuffs being exported as cargo or baggage. Where a quarantine certificate is required a small fee is charged. Given that all outbound passengers are currently questioned as to the presence of food items in their cargo or baggage, it is proposed that the quarantine officers could readily ascertain from passengers exporting coconut crabs the number and/or weight of crabs involved in their consignment. This information would then be passed on to the DAFF staff member looking after the data on coconut crab exploitation.
Possibly a local coconut crab clearance system, similar to that currently used for certain food items, could be instigated whereby all coconut crab exports must be examined by quarantine officers at the airport prior to export. For a small fee the consignments would be cleared and issued with a coconut crab export clearance sticker. The fee collected could then be used to fund the total exploitation monitoring programme (ie. subsistence, export and commercial exploitation).
3 Commercial-Based Exploitation (Markets)
During the period of the current survey regular monitoring of the number and, where possible, size of coconut crabs offered for sale at the local market was conducted by Mr Etuata from DAFF. Such monitoring normally required only 30 minutes or so each market day and it is proposed that a DAFF staff member could be assigned to permanently monitor market sales of coconut crabs.
It is proposed that follow-up surveys initially be conducted on an annual basis until the decline in the size of the coconut crab population has been reversed, where upon survey intervals could be increased to 2 years.
The survey programme proposed is of 5–6 weeks duration conducted during the months September-November. Surveys would be conducted along the same transects used in the present study although the number surveyed would be reduced from 35 to 30 through deletion of some Fernland and Light and Scattered vegetation category transects. Each transect would be surveyed twice to determine mean CPUE values. The period September to November is recommended because during these months most crabs would have completed moulting and emerged from their burrows. It is also before the onset of the wet season and would therefore minimise disruption of field-work due to inclement weather.
Transect surveys could be conducted by DAFF staff. Mr Colin Etuata (DAFF) was most competent in conducting transect surveys for the current study and either he, or someone trained by him, could complete the surveys.
Release of mature eggs into the ocean by coconut crabs is both synchronous and rhythmic and tends to be concentrated at specific coastal sites (Schiller 19988a, 1988b, Schiller et al 1991). It is proposed that a research programme be established to investigate the following areas:
1. Identification of the major coastal regions used by coconut crabs to release their eggs into the ocean. Release of eggs by female coconut crabs is restricted to a few days each month. The specific days of egg release for a given month in a given year can be calculated through use of a predictive model developed by Schiller et al (1991). As such it would be possible for a researcher to restrict coastal searches for egg-releasing females to calculated egg-release periods avoiding the necessity to search the same areas at different times of the month to ensure no reproductive activity was missed. Consequently it would be possible for the entire coastline of Niue to be surveyed in one reproductive season, from November to March.
Once the major egg-releasing sites have been identified area closures could be made much more localised both in terms of the actual area effected and the periods of closure necessary. This would have the effect of decreasing the impact of area closures as perceived by the public while at the same time increasing the effectiveness of the closures in affording protection to the coconut crabs and their eggs.
2. Conduct annual surveys of the major egg-releasing sites (as identified above) to monitor the number of egg-releasing females. This data could then be considered an index of annual reproductive effort and used to assess changes in the reproductive potential of the coconut crab stock on Niue. In terms of assessing the effectiveness of introduced management/conservation measures such information is crucial. The reproductive index in conjunction with annual stock survey data would provide an extremely reliable indication of changes in the size of the coconut crab stock.
The majority of the proposed follow-up research, collection of exploitation data and conducting of transect surveys, can be accomplished by staff from DAFF. However overall co-ordination of the research, development of transect survey programmes and analysis/interpretation of results would require an external consultant versed in such procedures. The combination of on-island field workers and off-island co-ordination used during the current study was a success in terms of data collection and minimising costs. It is suggested that continuation of such a working relationship would benefit Niue in terms of developing local research skills as well as providing for collection of long term data at minimal cost. Continued involvement by the Zoology Department, The University of Queensland, in any follow-up research is strongly recommended in that it will provide continuity of research plus access to a large coconut crab database covering information collected over many years from Christmas Island, Vanuatu, The Cook Islands, and Niue.
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Using Children's Literature in Mathematics
Library Home || Full Table of Contents || Suggest a Link || Library Help
|A list of children's books (with authors) that can be used in math lessons.|
|Levels:||Elementary, Middle School (6-8)|
|Math Topics:||Arithmetic/Early Math, Communicating Math, Literature/Poetry|
© 1994- The Math Forum at NCTM. All rights reserved.
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Take a sneak peek at the new NIST.gov and let us know what you think!
(Please note: some content may not be complete on the beta site.).
NIST Authors in Bold
|Author(s):||Elaine B. Barker; Allen L. Roginsky;|
|Title:||Recommendation for Cryptographic Key Generation|
|Published:||December 21, 2012|
|Abstract:||Cryptography is often used in an information technology security environment to protect data that is sensitive, has a high value, or is vulnerable to unauthorized disclosure or undetected modification during transmission or while in storage. Cryptography relies upon two basic components: an algorithm (or cryptographic methodology) and a cryptographic key. This Recommendation discusses the generation of the keys to be managed and used by the approved cryptographic algorithms.|
|Citation:||Special Publication (NIST SP) - 800-133|
|Keywords:||asymmetric key, key agreement, key derivation, key generation, key wrapping, key replacement, key transport, key update, private key, public key, symmetric key|
|Research Areas:||Computer Security|
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Putting prison overcrowding in perspective:
According to the Bureau for Justice Statistics, the number of adult federal and state prison inmates increased from 139 per 100,000 residents in 1980 to 502 per 100,000 in 2009 — an increase of 261 percent. Over two million Americans are now incarcerated in prisons or jails and the total number of Americans under some form of penal supervision (including jail, prison, parole and probation) is over 7.2 million.
According to the U.K.-based International Centre for Prison Studies, the U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world at 756 per 100,000, including juveniles as well as adults. With less than five percent of the world’s population, the U.S. accounts for about a quarter of its prison population.
It was not always this way.
When Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States in the early 1800s, he was impressed by the leniency of the young republic’s system of corrections. In the opening chapter of Democracy in America, he wrote that “In no country is criminal justice administered with more mildness than in the United States.”
For most of the 20th century, U.S. prison rates were fairly low and stable by comparison with contemporary levels. From 1930 to 1970, for example, the average annual rate of imprisonment was around 110 per 100,000.
But beginning in the 1970s, a number of political and economic factors gave rise to the prison boom, which was to bring the nation to the age of mass incarceration, which in turn would have far reaching and sometimes devastating impacts on those affected. Incarceration became the default setting rather than the backstop of the criminal justice system. This would most heavily impact low income, low skilled young men without high school diplomas or post-secondary education—and this was disproportionately true for young African Americans.
Contributing factors to the prison boom included fears of crime and unrest, political hysteria regarding drugs, a backlash against the gains of the civil rights movement, widening economic inequality and a decline in the demand for low-skilled labor.
The policy response around the nation included new criminal penalties, more severe sentencing and parole systems, less reliance on probation and other alternatives to incarceration, and a mushrooming prison building industry.
While drug use occurs throughout society, low income urban communities are more heavily policed, in part because more daily life occurs in public spaces and illegal activities are more difficult to hide.
According to the American Civil Liberties Union, “The racial disparities resulting from this system have been staggering. Black individuals are imprisoned at nearly six times the rate of their white counterparts — and Latinos are locked up at nearly double the white rate. Most of this racial disparity is a result of the War on Drugs. While these groups engage in drug use, possession, and sales at rates comparable to their representation in the general population, the system disparately impacts people of color. For example, black individuals comprise 13% of the U.S. population and 14% of drug users, yet they are 37% of the people arrested for drug offenses and 56% of those incarcerated for drug crimes.”
When young people are incarcerated, the effects last a lifetime, impacting job quality, earnings, assets, home ownership, marriage and family life, public benefits and, in some states, voting rights. When this occurs disproportionally in low income and minority communities, the effects reach far beyond those immediately involved.
The American Friends Service Committee is trying to change this trend, not only bringing attention to the issue at a policy level, but also working with men inside the prison system, as well as young people who bear the brunt of challenges in marginalized urban settings affected by decades of over reliance on incarceration as a way to solve broader social problems.
- AFSC West Virginia Economic Justice Project Program Director Rick Wilson
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One of de Cleyre’s key later essays, “Anarchism and American Traditions” (1909) offers a critical reflection on freedom, equality, government, and the American Revolution.
To the average American of today, the Revolution means the battles fought by the patriot army with the armies of England. The school children who attend our public schools are taught to draw maps, to know the general plan of several campaigns; required to remember the date when Washington crossed the Delaware on the ice; told to call General Wayne ‘Mad Anthony Wayne,’ and to execrate Benedict Arnold; and then they think they have learned the Revolution – blessed be George Washington! They have no idea why it should have been called a ‘revolution’ instead of the ‘English War:’ the name ‘American Revolution’ is held sacred, though it means to them nothing more than successful force, while the name ‘Revolution’ applied to a further possibility, is a spectre detested and abhorred. . . .
To the men of that time, the battles that they fought were the least of the Revolution; the stake they had in view, the real Revolution, was a change in political institutions which should make of government not a thing apart, a superior power to stand over the people with a whip; equal liberty is the political ideal. And yet even in the very days of the prophets, even with their own consent, the first concession to this later tyranny was made. . . .
What has Anarchism to say to the bankruptcy of Republicanism, this modern empire that has grown up on the ruins of our early freedom? That the sin our fathers sinned was that they did not trust liberty wholly. They thought it possible to compromise between liberty and government, and the moment the compromise was made, the whole misbegotten monster of our present tyranny began to grow. Anarchism says, Make no laws whatever concerning speech, and speech will be free. Let the guarantee of free speech be in every man’s determination to use it, and we shall have no need of paper declarations. On the other hand, so long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so. As to the American tradition of non-meddling, Anarchism asks that it be carried down to the individual himself. It demands no jealous barrier of isolation; but it teaches that by all men’s strictly minding their own business, a fluid society, freely adapting to mutual needs, wherein all the world shall belong to all men, as much as each has need or desire, will result. . . .
Introduced January 2012.
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Is competition in education the answer?
You could say it was a lousy Christmas for charter school supporters.
On December 21, after months of delays, official advice on the Government's controversial charter schools policy was finally made public. The advice from Treasury and the Ministry of Education undermined much of the rhetoric and promises made by backers of charter schools.
The rhetoric is that competition in education improves outcomes for everyone. But from the 56 pages of Treasury documents, a picture emerges of an education experiment that looks risky and even counter-productive. Treasury says evidence shows that "schooling systems that use strongly competitive elements do not produce systematically better [student] outcomes".
Some charter schools are more effective than others, Treasury found. The best are in urban areas, are largely classroom-based and not too "alternative". But downsides of the good ones include a negative impact on nearby state schools rather than the promised "positive competition impact".
Nor is it clear that overseas models are transferable. There is "not a wealth of studies which look at which charter schools raise achievement and why" and New Zealand's education system is already one of the most decentralised. This means that "the difference between state schools and charter schools will not be as pronounced as in other school systems", such as the United States, where charter schools started.
Treasury is also "doubtful" that charter schools will rapidly improve NCEA results as promised. And then there is the dollars and cents stuff: "It is still unclear whether the potential costs and risks of introducing the charter school model outweigh the potential benefit of trialling these new approaches via charter schools".
Treasury asked: Why not trial new approaches in the existing state system?
There is also the religious issue. Like state-integrated schools, such as Catholic schools, charter schools can provide religious rather than secular education. Treasury expects that "some in the education sector may see this as a challenge to the principles of 'free, secular and compulsory' state schools as a cornerstone of the Education Act", which gives students "a right to secular education".
Finally, there is a point so important that Treasury put it in bold type. While Associate Education Minister and ACT MP John Banks says not all charter school teachers need to be registered, Treasury urges the Government to take the Ministry of Education's advice and insist on registered teachers: "Quality teaching is the most important in- school factor influencing student achievement" and "teacher registration is a reasonable proxy for a minimum level of quality".
Again, these recommendations were not from a teachers' union or academic think-tank but from Treasury, which is usually a reliable supporter of free-market activity. But here they argue against competition, not for it.
"What we found interesting is how much Treasury agreed with us," says New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) researcher Stephanie Mills.
She says the NZEI, a teachers' union, made the Official Information Act request that eventually got the Treasury report released. It was put off again and again until the Ombudsman got involved. But large parts of the report remain blacked out and the NZEI is pushing for those omissions to be addressed, particularly as the report goes broader than just charter schools, into "privatisation in schooling" generally. What else is being considered behind closed doors, they wonder.
Catherine Isaac tries to give an impression of not being too bothered about what Treasury says.
"It's not for me to comment on Treasury's advice," Isaac says. "All I can say is that we have focused very closely on overseas evidence and the more freedom that you allow, the better."
But that seems to directly contradict with Treasury's finding that competitive elements don't produce better outcomes. "There are different schools of thought on that," Isaac says.
Last year, Isaac, a former president of the ACT party, was appointed chairwoman of the Partnership Schools Working Group after John Banks made charter schools part of a coalition deal with National. For New Zealand, charter schools have been renamed partnership schools. In Britain and Sweden they are known as "free" schools.
Most continue to call them charter schools in New Zealand although Isaac occasionally corrects the mistake.
Some critics worry that charter schools will take public money but be free from scrutiny. The Official Information Act will not apply and there will be no requirement to have parents on school boards. Some call it "privatisation by stealth", as the state contracts a "sponsor", which could be a business, to run the school.
The delayed release of the Treasury report set the scene for a busy month. From mid-December until yesterday, Isaac received indications of interest from groups wanting to set up charter schools. The first will be expected to open their doors in 2014.
Yes, that is a tight timeframe, Isaac agrees. It gets tighter still. Applications are not due until April, to be assessed by a Partnership School Authorisation Board that is yet to be appointed. In May, that board will advise the Minister of Education.
The minister announces the successful applicants at the end of May and those who miss out will get to apply again for 2015.
How many indications of interest have come in?
"Quite a few" is the clearest answer Isaac can give.
Will there still be one school in Auckland and one in Christchurch?
"There are some from Auckland," she replies. "I'm not sure that there are any from Christchurch. I'm not sure why Christchurch is so worried."
It is because the coalition agreement stated that disadvantaged areas in Auckland and Christchurch were likely locations.
"But [Christchurch] is looking quite unlikely," Isaac says. "Christchurch was named simply because of the earthquakes. The city was already at a disadvantage with the massive disruption to the education system.
"You have to remember, this is simply an option. If people see a need and have an interest in putting forward a proposal, and have the support of the community, they come forward. It's not going to be imposed. There have been attempts to indicate that some external power is somehow going to plant schools in communities that don't want them."
As for the spectre of for-profit groups running charter schools, she says: "As it happens, I'm not aware of any for-profits expressing interest. They are all either community groups or iwi or existing schools."
Other key details are still up in the air. Since the policy appeared in late 2011, most have assumed that two charter schools will open in 2014. There may be more.
"There never has been" a plan to open just two, Isaac says. "That's another misunderstanding."
There is no maximum number as "it's going to be a matter of quality".
What can Isaac say about the types of charter schools we will get? Will we see religious groups seeking full state funding?
"Again, you can't generalise. There are some faith-based groups coming forward."
But she dismisses claims that the state will fund creationist teaching as a "fear tactic" from the unions.
"Again, it's most unlikely. The truth is that some faith-based schools, especially Catholic schools, do exceedingly well for disadvantaged students. And there is a demand for that kind of education.
"No student will have to go to any of these schools and no teacher will have to teach in them.
"I know that the Swedish model is regarded as very successful and they have most of the freedoms that we are including in our model, including the possibility of for-profits. The for-profit schools in Sweden have done extremely well with disadvantaged children."
? ? ?
Isaac mentions Sweden often. The Swedish free schools, established in the early 1990s, are seen as a more attractive proposition than the United States model. In the US, the most quoted statistics, from a Stanford University study, say only 17 per cent of charter schools perform better than public schools, 37 per cent perform worse and 46 per cent perform no differently.
But is Sweden doing much better? Last month, Swedish newspaper The Local reported research by Jonas Vlachos, an associate professor of economics at Stockholm University. His 2011 research found that Sweden's "lower-secondary" free schools perform slightly better than state schools but inflate test scores more. At "upper-secondary" level, quality problems become "more severe" and there is "increased socio-economic sorting as a consequence of increased choice".
In other words, competition has made society less homogenous.
Providers without education experience have caused problems, Vlachos found. And secrecy has surrounded the profitability of the companies running schools.
His lesson was that market forces do not function well when it comes to education, and low quality providers are both costly and hard to remove.
But the prologue to creating charter schools in New Zealand is also something of an information war.
Isaac emails two documents that tell a different story. A report from a Swedish Ministry of Employment research institute says that competition has been effective although it took at least a decade for positive results to appear.
The second document is a blog by the editor of British conservative magazine The Spectator, translating Swedish findings for his readership. He is hugely in favour of the for-profit model, which the UK is yet to approve.
In the UK. "free" schools are a policy of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition.
Reports go back and forth, and opponents hurl statistics at each other. The charter school model is loose enough to include both successes and failures.
Still, while Isaac talks about Sweden, it is clear her working group also takes guidance from the less well-regarded US system. Minutes of working group meetings show that it met with two key players from the US last year. The first was Mike Feinberg, co- founder of the Knowledge is Power Programme (KIPP), which has 125 schools in 20 states. His visit was funded by US hedge fund billionaire Julian Robertson, who is also a major donor to KIPP.
Feinberg likes to tell a story from KIPP's early days in which he visited a student's home and confiscated her television set to make her study.
Meeting Feinberg was "very helpful", Isaac says.
The second meeting was with William Haft, from the National Association of Charter School Authorisers (Nasca), who spoke about the contractual side. Given the Ministry of Education's ongoing Novopay debacle, no-one can be too careful.
"You have to make sure the people running the schools are competent and capable, particularly in terms of financial management," Isaac agrees.
The working group had another expert closer to home. The minutes of its first meeting, in April 2012, show that former education secretary Lesley Longstone provided "major input". In interviews, Longstone claimed that she was not lured from the UK to help with charter schools but Isaac says "certainly she did bring expertise on this topic and was supportive of it".
Charter school opponents countered with experts of their own. New Orleans education activist Karran Harper Royal addressed the Post Primary Teachers' Association (PPTA) conference and warned of "disaster capitalism".
She said in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, the definition of a failing school was changed to allow schools to be taken out of the hands of local boards.
"Billionaire philanthropists" reinvented them as charters.
She warned that "they are buying their way into schools to suck the profits out of public education".
Veteran teachers were dumped in favour of newer, cheaper ones, parents were removed from boards and children who are harder to teach were barred.
"Children who cost more to educate don't give you a good return on your investment," she said.
While Isaac was taking indications of interest from possible charter school providers, submissions were flooding in about the law that will allow them, which is the Education Amendment Bill 2012. More than 1800 submissions came in through the NZEI website alone.
The PPTA put its submission online. It noted that it speaks for 95 per cent of registered teachers. It argued that charter schools are "a vote of no confidence in the capacity of parents to be actively involved in their local school in a governance role".
Instead, parents are "reduced to the role of 'customers' in the educational marketplace and their children become commodities from whom the charter school sponsors may seek to profit".
The PPTA argued that charter schools will experiment on children in poor communities, quoting Catherine Isaac's comment that charter schools will be "the R & D arm of the education system".
Isaac says she did make the comment but disagrees that it means charter schools are "experimental".
The PPTA also traced the policy's origins in ACT history. While most were surprised to hear about charter schools after the 2011 election, the PPTA called attention to a 2009 working group on "parental choice" in education, chaired by former ACT MP Heather Roy and containing former ACT MP Sir Roger Douglas and future education minister Hekia Parata.
But Roy and Douglas found this group too moderate and produced a minority report that pushed the line of choice and freedom even further.
From this, the PPTA concluded that charter schools are just the start of ACT's controversial "vouchers" policy, in which parents are education consumers shopping for schools.
PPTA president Robin Duff notes that the electoral fortunes of ACT will rise or fall on charter schools, adding that "they haven't much further to fall".
At times, the PPTA submission also displays a wry sense of humour, such as when it notes that "the ministerial sponsor of this bill, John Banks, rejects not only evolution but also the scientific understandings about geological time and presumably all the physical laws about the origin of the universe". That gives "implicit endorsement to the prospect that public money may be given to some charter school operators who believe that a framework of medieval beliefs is sufficient to prepare New Zealand children to take their place in the 21st century".
The PPTA also ran a high- profile advertising campaign urging people to make submissions. Isaac calls it "a fairly sleazy, hysterical, highly personalised" campaign in which she was targeted.
"I just wonder how teachers feel about their professional body spending what must be hundreds of thousands of dollars of their money on a campaign attacking an initiative which is trying to help students succeed." she says.
They feel "delighted," the PPTA's Robin Duff says. Support for the PPTA position was overwhelming at the last conference, he adds.
But what do parents make of it all? They are the "consumers" in this new model. Mills quotes a UMR poll that found that 86 per cent of parents were strongly against unqualified teachers.
Isaac says applicants will have to demonstrate parental demand for their schools, but is demand out there?
'There is not a flood of supporters or parents or anybody going, 'Yeah, yeah, we want a charter school'," Mills believes. "If you look at the list of people who have expressed interest, they are sectarian, basically. You've got fundamentalist Christian schools that are private at the moment and you've got the Maharishi Foundation and a couple of outdoor pursuit places. It's not a sterling group."
Mills and Duff expect to see some religious schools propped up by the taxpayer, with unregistered teachers promoting whatever world view they like.
"There is obviously an argument for parental choice in terms of belief systems but there is also an argument that every child deserves the opportunity to understand how the world works," Mills says.
- The Press
Do we need a ministerial review of school zones?Related story: School zones cripple buyers
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Warsaw (Sep. 14)
Arthur Bliss Lane, United States Ambassador to Poland, today returned from a trip to the extermination camp at Maidanek where the Germans murdered hundreds of thousands of Jews in gas chambers and burned their bodies in crematoriums.
“The most extensive reports in the press hardly conveyed the real picture of horror which one withnesses at the Maidanck camp even today,” the U.S. envoy declared. He brought with him ashes of the cremated Jews and toys which had belonged to Jewish infants. He will send these relics to the United States to be used in a forthcoming exhibition of German and Japanese atrocities.
Mr. Lane’s visit to Maidanek coincided with “Maidanek Week” which is now being observed throughout Poland in memory of those killed at the camp by the Germans. large mass-meetings are being held in Warsaw, Lublin, Cracow and other cities. Exhibitions depicting the horror of Maidanek are also being shown in many towns at the request of the central government in Warsaw.
In Maidanek itself a mass-meeting attended by more than 20,000 people, including delegations from all parts of the country, was held. The meeting was addressed by leaders of various political parties, in the presence of high government officials.
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". . . kill as many officers as possible, but, for God’s sake, spare the generals."
|--||Reported advice of President Paul Kruger
of the Transvaal Republic, to his Boer Commandos during the South African War
- To mark the end of his first semester at the Virginia Military Institute, Cadet George S. Patton, Jr., spent Christmas Day of 1903 at the grave of Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, contemplating the warrior’s life while eating figs.
- During the Second Century, at the height of the Roman Empire, officers were rarely ever posted to the same legion twice during their careers, apparently in order to reduce the possibility of developing undue influence with the troops.
- Reportedly, Napoleon had a pet gazelle that he kept at his palace at Malmaison, which he had trained to chase the ladies of the court upon a certain signal, and seemed to get great pleasure from watching them trying to run in their elegant gowns and precious jewelry.
- It appears that although on occasion Greek hosts ran into the tens of thousands – and perhaps 100,000 at Plataea (479 B.C.) against the Persians – typically during the “Golden Age” in the Fifth Century B.C. armies ran to only about 2,500 hoplites, plus some cavalry and perhaps archers or slingers.
- In 1929 Germany’s reparations debt to the Allies was restructured to 137.3 billion gold marks, payable in annual installments through 1987.
- The worst disaster in maritime history occurred in 255 B.C., when, shortly after overwhelming the Carthagians in the Battle of Cape Hermaea, a Roman fleet of 464 war galleys – including over 100 newly captured prizes – was wrecked in a storm off Pachynus (Cape Passero), Sicily, with the loss of some 380 ships and reportedly 150,000 men .
- Although invited to attend President Roosevelt’s war message to Congress on December 8, 1941, Chinese Ambassador Hu Shu required the personal assistance of Senator John Connelly of Texas to enter the Capitol building, because security guards thought he looked like a Japanese spy.
- Spanish Lt.-Gen. Miguel de Alava, appears to have been the only man present at both of Britain's great decisive victories over Napoleon, the naval Battle of Trafalgar (October 21, 1805), when he was a frigate captain with the Franco-Spanish fleet, and at Waterloo (June 18, 1815), when he was serving as an aide to Wellington.
Portions of "Al
Nofi's CIC" have appeared previously in Military Chronicles,
Copyright © 2765 Military
Chronicles (www.militarychronicles.com), used with permission, all rights
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It sure would be interesting to watch two stars run into each other — from a safe distance, of course. One can imagine there would be quite the titanic battle going on between their competing gravitational forces, throwing off gas and matter as they collide.
They also leave behind interesting echoes, at least according to new research. A European team looked at the leftovers of one collision and found a type of pulsating star that has never been seen before.
It’s common for stars to form in groups or to be paired up, since they form from immense gas clouds. Sometimes, a red giant star in a binary system gets so big that it will bump into a companion star orbiting nearby. This crash could shave 90% of the red giant star’s mass off, but astronomers are still trying to get their heads around what happens.
“Only a few stars that have recently emerged from a stellar collision are known, so it has been difficult to study the connection between stellar collisions and the various exotic stellar systems they produce,” Keele University, which led the research, stated.
Researchers who made the find were actually on the hunt for alien planets. They turned up what is called an “eclipsing” binary system, meaning that one of the stars passes in front of the other from the perspective of Earth.
The scientists then used a high-speed camera on the Very Large Telescope in Chile called ULTRACAM. The camera is capable of taking up to 500 pictures a second to track fast-moving astronomical events.
Observations revealed that “the remnant of the stripped red giant is a new type of pulsating star,” Keele stated.
“We have been able to find out a lot about these stars, such as how much they weigh, because they are in a binary system,” stated Pierre Maxted, an astrophysicist at Keele.
“This will really help us to interpret the pulsation signal and so figure out how these stars survived the collision and what will become of them over the next few billion years.”
The next step for the researchers will be to calculate when the star will begin cooling down and become a white dwarf, which is what is left behind after a star runs out of fuel to burn.
Check out more details of the find in Nature.
Source: Keele University
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|Palo Alto Centennial
While World War II affected the Palo Alto area in many ways, no group of people were as affected or hurt by the war as local nisei, or Japanese-Americans. They were American-born and American-educated, whose citizenship supposedly gave them the same rights as all other Americans. But they were taken from their homes and placed in internment camps under military guard for the duration of the war.
By the time the war was over and they returned to Palo Alto, many families had lost everything--homes, wealth, possessions. Banks wouldn't give them credit, some stores wouldn't sell to them, some restaurants wouldn't serve them, many employers wouldn't hire them.
Kiyo Doi of Palo Alto was a young woman studying in Japan just before the war broke out. Becoming educated in Japan was a common practice in those days to retain what is a rich cultural heritage, Doi said in an interview in 1989.
A graduate of Palo Alto High School, Doi said the American consulate warned her and others that war might break out and she was lucky enough to take "the last boat back" to America. Many other nisei were trapped in Japan for the duration of the war.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt on Feb. 19, 1942, signed an executive order for the internment of all persons of Japanese lineage, aliens and citizens alike. Doi's family, like the others, had only a week or two to prepare for their departure. They were allowed to take only two suitcases, leaving everything else behind at the farm they lived on in south Palo Alto.
Like many other local families, her family first went to Tanforan race track (now Tanforan Park Shopping Center), where they were housed in the stables, before they were shipped to Topaz, Utah, one of 10 relocation camps.
The camps were all in desolate, inhospitable locations. Topaz was called the Valley of Salt because of alkali soil that frustrated the efforts of Mormons to settle the area, according to one historian.
For Doi, like many other young nisei, camp life was not so bad, going to Japanese school and American school every day and learning crafts. "We made little flowers and ornaments and my father made carvings out of rocks," she said.
Doi said her family was happy that they were together and not separated. But "we never thought of the hardship our parents went through, working on a farm to raise all those vegetables that were ready to harvest" and leaving it behind.
After the war, Doi and her family returned to Palo Alto and to a post-war atmosphere of anti-Japanese sentiment. "We did run across not being waited on in restaurants," she said. "I had expected things like that to happen, and I didn't take it personally. After all, you have to carry on, you can't hold a grudge."
Doi and her husband, Ralph, fit a classic nisei pattern. Farmers before the war, many couldn't lease land to farm anymore and couldn't find other jobs, so many of the women, like Kiyo Doi, became domestics, and many of the men, like her husband, became gardeners.
Floyd Kumagai was 10 years old when the war broke out and his family was interned at Tule Lake. His family owned land in Palo Alto but was sharecropping land in East Palo Alto at the time. His father resisted pressures to sell his land before internment.
Kumagai, a Palo Alto resident, said camp life wasn't bad for a boy who had a lot of other children to play with. But Tule Lake was also one of the most notorious of the camps, under heavy military guard, where many of the more outspoken nisei were placed. Kumagai said he remembered tanks coming into the barracks area and tear gas being used to break up gatherings of camp members.
Kumagai, a graduate of Palo Alto High School and San Jose State University, said his family was luckier than others because they still owned land in Palo Alto. But they had nothing else when they returned in 1946. "It was rough," he said. "We had no house to live in. Three families lived in a garage of a friend," the man who took care of his father's land during the war.
The Kumagai family also underwent something else that was common in the post-war days. Nisei were not very welcome in the United States, and they were even less welcome in Japan. Kumagai's uncle went to Japan after the war, he said, splitting the family. "Half went back and half remained," he said, but they eventually came back.
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Men in same-sex couples in Oklahoma earn 26 percent less than their straight married counterparts, according to a new study on employment discrimination against LGBT people in the Sooner State.
The study, released today by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law, also concludes that LGBT Oklahomans are frequently subject to harassment and discrimination in the workplace because of their sexual orientation and gender identity.
The study estimates that there are between 43,000 and 57,000 LGB people working in Oklahoma, along with as many as 6,800 transgender people.
Expanding the state’s nondiscrimination law to include sexual orientation and gender identity would have little impact on state agencies, resulting in only 21-29 additional complaints per year, according to the study.
“Laws that provide protection from discrimination not only benefit employees, but also help businesses recruit and retain highly-skilled employees,” said study co-author Lee Badgett.
To read the full study and press release, go here.
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When the Mississippi River spilled over its banks late last month in Mark Twain's boyhood home of Hannibal, Mo., it was the sort of flood the Army Corps of Engineers expects to occur once every 10 or 25 years.
If Hannibal could only be so lucky.
The town saw similar floods in 1995, 1996, 1998 and 2001. Worse still was the 200-year flood in 2008. But none of those compared to the devastation in 1993, when river gauges at Hannibal measured floodwaters at levels expected only once in five centuries.
Similar stories have emerged along the length of the Big Muddy. In recent week, heavy rains created a monstrous swell that barreled from the river's upper reaches toward the Delta, shattering flood records as it went.
"Flooding is getting more frequent and more severe," said Robert Criss, a professor of Earth and planetary sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.
Criss is among a group of experts who believe worsening Mississippi River floods are due to a combination of changing climate and federal water projects over a century that have turned the river into a superhighway for shipping.
Construction of locks, levees and weirs, critics say, has created a deep passageway for shipping that has unnaturally constrained the river, forcing floodwaters higher in times of heavy rain. Meanwhile, they say, warming temperatures are forcing more water into the atmosphere, leading to heavier rainfall.
Criss blames the Army Corps, which he says has "dangerously underestimated" flooding potential along the Mississippi, promoting risky flood-plain development and pushing the National Flood Insurance Program to the brink.
"You know, if some casino were telling you the odds on their slots were this far off, somebody would be after them," Criss said. "It isn't like it doesn't matter. It is fraudulent to be stating flood statistics that are so erroneous."
To be sure, statistics are a poor predictor of whether a flood will occur in any given year. The arrival of a "100-year" flood is no guarantee that a similar disaster won't appear for another 99 years, just as hitting a number on a roulette wheel is no guarantee that a the winner won't hit another winner on the very next spin.
The corps disputes criticism of its flood calculations, arguing that Criss and others fail to recognize that a "100-year" flood has a 1 percent chance of showing up any given year, and could show up several times in a decade.
"I can tell you the ways he's couching them, I don't think that's a fair way to depict it," said Mike Petersen, spokesman for the corps' St. Louis District.
The corps' projections are based on historical data, he said. Climate change and urban development patterns affect the river and force the Army Corps to constantly update models and projects to reflect changes.
"We're always updating the yardstick," Petersen said. "It's a changing climate and a changing world, and we recognize that. It's not something that's lost on the Corps of Engineers."
Looking for a culprit
Criss says it's the Army Corps that misunderstands the statistics.
In a 2008 study, Criss ran a statistical test on the flood projections at various points along the Mississippi and found a 99.9 percent chance that they were incorrect.
Flood frequency projections across the entire system, he said, are off by a factor of 10, meaning that 100-year flood events should be reclassified as 10-year events and that risk, insurance premiums and official flood zones should be recalculated accordingly and independently.
The Army Corps "are the last people in the world at this point who ought to be doing it," Criss said. "Somebody independent needs to be doing it now. Talk about asking the fox to re-guard the henhouse. They have no credibility."
Many water experts blame climate change for worsening floods.
Peter Gleick, president and co-founder of the Pacific Institute, a nonprofit think tank based in Oakland, Calif., said that while it's impossible to attribute any weather event to climate change, "I'm completely sure that we're changing the climate."
"I'm also confident that because we're changing the climate, there is human influence on every weather event," Gleick said. "That influence may be incredibly tiny for every single weather event, but I'd like to argue that it is no longer zero."
Gleick noted that parts of the Mississippi River Basin have recently received major inundations of rain at levels 300, 400 and 600 percent above normal. The total picture points to human influence outside the normal variability of the weather.
"In effect, we're loading the dice and we're painting higher numbers on them," said Gleick.
Criss contends that climate change is a minor player in the worsening floods along the Mississippi. He blames the levees, weirs and dams -- projects that Congress ordered the Army Corps to build.
"Fundamentally, we've changed the landscape of the Mississippi River Basin," said Andrew Fahlund, senior vice president of conservation for the advocacy group American Rivers. "We've basically developed all the way up to the edge and really, the water has no place to go but to run off and create these massive floods."
'Not a realistic goal'
Construction of fewer levees and a return to the use of flood plains, Fahlund and Criss argue, would allow that river to spread out when heavy rain causes it to swell.
But industry groups contend that's a pie-in-the-sky solution, since towns and cities have already been built behind the thousands of miles of levees along the Mississippi.
"The notion of returning nature to its pristine state along the rivers of this country is just not a realistic goal," said Amy Larson, president of the National Waterways Conference, a group that represents a broad array of shippers, dredgers and local levee boards along the Mississippi.
Fahlund concedes that flood plains that could be realistically reclaimed are "limited" but said that should not deter the government from attempting to purchase certain low-lying farmlands, to contract farmers to allow their land to be flooded during wet seasons, or to relocate outright some small, rural communities built in flood-prone areas.
"We need a combined approach," said Fahlund. "Levees need to be our last line of defense, not our only line of defense."
Want to read more stories like this?
E&E is the leading source for comprehensive, daily coverage of environmental and energy politics and policy.
Click here to start a free trial to E&E -- the best way to track policy and markets.
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A time-domain reflectometer (TDR) is an electronic instrument that uses time-domain reflectometry to characterize and locate faults in metallic cables (for example, twisted pair wire or coaxial cable). It can also be used to locate discontinuities in a connector, printed circuit board, or any other electrical path. The equivalent device for optical fiber is an optical time-domain reflectometer.
- 1 Description
- 2 Example traces
- 3 Explanation
- 4 Usage
- 5 See also
- 6 References
- 7 External links
A TDR measures reflections along a conductor. In order to measure those reflections, the TDR will transmit an incident signal onto the conductor and listen for its reflections. If the conductor is of a uniform impedance and is properly terminated, then there will be no reflections and the remaining incident signal will be absorbed at the far-end by the termination. Instead, if there are impedance variations, then some of the incident signal will be reflected back to the source. A TDR is similar in principle to radar.
Generally, the reflections will have the same shape as the incident signal, but their sign and magnitude depend on the change in impedance level. If there is a step increase in the impedance, then the reflection will have the same sign as the incident signal; if there is a step decrease in impedance, the reflection will have the opposite sign. The magnitude of the reflection depends not only on the amount of the impedance change, but also upon the loss in the conductor.
The reflections are measured at the output/input to the TDR and displayed or plotted as a function of time. Alternatively, the display can be read as a function of cable length because the speed of signal propagation is almost constant for a given transmission medium.
TDRs use different incident signals. Some TDRs transmit a pulse along the conductor; the resolution of such instruments is often the width of the pulse. Narrow pulses can offer good resolution, but they have high frequency signal components that are attenuated in long cables. The shape of the pulse is often a half cycle sinusoid. For longer cables, wider pulse widths are used.
Fast rise time steps are also used. Instead of looking for the reflection of a complete pulse, the instrument is concerned with the rising edge, which can be very fast. A 1970s technology TDR used steps with a rise time of 25 ps.
Still other TDRs transmit complex signals and detect reflections with correlation techniques. See spread-spectrum time-domain reflectometry.
These traces were produced by a time-domain reflectometer made from common lab equipment connected to approximately 100 feet (30 m) of coaxial cable having a characteristic impedance of 50 ohms. The propagation velocity of this cable is approximately 66 % of the speed of light in a vacuum.
These traces were produced by a commercial TDR using a step waveform with a 25 ps risetime, a sampling head with a 35 ps risetime, and an 18-inch (0.46 m) SMA cable. The far end of the SMA cable was left open or connected to different adapters. It takes about 3 ns for the pulse to travel down the cable, reflect, and reach the sampling head. A second reflection (at about 6 ns) can be seen in some traces; it is due to the reflection seeing a small mismatch at the sampling head and causing another "incident" wave to travel down the cable.
Consider the case where the far end of the cable is shorted (that is, terminated into zero ohms impedance). When the rising edge of the pulse is launched down the cable, the voltage at the launching point "steps up" to a given value instantly and the pulse begins propagating down the cable towards the short. When the pulse hits the short, no energy is absorbed at the far end. Instead, an opposing pulse reflects back from the short towards the launching end. It is only when this opposing reflection finally reaches the launch point that the voltage at this launching point abruptly drops back to zero, signalling the fact that there is a short at the end of the cable. That is, the TDR has no indication that there is a short at the end of the cable until its emitted pulse can travel down the cable at roughly the speed of light and the echo can return up the cable at the same speed. It is only after this round-trip delay that the short can be perceived by the TDR. Assuming that one knows the signal propagation speed in the particular cable-under-test, then in this way, the distance to the short can be measured.
A similar effect occurs if the far end of the cable is an open circuit (terminated into an infinite impedance). In this case, though, the reflection from the far end is polarized identically with the original pulse and adds to it rather than cancelling it out. So after a round-trip delay, the voltage at the TDR abruptly jumps to twice the originally-applied voltage.
Note that a theoretical perfect termination at the far end of the cable would entirely absorb the applied pulse without causing any reflection. In this case, it would be impossible to determine the actual length of the cable. Luckily, perfect terminations are very rare and some small reflection is nearly always caused.
The magnitude of the reflection is referred to as the reflection coefficient or ρ. The coefficient ranges from 1 (open circuit) to -1 (short circuit). The value of zero means that there is no reflection. The reflection coefficient is calculated as follows:
Where Zo is defined as the characteristic impedance of the transmission medium and Zt is the impedance of the termination at the far end of the transmission line.
Any discontinuity can be viewed as a termination impedance and substituted as Zt. This includes abrupt changes in the characteristic impedance. As an example, a trace width on a printed circuit board doubled at its midsection would constitute a discontinuity. Some of the energy will be reflected back to the driving source; the remaining energy will be transmitted. This is also known as a scattering junction.
Time domain reflectometers are commonly used for in-place testing of very long cable runs, where it is impractical to dig up or remove what may be a kilometers-long cable. They are indispensable for preventive maintenance of telecommunication lines, as TDRs can detect resistance on joints and connectors as they corrode, and increasing insulation leakage as it degrades and absorbs moisture, long before either leads to catastrophic failures. Using a TDR, it is possible to pinpoint a fault to within centimetres.
TDRs are also very useful tools for technical surveillance counter-measures, where they help determine the existence and location of wire taps. The slight change in line impedance caused by the introduction of a tap or splice will show up on the screen of a TDR when connected to a phone line.
TDR equipment is also an essential tool in the failure analysis of modern high-frequency printed circuit boards with signal traces crafted to emulate transmission lines. By observing reflections, any unsoldered pins of a ball grid array device can be detected. Short circuited pins can also be detected in a similar fashion.
The TDR principle is used in industrial settings, in situations as diverse as the testing of integrated circuit packages to measuring liquid levels. In the former, the time domain reflectometer is used to isolate failing sites in the same. The latter is primarily limited to the process industry.
TDR in level measurement
In a TDR-based level measurement device, the device generates an impulse that propagates down a thin waveguide (referred to as a probe) – typically a metal rod or a steel cable. When this impulse hits the surface of the medium to be measured, part of the impulse reflects back up the waveguide. The device determines the fluid level by measuring the time difference between when the impulse was sent and when the reflection returned. The sensors can output the analyzed level as a continuous analog signal or switch output signals. In TDR technology, the impulse velocity is primarily affected by the permittivity of the medium through which the pulse propagates, which can vary greatly by the moisture content and temperature of the medium. In many cases, this effect can be corrected without undue difficulty. In some cases, such as in boiling and/or high temperature environments, the correction can be difficult. In particular, determining the froth (foam) height and the collapsed liquid level in a frothy / boiling medium can be very difficult.
TDR used in anchor cables in dams
The Dam Safety Interest Group of CEA Technologies, Inc. (CEATI), a consortium of electrical power organizations, has applied Spread-spectrum time-domain reflectometry to identify potential faults in concrete dam anchor cables. The key benefit of Time Domain reflectometry over other testing methods is the non-destructive method of these tests.
TDR used in the earth and agricultural sciences
A TDR is used to determine moisture content in soil and porous media. Over the last two decades, substantial advances have been made measuring moisture in soil, grain, food stuff, and sediment. The key to TDR’s success is its ability to accurately determine the permittivity (dielectric constant) of a material from wave propagation, due to the strong relationship between the permittivity of a material and its water content, as demonstrated in the pioneering works of Hoekstra and Delaney (1974) and Topp et al. (1980). Recent reviews and reference work on the subject include, Topp and Reynolds (1998), Noborio (2001), Pettinellia et al. (2002), Topp and Ferre (2002) and Robinson et al. (2003). The TDR method is a transmission line technique, and determines apparent permittivity (Ka) from the travel time of an electromagnetic wave that propagates along a transmission line, usually two or more parallel metal rods embedded in soil or sediment. The probes are typically between 10 and 30 cm long and connected to the TDR via coaxial cable.
TDR in geotechnical usage
Time domain reflectometry has also been utilized to monitor slope movement in a variety of geotechnical settings including highway cuts, rail beds, and open pit mines (Dowding & O'Connor, 1984, 2000a, 2000b; Kane & Beck, 1999). In stability monitoring applications using TDR, a coaxial cable is installed in a vertical borehole passing through the region of concern. The electrical impedance at any point along a coaxial cable changes with deformation of the insulator between the conductors. A brittle grout surrounds the cable to translate earth movement into an abrupt cable deformation that shows up as a detectable peak in the reflectance trace. Until recently, the technique was relatively insensitive to small slope movements and could not be automated because it relied on human detection of changes in the reflectance trace over time. Farrington and Sargand (2004) developed a simple signal processing technique using numerical derivatives to extract reliable indications of slope movement from the TDR data much earlier than by conventional interpretation.
Another application of TDRs in geotechnical engineering is to determine the soil moisture content. This can be done by placing the TDRs in different soil layers and measurement of the time of start of precipitation and the time that TDR indicate an increase in the soil moisture content. The depth of the TDR (d) is a known factor and the other is the time it takes the drop of water to reach that depth (t); therefore the speed of water Infiltration (hydrology) (v) can be determined. This is a good method to assess the effectiveness of Best Management Practices (BMPs) in reducing stormwater Surface runoff.
TDR in semiconductor device analysis
Time domain reflectometry is used in semiconductor failure analysis as a non-destructive method for the location of defects in semiconductor device packages. The TDR provides an electrical signature of individual conductive traces in the device package, and is useful for determining the location of opens and shorts.
TDR in aviation wiring maintenance
Time domain reflectometry, specifically spread-spectrum time-domain reflectometry is used on aviation wiring for both preventative maintenance and fault location. Spread spectrum time domain reflectometry has the advantage of precisely locating the fault location within thousands of miles of aviation wiring. Additionally, this technology is worth considering for real time aviation monitoring, as spread spectrum reflectometry can be employed on live wires.
This method has been shown to be useful to locating intermittent electrical faults.
- Frequency domain sensor
- Murray loop bridge
- Noise-Domain Reflectometry
- Return loss
- Standing wave ratio
- This article incorporates public domain material from the General Services Administration document "Federal Standard 1037C".
- 1983 Tektronix Catalog, pages 140–141, the 1503 uses "1/2-sine-shaped pulses" and has a 3-foot resolution and a range of 50,000 feet.
- 1983 Tektronix Catalog, pages 140–141, the 1502 uses a step (system rise time less than 140 ps), has a resolution of 0.6 inch and a range of 2,000 feet.
- 1983 Tektronix Catalog, page 289, S-52 pulse generator has a 25-ps risetime.
- S-6 Sampling Head, Instruction Manual, Beaverton, OR: Tektronix, September 1982 First printing is 1982, but copyright notice includes 1971.
- 7S12 TDR/Sampler, Instruction Manual, Beaverton, OR: Tektronix, November 1971
- Hamilton Avnet part number P-3636-603-5215
- C. Furse, P. Smith, M. Diamond, “Feasibility of Reflectometry for Nondestructive Evaluation of Prestressed Concrete Anchors,” IEEE Journal of Sensors, Vol. 9. No. 11, Nov. 2009, pp. 1322 - 1329
- Smith, P., C. Furse, and J. Gunther, 2005. "Analysis of spread spectrum time domain reflectometry for wire fault location". IEEE Sensors Journal 5:1469–1478.
- Furse, Cynthia, Smith, P.,Safavi, Mehdi, and M. Lo, Chet. "Feasibility of Spread Spectrum Sensors for Location of Arcs on Live Wires". IEEE Sensors Journal. December 2005.
- Hoekstra, P. and A. Delaney, 1974. "Dielectric properties of soils at UHF and microwave frequencies". Journal of Geophysical Research 79:1699–1708.
- Smith, P., C. Furse, and J. Gunther, 2005. "Analysis of spread spectrum time domain reflectometry for wire fault location". IEEE Sensors Journal 5:1469–1478.
- Waddoups, B., C. Furse and M. Schmidt. "Analysis of Reflectometry for Detection of Chafed Aircraft Wiring Insulation". Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Utah State University.
- Noborio K. 2001. "Measurement of soil water content and electrical conductivity by time domain reflectometry: A review". Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 31:213–237.
- Pettinelli E., A. Cereti, A. Galli, and F. Bella, 2002. "Time domain reflectometry: Calibration techniques for accurate measurement of the dielectric properties of various materials". Review of Scientific Instruments 73:3553–3562.
- Robinson D.A., S.B. Jones, J.M. Wraith, D. Or and S.P. Friedman, 2003 "A review of advances in dielectric and electrical conductivity measurements in soils using time domain reflectometry". Vadose Zone Journal 2: 444–475.
- Robinson, D. A., C. S. Campbell, J. W. Hopmans, B. K. Hornbuckle, Scott B. Jones, R. Knight, F. Ogden, J. Selker, and O. Wendroth, 2008. "Soil moisture measurement for ecological and hydrological watershed-scale observatories: A review." Vadose Zone Journal 7: 358-389.
- Topp G.C., J.L. Davis and A.P. Annan, 1980. "Electromagnetic determination of soil water content: measurements in coaxial transmission lines". Water Resources Research 16:574–582.
- Topp G.C. and W.D. Reynolds, 1998. "Time domain reflectometry: a seminal technique for measuring mass and energy in soil". Soil Tillage Research 47:125–132.
- Topp, G.C. and T.P.A. Ferre, 2002. "Water content", in Methods of Soil Analysis. Part 4. (Ed. J.H. Dane and G.C. Topp), SSSA Book Series No. 5. Soil Science Society of America, Madison WI.
- Dowding, C.H. & O'Connor, K.M. 2000a. "Comparison of TDR and Inclinometers for Slope Monitoring". Geotechnical Measurements—Proceedings of Geo-Denver2000: 80–81. Denver, CO.
- Dowding, C.H. & O'Connor, K.M. 2000b. "Real Time Monitoring of Infrastructure using TDR Technology". Structural Materials Technology NDT Conference 2000
- Kane, W.F. & Beck, T.J. 1999. "Advances in Slope Instrumentation: TDR and Remote Data Acquisition Systems". Field Measurements in Geomechanics, 5th International Symposium on Field Measurements in Geomechanics: 101–105. Singapore.
- Farrington, S.P. and Sargand, S.M., "Advanced Processing of Time Domain Reflectometry for Improved Slope Stability Monitoring", Proceedings of the Eleventh Annual Conference on Tailings and Mine Waste, October, 2004.
- Smolyansky, D. (2004). "Electronic Package Fault Isolation Using TDR". Microelectronics Failure Analysis. ASM International. pp. 289–302. ISBN 0-87170-804-3.
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to Time-domain reflectometry.|
- Radiodetection Extended Training - ABC's of TDR's
- Work begins to repair severed net
- Time Domain Reflectometry Theory (PDF), Application Note, Agilent Technologies, 31 May 2013, AN-1304-2
- DeWinter, Paul; Ashley, Bill (2011), Step vs Pulse TDR Technology (PDF), Application Note, AEA Technology, Inc., AN201
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SETTING THE STAGE FOR INFORMED, OBJECTIVE DELIBERATION ON SCHOOL CHOICE
The debate on school choice has been characterized by overblown, rhetorical claims that often are at variance with available evidence. This must change. Policy makers cannot afford to make such important decisions on the basis of rhetoric.
The 2002 decision of the United States Supreme Court in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, upholding the school voucher program implemented in the Cleveland Public School District, brought school choice to the forefront of educational issues. Policy makers in New Jersey and other states are being pressed to consider what choice options, if any, should be offered to students and their parents. Their decisions could fundamentally alter the manner in which state provide and finance their educational programs, and could have other major policy implications as well. Given the potential consequences, it is essential that policy makers be informed by the best possible legal and educational policy research, and by the best expert opinion on education practices and student outcomes.
The Institute's project, "Setting the Stage for Informed, Objective Deliberation on School Choice," is designed to establish a framework and a forum for informed and objective consideration of the legal, fiscal and educational policy issues relating to school choice. The project is based on the premise that informed discussion of all the relevant issues is necessary, but not that any particular choice program is certain to be established or expanded in the near future, in this state or elsewhere, and not to advocate for any particular conclusion. The goal is to make a meaningful contribution to the quality of the school choice debate.
Background Paper. The project was launched in November 2002 with an invitational meeting of state and national experts on school choice issues. IELP distributed a background paper, What We Know, and What We Need to Know, about School Choice, for that meeting.
Tough Choices. The first publication of the project, issued in 2004, was Tough Choices: Setting the Stage for Informed, Objective Deliberation on School Choice. Tough Choices sets the state by surveying choice programs in New Jersey and other state and raising several issues that form the backdrop for discussion:
New Jersey, Abbott v. Burke, and School Choice
The School Choice Debate
Evidence of Impacts on School Choice
Redefining "Public Education"
It then discusses the tough choices that have to be made in relation to school choice policy:
Should choice play a larger role in our effort to improve education?
Should New Jersey's public school choice programs be expanded?
Should New Jersey provide public subsidies for students to enroll in private schools?
What accountability measures should be imposed on school choice programs?
Should New Jersey regulate home schooling?
Should New Jersey authorize, encourage, or regulate cyberschools?
Finally, it identifies what we need to know with recommendations for research:
Comprehensive Evaluations of New Jersey's Choice Programs
Analysis of Private School Choice
Examination of Compulsory Education Requirements and Enforcement
Additional Reports. Tough Choices will be updated in a forthcoming volume with an overview of school choice issues for 2005, a 50-state survey of state laws on school choice, bibliographies and other resources. And it will be supplemented with additional reports on selected school choice issues:
New Jersey, Abbott v. Burke and School Choice
New Jersey's School Choice Programs
School Choice Policy in New Jersey under No Child Left Behind
Setting the Stage for Informed, Objective Deliberation. IELP sponsors and conducts meetings and discussions of school choice issues; its staff participates in conferences and meetings sponsored by other organizations, in New Jersey and throughout the nation, to discuss school choice issues in our state and elsewhere; and it serves as an objective resource for education policy makers.
For more information about IELP's school choice activities, or to schedule a meeting or conference with your organization to discuss school choice, contact us at firstname.lastname@example.org.
NEW! A257/S1332/S2228: Tax Credits for Contributions to "Scholarship Organizations" and "Educational Improvement Organizations" (2/8/2007)
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Global Climate Change: Research Explorer
Library Home || Full Table of Contents || Suggest a Link || Library Help
|Explore scientific data relating to the atmosphere, the oceans, the areas covered by ice and snow, and the living organisms in all these domains. Get a sense of how scientists study natural phenomena, how researchers gather evidence, test theories, and come to conclusions.|
|Levels:||Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)|
|Resource Types:||Graphics, Lesson Plans and Activities, Public and Government Institutions|
|Math Topics:||Data Analysis, Statistics|
© 1994- The Math Forum at NCTM. All rights reserved.
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Clean Up The World Maps Activities Online
SYDNEY, Australia, September 19, 2008 (ENS) – A new online tool will track environmental protection activities across the planet as part of the annual Clean Up the World Weekend, the United Nations Environment Programme announced today.
Clean Up the World Weekend, celebrated globally on the third weekend in September, starts today.
Clean Up the World is a global environmental campaign held in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme, which assists through distribution of media materials and endorsement of the program, as well as encouraging a worldwide network of environment and community groups to participate.
Founded by Australian environmental campaigner Ian Kiernan 16 years ago, the Clean Up the World campaign and UNEP are launching the website today.
Kids in Cordoba, Spain clean their corner
of the world. (All photos courtesy
Clean Up The World)
“All over the world people are seeing the devastating effects of climate change. Clean Up the World provides every person and every community with the opportunity to do something about it,” Kiernan said.
“Now, thanks to Clean Up the World’s use of Google Maps, we have the tool to visually show the extent of the environmental action being undertaken around the world and motivate new communities to get involved in the campaign,” he said.
Many of this year’s activities will focus on limiting the impact of climate change under the campaign’s theme “Start today… Save tomorrow – Clean Up Our Climate.”
“Climate change is the number one issue facing humanity at the turn of the 21st century,” said UNEP Director-General Achim Steiner. “Lives are threatened as is the very fabric of all countries and communities. So let’s all start today to save tomorrow.”
The website, developed with the support of Google, will allow communities participating in this weekend’s clean-up campaign to share their projects worldwide.
Friends clean a Cuban beach.
On the website, individual environmental projects are marked on a map of the world, and a click of the mouse provides users with a project’s name, location and description.
Participating organizations and their volunteers will take part in a range of activities designed to improve the environment such as waste reduction and recycling, water and energy conservation and revegetation projects.
Clean The World began 17 years ago as an idea in the mind of the solo-yachtsman and builder from Sydney, Australia.
In 1987, Ian Kiernan competed in the BOC Challenge solo yacht race and as he sailed around the world he was shocked by the pollution he saw. Having waited years to see the Sargasso Sea’s long golden weeds, he was disappointed to find them polluted and tangled with rubbish.
“I can’t overstate the disappointment I felt when I found this sea of magic and myth littered with rubbish from discarded thongs, plastic buckets and disposable nappies, to toothpaste tubes and plastic bags,” Kiernan said.
Once back in Sydney, Kiernan and some friends held Clean Up Sydney Harbour Day in 1989. The event drew 40,000 volunteers who removed rusted car bodies, plastics of all kinds, glass bottles and cigarette butts from the harbor.
Kiernan and his committee believed that if a city could be mobilized to take action, then so could the country. Nearly 300,000 volunteers turned out on the first Clean Up Australia Day in 1990 and that involvement has steadily increased.
In 2007, Clean Up the World Member organizations in more than 115 countries participated in activities including clean up events, recycling and resource recovery projects, biodiversity initiatives, education and community awareness campaigns, competitions and exhibitions.
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Shining a light on autism
Today’s post was written with Anne-Lise Prigent, editor in charge of education publications at OECD Publishing.
The best (and worst) answer ever to the question “Why is the sky blue?” has to be “Because God’s a boy”. The answer to why the OECD is turning blue this evening is more straightforward: our colleague Debbie Bloch and her daughter Emma persuaded the Organisation to join in Light it up Blue night, where all kinds of buildings from public monuments to people’s homes will be lit with blue bulbs to mark the fifth UN World Autism Awareness Day. You can see some spectacular examples from last year here (and not just buildings, check out the Niagara Falls).
France has designated autism as this year’s Grande cause nationale, a distinction that raises the media and political profile of the cause chosen. Emma is one of millions of people worldwide on the autism spectrum, and mother and daughter will be taking an active part in the initiative. “I’m glad that France is finally doing something about autism,” says Emma, “helping people understand that we’re different, not crazy.”
Nobody knows the exact number of autism cases globally since many developing countries do not monitor the condition and prevalence can vary drastically in a short time even within a single country. The Centers for Disease Control for example found that prevalence in the US had increased by 57% to 1 in 110 eight year-olds in only four years (2002-2006), and data released on March 29th put the figure at 1 in 88. The CDC admits that the “reasons for the increase are not completely understood”, although better reporting and changes in diagnostic procedures would seem obvious factors. Sex plays a role, with significantly more boys than girls affected, but data on socioeconomic status and ethnicity are inconclusive.
Brain studies suggest that the disorder could occur when defects in genes that control brain growth and that regulate how brain cells communicate with each other disrupt normal brain development early in foetal development. The causes are not fully understood however, with genetics and the environment both playing a role (as in most disorders).
The likelihood of both children being affected is higher among identical twins than among non-identical ones, whereas this rate would be the same if genes weren’t involved. The 2011 California Autism Twins Study (CATS), the biggest ever research programme on twins with the condition, estimates less genetic influence than previous findings, but on the other hand it finds a far higher chance of two non-identical twins both developing the disorder than previous studies (35% versus 0% to 10%).
Dr Clara Lajonchere, vice-president of clinical programs at Autism Speaks argues that the CATS results may mean that twins share environmental risk factors that other siblings don’t, and there is some evidence that advanced parental age, maternal nutrition, maternal infections during pregnancy (especially flu), and premature and/or underweight birth play a part. There may be a time during the pregnancy when brain development is particularly vulnerable to environmental influences.
Apart from the challenges inherent to any scientific research of this type, another difficulty is that “autism” is used to designate a wide variety of conditions with different names, and it is hard to diagnose accurately. For example, the autistic savant Dustin Hoffman plays in the 1988 movie Rainman is based on Kim Peek. A 2008 study concluded that Peek probably had FG syndrome, a genetic condition that causes physical anomalies, not autism.
Specialists talk about “autism spectrum disorder” (ASD), and ASD is likely to be adopted in next year’s revision to the US Psychiatric Association’s influential Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 5 (DSM-5) to replace current diagnoses of autistic disorder, Asperger’s disorder, childhood disintegrative disorder, and Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS). Some groups, including the Autism Society, are worried that this will exclude people who need care from getting access to services.
The reason for adopting a single category is that although the causes and manifestations of the conditions vary widely, people with the disorders mentioned above show similar types of symptoms, including the ones most of us associate with autism, such as communication difficulties, lack of social skills and stereotyped or repetitive behaviours and interests. Many people who don’t suffer from ASD can show these symptoms too, leading to “autistic” being used as an insult by those ignorant of the pain such usage can cause.
Fortunately, such attitudes do change and language evolves. Today, the OECD wouldn’t publish this if the student association criticising economics teaching still insisted on calling itself the “French Post-autistic Movement” and complaining that their courses were “autistic”. I wonder what Vernon L. Smith, 2002 Nobel economics laureate would say. You can see him talking about being diagnosed with Asperger’s here.
Professor Smith often features on lists of famous people with ASD. These are useful in promoting a positive image, and showing that autism doesn’t stop you from developing your talent. There’s a downside to this as well though, with so many autistic geniuses turning up in movies and other media. Yourlittleprofessor quotes Luke Jackson who wrote a book 10 years ago when he was 13 about what it’s like to have Asperger Syndrome. Luke complains that television always shows high functioning autistic people who can do things like play the piano brilliantly without taking lessons, draw detailed renditions of buildings they had only seen once, or add complicated numbers in their head. “I find these television programs depressing,” he says. “I got all the nerdiness and freakishness, but none of the genius.”
Stereotypes, whether positive or negative, stop you seeing the person as an individual with his or her own strengths and weaknesses. As Emma puts it: “At school I’ve led autism awareness discussions because I just want my classmates to understand my differences, and to see that I’m not THAT different !” For those of us who don’t have an Emma around, luckily there are initiatives like Autism Awareness Day to help us understand ASD and the issues involved, and even be able to offer practical help to people with ASD.
Within the OECD itself, a project on mental health argues for a greater multi-sectoral approach to include issues such as autism and learning disabilities, especially the link to schools and school health programmes. Work by the Education Directorate on students with disabilities is also starting to consider autism, but as an Organisation, we could, and hopefully will, do more.
OECD Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI) work on Brain and Learning, with links to Understanding the Brain: Towards a New Learning Science and Understanding the Brain: The Birth of a Learning Science
Autism organisations worldwide maintained by Action for Autism, India
International Society for Autism Research (INSAR)
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Health department to offer measles vaccine
Published: Friday, April 26, 2013 at 4:22 p.m.
Last Modified: Friday, April 26, 2013 at 4:22 p.m.
Public health officials from the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services are working with local health departments to investigate an outbreak of measles. To date, 14 cases and one suspect case have been identified throughout the state.
Local public health departments are contacting other people who might have been exposed to these cases and providing vaccine to limit the spread of infection.
The Davidson County Health Department will offer the measles vaccine to those who are not up-to-date on their vaccine. People can either walk in and receive the vaccine or call for an appointment at 242-2510. There is no charge for the vaccine.
"Measles is very uncommon in North Carolina, so many people aren't aware of the symptoms," said Dr. Laura Gerald, state health director. "Measles spreads quickly, particularly in children and adults who aren't vaccinated. We want to make the public aware of this outbreak so individuals can take steps to protect themselves and their families."
Measles is a highly contagious disease that is spread through the air by coughing and sneezing. It also can be transmitted through contact with secretions from the nose or mouth of an infected person. Initial symptoms may include fever, runny nose, watery red eyes and cough. After a few days, a rash appears on the head and spreads over the entire body.
Measles can lead to pneumonia and other complications, especially in young children. The disease poses serious risks for pregnant women, including miscarriage and premature birth.
Although the early symptoms of measles can be similar to those of many other infections, Gerald recommends that anyone with fever, runny nose, watery red eyes and a cough should stay at home and limit contact with others to avoid spreading illness. If a rash develops or if symptoms worsen, call a doctor or seek medical care. Patients should call their doctor's office or health care facility before going so they can prepare for the visit and protect other patients from exposure.
Reader comments posted to this article may be published in our print edition. All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be re-published without permission. Links are encouraged.
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Martin Luther King, Jr. 1929–1968
American orator and essayist.
The following entry provides an overview of King's career.
King was the leader of the civil rights movement in the United States during the 1950s and 1960s. His nonviolent approach to social reform and political activism, characterized by mass marches and large gatherings designed to demonstrate both the widespread acceptance of the tenets of civil rights and the barbarism of those who opposed them, contrasted with the confrontational methods espoused by Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam. King's Letter from Birmingham City Jail (1963) and the 1963 speech in which he declared "I Have a Dream" are considered the written landmarks of the movement. Today they are counted among history's great statements of human rights.
King was born in Atlanta, Georgia, and was raised in a middle-class family. Following the lead of his father and grandfathers, he pursued a theological education. He studied the works of Walter Rauschenbusch, who contended that the church must work to undo social injustices, and those of Mohandas K. Gandhi, who espoused a philosophy of nonviolence. In the fall of 1951 he began his doctoral studies at Boston University and received his Ph. D. in systematic theology in 1955. That same year he rose to prominence in the civil rights movement by organizing a protest in support of Rosa Parks, a black woman who was arrested in Alabama for sitting in a "whites only" section of a public bus. Near the end of 1962 he began working to desegregate Birmingham, Alabama. His leadership produced an agreement with the Justice Department that led to the desegregation of lunch counters, restrooms, fitting rooms, and drinking fountains. In 1963 King helped plan a massive march on Washington, D.C., where an estimated 250,000 people were on hand to hear him present his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. In 1964 King received the Nobel Peace Prize. His campaign for voting rights, concentrated in Selma, Alabama, was met with violence from both police and civilians and resulted in President Lyndon Johnson signing the 1965 Voting Rights Act into law. King continued his social campaigns until April 4, 1968, when he was assassinated by James Earl Ray in Memphis, Tennessee.
King's written works reflect his heritage in the traditions of the southern black church as well as his knowledge of western philosophy. In Why We Can't Wait (1964), an account of his efforts to desegregate Birmingham, and Where Do We Go from Here? (1967), his response to the Black Power movement, King utilizes the Israelites' exodus from Egypt as a metaphor for the civil rights movement and suggests nonviolent solutions to the problem of social injustice. King further implements biblical theology, along with the philosophies of Gandhi and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, in Stride toward Freedom (1958), a discussion of the events leading up to the Montgomery bus boycott. In his "I Have a Dream" speech, King paints a vision of a "promised land" of justice and racial equality. In the celebrated Letter from Birmingham City Jail, a commentary directed at his critics, King again displays his sermonic style and use of biblical allusions and rhetoric. Reminiscent of St. Paul's writings, the Letter has been described by Stephen Oates as "a classic in protest literature, the most elegant and learned expression of the goals and philosophy of the nonviolent movement ever written." Wesley T. Mott also commends King for harnessing "the profound emotional power of the old Negro sermon for purposes of social action."
Although often praised for their emotional power and widespread appeal, King's writings have been faulted for relying too heavily on rhetorical flourishes and for not offering concrete solutions to the social, political, and economic problems they address. In a review of Where Do We Go from Here? Andrew Kopkind commented that although King had worthy goals, he had "no real notion of how they are to be attained, or to what they may lead." In addition, nearly twenty-five years after his death, Clay-borne Carson—who had been engaged by King's widow, Coretta Scott King, to compile a collection of her husband's writings—announced that King may have plagiarized parts of his doctoral dissertation and other writings. These disclosures prompted scores of newspaper editorials and other responses arguing that the allegations had no bearing on King's contributions to the civil rights movement. In 1990 a New York Times editorial stated that King's "achievement glows unchallenged through the present shadow, [his] courage was not copied; and there was no plagiarism in his power."
"A Comparison of the Conceptions of God in the Thinking of Paul Tillich and Henry Nelson Wieman" (dissertation) 1955
Stride toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story (nonfiction) 1958
The Measure of a Man (meditations and essays) 1959
"I Have a Dream" (speech) 1963
Letter from Birmingham City Jail (nonfiction) 1963; also published as Letter from Birmingham Jail, 1968
Strength to Love (sermons) 1963
"Unwise and Untimely?" (letters) 1963
A Martin Luther King Treasury (sermons, speeches, and essays) 1964
"Nobel Prize Lecture" (speech) 1964
Why We Can't Wait (letter and essays) 1964
"A Time to Break the Silence" (speech) 1967
Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? (nonfiction) 1967
"I Have A Dream": The Quotations of Martin Luther King, Jr. (speech excerpts) 1968
∗"I See the Promised Land" (speech) 1968
The Trumpet of Conscience (broadcasts) 1968
We Shall Live in Peace: The Teachings of Martin Luther King, Jr. (juvenilia and speech excerpts) 1968
The Wisdom of Martin Luther King in His Own Words (meditations and sermons) 1968
A Martin Luther King Reader (speeches and essays) 1969
Speeches about Vietnam (speeches) 1969
Words and Wisdom of Martin Luther King (meditations and speech excerpts) 1970
Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. (speeches) 1972
Loving Your Enemies, Letter from Birmingham Jail, Declaration of Independence from the War in Vietnam (letter and speeches) 1981
The Words of Martin Luther King, Jr. (meditations and speeches) 1983
Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings of Martin Luther King, Jr. (essays, speeches, sermons, and interviews) 1986
The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., Volume One: Called to Serve, January 1929–June 1951 (letters, student papers) 1992
∗This was King's last speech, delivered on April 3, 1968—the day before his assassination.
[Duberman is an American educator and historian. In the following essay, he praises King's Where Do We Go from Here? for summarizing the "conflicts within the civil rights movement" but faults King's suggested solutions as either too general or impractical.]
In terms of character alone Martin Luther King is a phenomenon. He learned long ago that white hatred of Negroes reflects white, not Negro, deformities, and this has allowed him to feel compassion for the oppressors as well as the oppressed, to grow in strength even while surrounded by vilification. But recently the personal attacks on King have come from less traditional sources and must therefore have proved a greater challenge to his equanimity. Some of the advocates of Black Power and of black nationalism have begun to treat King's insistence on nonviolence as a prehistoric relic, and to mock King himself, with his appeals to religion, to patience and to conscience, as an irrelevancy. Their scorn has been modified in recent months by King's outspoken stand against our policy in Vietnam, but ironically that same stand has brought denunciation from a different quarter in the Negro community—from the established civil rights forces led by Roy Wilkins, Ralph Bunche and Whitney Young.
Faced with abuse on all sides, King has not only remained temperate but has continued to seek reconciliation—both within the Negro community and also interms of a larger alliance with disaffected whites. At the same time, he has continued to speak his mind, refusing to let pleas for tactical caution obscure the imperative responsibility he feels (which every citizen should feel) to apply ethical standards to international as well as domestic questions. To have managed all this in the face of heavy pressures and wounding accusations bespeaks a character of rare stability, breadth and integrity. What a pity he will never be our President.
King's new book, Where Do We Go from Here?, is his attempt to summarize the recent conflicts within the civil rights movement, to consider the larger context, both national and international, which helps to account for these conflicts, and finally, to suggest possible lines for action. King is far more successful, it seems to me, in dealing with the first two of these considerations than with the third, in part because of his tendency when speaking of the future to substitute rhetoric for specificity, in part because of the difficulties of analyzing this complex, appalling moment in our nation's history. That King succeeds as well as he does is additional tribute to the unruffled intelligence of this unendingly impressive American.
The book begins with the question "Where are we?" King, in answering it, makes some subtle and needed distinctions. He rightly insists, first of all, that the disruption of the civil rights movement cannot be explained, as it so often is, by resort to pat answers. The simple equation which has the white backlash growing solely out of Watts and Black Power is inadequate. The hard truth is that the decrease in white sympathy preceded those developments. With Selma and the Voting Rights Act, one phase of the civil rights movement ended—the easy phase—where white sympathy could be readily engaged against the outright brutalities of Southern life. But as King puts it, "To stay murder is not the same thing as to ordain brotherhood." Public indignation against the Bull Connors was achieved far more easily than was the follow-up commitment to eradicate discrimination in housing, jobs and schools—in other words, to establish equal rather than improved opportunities for Negroes.
White America showed its reluctance about equality before Watts and before the emergence of Black Power, though these developments have since served as convenient excuses for still further delays. The reluctance showed in polls which indicated that 50 per cent of white Americans would object to having a Negro as a neighbor and 88 per cent to having their teenage child date a Negro. It showed in the refusal to implement vigorously civil rights legislation—a refusal which has left segregation the over-whelming pattern of our schools (84.1 per cent in the 11 Southern states), which has left Negro voter registration in Virginia, Mississippi, Louisiana and Georgia still under 50 per...
(The entire section is 1786 words.)
[In the following essay, Smylie examines King's use of biblical interpretation and references in his writings and sermons.]
The purpose of the following analysis is to explore the exodus theme in King's interpretation of the New and Old Testaments. Drawing upon the religious traditions of most Americans, including those brought from Africa, King defined the chosen people, oppression under this world's pharaohs, and the promised land in the light of his interpretation and acceptance of the radical demands of Jesus Christ upon his life.
(The entire section is 6181 words.)
[In the following excerpt, Mott assesses Letter from Birmingham Jail as an emotion-charged sermon in the tradition of "old-time Negro preaching."]
[Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Letter from Birmingham Jail] is one of the most frequently collected items in college English anthologies and has proved the most popular reading among black and white students in basic literature courses for several years. The success of the Letter can be attributed, I think, to the remarkable confluence of three distinct rhetorical traits: King's heritage of the highly emotional Negro preaching tradition; his shrewd sense of political timing and polemical skill; and his conscious literary ability....
(The entire section is 4586 words.)
[Carson, an American educator and historian, is the senior editor and director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers project and Peter Holloran is an assistant editor on the project. Ralph E. Luker and Penny Russell are editors of volumes 1 and 2 of The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr. In the following essay, they consider King's theological writings as "evidence of King's effort to construct an identity as a theologian and preacher."]
What is the historical and biographical significance of the papers Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote as a divinity student at Crozer Theological Seminary and as a doctoral student at Boston University? Judged retroactively by the standards of academic...
(The entire section is 5290 words.)
[Miller is an American educator and author. In the following essay, he examines the literary, historical, and theological influences that informed King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail and his famous speech "I Have a Dream," and defends King's use of "borrowed" or adapted material.]
On August 28, 1963, one hundred fifty thousand or more demonstrators sweltered in Washington, D.C., listening to fine music from Marian Anderson, Joan Baez, and other singers. On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial an endless procession of speakers droned and droned. Despite the interruption of John Lewis's impassioned eloquence, the perspiring crowd began to wilt. Then, late in the afternoon, Mahalia Jackson...
(The entire section is 7300 words.)
Bosmajian, Haig A. "The Rhetoric of Martin Luther King's Letter from Birmingham Jail." The Midwest Quarterly XXI, No. 1 (Autumn 1979): 46-62.
Discusses structure, rhetoric, and style in Letter from Birmingham City Jail.
Fulkerson, Richard P. "The Public Letter as a Rhetorical Form: Structure, Logic, and Style in King's Letter from Birmingham Jail." The Quarterly Journal of Speech 65, No. 2 (April 1979): 121-36.
Analysis of King's argumentative techniques in Letter from Birmingham City Jail.
Gasnick, Roy M. Review of Strength to Love, by...
(The entire section is 558 words.)
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By Fr Aidan Nichols
The Italian historian of culture Adriano Tilgher, writing in the 1920s, advanced the thesis that Western society's increasing secularisation was the result of a change in attitudes to work. Ever since the Renaissance, so Tilgher argued, work and secularisation have gone hand in hand. Or to be more precise, secularisation and distinctively modern styles of work have gone hand in hand. As technology develops, it gives man an increasing mastery of matter. He pushes back the frontiers of matter, making the material world ever more pliable, ever more under the domination of the human spirit, the human mind. Man begins to claim the kind of prerogative rights in regard to creation which in mediaeval society had been ascribed to God alone. As a result, so Tilgher thought, God 'disappeared' - not of course in a literal sense, for the truth or falsehood of theism hardly depends on human attitudes to the idea of God. God began to 'disappear' in a metaphorical sense, to withdraw, namely, from the imaginative space of the world as humanly occupied. And to all intents and purposes that was tantamount to 'real' disappearance since, adapting the English proverb, what the mental eye doesn't see, the heart doesn't grieve for. Renaissance attitudes to mastery of the world by technological man produced a 'Promethean' concept of the human being. Like Prometheus, the figure in Greek mythology who stole fire from heaven so as to make possible the art of smelting and thus in embryo all succeeding technical development, humankind must by its own resolute action take over the central place in the scheme of things once reserved to God alone. The Tilgher thesis has a certain plausibility, in that in the inter-war years and indeed after the Second World War and indeed for much of Europe today, wherever traditional agricultural society and its typical rhythms of work survive, Catholicism or other historic forms of Christianity tend to retain their importance in the lives of communities and individuals. Let us note this thesis, then, but leave it for now, with a memo to return to Tilgher in due course.
Tilgher's idea that the secularisation of a Christendom society originated in the devising of distinctively modern ways of working in or, better, on the world in roughly the Renaissance period, can be combined with the better known claim of the German sociologist Max Weber that the Protestant Reformation underlay the rise of industrial capitalism, with its characteristic attitude to labour, to work. Reformation man, obsessed with the problem of his own justification - How can I know myself to be in the right with God? - lived in a society still publicly Christian but denuded of the monasteries which had kept the dimension of contemplation alive, and deprived too of the traditional ceremonies which enabled ordinary people to access the mystical element in religion. Instead, Reformation man found his assurance in the activity of working. Indeed, as the abrogation of the once numerous holydays, suggests - apart from Sunday, which Sabbatarianism guarded all the more rigorously by way of reaction - he found that assurance in incessant work. That is still today the model of the entrepreneurial businessman: someone who stops planning only when asleep. The expectation that meaning, purpose, or what later generations would call 'fulfilment' or 'identity' is discovered not through the contemplative enjoyment of God as a redeemed creature but by work, lent itself readily enough to the process of secularisation.
Weber's thesis has been much more discussed than Tilgher's, probably because for the simple reason that it is better known. Insofar as it is plausible, its field of application has ceased to be restricted to Protestant countries. The once religiously motivated Protestant work ethic has over the course of time made common cause with the Promethean emphasis of the European Renaissance and Enlightenment. The two together have come to produce, especially in that Anglo-Saxon form which American hegemony - political, economic, cultural - has done so much to export around the world, the basis for a global civilisation of work whose ultimate victory is presumed to be (even in Ethiopia!) only a matter of time.
But let us return to the Tilgher thesis, and this time by beginning to offer some theological commentary. It will come as no surprise to hear that Tilgher was not a theologian. He appears to be a conservative moralist, a lover of the ancient world, both pagan and Christian, but probably not a believer. Consequently he never asks himself about the Christian and theological rationale of his primary affirmation, namely, that while the agricultural work performed by a peasantry could readily be sacralised by the Church in an evangelically congruent way, the forms of work which eventually succeeded agricultural labour - artisanal, mercantile, industrial and post-industrial - were incapable of receiving a religious interpretation that would be plausible and satisfying to those who made a living by them. It does not occur to Tilgher that from within her own intellectual and spiritual resources the Church might have been able to persuade those whose occupations were most distinctively modern - who were at the cutting-edge of technical and commercial advance - not to abandon the imaginatively God-centred world of work of their peasant contemporaries or forebears.
Tilgher's oversight is not simply bizarre. One can see that there is a peculiar affinity between the world of the Scriptures and that of the peasant. Most of what the Bible has to say about work is found in the Old Testament, and the society which produced the Hebrew Bible was overwhelmingly a peasant society engaged in agricultural work, as the great images and metaphors of Scripture bear witness. The God of Israel is a Vine-dresser, not a bank manager or computer programmer. In the post-War years various Belgian and French theologians tried to produce what they called une theologié des réalités terrestres, a 'theology of earthly realities' meaning by that phrase precisely such an enterprise as is found in this essay. But despite the importance of their influence on the Pastoral Constitution of the Second Vatican Council On the Church in the Modern World it has to be said that the basis of their work lies in a combination of Old Testament exegesis with what I can only call theological free-wheeling. The New Testament was written, by and large, or at least this is an arguable case, for far more urbanised communities than was its predecessor. And yet it has precious little to say about forms of work that constituted important social facts in the period of its composition. Those would range from the industrial-type production of common objects, through the work of professional bureaucrats, much needed in the Roman imperial administration, to the slave labour, whether domestic or set to use in the mining industry and in transport, which so unfortunately disfigured the pax romana. It is true that St Mark's Gospel calls our Lord a techtôn, usually translated 'carpenter', and some beautiful Christian poetry and art has taken its rise from there. But in St Matthew's Gospel, to which the Church has always given a primacy among the Synoptics, he is not 'the carpenter' but 'the carpenter's son', while in St Luke and St John nothing is said of his work in the hidden years at all. Perhaps we could find a semi-concealed reference to our Lord's activity as a labourer when the hymn embedded in the text of the letter to the Philippians says that he took on 'the form of a slave', for 'slave', doulos, was the ordinary word for 'worker' in the hellenistic world. What, however, interests the New Testament writers is not everyday human work such as Jesus may have done in Joseph's workshop but rather the unique redeeming work of Christ, and although they are conscious of a range of virtues needing to be brought into play in Christian living and a variety of good works (roughly speaking, the corporal and spiritual works of mercy of later catechesis) that give flesh to the new life of grace, the main human work in which they are interested is the proclamation of the Good News about the Word incarnate and him crucified and risen, redeeming and reconciling, to the rest of the world. St Paul thought it important that an apostle should give good example by not being an economical parasite if he could possibly help it - which is why, so he tells us, he chose to keep up his trade
Again, the Church of the Word incarnate, as we see her fully formed, with the main lines of her life set forth, in the writings of the Fathers of the post-apostolic age, happened to be, at least in the East, mainly an urban phenomenon (that is why, despite 'East Anglia' and 'Argyll and the Isles', it is so unusual to find bishops named after regions not cities). But like Dorchester in Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge, the Church's strongholds were towns that were not only surrounded by the countryside but positively permeated by it through a network of not only close economic ties but actual green spaces for tilling and husbandry, what the Romans called rus in urbe, the 'country in the city'. The Church's liturgical celebration of the great saving events of the Word incarnate's life, death and Resurrection followed a pattern which readily blended with the rhythm of rural work - the cycle of the seasons, and the cycle of the day, from Lauds when the farmer goes out at first light, to Vespers when the lamps are lit for dusk as he returns.
There is a whole poetic here which does not fit so easily a non-agrarian or predominantly non-agrarian world, and it lent itself to elaboration in a hundred cultural ways that sealed the union of the peasant labour with the Church's life. One need only think of the folk song tradition with its blending of work motifs with religious ones. Part of the humour in G.K.Chesterton' s tongue-in-cheek suggestions of work songs for modern trades and professions comes from our tacit awareness of this difference. To compare the sardonic 'modern work song' composed for a contemporary post office worker, who is asked to praise
with Chesterton's serious and beautiful songs For five guilds each of which has either a connexion with church-building and furnishing (glass-stainers, stone-masons, bell-ringers) or a link with biblical and liturgical symbolism (bridge-builders, ship-wrights) is to see at once, I think, the imaginative problem. Since Chesterton was to be found among the (mainly but by no means exclusively) Catholic supporters of Distributivism and the Back-to-the-Land movement (those two distinct but inter-related impulses in the early twentieth century English Catholic church), we shall not be surprised to find that his criticism of modern work-situations includes a strong neo-agrarian component, with the insinuation that technical 'progress' is frequently a misnomer for class exploitation and the regrettable human propensity to replace things of undoubted worth with those of none.
I do not remember reading, however, that the notoriously corpulent Chesterton ever refused to be conveyed from place to place in such a vehicle.
There is much, then, in the circumstances of the making of Scripture and the happenstance of the Church's later Tradition which explains why the technologies that have led to the gradual replacement of labour-intensive agriculture as the principal form of human work in the West do not appear - imaginatively speaking - to sit comfortably with Christianity, especially Catholic (and it may be added, Orthodox) Christianity. The question then arises, Taking as given the fact that this literature (the books of the biblical Canon) and the particular human community they brought into being in the sub-apostolic period (the Church) are pre-modern in their assumptions about work (as about everything else on which modernity has or had a view of its own), is this fact in and of itself of doctrinal importance? In other words, is this assumption about traditional styles of work of any intrinsic importance for the understanding of Christian revelation and the life which should flow from that understanding for ourselves who as Catholic Christians are privileged to be its recipients?
There could of course be an argument which had it that the linking of biblical revelation and its continuation in Christian tradition to agricultural work and handcrafts is a providential dispensation. That is, I take it, the view of the Christian sect called the Amish who, for precisely this reason, maintain exclusively rural communities of believers. But I think we can say with assurance that Catholics have only ever drawn on such considerations in a prudential way, not a doctrinal one. One can perfectly well maintain that living close to cosmic nature and working collaboratively with that nature through crop-growing, animal husbandry and the like, is a way of life which should be adopted by far more people than presently do so, since it would greatly reduce the stress and sense of artificiality many people find in the distinctively modern workplace, with its severe time-constraints and such physical inconveniences as gazing all day long at a computer screen. One can also perfectly well propose that craftsmen working with their hands in a fashion which requires skill, that is practical reason in the mode adapted to making things, and doing so by inheriting and perpetuating a tradition of fine work, possess a peculiarly paradeigmatic quality as exemplars of what it is to be a worker. But one does not for all that have to 'buy' the argument that there is something innately rebarbative to the Judaeo-Christian revelation and its ethos in forms of work that do not fall under either of these descriptions. As St Thomas, speaking as a philosopher, makes plain, when we talk of the 'matter' with which the labourer co-operates so as to educe from it a form - whether on his or her own, as with the potter or sculptor, or in collaboration with nature as with the market gardener or the grower of grain - we are not using a univocal expression, a word that has only one meaning. We are, rather, using an analogical notion, a word that has a variety of related meanings. What 'matter' means, and, so far as that goes, what 'form' means too is very much context-dependent. A nurse's 'matter' is her patient; a lawyer's is human behaviour; a playwright's is human life itself, and so on. There is no reason why this range of examples cannot be extended so as to take in every legitimate type of human labour.
In his brilliant study The Theology of Work, Father Richard O'Connor points out that there is no philosophical reason why the matter on which the worker works cannot be so extended and every theological reason why it should be. Such clues as we have from the Fathers of the Church, the principal sources, with Scripture, of an evangelical and catholic theology, betray no evidence of Tilgher's assumption that the only work valued in the Christian tradition was manual work in the strict sense. St John Chrysostom, for example, speaks of the value to be found in the complementarity of human skills. Origen remarks that God created man with various needs so that we might exercise our intelligence in providing for them. For St Augustine, through work man co-operates with God in completing the creation. For St Maximus the Confessor, man is a 'living workshop' since through his labour he synthesizes matter with spirit.
It is true that the ascetic tradition, as represented in, for example, the Rule of St Benedict, or the Sayings of the Desert Fathers, concentrates on hard manual toil, but this is, after all, in the context of specifically monastic life, where a rather different set of criteria from the usual may be thought to apply.
In reality, there is nothing in the nature of Christian doctrine which could make us treat as inevitable the development described by Tilgher (assuming it to be correctly described) whereby Renaissance and post-Renaissance forms of work led ineluctably to the desacralisation of the cosmos and the secularisation of the European mind.
The question then arises, If that is so, what needs to be done? How can we put in place new imaginative patterns which allow people and indeed invite them to experience their work, when it is genuinely human - humane - work, work fit for man, in the same way as once was done in the best agrarian commonwealths known to the Church in the past or the present? I add the rider 'when it is genuinely human - humane - work, work fit for man' because that has been, of course, a preoccupation of the moral magisterium of the Papacy in the last hundred and more years. I am not concerned with those ethical aspects of work which need to be attended to for work to be deemed fit for human beings in the first place, but rather with the doctrinal in the sense of dogmatic interpretation of authentically human work in a modern mode. How can we proceed in trying to suggest for non-traditional kinds of work the sort of imaginative theological space in which traditional work modes have been deployed in Christendom?
Following - in large part - O'Connor's analysis: we can say that such traditional ways of work have been given theological sense in three ways. First, they were regarded as enjoying a relation to the divine creative activity. Second, they had a bearing on the divine redemptive activity. And thirdly, they carried implications for the divine transfiguring or consummating activity at the end of time. However their theological meaning was construed, whether on the basis of the original creation, or on that of the act of Incarnation and its redemptive consequences, or on that of the ultimate glorious Parousia, what was in question was some kind of analogy between divine and human working.
St Thomas has no treatise on labour (the issue was not for him the problem it was to become later). Nevertheless, human work, considered as the activity of what he called, after Aristotle, the 'practical intellect', was for him our principal analogue for God's activity in regard to the world. God's understanding, the divine mind, is engaged in action which both makes things and transforms them. That is why Thomas can use the model of artisanal labour to expound the divine mysteries of both creation and salvation. This is for him a true analogy, and not just a metaphor, which means that when we speak of human beings 'making' things or 'salvaging' or 'transforming' them by their labour we should be aware that the principal maker, salvager and transformer - the 'prime analogate' as the Scholastics say of our language in these respects - is God himself. And what that means for us is that our work - whether it be making, repairing or transforming by acting in any of these ways on 'matter' variously understood, is nothing less than a sign of the divine activity itself, the divine action in creation and redemption, Incarnation and salvation.
Take for instance human making as a sign of the making of all things by the triune Creator. St Thomas writes:
Correspondingly, then, production, in the sense in which we use that word when discussing human work, is a sign of the Trinitarian causal action in making the world. That was the starting point of the Anglo-Catholic lay theologian, detective story writer and translator of Dante Dorothy Sayers in her marvellous book, recently reprinted, The Mind of the Maker. Of course no human work is absolutely creative in the way that God?s is. God creates from nothing; that means, his creative activity has no other principle than itself. When we are creative, whether in humble ways by making a plum pudding or grandiose ways like producing a development plan for a third world country or writing an opera, we are only relatively creative, since we depend for our action on many factors beyond ourselves. And yet toutes proportions gardees, as the French say, the analogy holds. Work is a sign of the mystery of creation.
It is also, I suggested, a sign of the mystery of the Incarnation. As we have seen, 'crafting' things in matter is an analogous reality which can be carried out in many ways. As Eric Gill liked to say, every man is a special kind of artist. But in every case a craftsman wants to embody his ideas, to let his idea take on flesh. In work something goes out from us to what is outside us, just as in God, the archteype of human working, the Word took on flesh through union with human nature, which was infinitely 'outside' it, in our Lady's womb. And just as, in the humanity assumed from Mary, the Word had at his disposal an instrument perfectly suited for his purpose in becoming incarnate, so the worker has at the service of his own 'incarnations' extensions of his own powers in the shape of tools which now range from rudimentary implements still in use like brushes and saws, to mechanical instruments that extend the arm, visio instruments like microscopes that extend the eye, audio instruments like transmitters that extend the ear, and finally instruments which extend the brain - computers - and have within them the power to devise more sophisticated computers still. Some would ask whether technology remains an instrument when it reaches this level of independence, but in the Incarnation the fully human mind and will of Christ, as defined at the Councils of Chalcedon and Constantinople III respectively, were what guaranteed the perfect suitability of his humanity for the task given it by the Word. That does not mean that all advanced technology of an innovatory kind must be embraced simply because it exists: for the question always remains open, Does this or that new tool allow us to devote greater time and energy to our spiritual, intellectual, family, social lives without damage to the fabric either of human community or the natural environment in which our lives are set? The human mind and will of the Word worked to realise the Father's plan of love - so how things fit with the total context here can hardly be irrelevant.
If, then, work is or should be a sign of the Incarnation, can it also be called a sign of the redemption which is the Incarnation's goal? After the Fall, work has taken on a penal character, an aspect of suffering, which was not native to it at the beginning but which human ingenuity finds ever new ways of underlining from sweatshops to assembly line alienation. In his Literal Commentary on Genesis St Augustine notes how nonetheless work retains enough of its original delight to make us realise how wonderful it must have been in Paradise.
In his redeeming work, Christ suffered, as the mediaeval Franciscan theologians liked to say, non ex corruptione sed ex caritate, 'not out of corruption but out of charity' - he suffered because he willed it - and in his toil for our salvation he made the redeemed world sweet for us through those very actions - his Passion and Death - whereby we made life burdensome for him. When the damaged world of work is repaired by the removal from it of needless suffering but not of sacrifice, it becomes a sign of the redemptive action of God himself.
Lastly, there is the question of the relation of work to the mystery of the Parousia, the Second Coming of Christ, and the consummation of all things. It is intelligible that we should raise this question because it is of the nature of work to be future oriented, to have the character of a project, and for a Christian the future is ultimately our Lord's reign as universal King. If redeemed humanity is to be transfigured in glory, this must surely have an extension not only in our natural environment, the cosmos, but also in the environment we have made for ourselves by our work. We do not know in concrete terms in what respect God will allow human achievements to become constituent elements of his Kingdom. But it coheres with the account of Kingdom existence given by classical theology on the basis of the images found in Scripture and Tradition to find a foretaste of the life of the Kingdom in work that has become playlike - thanks among other things to developing technology (always provided that such work is performed for good ends, in a morally upright way). Play in work, the play of work, is an anticipatory sign of the Kingdom of God, because the Kingdom of God means human beings corporatedly sharing the life of God insofar as rational creatures may, and the life of God, as St Augustine bids us recognise in the Confessions is simultaneous work and rest, it is work that is rest and rest that is work, because all that God does, whether working or resting, he accomplishes 'with the majestic ease of play'.
2. The most celebrated English statement of the Weber thesis is the High Anglican R. H. Tawney's Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (Harmondsworth 1922). See also S. S. Acquaviva, The Decline of the Sacred in Industrial Society (Oxford 1979).
3. The stage was set by Gustave Thils in his Theologié des Réalités terrestres (Paris 1946).
4. Mark 6: 3.
5. Matthew 13: 55.
6. Philippians 2: 7.
7. See A. Richardson, The Biblical Doctrine of Work (London 1952).
8. A. Cunningham, 'Primary things: Land, Work, and Sign', Chesterton Review XXII. 1-2 (1996), pp. 73-88.
9. G. K. Chesterton, 'Songs of Education: 1. History', in The Collected Poems of G. K. Chesterton (London 1937, Sixth Edition), p. 99.
10. R. O'Connor, The Theology of Work. Analogies between the principal Mysteries of the Faith and the operation of the Practical Intellect using Thomistic Principles (Castleisland, Co. Kerry, 1995).
11. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Ia., q. 45, a. 6, corpus.
12. D. L. Sayers, The Mind of the Maker (London 1941).
13. See A Holy Tradition of Working. Passages from the Writings of Eric Gill. Introductory Essay by Brian Keeble. Foreword by Walter Shewring (Ipswich 1983).
14. Augustine, De Genesi ad Litteram, VIII. 8, 8.
15. R. O'Connor, The Theology of Work, op. cit., p. 201.
Section Contents Copyright ©: Mark Alder & Fr Aidan Nichols 1998-2000
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Every once in a while, even in this period of continuous legislative gridlock, a bill or an act finds its way through the 113th Congress and onto President Obama’s desk.
Just such an act is S. 23, the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore Conservation and Recreation Act, designating 32,557 acres of land already protected by the National Park Service as an official wilderness. President Obama signed this act into law on March 13.
Sleeping Bear Dunes can be found on the northwestern edge of Lower Michigan at the “pinkie” of Michigan’s mitten shape, on a peninsula that extends into Lake Michigan. The park follows the eastern coast of Lake Michigan from Crystal Lake north to Good Harbor Bay. Among its natural features are bluffs that rise up to 450 feet over Lake Michigan, inland lakes, forested lands, beaches, sand dunes, and an extraordinary Great Lakes viewscape.
The newly designated wilderness area includes lands on nearby islands in Benzie and Leelanau counties as well as considerable land on the mainland shore.
The power to assign additional protection to a fragile ecosystem on federal lands came to Congress in 1964 through the Wilderness Act. The act allows Congress to prohibit development in virtually any form, including permanent roads, commercial enterprises, motorized equipment, motor vehicles, mechanical transport, temporary roads, permanent structures or installations.
Visitors can engage in non-motorized recreation in wilderness areas, including hiking, fishing, camping, canoeing, kayaking, and hunting.
“President Obama and Congress have given the American people a priceless gift by ensuring that this extraordinary landscape with its towering sand dunes and bluffs will be preserved forever as wild and primitive,” said Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell in a prepared statement. “Hikers, anglers, paddlers and others who venture into this wilderness will find it just as the Ottawa and Chippewa tribes have for the past 3,000 years—a place of quiet solitude, spectacular views, and abundant wildlife.”
The Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore Conservation and Recreation Act was introduced by Senator Carl Levin (D-MI), and co-sponsored by Senator Debbie Stabenow, also of Michigan. Rep. Dan Benishek (R-MI) introduced the companion bill in the House of Representatives with eleven cosponsors.
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A view from partly under the ocean near the seawater cooling intake pipe… (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles…)
Scuba diver John Vincent sensed something was wrong when, fishing for lobster one night off Playa del Rey, he felt a strange current.
It grew stronger. Seconds later, Vincent, 49, was swept into the mouth of a huge intake pipe for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power's Scattergood power plant.
He tried to kick against the flow, but it was no use: Down the pipe he went, clutching his flashlight and his limit of lobsters, a long, fast journey through the dark. "I was flipping out," he said. "My air supply was running out."
Vincent's misadventure was exceptional. Most of the organisms sucked into power plant intake pipes off the California coast are plankton and small fish.
But his story provides an unusual firsthand perspective on a process at the heart of a messy controversy coming to a head before the State Water Resources Control Board.
Every day, intake pipes such as the one that caught Vincent are permitted to suck in enough seawater to fill Lake Arrowhead, then spit it out again, a little warmer and a lot deader. The seawater is used for cooling mechanisms in power plants, and for decades, it has provided California's electricity generators with a cheap and convenient way to keep the lights on.
Now state water board regulators are mulling a plan to force the power companies to spend billions to stop vacuuming the ocean for water to cool their machinery. Mostly, the companies don't want to. That's the simplified version of what's becoming an epic tug-of-war between two reliable California obsessions, energy and coasts, each backed by its own scientific spin and political clout.
Environmentalists say the intake pipes destroy too much sea life; utility advocates say that the impact is minimal and that banning the practice would cost too much, jeopardize the reliability of the electricity grid and slow the state's transition to clean energy.
The issue mainly concerns small animals and microorganisms. Large members of the animal kingdom, Vincent included, are prevented from entering the plants by screens. He survived in a catch basin. But fish can die while trapped against these barriers. Anything smaller than the openings in the screens, including millions of tiny fish larvae, enters the power plants and dies.
Federal rules have banned new plants from drawing in seawater for so-called "once-through" cooling systems. Now the state water board wants to apply this rule to the 19 existing plants dotting the coast from Eureka to San Diego.
The board's proposal would allow owners up to a dozen years to comply and contains special provisions for nuclear-plant safety issues and changes that might put the state's power supply at risk. But in most cases, it would require plants to supplant seawater pipes with massive cooling towers that recycle water, or to use air-cooling platforms.
Environmental groups laud the proposal, which they say comes after decades of efforts to get resistant power plants to comply with the federal Clean Water Act.
Utilities say it would force expensive retrofits or shut down plants. The combined cost for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, PG&E and Southern California Edison would surpass $8.5 billion, they say.
Interim DWP Chief S. David Freeman said his utility's $1 billion tab to comply is about what DWP was going to spend on switching from coal to wind and solar sources.
The measure also could force the municipal utility to temporarily shut down its relatively clean-burning natural-gas plants and rely more on inland coal power stations, he added.
"I am working hard on issues that I think everyone would agree are far more important than some minor impact on the fisheries," Freeman said.
Environmentalists don't buy it. Power plants are responsible for "the unnecessary sterilization and death of coastal waters," said Tom Ford of the environmental group Santa Monica Baykeeper.
The extent of this damage is disputed. Coastal fish are slippery in every sense: hard to count, and hard to count on. Their reproduction varies from year to year, their populations rise and fall, and their path from egg to adulthood in some cases is mysterious. Some species are spiraling down from overfishing and habitat loss.
Scientists are reduced to making estimates of estimates, leaving room for opposing sides to make contrary arguments using the same studies.
Environmentalists emphasize the loss of millions, even billions, of fish larvae, eggs and other organisms from power plants. But fish employ a reproductive system a little like dandelions, scattering clouds of offspring, of which a tiny fraction will survive. So such figures are less eye-popping when compared with vaster numbers of larvae in the sea, most of which would die anyway.
Utility interests commonly express the loss as a proportion of fish populations depleted because of the lost larvae. By that yardstick, less than 1% of the populations of many species on the southern coast are affected.
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In the middle of 1990 people trafficking became a very serious and complicated problem in the countries of Eastern and Central Europe, such as Bosnia-Herzegovina.
With the collapse of communism, woman from Central and Southeast Europe become the largest group on the trafficking market in the region, mostly for the purpose of sexual abuse.
After the war, when Bosnia-Herzegovina first faced this problem, it was extremely hard to solve because there was no legal framework that acknowledged this crime as a trans-national form of organized crime and there was insufficient knowledge about the trafficking problem.
In the beginning, Bosnia-Herzegovina was characterized as a transit country to West Europe but also a destination country for women coming from Central and Southeast Europe.
Latest information indicates that the number of trafficking victims who are citizens of Bosnia-Herzegovina is increasing.
International community and non-governmental organizations were the first ones to get involved in the trafficking problem in 2000. The Government of Bosnia-Herzegovina joined in trafficking prevention actions.
A series of legal, administrative and operational measures was undertaken, the majority of which were included in the first 2001 action plan. The decision of the Council of Ministers in 2003 established an office of state coordinator and structures for anti-trafficking and illegal emigration.
Caritas in Bosnia-Herzegovina joined initiatives through active involvement in trafficking prevention programmes.
Trafficking, especially women and children, is trafficking in human misery and naivety and represents one of the biggest crimes of our time. Examples of trafficking are forced prostitution, unpaid housework, baby sitting, care of the elderly, illegal work, forced residence, debtor slavery, fake adoption, sex-tourism and entertainment, pornography, begging, and the sale of human organs.
Financial support for anti-trafficking in Bosnia-Herzegovina comes from Caritas and the Government of Norway and in partnership with Catholic Relief Services.
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DMSO / MSM - Pine Tree Source v Fossil Fuel Source - The great debate !
1). Definition of Fossil Fuel Source
Definitions:1). Fossil Fuel Source:
Fossil fuels include coal, petroleum, and natural gas. They all contain carbon and were formed as a result of geologic processes acting on the remains of (mostly) plants and animals that lived and died hundreds of millions of years ago. (Ref 1)
Fossil Fuel Source - also know as Petrochemical Source :
Petrochemicals are chemical products made from raw materials of petroleum or other hydrocarbon origin. Although some of the chemical compounds that originate from petroleum may also be derived from other sources such as coal or natural gas, petroleum is a major source of many. (Ref 1a)
Any of about 90 species of ornamental and timber evergreen conifers of the genus Pinus (family Pinaceae), distributed throughout the world but native primarily to northern temperate regions. (Ref 2)
Plant sources include corn
See also (5) below.
It is commonly understood that processing (Ref 3) is essential in the manufacture and isolation of many nutrients (Ref 4), vitamins, minerals, trace elements and "natural" products. MSM is no exception in this respect.
Let's explore this for a full understanding and address any misconceptions.
We'll start with the example of Canadian Clover honey. Im sure the vast majority of people are well aware, the honey is not, nor cannot be extracted from a Clover leaf or Clover Petals.
In the case of Clover honey, the Honey Bees (Ref 5) collect Nectar (Ref 6) from Clover (Ref 7) and take it back to the hive where it is processed and becomes honey. The source material is Nectar from Clover, the end product is honey. In Canada, for example, its commonly called Pure / Natural Canadian Clover Honey. Made from Clover leaves or flowers? Of course not, Clover is simply the source of the Nectar, however, it is referred to, and widely accepted as, Pure Canadian Cover Honey. (See also - How do Bees make Honey (Ref 8)).
5). Pine Tree Source Methylsulfonylmethane (MSM)
Again, similarly, Im also sure that the vast majority of people are well aware that MSM is not, nor cannot be extracted directly from a pine tree or vegetable source! Suggestions to the contrary (often seen on web sites and quoted in the press) reveal a fundamental ignorance of the very basics of source.
In the case of MSM, the source material, rather than being Nectar as in the honey example above, are the Methyl groups (Ref 9) (One of the commonest structural units of organic compounds, consisting of three hydrogen atoms bonded to a carbon atom, which is linked to the remainder of the molecule. The methyl radical (CH3), the methyl cation (CH+3), and the methyl anion (CH-3)34 are transient intermediates in many chemical reactions.
a). In the case of Pine Tree Source MSM:
The Methyl Groups are found within the Lignin (Ref 10) structures of pine trees. Organic Lignin is the second most prevalent organic substance on earth, organic cellulose being the most prevalent. Organic Lignins are described as "The cement like bonds which hold organic cellulose together" constituting from a quarter to a third of the dry mass of wood. Needless to say, Lignin is vital in the structure of all living plant material. It is also the substance which contains the methyl groups (source material) we need for the production of "natural" source MSM as opposed to Fossil Fuel MSM.
b). In the case of Fossil Fuel Source MSM (often called petrochemical or synthetic MSM)
The Methyl Groups are derived from the Dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) (Ref 11) by-product of petrochemical works. After oil and petrol have been refined there are a large number of by-products. DMSO in this case, is one of the by-products of the manufacture of Petrochemicals.
First we need to have a brief look at paper manufacture (Ref 12). Paper manufacturers use both mechanical and chemical methods to obtain the pulp fibres from trees needed to make paper. Mechanical pulping results in the vast majority of lignin going into the paper (This tends to make paper yellow with time) In contrast, chemical pulping breaks down the chemical structures of lignin and renders it soluble in the cooking liquor, so that it may be washed from the cellulose fibres. Because lignin holds the plant cells together, chemical pulping frees the fibres and makes pulp. The resulting by-product of paper manufacture is black liquor (Ref 13) which is an aqueous solution of lignin residues, hemicellulose and the inorganic chemicals used in the process. The black liquor is refined to obtain Dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO).
9). Dimethyl Sulfoxide (DMSO) (CH3)2SO) (Ref 14)
MSM is produced by oxidising Dimethyl Sulfoxide (DMSO). Just like bees in the honey example further above, we use a number of ingredients to facilitate this process, however, unlike honey, MSM produced by distillation is extremely pure.
The process we use to manufacture MSM reflects the way it is produced in the earth's upper atmosphere. The result is pure MSM identical to that produced by nature (See below)
The life cycle of DMSO and MSM (the closest relative of DMSO) begins in the oceans where the action of sun light on Phytoplankton (Ref 15) creates dimethylsulfonium salts which are trasformed into the gas Dimethylsulfide (DMS) (CH3)2S (Ref 42). In terms of numbers, the most important groups of Phytoplankton include the diatoms, cyanobacteria and dinoflagellates, although many other groups of algae are represented. One group, the coccolithophorids, is responsible (in part) for the release of significant amounts of Dimethylsulfide (DMS) into the atmosphere. (Ref 15)
Dimethyl sulfide (DMS) is vloatile i.e. Volatile organic compounds (Ref 16) (VOCs) are organic chemical compounds that have high enough vapour pressures under normal conditions to significantly vaporise and enter the atmosphere. The DMS rises into the atmosphere where in the presence of Oxygen O2, (Ref 16), Ozone O3 (Ref 17), and high energy ultraviolet light (Ref 18), the DMS is transformed into Dimethyl Sulfoxide (CH3)2SO) (Ref 14) and Dimethyl Sulfone (MSM) (CH3)2SO2 (Ref 19).
These compounds fall to the earth in rain water and are concentrated by the roots of plants and trees upto 100 fold (Ref 42). Through photosynthesis, they become part of their living structure.
The energy for photosynthesis ultimately comes from absorbed photons and involves a reducing agent, which is water in the case of plants, releasing oxygen as a waste product. The light energy is converted to chemical energy (known as light-dependent reactions), in the form of ATP and NADPH, which are used for synthetic reactions in photoautotrophs. The overall equation for the light-dependent reactions under the conditions of non-cyclic electron flow in green plants is:
H2O + 2 NADP+ + 2 ADP + 2 Pi + light --->
2 NADPH + 2 H+ + 2 ATP + O2 [ref 41]
To be more specific, carbon fixation produces an intermediate product, which is then converted to the final carbohydrate products. The carbon skeletons produced by photosynthesis are then variously used to form other organic compounds, such as the building material cellulose, as precursors for lipid and amino acid biosynthesis, or as a fuel in cellular respiration.
The question then arises:
11). Whats the difference between DMSO from Pine tree source and DMSO from Fossil fuel source? (Ref 1) (Note: Fossil Fuel source DMSO is also referred to as petrochemical (Ref 1a) or synthetic source)
As long as they are both absolutely pure samples then it is generally understood that the chemical composition is the same for both however, even scientist are now questioning this - (See 14 & 15 below).
Sadly, there is no definitive answer (See below)
Although the following test are excellent for defining purity levels, they are not able to give any indication of source:
High Resolution Gas Chromatography (Ref 20) (HRGC):
A specific quantitative method that determines the volatile purity of MSM.
Melting Point (Ref 21) :
Reveals the non-volatile impurities not detected by HRGC. This is a very important test. Some manufacturers claim that their MSM is "99.9% pure", but they are only referring to volatile purity testing. That same MSM could contain 50% Epsom salts or some other non-volatile impurity for example and it would not affect the " 99.9%" volatile purity rating. Therefore, tests of non-volatile purity, such as melting point (Ref 21), are critical to confirm volatile purity results.
KFT: (Karl Fischer Titration Method) (Ref 22):
Pure MSM should be extremely dry, with a water content of less than 0.1%.
Heavy Metals (Ref 23) Testing:
Heavy metals (Ref 23): Mercury, Arsenic, Cadmium, Aluminium and Lead. Water is a key component of the MSM production process. Some MSM production facilities are located in areas (Far East) where local water supplies do not meet the recognised safe guidelines for organic and inorganic volatiles, heavy metals, and other contaminants, making heavy metal testing essential especially for MSM produced by the crystallisation method.
Microbiological (Ref 24) Testing:
For aerobic bacteria (Ref 25), total coliform bacteria (Ref 26), and yeast (Ref 27) and molds (Ref 28). Poor water quality can lead to coliform (Ref 26) and bacterial (Ref 29) contamination. Too much moisture (Ref 30) in the product can lead to yeast and mold contamination.
14). Carbon Dating (Ref 31)
Surely Carbon Dating would give a definitive answer!
Carbon dating (Ref 31) relies on a minimum of 5 to 10 carbons by comparing their ratio to carbon 12's and 13's. If a manufacturer uses DMSO from pine tree source and uses a basic crystallisation method, it would undoubtedly contain residues of the processing i.e. lignins and impurities which would enable carbon dating. MSM manufacturer Carolwood (Before they moved their plant to China) had their former Lignisul brand (Not Lignisul DC) carbon dated resulting in it being found to be "From recently living source material". It would be interesting to see what the result would be from their Lignisul DC manufactured from DMSO from fossil fuel source from China - though some suggest it is now manufactured in the USA.
In contrast, carbon dating is neither appropriate nor effective for MSM manufactured using the distillation process as all impurities and residues of lignins are removed by distillation. Consequently one has to rely on the trust, morals and integrity of the manufacturer to state the source of their DMSO.
Carbon Dating - What Do The Experts Think?
Robert Lee summed up the reasons behind the controversy over the Carbon dating method in his article "Radiocarbon, Ages in Error," published in the Anthropological Journal of Canada: "The troubles of the radiocarbon dating method are undeniably deep and serious. Despite 35 years of technical refinement and better understanding, the underlying assumptions have been strongly challenged, and warnings are out that radiocarbon may soon find itself in a crisis situation. Continuing use of the method depends on a 'fix-it-as-we-go' approach, allowing for contamination here, fractionation here, and calibration whenever possible. It should be no surprise, then, that fully half of the dates are rejected. The wonder is, surely, that the remaining half come to be accepted. No matter how 'useful' it is, though, the radiocarbon method is still not capable of yielding accurate and reliable results. There are gross discrepancies, the chronology is uneven and relative, and the accepted dates are actually selected dates" (Robert E. Lee, "Radiocarbon, Ages in Error," Anthropological Journal of Canada, Vol. 19, No.3, 1981, pp. 9, 29).
Although we currently have no scientific means of measuring the difference, it doesnt mean that we still feel there is a difference. For example, there is no apparent difference with water (Ref 32), surely if its pure then its all simply H2O (Ref 33) - Continued below:
16). Messages from Water (Ref 34) - Challenging Preconceived Scientific Assumptions
Japanese researcher Masaru Emoto (Ref 35), however, has made a remarkable discovery and revealed that contrary to common scientific opinion, water can be very different as seen with his breakthrough method of microscopic photography of frozen water crystals (Ref 36).
If you havent seen Emotos books Messages from Water(Ref 37), "The Hidden Messages in Water"(Ref 38) and "The Secret Life of Water"(Ref 39), then may I suggest you get copies. Beautifully illustrated they certainly call to question some of our preconceived scientific assumptions about the nature of elements and our influence on them, in a most stunning and compelling manner.
17). What the Bleep do we know
The question of our preconceived scientific notions and assumptions has also been brought under scrutiny in a most entertaining, thought provoking and greatly inspiring way in the DVD titled What the Bleep do we know (Ref 40) Leading thinkers and researchers in the quantum physics field introduce the exciting ramifications of the latest understanding of quantum physics and mechanics revealed in a delightfully easy to understand and most entertaining way, the film is so far reaching in its potential practical applications that some major corporations world wide are making it compulsory viewing for all its senior management! At the street level, the film has prompted thousands of discussion groups around the world. If you havent seen it then may I suggest you get a copy, you wont be disappointed!
I hope this is somewhat helpful in your understanding about the great controversy and debate regarding the source of DMSO and MSM - obviously the story will continue as manufacturers come and go, new processes and analytical methods are developed - We'll keep you posted !
My very best wishes for your health :)
Mike Pritchard-Jones © February 2008
This article / web page is Copyright
Journalists / Editors: Please contact Mike Pritchard-Jones for permission to use this article in full or in part. You may find him most obliging if you seek permission first.
1. Encyclopædia Britannica Online:
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Products (Precision Instrument - Optical Instrument)
Ohira Tech: Optical Planetarium Projector MEGASTAR-IIA
A planetarium projector is a device used to project the night sky onto a dome-shaped ceiling.
Planetarium projectors use various projection methods, but the most popularly used is optical technology, which makes use of a star globe and a star plate. The star plate is a circular disk covered in holes so tiny they are invisible to the naked eye; some are mere microns in width. Light shines through these holes from the light source, travel through the star globe lens, where the focus is adjusted, and is then projected onto the dome ceiling, which can be a distance of up to 20m in larger planetariums.
The location of these tiny holes, opened in the star plate, are calculated with extreme accuracy in order to correctly project the night sky onto the dome-shaped ceiling; the size of the holes is also adjusted according to how brightly the light representing each star should be projected. Holes opened in the star plate number in the several thousand for smaller devices. More recent, larger projectors can have several million. Clearly this cannot be achieved without the most precise of technology.
Japan is the world-leader in manufacturing technology for optical planetarium projectors, particularly in precision technology. Fifty percent of the global production share is held by Japan’s GOTO INC. and KONICA MINOLTA Japan. Japan’s planetarium market sets the standard for the rest of the world, and the projector that emerged above the top of the field in Japan is the revolutionary MEGASTAR planetarium series, created by Ohira Tech Ltd.
Before the MEGASTAR, even the most advanced planetarium projectors were only able to project several tens of thousands of stars. By contrast, the technology used in the MEGASTAR allowed it to project 1.7 million stars. It could show stars up to a magnitude of 11.5; stars so distant and so faint that they cannot be seen at all by the naked eye even in the darkest night sky. This stunning level of accuracy brought the night sky view that could be recreated by a projector much closer to the real thing than any other planetarium before it. In particular, the way the MEGASTAR was able to present the Milky Way was revolutionary. Instead of seeing just a hazy band of light, the MEGASTAR allows the Milky Way to be viewed as huge clusters of stars that cannot be seen by the human eye. Despite the amazing scale and clarity of its projections, the MEGASTAR is compact, at just 46 cm in diameter and 27 kg in weight.
The MEGASTAR, however, was not thought of
or created by a research at a major company or university. Instead, it was
built by a man with a lifelong love of planetaria, who developed the MEGASTAR
over many years of trial and error. That man was Takayuki Ohira, and he alone
produced the star plate (something previously thought impossible for an
individual), by developing a device that exposes the plate to a photoresist
using laser technology, thereby creating photographic film. Ohira’s creative
ability and his success in development his unique planetarium technology are
|Dome Diameter Range||15~22m flat/tilt dome|
|Number of Stars||1 million ~ 20 million|
|Clusters & Nebulae||over 170|
|Projection Type||32 Optical projection units|
|Light Source||Ultra bright LED light source（lamp life expectancy 30.000 hours）|
|Dimming||Electronic contro（l PWM） 0-100％|
|Shutter||External shutter/Electronic shutter|
|Motion||Time motion：Diurnal, Annual, Precession
Location motion：Longitude, Latitude（ Full sphere）
Option: Extraterrestrial position
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Desalination Plants Worldwide
Of the more than 12,500 desalination plants in operation worldwide, 60% are located in the Middle East. Total world capacity is approaching 30 million m3/day of potable water (almost 8 billion gallons per day).
The world’s largest plant in Saudi Arabia produces 128 Million Gallons a Day (MGD) of desalted water. In contrast, 12% of the world’s capacity is produced in the Americas, with most of the plants located in the Caribbean and Florida. To date, a limited number of plants have been built, primarily because the cost is generally higher than the costs of other water supply alternatives available (e.g., water transfers and groundwater pumping). However, as drought conditions occur and concern over water availability increases, desalination projects are being proposed at numerous locations around the world.
IDE Technologies Ltd. has recently signed a contract for the provision of two ‘desal’ units for a power plant in Kazakhstan.
Desalination is a process that removes dissolved minerals (including but not limited to salt) from seawater, brackish water, or treated waste water. A number of technologies have been developed, including reverse osmosis (RO), distillation, electrodialysis, and vacuum freezing. These methods are described below.
• Reverse Osmosis (RO) In RO, feedwater is pumped at high pressure through permeable membranes, separating salts from the water. The feedwater is pre-treated to remove particles that would clog the membranes. The quality of the water produced depends on the pressure, the concentration of salts in the feedwater, and the salt permeation constant of the membranes. Product water quality can be improved by adding a second pass of membranes, whereby product water from the first pass is fed to the second pass.
• Distillation In the distillation process, feedwater is heated and then evaporated to separate out dissolved minerals. The most common methods of distillation include multistage flash (MSF), multiple effect distillation (MED), and vapour compression (VC).
In MSF, the feedwater is heated and the pressure is lowered, so the water “flashes” into steam. This process constitutes one stage of a number of stages in series, each of which is at a lower pressure. In MED, the feedwater passes through a number of evaporators in series. Vapour from one series is subsequently used to evaporate water in the next series. The VC process involves evaporating the feedwater, compressing the vapour, then using the heated compressed vapour as a heat source to evaporate additional feedwater. Some distillation plants are a hybrid of more than one desalination technologies. The waste product from these processes is a solution with high salt concentration.
Desalination typically requires large amounts of energy as well as specialised expensive infrastructure, making it very costly compared to the use of fresh water from rivers or wells (bores). Most plants today use fossil fuels as a power source, and thus they contribute to increased levels of greenhouse gases. The major technology in use is the multi-stage flash (MSF) distillation process using steam, but reverse osmosis (RO) driven by electric pumps is increasingly significant.
With brackish water, RO is much more cost-effective, though MSF gives purer water than RO. A minority of plants use multi-effect distillation (MED) or vapour compression (VC). MSF-RO hybrid plants exploit the best features of each technology for different quality products.
Desalination is energy-intensive. Reverse Osmosis needs about 6 kWh of electricity per cubic metre of water (depending on its salt content), while MSF and MED require heat at 70-130°C and use 25-200 kWh/m3. A variety of low-temperature heat sources may be used, including solar energy. The choice of process generally depends on the relative economic values of fresh water and particular fuels.
Some 10% of Israel’s water is desalinated, and one large RO plant provides water at 50 cents per cubic metre. Malta gets two thirds of its potable water from RO. Singapore in 2005 commissioned a large RO plant supplying 136,000 m3/day (36MGD) or 10% of needs, at 49 cents US per cubic metre.
Regardless of the method used, there is always a highly concentrated waste product consisting of everything that was removed from the created fresh water. This is sometimes referred to as brine, which is also a common term for the byproduct of recycled water schemes that is often disposed of in the ocean. These concentrates are classified by the United States Environmental Protection Agency as industrial wastes.
With coastal facilities, it may be possible to return it to the sea without harm if this concentrate does not exceed the normal ocean salinity gradients to which osmoregulators are accustomed. Reverse osmosis, for instance, may require the disposal of wastewater with a salinity twice that of normal seawater. The marine community cannot accommodate such an extreme change in salinity and many filter-feeding animals would be destroyed when the water is returned to the ocean. This presents an increasing problem further inland, where one needs to avoid ruining existing fresh water supplies such as ponds, rivers and aquifers. As such, proper disposal of concentrate needs to be investigated during the design phases.
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It Takes AlkynesAlkynes take alkanes to the next level…all the way up to a triple bond. Just like the "triple-dog dare" is the most intense level of dares, the triple bond is the most intense carbon-carbon bond because they involve six bonding electrons instead of the usual two (or four, in the case of alkenes).
Alkynes follow the formula CnH2n-2.
Alkynes follow the same naming rules as alkenes, making the bad boy above respond to the name 2-pentyne (the 2 indicates that the triple bond comes after the second carbon).
Want to take a stab at naming this one?
There are four carbons and one triple bond (on the first carbon), making this lovely lady respond to butyne.
Like all siblings, Alkynes copy what their big brother Alkenes do.
Specifically, the copy-cat Alkynes participate in hydrogenation and halogenations reactions, but they require two rounds of reactions: one to bring the triple bond to a double bond, and one to turn the double bond to a single bond. The first round will turn the alkyne to an alkene, and this might be where the reaction (and the copy-cat behavior) stops. If the reaction keeps going, the alkene can continue be transformed into an alkane.
Lets get ready to rumble. Round 1 of Alkyne halogenation:
And Round 2:
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Research Spotlight on Out-of-Field Teaching
NEA Reviews of the Research on Best Practices in Education
As Richard Ingersoll (2003) says, "few would require cardiologists to deliver babies, real estate lawyers to defend criminal cases... or sociology professors to teach English."
This phenomenon of out-of-field teaching – teachers teaching subjects for which they have little education or training – has long been and continues to be an important issue in our public schools.
Much of the problem in out-of-field teaching can be attributed to selective shortages of teachers, as well as misplacement of teachers. The data show (Ingersoll, 2003) that each year some out-of-field teaching takes place in more than half of all U.S. secondary schools, and each year over one fifth of the public 7th-12th grade teaching force engages in this practice. And, in schools whose students come from low-income households, the percentage of teachers teaching out of their field is much higher.
With rapid growth in student enrollment and a high teacher attrition rate, school systems now realize they need to take some prescriptive measures to address this issue. Here are some recommendations from Glori Chaika (2000) to insure the finding and keeping of those teachers certified to teach subjects for which they have been educated and trained:
- Providing financial incentives to colleges to steer potential teachers specifically toward shortage areas
- Offering hiring bonuses to attract – and annual stipends to retain - teachers who have certification in shortage areas
- Offering stipends for mentor teachers to assist those new to the field – perhaps targeting teachers in special needs areas especially during the critical first or second year of teaching
- Out-of-Field Teaching and the Limits of Teacher Policy (CPRE, 2003) ( PDF)
Richard Ingersoll research paper referenced above.
- All Talk, No Action: Putting an End to Out-of-Field Teaching (Education Trust, August 2002) ( PDF)
- Out-of-Field Teaching: How Qualified Is Your Child's Teacher? (Education World, 2000)
- Research Spotlight on Best Practices in Education
Other Spotlights from NEA.
- NEA Reports & Statistics
Research reports reviewing data on educational issues and policy papers concerning NEA members, educators, and the public school community.
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- Safe Gluten-Free Food List (Safe Ingredients)
- Unsafe Gluten-Free Food List (Unsafe Ingredients)
- Gluten-Free Alcoholic Beverages
- Celiac Disease Symptoms
- The Gluten-Free Diet 101 - A Beginner's Guide to Going Gluten-Free
- Interpretation of Celiac Disease Blood Test Results
- Is Buckwheat Flour Really Gluten-Free?
Celiac Disease Rates Skyrocket: Up 400% in Last 50 Years
Jefferson Adams is a freelance writer living in San Francisco. His poems, essays and photographs have appeared in Antioch Review, Blue Mesa Review, CALIBAN, Hayden's Ferry Review, Huffington Post, the Mississippi Review, and Slate among others.
He is a member of both the National Writers Union, the International Federation of Journalists, and covers San Francisco Health News for Examiner.com.View all articles by Jefferson Adams
Celiac.com 07/09/2009 - Rates of celiac disease are four times higher today than they were just fifty years ago, according to the results of a new study by scientists at the Mayo clinic. In addition, the study showed that people with undiagnosed celiac disease died at rates four times higher than non-celiacs over the 45 year follow-up period.
Celiac disease is an immune system reaction to gluten in the diet which, left untreated, celiac disease causes damage to the lining of the digestive tract and leaves sufferers at risk for various cancers and other associated conditions. When people with celiac disease eat wheat, barley or rye, a protein called gluten triggers an immune system attack, which damages the villi in the small intestine.Villi are finger-like folds in the intestine that increase surface area for nutrient absorption.
Celiac disease symptoms may include diarrhea, abdominal discomfort, weight loss, anemia, unexplained infertility, loss of teeth or even premature or severe osteoporosis, among others.
Joseph Murray, M.D., the Mayo Clinic gastroenterologist who led the study says celiac disease "now affects about one in a hundred people. We also have shown that undiagnosed or 'silent' celiac disease may have a significant impact on survival. The increasing prevalence, combined with the mortality impact, suggests celiac disease could be a significant public health issue."
So, celiac disease is striking a higher than ever portion of the population, yet doctors don't yet fully understand the reasons for this reality.
A team of Mayo Clinic scientists team performed celiac disease antibody tests on blood samples gathered at Wyoming's Warren Air Force Base (AFB) between 1948 and 1954. They then compared those blood test results with results from two recently collected groups from Olmsted County, Minn. Tests for the first group were matched by age to those from the Warren AFB group at the time of the blood draw, while the second group was matched by birth years.
Researchers found that young people today are 4.5 times more likely to have celiac disease than young people were in the 1950s, while those whose birth years matched the Warren AFB participants were four times more likely to have celiac disease.
Celiac disease was once thought to be rare, and many physicians still regard it as so, but, according to Dr. Murray, that is no longer the case.
"Celiac disease is unusual, but it's no longer rare," he says.
Dr. Murray adds: "Something has changed in our environment to make it much more common. Until recently, the standard approach to finding celiac disease has been to wait for people to complain of symptoms and to come to the doctor for investigation. This study suggests that we may need to consider looking for celiac disease in the general population, more like we do in testing for cholesterol or blood pressure."
For Dr. Murray, the findings underscore the importance of raising awareness of celiac disease, both among physicians and patients. He adds that some studies "have suggested that for every person who has been diagnosed with celiac disease, there are likely 30 who have it, but are not diagnosed. And given the nearly quadrupled mortality risk for silent celiac disease we have shown in our study, getting more patients and health professionals to consider the possibility of celiac disease is important."
One interesting point not touched on in the study is the increase in the gluten content of commercial varieties of wheat now being grown compared to gluten levels of 50 years ago. Additionally, people are eating more wheat and gluten than ever before.
As always, Celiac.com welcomes your comments (see below).
- Can Antibodies Predict Mucosal Healing in Kids with Celiac Disease?
- Do Proton Pump Inhibitors Increase Risk of Celiac Disease?
- Should We Have Mass Screening for Celiac Disease?
- Peptic–tryptic Digest of Gliadin Differentiates Human Monocytes into Dendritic Cells Independently of the Presence of Celiac Disease and Genetic Make-up
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Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have developed a chip-cooling process that they hope will replace the bulky, bolt-on metal towers used with microprocessors like the G5. Instead of an entire tower through which water circulates, they have created water-filled wafers that can be integrated on self-cooling pc boards. The boards, which are being fabricated by the Microelectronics Advanced Research Corp. (Marco), will provide the plumbing for flip-chip-mounted ICs. In the streamlined cooling system envisioned by the researchers, water will circulate through the silicon substrates of microprocessors and other system-level chips by virtue of trenches etched on the otherwise unused backside of the wafer. "We have applied for the patents with Marco, and so far we have garnered interest in licensing our technology from over a dozen major semiconductor makers," said Georgia Institute of Technology EE Bing Dang. The researcher co-invented the technique in collaboration with professors Paul Kohl and James Meindl and their research assistants Paul Joseph, Muhannad Bakir and Todd Spencer. Although the technique is still in the prototype stage, the EEs have succeeded in fabricating very deep trenches that are only about 100 microns wide in the backside of wafers. Normally that side remains unused, but the new technique utilizes almost the entire surface area of that side for cooling. Because the water circulates through the silicon chips themselves, which have excellent thermal conductivity, the approach promises to cool chips much more efficiently than the customary metal cooling towers.
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What is in this article?:
- The SW drought is not as widespread.
- The heat is not as intense.
- Pockets of severe to extreme drought continue.
Northeast Texas cotton
Jerry Goodson, Oklahoma State University Extension assistant, Southwest Oklahoma Research and Extension Center in Altus, reports in the Cotton Comments Newsletter that without timely rainfall the crop will continue to deteriorate.
“Much of the dryland cotton, although in fair condition a week ago, will be headed in the wrong direction soon with the forecasted temperatures,” Goodson reported. “We really need a good rainfall event very soon.”
He noted that Altus has encountered 28 days of 100 degrees or greater—1 in April, 9 in May, 11 in June, and 7 days in July (through July 19). “Temperatures have been considerably above average with triple digits and more forecast and few chances of rainfall.”
Cotton heat unit accumulation for a May 1 planting date at Altus is about 1,637 versus a typical 1,330, about 23 percent above normal.
He reported that a rainfall that occurred in mid-July “provided some badly needed moisture and delayed a potentially earlier cutout.” But many of those fields now are exhibiting considerable signs of moisture stress. “Although some boll set has occurred, unless rainfall occurs soon, these bolls will be extremely small, further limiting yield potential.”
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<urn:uuid:c11c8bc6-bd70-47e2-899e-2572f7acdd2c>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
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http://southwestfarmpress.com/management/sw-conditions-better-overall-not-all-better?page=4
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en
| 0.948615
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| 2.546875
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|
In their endless pursuit of more trout or bigger trout, anglers have analyzed and thought over every aspect of their quarry's life cycle. In spite of the fact that so much of this well-researched species' biology has been published, a lot of misinformation still floats around in speckled trout angling circles.
Some of it is hard to kill.
One incorrect observation that is stated over and over again is that speckled trout follow the migration of shrimp into the marsh in the spring. This is incorrect in two respects.
First, when 100-count shrimp first appear in coastal lakes and bays in April and May, they aren't moving "in." Actually, they are in the process of moving "out" from the shallow marshland nursery areas, first into lakes and bays, and then into the Gulf. These shrimp did indeed come in — several months earlier as fingernail-size post larvae. But they didn't just come in from offshore.
Secondly, the trout aren't moving "in" from offshore, either. They are simply changing from their wintertime pattern into their summer pattern of concentrating in the lower parts of high-salinity bays, passes and beaches where they will spawn.
During the winter, male speckled trout concentrate in numbers in interior low-salinity, sometimes almost freshwater, marshes. During the winter, females tend to be scattered widely throughout the ecosystem, with no concentration of numbers anywhere.
The summer speckled trout spawn produces more myths, to which some anglers stubbornly cling. One that I hear a lot is that speckled trout will pair up during spawning season, and that the male will fan out a "nest" for the female to lay her eggs in.
Most who ascribe to this theory place the nest in quiet waters behind barrier islands — places with little current to disturb the nest. Sometimes the nest is placed in coffee-ground-like detritus and sometimes it is in marsh grass stubble.
This actually does describe the way that a certain fish species spawns, but it is the largemouth bass, not speckled trout. Speck spawning is almost the exact opposite of the picture painted above.
In Louisiana, speckled trout almost always spawn in groups numbering in dozens to thousands in deep, moving water, such as passes between barrier islands or natural and manmade channels in open water. Water depth in these locations is usually between 10 and 100 feet deep. Current seems to be necessary to keep the eggs from sinking to the bottom and suffocating.
Spawning always takes place between 6 p.m. and midnight. Males typically gather at the site an hour or two before sunset. There, they begin drumming — vibrating their tough swim bladder with surrounding muscles. The grunts, knocks and raps made by hundreds of males at one time sounds like a constant roar.
Drumming hits its peak around 8 or 9 p.m. and decreases sharply after 11 p.m. It is assumed that drumming activity attracts females to the site.
During spawning, the trout in the school mill constantly, with light side-to-side contact between the fish. Eggs and sperm are discharged into the water for random fertilization. The outgoing current in the channel or pass rapidly sweeps the eggs out to Gulf waters, where they float untended until they hatch.
This brings me to the final myth — my favorite.
Many speckled trout anglers use small croakers as bait. They are fairly tough and live well in a livewell or on a hook. They are fairly easy to come by, and speckled trout really seem to like to eat them.
The oft-repeated theory as to why croakers are such good speck bait is that female trout "hate" them because croakers eat their eggs. This one is hard to discuss without bringing a smile to my face.
Speckled trout abandon their eggs to the sea immediately after spawning. A week later she does the same thing again. She does this repeatedly all summer. It is hard to picture a female trout following her eggs out to sea (in the dark no less) to check on their well-being, even if she could tell her eggs apart from all the other fish eggs in the sea.
A second problem with this theory is that fertilized speckled trout eggs are buoyant and float near the surface, and croakers are demersal creatures, meaning they live and feed near the bottom.
Thirdly, it is hard to attribute the emotion of hate to such a primitive creature as a speckled trout. Indeed, if they feel hate, they must also feel love — and being in love. Picture that.
Finally, male trout seem to like to eat croakers just as much as do females. Yet, one only hears that female trout hate their egg-eating croaker cousins.
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<urn:uuid:5ee46c40-df9e-4a7b-97d8-849ff93ed34e>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
|
http://www.louisianasportsman.com/details.php?id=3800
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s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783394605.61/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154954-00160-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.973856
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|
The Kingdom of Cambodia is a fascination Asian nation rich in art, culture and history.
One thousand years ago, the Khmer people grew into a magnificent civilization, leaving a legacy of architectural marvels like the jungle temple of Angkor Wat. Today, every Southeast Asian visitor still sees the genius and beauty of the Khmer people infused in local traditions.
Cambodia has always been an exotic land of tropical abundance. Each year the endless waters of the mighty Mekong River and seasonal monsoons bring life-giving water to the fertile soil. This is why Cambodia produces huge quantities of rice, fish, fruits and vegetables, to the delight of farmers and animals alike.
Like people throughout the world, Cambodians created folktales over the centuries. Elders passed stories on to their children, sometimes to teach and other times to entertain. However, in this ancient land with powerful animals like elephants, tigers and cobras some tales have a surprising hero: a small rabbit!
Ah, but Mr. Hare uses his brain to make up for his size! Time and again he outsmarts huge elephants, hungry crocodiles, fierce tigers...and even men!
Now students of Khmer and English can enjoy this amusing collection with side-by-side translations to inspire students of both languages to continue the tradition!
University of Hawai'i Manoa
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<urn:uuid:d165224b-d51e-40d5-bf6b-ad438d583a93>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
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http://www.hawaii.edu/khmer/KhmerMaterials/27TalesOfHare.html
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|
en
| 0.905242
| 277
| 2.859375
| 3
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First Class Recorder Method
By John Brimhall
Brimhall Music Publishing, Inc.
A gradual approach to learning to play the recorder, to reading music and to understanding basic music theory. As ability increases, new material is added. There are 67 familiar popular, classical and folk songs to play and enjoy. Includes chord symbols for accompaniment instruments -- piano, guitar or autoharp.
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<urn:uuid:a1016fb9-5484-41ed-8ec5-00c1dde1eaa2>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
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http://www.alfred.com/Products/First-Class-Recorder-Method--05-BMP333A.aspx
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en
| 0.805676
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|
The gentlebirth.org website is provided courtesy of
Ronnie Falcao, LM MS, a homebirth midwife in Mountain View, CA
An interactive resource for moms on easy steps they can take to reduce exposure to chemical toxins during pregnancy.
Other excellent resources about avoiding toxins during pregnancy
These are easy to read and understand and are beautifully presented.
Can We Really Use Super Glue Instead of Suture? The Real Scoop on the Use of Tissue Adhesive for Wound ClosureFor several years there has been increasing interest in the midwifery community regarding the use of commonly available "Super Glue" types of adhesives for wound closure. Midwives who have done a little research have found that the cyanoacrylate glue (Super Glue) sold over-the-counter and medical cyanoacrylate glues are apparently identical in composition and rumored to the be same as the tissue adhesive used extensively during the Vietnam War. Some midwives have even used over-the-counter Super Glue (Krazy Glue) successfully in lieu of suture to close the perineum. In readying in the 5th edition of Healing Passage: A Midwife's Guide to the Care and Repair of the Tissues Involved in Birth, I felt it was important to address this issue. This article offers an expanded version of the information you will also find in the new edition.
History and development:
In 1959, a variety of cyanoacrylate adhesives were developed, some types of which are now used for surgical purposes in Canada and Europe. These glues polymerize on contact with basic substances such as water or blood to form a strong bond. The first glue developed was methyl cyanoacrylate, which was studied extensively for its potential medical applications and was rejected due to its potential tissue toxicity such as inflammation or local foreign body reactions. Methyl alcohol has a short molecular chain which contributes to these complications. Further research revealed that by changing the type of alcohol in the compound to one with a longer molecular chain, the tissue toxicity was much reduced. All the medical grade tissue adhesives currently available for human use contain butyl-esters, which are costlier to produce.
In 1964, the Tennessee Eastman lab submitted its first application for new drug approval to the FDA. The military learned of this new glue and became extremely interested in its potential for use in field hospitals. MASH units in Vietnam were overloaded. Many solders were dying from chest and abdominal wounds, despite the best efforts of medics. In 1966 a special surgical team was flown to Vietnam, trained and equipped to use cyanoacrylate adhesive. A quick spray over the wounds stopped bleeding and bought time until conventional surgery could be performed. The possibilities were immediately seized by the medical communities of Europe and the Far East. Meanwhile the FDA changed standards and kept requesting additional data until Eastman was reluctantly forced to withdraw his application. (Jueneman, 1981)
Histoacryl Blue (n-butyl cyanoacrylate) has been used extensively in Europe since the 1970s for a variety of surgical applications including middle ear surgery, bone and cartilage grafts, repair of cerebrospinal fluid leaks, and skin closure. It has been available in Canada through Davis & Geck Canada, with no adverse effects reported to date. Further, laboratory studies have been done which concluded that it has no carcinogenic potential. Tissue toxicity has only been noted when the adhesive is introduced deep in highly vascular areas (the perineum qualifies). While I always take claims of harmlessness with a grain of salt, if used as directed, these adhesives appear to be basically safe. (Quinn & Kissick, 1994)
Although not labeled as such, over-the-counter Super Glue products contain methyl alcohol, because it is inexpensive to produce. Cyanoacrylates cure by a chemical reaction called polymerization, which produces heat. Methyl alcohol has a pronounced heating action when it contacts tissue and may even produce burns if the glue contacts a large enough area of tissue. Rapid curing may also lead to tissue necrosis. Midwives have not noted such reactions because minimal amounts are being used for perineal repair. Nevertheless, with a greater toxic potential, over-the-counter products are inappropriate for use in wound closure. (Quinn & Kissick, 1994)
Medical grade products currently available contain either butyl, isobutyl or octyl esters. They are bacteriostatic and painless to apply when used as directed, produce minimal thermal reaction when applied to dry skin and break down harmlessly in tissue. They are essentially inert once dry. Butyl products are rigid when dry, but provide a strong bond. Available octyl products are more flexible when dry, but produce a weaker bond.
When used for repair, ideally the wound to be closed is fresh, clean, fairly shallow, with straight edges that lie together on their own. The glue is applied to bridge over the closed edges; it should not be used within the wound (on raw surfaces), where it will impair epithelization. The only currently FDA approved adhesives suitable for use as suture alternatives are veterinary products; n-butyl- cyanoacrylate tissue adhesives Vetbond (3M) and Nexaband liquid and octyl-based Nexaband S/C (intended for topical skin closure when deep sutures have been placed). Histoacryl Blue (butyl based) (Davis & Geck) and Tissu-Glu (isobutyl based) (Medi- West Pharmaceuticals) are sold in Canada for human use. DMSO (dimethyl sulfoxide) or acetone serve as removers. (Helmstetter, 1995; Quinn & Kissick, 1994)
How to use tissue adhesive:
Although not specifically recommended for perineal repair, tissue adhesive has been successfully used by some midwives. However, Histoacryl Blue was used in place of interrupted or subcuticular stitches in a small study of the closure of the superficial layer in mediolateral clitorotomy (episiotomy). (Adoni & Anteby) In this study, the yoni (vaginal) mucosa and subcutaneous layers were closed with conventional suture techniques. It might be a good alternative to offer when women refuse conventional sutures. Tissue adhesive works best when the wound is moderately shallow. Midwives report that extremely shallow wounds tend to pull apart as healing occurs and usually require no closure of any kind. The wound should also have no pockets to collect lochia and should not require other sutures. However, as the study mentioned above demonstrates, it can also be used instead of subcuticular sutures after placing basting stitches. Tissue glue is only applied to outside surfaces to bridge over edges; do not apply it directly to raw surfaces.
The wound edges should be straight and lie together naturally. Insert a tampon, then clean and dry the skin thoroughly. Have your assistant stabilize the wound edges from top to bottom (be sure the edges are matched correctly).
Insert your finger between the edges and pull it out to bring them forward slightly. This is to ensure that the wound edges are not rolled inward toward each other, but meet perfectly. It could also be accomplished with a tissue forceps. Hold gauze against the area immediately below the apex to catch and drips as you apply the glue. Apply tiny dots of glue sparingly at intervals where the wound edges meet. Or, apply a bead of tiny droplets to bridge the edges. (Thick applications do not enhance bonding and tend to crack and loosen prematurely.) Products dyed blue are easier to see. (If using Histoacryl Blue, attach a 27 g. syringe needle to the ampoule hub to help control application.
After use, the needle should be discarded and replaced with a new needle that does not have glue within its lumen.) Be careful to apply the glue on where it is needed; glue removers should not the used in the genital area. As long as no part of the tube tip or the attached needle contacts the tissue or bodily fluids, the tube can be reused.
Use a hair dryer or fan the area dry, which takes about 30 seconds.
Adhesive will stiffen when dry. Women should observe the same precautions
as those who have refused sutures entirely. Bathing is not contraindicated
but prolonged soaking should be avoided. Expect the adhesive to flake off
in 3 to 7 days. Allergic reactions are very rare, but may include inflammation
and swelling. (Various midwives 1993-95; Quinn & Kissick, 1994)
Adoni, A., & Anteby, E., "The Use of Histoacryl for Episiotomy Repair," Br. J. of Ob Gyn, Vol. 98, May 1991, pp. 476-8.
Heimstetter, G., personal communication, Permabond Internat. Bridgewater, NJ, 1995.
Jueneman, F, "Stick it to um," Industrial Research & Dev. Aug. 1981, p. 19. Quinn, J., & Kissack, J., "Tissue Adhesives for Laceration Repair During
Sporting Events," Clinical J. of Sports Med., Vol. 4 No. 4, 1994, p. 245.
Sources of tissue adhesives: Animal Care Products, 3M Health Care, 3M
Center Building 225 1N 07, St. Paul, MN 55144-1000, (612) 733-8477. 3M
produces Vetbond Tissue Adhesive. Veterinary Products Laboratory (800)
548- 2828 distributes Nexaband products which are manufactured by Tri-Point
in Raleigh, NC (919) 790-1041. These products are restricted items sold
and approved for veterinary use only. Davis & Geck-CANADA (905) 470-3647
distributes Histoacryl Blue, which is manufactured in Germany by B. Braun.
Medi-West Pharmaceuticals markets Tissu-Glu.
|About the Midwife Archives / Midwife Archives Disclaimer|
|
<urn:uuid:a952a034-a73e-4e47-a622-c7803bbe4e3b>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
|
http://www.gentlebirth.org/archives/superglu.html
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|
en
| 0.943105
| 2,131
| 2.625
| 3
|
UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN River Falls
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), having a child during the teen years carries high costs—emotional, physical, and financial—to the mother, father, child, and community.
For example, the National Campaign to Prevent Teenage and Unplanned Pregnancy has estimated that in 2008 teen pregnancies cost Minnesota and Wisconsin taxpayers $69 million in public health service costs for the children of teen mothers.
Although the rate of teen pregnancies is declining in the United States, the CDC reports that the current United States rate is a much as nine times higher than in similar countries. CDC data show that the teen birth rate in Minnesota and Wisconsin are below the national average.
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<urn:uuid:e6759a03-732d-4868-af32-246adfd8d481>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
|
http://www.uwrf.edu/StateOfTheValley/YouthIndicators/Index.cfm?respOpt=FALSE
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s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395039.24/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00014-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.928132
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| 3.015625
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|
It's important for all people to find ways of communicating with others in a kind manner. Kind words make everyone feel better about themselves, including the person saying something kind. This project helps your child think of nice words to say that come from the heart. She'll then be able to use them while communicating with friends and family.
What You Need:
- Construction paper in two different colors
- Glue stick
What You Do:
- Ask your child to make a list of words she thinks are kind. Review the list and ask her how it makes her feel when people say these words to, or about her.
- Now ask her how she feels when someone uses words that are not kind. How does she feel when someone is being unkind to her or around her?
- Have her cut a heart out of one sheet of construction paper and glue it in the center of a sheet of paper that's a different color.
- In the middle of the heart have her write "Use kind words" with a marker.
- Make small sun ray lines coming out of the heart. At the end of each ray, have her write one of the kind words from her list. She can continue writing until her entire list is written on the heart.
- Encourage her to orally construct sentences using each word as if she was speaking to a friend, or schoolmate.
- Hang her kind word heart on her door so as she exits her room each day, she's reminded how good it feels to use kind words.
|
<urn:uuid:c75caf44-7fb5-43dc-9869-8c55fc073b0f>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
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http://www.education.com/activity/article/kind-words/
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s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.18/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00026-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.961729
| 313
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| 4
|
SUPTS. MEMO. NO. 30
February 14, 1997
||Richard T. La Pointe
Superintendent of Public Instruction
||School Breakfast Week--March 3-7, 1997
"Think Smart, Think School Breakfast!"
In our efforts to enhance student learning, it is important that students' basic needs not be overlooked. Adequate nutrition is necessary for students to benefit fully from educational experiences provided in the classroom. Eating breakfast can make a significant difference in student learning not only during testing periods but each school day. Research studies demonstrate that students who eat breakfast perform better and have less absenteeism than those who do not have this meal. Eating breakfast on a daily basis has a significant relationship with improvement in test scores and reduced absenteeism and tardiness. Children who do not eat breakfast frequently have inadequate intakes of calories, protein, calcium, and other nutrients that affect not only academic performance, but also their health and growth. In addition, children do not have the ability to compensate for the missed meal as adults do. The School Breakfast Program helps many Virginia students prepare for learning. They may not have had time to eat before riding the bus, eat breakfast so early that they are hungry, or may not have the resources for breakfast at home. School Breakfast Week spotlights the importance of eating breakfast and the benefits provided by school breakfasts for all children every day. Schools are encouraged to promote and participate in School Breakfast Week with both cafeteria and classroom activities. There are a variety of ways to encourage students to eat a school breakfast: breakfast promotions, classroom lessons, cafeteria decorations, and inviting parents, administrators, and community leaders to eat school breakfast with students. For additional information on breakfast, nutrition, and learning, you may request copies of the publications, "Better Breakfast, Better Learning," and "Eat Well, Learn Well" by contacting Dr. Jane Logan, Director, School Nutrition Programs at (804) 225-2074. RTL/idl
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<urn:uuid:4b5701c0-1911-4def-be55-c287ecd357e2>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
|
http://www.doe.virginia.gov/administrators/superintendents_memos/1997/inf030.html
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|
en
| 0.963046
| 398
| 3.3125
| 3
|
The Middle School is a transition time for students who are entering their young adolescent phase. Boys and girls, aged between 10 and 13 [Grades 5 to 7], begin to develop mature and abstract ways of thinking. They continue to enhance the skills learned in Junior School, but begin to equip themselves for transition into the Senior school.
Similar to the Junior School, students in the Middle School study in vertical age groups; their homes are their learning spaces, and their main teachers are also their house parents. Having been rooted in inspirational choice based learning in the Junior School, students are now exposed to a seemingly more structured syllabus. The teaching pedagogy now involves an amalgamation of best practices in teaching to facilitate both guided and self-directed learning. The classroom is conducted via a mixture of timed instructional periods and fluid learning blocks.
Within this latticed approach, there are specific points of integration. An integrated 3-year curriculum provides students with the opportunity to see the interconnections of different disciplines and develop key learning skills in every subject. Students now begin to show their inherent strengths and weaknesses, innate talent and skills. The unique ‘home school’ pedagogy enables teachers to cater to different needs and talents in the students. The student is now encouraged to take ownership and responsibility for his/her education. Various activities and assessment programs are geared to promote independent learning skills. The emphasis is on learning ‘how’ to learn.
Each student is also allowed to pursue multiple co-curricular interests, participate in workshops and clubs, go on treks and field trips. These opportunities also become focal loci for further learning in the classroom.
As in Junior School, there are no yearly examinations. The student follows a 3-year plan embedded with regular assessments and evaluations. They transit to Senior School once they exhibit ease and proficiency with key content and skills, and are now ready to follow a more prescribed syllabus and participate in formal examinations.
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<urn:uuid:91fbe3e5-eb22-43d4-819d-55f6e023c26f>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
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http://ishahomeschool.org/founders-message/middle-school/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397842.93/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00134-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.970255
| 396
| 3.296875
| 3
|
The next morning, the soldiers learn that Jim was mistaken: the army does not move. Henry continues to worry about his courage, and watches his comrades for any sign that they share his self-doubt. One day, the army is given orders and begins to march. While marching, the soldiers debate when and if they will see battle. Henry keeps to himself, too preoccupied with his own speculations to join the other men. The regiment enjoys itself, and is wildly amused when a fat soldier attempts to steal a horse but the young girl who owns it stops him. At night, the men set up camp, and Henry, feeling “vast pity for himself,” asks Wilson if he can imagine himself running from battle. Wilson indignantly claims that he would do his part in a battle and leaves Henry feeling even more alone.
The next night finds the increasingly exhausted soldiers marching through a dark forest. Henry worries that the enemy might appear at any moment. When the enemy fails to materialize, Henry returns to thinking that his regiment is nothing more than a “blue demonstration.” One morning, however, Jim shakes Henry awake. They hear the crack of distant gunfire, and the regiment begins to run. Boxed in by his fellow soldiers as the officers goad them toward the battle, Henry realizes that even if he wanted to run, the throng of surrounding soldiers would trample him. Pressed forward, the regiment parts to move around the body of a dead soldier. As he passes the corpse, Henry grows increasingly vulnerable, and curses the commanding officers who, it seems, are leading them to certain death.
The men stop several times, many using branches and stones to build protective trenches which they must abandon as the march drives them forward. The more the regiment moves, the faster the soldiers’ morale wanes. They gradually begin to think that their leaders are incompetent and indecisive. As the fighting draws closer and the sound of gunfire grows louder, Wilson tells Henry that he believes he will die in the battle. He gives Henry a yellow envelope and asks him to deliver it to his family, should he not make it home.
The regiment stops in a grove with the chaos of battle raging around them. The regiment’s lieutenant is shot in the hand. The soldiers of the 304th take their place on the line, and veteran soldiers who mock their inexperience surround them. As a group of enemy soldiers thunders toward them, Henry and his regiment load their weapons and prepare to engage. Miserably, Henry remains convinced that when he has to confront the worst that war has to offer, he might distinguish himself not by how bravely he fights, but by how quickly he runs away.
The self-doubt awakened in Henry in Chapter I continues to plague him as he draws closer to battle in Chapter II. He oscillates between grand, dramatic fantasies of the “traditional courage” that leads to glory in the field and an innocent belief that the army is never going to fight—that his regiment, rendered impotent by Christian education, constitutes merely a “blue demonstration.” Henry’s experiences eventually shatter these preconceptions. His development into a man who understands that courage, duty, and manhood are complicated and sometimes compromised is the most compelling aspect of The Red Badge of Courage.
Even at this early stage, there are excellent opportunities to scrutinize Henry’s conflicted character. He is incredibly vain, obsesses over his own feelings, and seems unwilling to differentiate between moral behavior and behavior that simply wins him the envy and praise of others. In other words, he is less concerned with duty than with glory. He fears being exposed as a coward, not because cowardice marks a shirking of his responsibilities as a soldier, but because such exposure would deny him an illustrious reputation. After all, Henry’s desire for a noble name prompts his enlistment in the first place—he feels little obligation to earn the title of hero. Rather, the “lavish expenditure” of food, smiles, and compliments that he meets on the way to Washington proves to be enough to make him believe that he deserves such rewards.
|
<urn:uuid:8bf9bbc5-2427-4b9a-84ba-17aa49757b05>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
|
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/redbadge/section2.rhtml
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783395679.18/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154955-00089-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.978444
| 855
| 3.03125
| 3
|
From the early days of the Republic , Rome gained strength and frenquently started wars to gain new territory and safeguard its security. Their first major gain was when they captured Veii, the southernmost of the Etruscan cities in 396 BC. Six years later, a Celtic raiding party descended from northern Italy. They defeated the Romans at the River Allia and captured and sacked Rome itself. This did not effect the Romans much as for the rest of the 4th century BC they steadily expanded their political and millitary influence through central Italy. They took over Italy by a astute mixutre of warfare and diplomacy, they used fighting only where necessary.
In 340-338 BC the Romans gained mastery of Latium in the Latin war. They also defeated their erstwhile allies, the Samnites, in the Second and Third Samnite Wars of 327-304 BC and 298-290 BC. This gave them power in the east to Adriatic and southwards to the Bay of Naples. Their next major war was against Pyrrhus, King of Epirus in northwest Greece. In 280 BC, he landed in sourthern Italy with an army of 25,000 men and 20 elephants. Even though Pyrrhus had several victories he was still wasn't able to defeat them so he withdrew back to Epirus five years later. The Romans were able to hold on to sourthern Italy.
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<urn:uuid:2270f9dd-c155-4b7a-9e42-868de31714dd>
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CC-MAIN-2016-26
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http://www.classicsunveiled.com/romeh/html/unifyitaly.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-26/segments/1466783397864.87/warc/CC-MAIN-20160624154957-00022-ip-10-164-35-72.ec2.internal.warc.gz
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Even today it is difficult to reconstruct Johanna Löwenherz’s biography in full. She was born on March 12, 1857 in Rheinbrohl and according to her biographer, Wolfgang Dietz, was “the daughter of a well-to-do Jewish family and brought up in the Jewish faith” (Dietz 1989, 31). Her father, Hermann Löwenherz (1811–1897), was a businessman who owned a quarry. Her mother was Fanni, née Jacobsohn (1826–1902). Little is known about her education, though Cornelia Kunze claims that she studied piano and singing at the Conservatory in Stuttgart and was able to teach Esperanto. Although by upbringing she was closest to the middle-class women’s movement, she switched to the socialist women’s movement, on whose behalf she traveled widely in order to raise consciousness. According to Dietz, this change in her political allegiance led her to abandon Judaism. She was one of the most active representatives of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in the Neuwied region and co-founder of the local Volksbildungsverein (Association for Popular Education). Although her political opinions made her a somewhat controversial figure in the SDP, she was nevertheless elected as a delegate to the regional party conferences in Duisburg (1895), Essen (1897) and Neuweid (1897).
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Combining essential background knowledge with hands-on tools, this practical resource and text provides a detailed roadmap for conducting multidimensional reading assessment. The authors' research expertise and extensive classroom experience are reflected on every page. Presented are effective ways to evaluate K-6 students' spelling, word recognition, fluency, comprehension, strategic knowledge, and more. Aided by lively case examples, preservice and inservice teachers and reading specialists learn to tailor assessment to the needs of each child and use results strategically to inform instruction. The concluding chapter offers useful information on preparing a reading clinic report. Special features of this accessible 8 1/2" x 11" volume include numerous figures, tables, and sample assessment instruments, many with permission to photocopy.
Michael C. McKenna, PhD, a former middle grades teacher, is currently Professor of Reading at Georgia Southern University in Savannah. He visits schools almost every day and has long been interested in identifying teaching strategies that really work in challenging classrooms. Dr. McKenna has published 7 books and more than 100 articles, and his research has been sponsored by the National Reading Research Center (NRRC) and the Center for the Improvement of Early Reading Achievement (CIERA).
Steven A. Stahl, EdD (deceased), was Professor of Reading at the University of Illinois at Urbana/n-/Champaign, where he taught graduate courses in reading. He was a nationally known researcher in the areas of beginning reading, phonics, fluency, and vocabulary instruction.
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Antique silver comes in many different standards of fineness. Sterling is not the only “real” silver. Different countries use different ‘standards of fineness’ to legally define what is considered ‘real’ silver in that country.
- Defining Sterling Silver – Silver by itself is NOT sterling. It needs to be combined with copper in order to be useful. 925 parts of silver:75 parts copper is not the only “real” silver.
- Misunderstanding Sterling – Standards of Fineness are important to understand. Don’t confuse not sterling with not “silver at all”.
Antique Silver comes in many different standards of fineness
Some countries use more than just 1 definition or standard.
- .950 – Japan, France
- .925 – US, UK, Australia, Mexico
- .900 – all early American silver is .900 or “coin silver”. Even Paul Revere’s work is not “sterling”
- .875 – Soviet Union and the Baltic States
- .830 – Scandinavian countries
- .800 – Germany and France
England and the US use .925, but other countries use other standards. For example, Germany’s definition is the .800 standard.
This antique silver ladle is a beautiful, really heavy piece. The silver is a very thick gauge. It would stand up to anything much less a sauce!
The square bowl has pouring spouts on either side. Very handy when you are left handed. A small detail but this piece is full of small details. Look at the photo below. Do you see how the piece transitions from handle to bowl with that sweet little fillip. This is one of my favorite places to check, obviously the marks are often here, but also on a nice piece there will be a wonderful decorative detail.
Different combinations of sterling to copper have different qualities – strength, flexibility, softness. It’s not better or worse – just different. One of the great beauties of antique silver is it’s lack of uniformity, this include the natural variations found in handmade pieces as well as the differing qualities due to different standards of fineness.
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Dendrobium draconis is one of the most common of the genus. It is native to most of Southeast Asia where it grows as an epiphyte. It is a fragrant, intermediate to warm growing plant which flowers in the spring.
It is a bit larger than most of the miniatures we discuss, growing to 12 inches, or 30 centimeters, in some cases, but it generally stays in the 6-8 inch or 13-15 centimeter range. The canes on this plant are interesting in that they have small black hairs on the new growths. The white flowers with orange or red throats appear on short inflorescences with up to five flowers that can reach 3 inches, or 7 centimeters across. The inflorescences appear on older canes. The flowering season is spring to summer and the flowers are surprisingly long lasting with a lovely orange fragrance.
D. draconis can be grown in pots or mounted. They require a cool dry rest during the winter months and careful watering when the new growth appears because they are subject to rot if water gets in the new growth tips. One choice is to soak the plant in some kind of bowl so that the roots get water, but no water is splashed on the new growth tips. It's better to let the shoots get about half an inch, or 2 centimeters, high before watering. During this period be sure that the humidity is kept high to allow the plants to absorb water. After the new growths are large enough start with regular watering and fertilizing and don't allow the plant to dry out until the growth has reached its full height.
The genus Dendrobium is one of the largest in the orchid family. It is comprised of over 1200 species found from Asia, throughout India and the Pacific islands. Most are epiphytes (growing in trees) that have cane-like pseudobulbs. It is important to determine the exact growing requirements of the species you are dealing with since the genus is so diverse that they are broken down to sections in order to further classify them. Also be sure that your conditions are correct for the particular Dendrobium you are considering.
Here is a listing of some vendors who provide seed grown species. Of course, not all species are always available. If youíre interested in something, talk to some of these vendors to see if thereís another variety that is close. Often the only difference would be 8 inches tall versus 6 inches or a different colored flower. Also, please mention that you are calling as a result of seeing them recommended on BellaOnline Orchids.
Carter and Holmes
First Rayís Orchids
Oak Hill Farm
Parkside Orchids Nursery
Tropical Orchid Farm
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Nagamma vs Deveeramma 2001 (6) KarLJ 373 Mysore Act No. 10 of 1933 (Mysore Hindu Law Women's Rights Act, 1933) had been in force on the First day of January, 1934. The question is what is the effect of the provisions of this Act. This Act no doubt governs succession to interest in the property, after coming into force of the Act, it had the effect of regulating the succession to the property in case of a male Hindu dying intestate. The Act declare that it shall come into force on the first day of January 1934. The Act became applicable to persons who but for the passing of this Act, would have been subject to the law of Mitakshara in respect of matters for which the provisions are contained in the Act. Section 3 does not reveal that it is retrospective in operation.
High Court of Mysore in Hutcha Thimme-gowda v. Dyavamma, AIR 1954 Mys 93. The foregoing shows that the Mithakshara law in force in the former Princely State of Mysore was different from the law which was in force in the State of Madras. It could further be seen that the personal laws of Hindus in Madras as well as in the former Princely State of Mysore were amended by statutes passed by Legislature which were in force in the respective areas.
Chinnamma vs Srinivas AIR 1971 Mys 28, (1970) 2 Mys LJ Bench: C Honniah, E Venkataramiah It is well settled law that a Hindu belonging to Mithakshara School continues to be governed by the law in force in the area to which he belongs even though he may migrate to some other area, until it is proved that the family has adopted the Mithakshara law which is in force in the area to which the family has migrated. It is enough to refer In support of what is stated above to a decision of the Privy Council in Abdurahim v. Halimabai, AIR 1915 PC 86, in which it is observed as follows;-- "Where a Hindu family migrates from one part of India to another, prima facie, they carry with them their personal law, and, if they are alleged to have become subject to a new local custom, this new custom must be affirmatively proved to have been adopted....." The position would not be different even when a part of one State is taken out of that State and added on to another for administrative reasons. That was the view which was expressed by the Privy Council in Somashekara Royal v. Sugutur Mahadeva Royal, AIR 1936 PC 18, in which it was held that the mere transfer of a district to another presidency for administrative purposes was not sufficient to affect the personal law of the residents in that district, unless and until it was shown that in the case of any resident there that he had intended to change and had in fact changed his personal law. …….. The mere fact that Venkata-swamy had gone to Mysore in search of an employment cannot, therefore, be considered as sufficient to hold that there was change of his personal law unless it is shown that he intended to do so. Further, in this case it is to be seen that it is not pleaded in the plaint that there was any such change of personal law, applicable to the family of the parties to these proceedings on account of their intention to do so. This question is a question of law and fact and unless proper pleadings are placed before the court and necessary evidence is led in support of the pleadings, it would not be possible to hold that there was such a change in the personal law governing the family. ………… It may also be mentioned here that by virtue of the personal law of the parties derived from the texts which constitute the source of the law, the plaintiff would not be entitled to a share in the family properties on the ground that the properties have passed on to the hands of the sole surviving coparcener. Such a right was created for the first time by the Mysore Act of 1933 which came into force on 1-1-1934 in the former princely State of Mysore. So unless it is established that the parties to this suit were governed by the Mysore Act of 1933, the plaintiff would not be entitled to a share on the ground that the joint family properties passed to the hands of a sole surviving coparcener on the death of Venkataswamy.
High Court of Mysore in Keshava Anantha Dixit v. Rama Dixit, (1947) 25 Mys LJ 94. That was a case in which a Hindu male who belonged to a family that migrated to former Mysore State from Ranibennur in Dharwar District in the days of his paternal grand-father, died intestate in Mysore after the Mysore Act of 1933 came into force, leaving immoveable property in Mysore. He and his father who had pre-deceased him were born in Mysore after the migration. After his death the plaintiffs who were the sons of his mother's sisters, filed a suit claiming to be his nearest heirs according to the school of Hindu Law that prevailed at Ranibennur at the time of migration. The suit was resisted by the defendants who were the paternal grand-father's sister's sons of the Hindu male in question on the ground that they were the nearest heirs to succeed to his estate according to the Hindu Law Women's Rights Act of 1933 in force in Mysore. The Court found that the members of the family who migrated to Mysore had become the subjects of the Maharaja of Mysore, and, therefore, they were governed by the Mysore Act of 1933 which laid down a course of succession different from the one on which the plaintiffs based their suit.
High Court of Mysore in Chikka Kempegowda v. .Madaiya, (1951) 29 Mys LJ 64 in which it was held that the interest that was acquired in a joint family property by a Hindu female governed by Mitakshara under Clause (d) of Section 8 (1) of the Mysore Act of 1933, was a vested right which was heritable and transferable. This view of the former High Court of Mysore receives support from a decision of the Supreme Court in Nagendra Prasad v. Kempananjamma, AIR 1968 SC 209 . While construing the provisions of Section 8 (1) (d) of the Mysore Act of 1933 Bhargava, J-, speaking for the court observed as follows:-- "This example makes it clear that the scope of ascertainment of the females who are to receive a share under Clause (d) must be very wide, because Clause (d) mentions that when the joint family property passes to a single coparcener by survivorship, the right to shares is vested in all the classes of females enumerated in all the three Clauses (a), (b) and (c). That being the position, we do not think that Clause (d) can be interpreted narrowly as giving a right to only those females who happen to be related to one or the other of the last two male coparceners in the manner laid down in Clauses (a) and (b). In fact the language of Clause (d) has to be interpreted as laying down that right to shares will vest in all females of the joint Hindu family who would have possibly received the right to a share if at any earlier time there had been oarti-tion in the family in any of the three manners laid down in Clauses (a), (b) and (c). This intention can only be given effect to on the basis that Clause (d) does not restrict itself to finding out females on the basis of an assumed partition, between the last two male coparceners. It is significant that Clause (d) gives a right independently of a partition and we do not see why its scope should be restricted by assuming a partition. The reference to the earlier Clauses in this Clause must be held to be restricted to the sole purpose of ascertainment of the females falling under Clauses (a), (b) and (c). and once they are ascertained, it has to be held that each one of them becomes entitled to a share under this Clause. The object of Clause (d) is to give to all females entitled to maintenance from the coparcenery property a right to claim a share in the joint family property instead of a right to maintenance and that is why reference is made in it to all females enumerated in Clauses (a), (b) and (c)....." It is therefore clear from the observations of the Supreme Court extracted above, that females who are entitled to a share under Clause (d) of Section 8 (a) of the Mysore Act of 1933, acquire a vested right to a share as laid down by that section. There is no provision in the Mysore Act of 1933 which provides for a vested right being created in respect of a share of a joint family property on a second occasion when the joint family properties pass on the hands of a sole surviving coparcener during the lifetime of the same female who is entitled to a share under that provision.
Nagendra Prasad vs Kempananjamma AIR 1968 SC 209 :- Clause (a) of sub-s. (1) of s 8 of the Hindu Law Women's Rights Act 1933, provided that at a partition of joint family property between a person and his son or sons, those entitled to share with them would be his mother his unmarried daughters, and the widows and unmarried daughters of his predeceased undivided sons and brothers who had no male issue. Clause (b) provided that when the partition was between brothers, those entitled to share with them would be their mother, their unmarried sisters, and the widows and unmarried daughters of their predeceased undivided brothers who had left no male issue. According to cl. (c) clauses (a) and (b) would apply, mutatis mutandis, to a partition among other coparceners in a joint family. Clause (d) laid down that when a joint family property passed to a single coparcener by survivorship it would so pass subject to the right to share of the classes of females enumerated in the earlier clauses. Sub-s.(2) of s. 8 fixed the shares of the aforesaid relatives. Sub-s.(3), inter alia, defined the term 'mother' as including whether there were both a mother and a step-mother, all of them jointly, and the term 'son' as including a step-son, a grandson and a great grandson. It also provided that the Provisions of the section relating to the mother would be applicable, mutatis mutandis, to the paternal grandmother and great grandmother. …………… It is, however, to be noticed that s. 8, in conferring rights on females, envisages two different circumstances in which that right is to accrue to them. The first circumstance is when there is a partition of the joint family property between any co-parceners, and the other is when, though there is no partition, the entire joint Hindu family property passes to a single male owner. It is in both these cases that the Act envisages that the property may lose its character of co-parcenary property, because the co-parcenary body may cease to exist on partition or on survival of a single male member of the family. It seems that the purpose of S. 8 was to safeguard the interests of females in such contingencies where the co-parcenary property is to disappear either by partition or by survival of a sole male member. The legislature seems to have felt that, in such circumstances, it was not safe to leave the females entitled to maintenance, etc, at the mercy of the individuals who may receive property on partition or at the mercy of the individual in whom absolute rights in the property might vest as a result of sole survivorship. For the first contingency, when there is a partition, provision was made in clauses (a), (b) & (c) of sub-section (1) of S. 8 under which a right was granted to the females to ask for separation of their shares if the male members decided to have a partition. Unless the male members themselves sought a partition, it was not considered necessary to grant any right to the females themselves to ask for partition, because the property could not lose its character as co- parcenary property until the male members of the family sought partition. The right of the females under clauses (a), (b) & (c) of section 8(1), therefore, only arises at a partition between the male co-parceners forming the joint Hindu family.
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Canada: No more Stolen Sisters
Indigenous women are going missing and being murdered at a much higher rate than other women in Canada—a rate so high it constitutes nothing less than a national human rights crisis.
According to RCMP data, at least 1,017 Indigenous women and girls were murdered from 1980-2012.
Amnesty International is calling for a comprehensive, coordinated, and well-resourced National Action Plan, created in collaboration with Indigenous women and girls, to stop the violence.
A National Action Plan must address the root causes of violence and identify holistic, culturally-appropriate ways in which to prevent violence and to support those impacted by violence. The National Action Plan should include a national public inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls - focused on exposing the nature of this violence and on ensuring government and police accountability for an effective and coordinated response.
Amnesty International stands in solidarity with the families of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls and Indigenous peoples’ organizations to demand real action now to prevent more sisters from being stolen.
Call on Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to stop the violence now.
To the Prime Minister of Canada:
Too many Indigenous women and girls have gone missing or been murdered. As a society, we have a responsibility to help end this violence.
I call on the federal government to work with Indigenous women and representative organizations, as well as with provinces and territories, to enact a comprehensive National Action Plan to both prevent violence against women and support victims of violence. Such a national action plan must include measures to ensure an effective and unbiased police response but it must also tackle the discrimination and inequalities which lead to such high rates of violence. A comprehensive national action plan must:
- Uphold and promote the rights of all Indigenous women and girls whether they live on reserve or in other communities.
- Ensure effective coordination of federal, provincial, and territorial policies, programs and services affecting the lives and well-being of Indigenous women and girls.
- Address long-standing and deep-rooted patterns of discrimination and impoverishment that put so many Indigenous women and girls in harm's way.
- Ensure that police in every jurisdiction have clear guidance on effective and appropriate responses to threats to Indigenous women's lives and safety, including missing persons protocols based on clear recognition of the heightened risk faced by Indigenous women and girls.
- Help Indigenous women escape from abusive relationships and dangerous situations by ensuring adequate, sustained funding to shelters and frontline organizations providing culturally appropriate services.
- Include a National Public Inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women to expose the nature of violence against Indigenous women and girls and to ensure government and police accountability for an effective and coordinated response.
YOUR VOICE IS NEEDED >>
Ten years ago, Amnesty International released a report on Stolen Sisters, and tens of thousands of human rights supporters have signed petitions urging the government to take action. Learn more about more about the issues, actions you can take, and other helpful links on Amnesty's web page: No More Stolen Sisters
MORE YOU CAN DO:
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Mars, like Earth, appears to have experienced global climate changes over the past few million years. The effects of Earth's ice ages are well recorded in polar ice in Greenland and Antarctica. Similarly, layered deposits in both polar regions on Mars (see Figure 1) appear to record ancient Martian climate variations. Changes in the tilt (relative to the Sun) of the rotation axes of both Earth and Mars are thought to have influenced their climates, but these changes were larger in the Martian case. For this reason and because of the apparent lack of recent oceans and life on Mars, it should be simpler to determine the causes and history of climate changes on Mars. HiRISE has the potential to return images of the polar layered deposits on Mars that will help to unravel Mars' climate history.
Most Mars researchers believe that the polar layered deposits are the result of variations in the amounts of dust and water ice deposited over many climate cycles, but their composition is poorly constrained. In addition, the amount of time needed to form individual layers remains a major uncertainty. Studies of the thickness of polar layers are limited by image resolution. Are thinner layers present, but not visible in the available images? HiRISE is expected to answer this question and better determine the thickness of layers in the polar deposits. Analysis of HiRISE data should result in a better understanding of the timescales involved in the deposition of the layered deposits and provide important information regarding the climate history of Mars.
MGS Mars Orbiter Camera image M03-03597
of the south polar layered deposits.
Resolution = 8.5 m/pixel, illumination from bottom.
(Click for larger version.)
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By Tracy Cozzens
Can GPS be used to detect underground nuclear explosions?
A research team is developing a software program that uses GPS to analyze the ionospheric effect of nuclear explosions. Results would show when and where a country has conducted a secret underground nuclear test. Team members are Jihye Park, Ralph. R. B. von Frese, and Dorota A. Grejner-Brzezinska from The Ohio State University and Jade Yu Morton from Miami University.
The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1996, but not all nuclear countries have ratified it, including the United States, China, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, and Israel. Also, India, North Korea, and Pakistan have not signed the treaty.
Park, a doctoral student in geodetic science at Ohio State, created the computer program to detect changes in the ionosphere from nuclear weapons testing.
A previous study showed that the ionosphere was disturbed by underground nuclear testing conducted by Russia in 1990. GPS is capable of precisely measuring the total electron content (TEC) of the ionosphere along the path between satellite and receiver at a GPS station, so Park and her team decided to begin researching the use of GPS in detecting nuclear explosions.
“Many studies have been done to monitor and model the atmosphere using GPS technology,” Park said. “Research has proven that GPS can detect natural disasters such as earthquakes or tsunamis. This study broadens those areas of study with its capability to detect underground explosions.”
Detonation of a nuclear weapon results in a shockwave that travels through the atmosphere, changing the density of charged particles in the ionosphere. “The explosions can’t hide from the ionosphere,” said von Frese, geophysicist and project leader. “Our technology would be another nail in the structure to detect explosions.”
“One of the arguments is ‘Well, how do you prove that a clandestine explosion occurred?’” said Grejner-Brzezinska, Park’s adviser and GPS World’s Tech Talk blog editor. “Now we can say, ‘Here, we have the data from GPS to show when and where.’”
According to the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) nuclear testing has been carried out in the past by the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, and North Korea (see Figure 1).
Researchers, and those monitoring treaty violations, are able to target specific geographic areas that are equipped for tests, since development of a nuclear test site requires a lot of technical effort and budget. For example, the North Korean tests carried out in 2006 and 2009 were very close geographically.
“They tend to stick to the same site and reuse their facilities for nuclear testing,” von Frese said. “So a country that has previously conducted underground nuclear testing probably will reuse the site if new testing is needed.”
“They could be monitored using GPS as long as there are GPS stations nearby,” Park said.
The new GPS nuclear-detection technology was presented at the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization meeting held June 8–10 in Vienna, Austria, and received press coverage that drew additional interest.
GPS Detection. The team zeroed in on a specific event to test the software, selecting a nuclear test conducted by North Korea in 2009 and using data pulled from nearby South Korean GPS stations.
Traditional detection methods for underground nuclear tests include seismic and other sensors. The CTBTO operates an international monitoring system to detect explosions with a yield of at least one kiloton. Besides seismic sensors, monitoring includes hydroacoustic sensors to monitor for shockwaves on land and in water, infrasound to detect pressure waves, and radionuclide detectors for any gas that may have been generated, though the levels aren’t always detectable.
“Even though there are four different systems available, they sometimes are unable to detect the underground nuclear explosions,” Park said. “GPS technology will make the detection validation stronger since each of them is based on a different theory. In the case of the nuclear test conducted by North Korea in 2009, only seismic and a few infrasound sensors detected the event because of their improved containment technique. Our study tracked down the 2009 event using GPS, and found it coincided with the seismic results.”
Park was able to take advantage of the well-established worldwide infrastructure already in place for GPS for her software test. The team used GPS data recorded by South Korean GPS receivers of the 2009 North Korea test. “There are a few IGS (International GNSS Service) stations in South Korea, China, and Japan. Since South Korea runs their own GPS network, I requested the data so that we could obtain data from more stations located in South Korea,” Park said.
“Since the stations we chose were permanent reference stations controlled by an international organization (IGS) and a specific country (Republic of Korea or South Korea) respectively, most of them have been running continuously except for unexpected data gaps from time to time,” Park said. Figure 2 shows the GPS stations processed for the project.
With data in hand, Park was able to test her software. The results showed definite peaks from different stations at different times after the 2009 explosion. “We realized that the time of the detected peak was dependent on the distance between underground nuclear explosion and each GPS station,” Park said. Figure 3 shows four different stations’ TIDs (traveling ionospheric disturbances) that the team initially recognized.
Ruling Out Quakes. One big challenge using GPS for ionospheric monitoring is determining the origin of an event. “Since earthquakes also disturb the ionosphere, distinguishing earthquakes from underground nuclear explosions are problematic even with GPS,” Park said. “Indeed, we only focused on examining and isolating TIDs from the nuclear explosions. We are now working to analyze the TIDs from earthquakes and compare them with nuclear TIDs.”
Besides helping to distinguish between earthquakes and nuclear-test explosions, the software may eventually distinguish between nuclear plant fallout and nuclear test fallout.
With this goal in mind, the team is analyzing the ionospheric data gathered from recent nuclear plant accidents such as the one in Japan following the earthquake and tsunami in March. “Since there were data gaps and other data issues, we have as yet nothing more to report. Hopefully, we find the earthquakes’ signature soon.”
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Since of the end of 36 years of the civil war in 1996, Guatemala has pursued several economic reforms aimed at ensuring greater macroeconomic stabilization. Although significant progress has been made on several fronts, various challenges remain. The enforcement of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) in 1996 has ensured greater foreign investment and diversification of exports. One of the top ten poor nations in the world, Guatemala faces the problem of unequal distribution of income and high level of malnutrition. The country’s trade deficit has continued to grow and its GDP growth rate has declined in the last couple of years.
Guatemala Economic Structure: Major Contributors
The decline in Guatemala’s real GDP growth rate from 6.3% in 2007 to 4% in 2008 and -0.5% in 2009 is largely attributable to the declining export demand from the United States and the other Central American nations. Nearly 90% of Guatemala’s GDP is contributed by the private sector, with the government’s involvement limited to some public utilities and development oriented financial institutions.
Like all developing nations, the services segment plays a significant role in Guatemala’s economy and contributes nearly 65% of its GDP, while employing 50% of the country’s population. Although the country’s abundant and unique ecosystem allows it to have a diversity of crops, inequitable distribution of land and scarcity of resources act as constraints and restrict the agriculture sector’s contribution to the GDP to around 10%. Guatemala’s agriculture segment employs nearly 50% of the country’s population and the major products grown are sugarcane, corn, bananas, coffee, beans, cardamom, cattle, sheep, pigs and chickens. In recent years products like fruits, vegetables, flowers and ornamental plants are being grown for export purposes.
The country’s manufacturing industry largely comprises of food processing or light assembly units and employs nearly 15% of the country’s population. Major items being manufactured are sugar, textiles, clothing, furniture, chemicals, petroleum, metals and rubber. Poor infrastructure and lack of skilled workers, however, hinder the performance of the industrial segment, which contributes nearly 25% of the country’s GDP. A major source of foreign exchange inflows is the remittances from Guatemala’s large expatriate community in the United States.
Guatemala Economic Structure: Problems
Guatemala economy faces several challenges in the form of unequal distribution of income, negotiation of international assistance, curtailing crime and drug trafficking and narrowing the country’s trade deficit, overhauling the country’s public finances and improving the food situation and nutrition levels.
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Not all bees are the same in behavior and nesting habits. While some bees, such as bumblebees, build their nests off the ground, other bees such as wasps, build nests in the ground. And if these nests are near your habitat, they can become a nuisance. While your first instinct is to kill them right away without thinking it through, this can be very dangerous. Bees do not take kindly to threats and will attack if they are threatened. If you are going to attempt to get rid of the ground bees yourself, the following process may serve you well:
1. Wait until dark before doing anything. Since bees are most active during the day, trying any method to kill them will be more safe when they are dormant.
2. Try soaking the ground around their nests with water. Ground bees are not fond of damp areas, and will seek out dry ground. However, this may not work all the time. If it does not, try the next step.
3. Put some powdered insecticide down the opening of the hole. Liquid does not spread as well as powder, making it harder to get inside the entire nest.
4. Should the above step not work, you may want to hire a professional exterminator. They will have professional products that will help to rid your property of ground bees for good. You may also want to consider hiring out if there are numerous ground bee nests on your property, as the professionals may have equipment to deal with all the nests all at once.
For centuries, people have been getting rid of ground bees on their properties with a variety of methods that have been handed down through the generations. Some of these ideas include:
–Pour a bucket of turpentine on the nests. Sounds pretty effective, since no living creature can breathe that in and live.
–Smoke out the bees, and then seal the opening once all the bees are out.
–Soapy water poured down the opening of the nest may help to drive out the bees. After pouring the water, be sure to move quickly away from the opening, as they will race out to avoid the water. The theory behind this one is that if you continue keeping the ground around the opening wet, the nest will eventually cave in, trapping the queen bee and other bees still inside. Other bees will not return because of the smell.
–Put mothballs down the opening of the nest. This is repels bees, and they will not stick around very long.
–Place a large glass bowl over the opening of the nest. While this may not kill the bees right away, it will eventually kill them from lack of food and water. This may be the least dangerous option, as it does not harm the environment with harmful chemicals.
Killing bees is a dangerous activity if you do not know what you are doing. Protect yourself by following any directions listed on pesticides. Also, if you or any of your family members are allergic to bee stings, by all means, hire an exterminator and stay far away from the nest. Killing ground bees are not worth making you or a loved one sick. You are out to kill bees, not yourself or your family!
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As I've explained before, we don't write a conclusion for task 1, we write an overview. You can put this at the end of your essay, but I prefer to put it straight after the introduction. Let's return to last week's life cycle question.
Example introduction and overview:
The diagram illustrates the various stages in the life of a honey bee. We can see that the complete life cycle lasts between 34 and 36 days. It is also noticeable that there are five main stages in the development of the honey bee, from egg to mature adult insect.
Note: I often separate the introduction and overview, but in this case I've put them together in the same paragraph. Both ways are fine.
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Quantification of In-Flight Physical Changes - Anthropometry and Neutral Body Posture (Body Measures) - 06.15.16
Currently, NASA does not have sufficient in-flight anthropometric data (body measurements) gathered to assess the impact of physical body shape and size changes on suit sizing. This study will involve collecting anthropometric data (body measurements) using digital still and video imagery and a tape measure to measure segmental length, height, depth, and circumference data for all body segments (i.e., chest, waist, hip, arms, legs, etc.) from astronauts for pre-, post-, and in-flight conditions. Science Results for Everyone
Information Pending Experiment Details
OpNom: Body Measures
Sudhakar Rajulu, Ph.D., Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX, United States
Karen Young, Lockheed Martin, ABF, Houston, TX, United States
Ryan Zackary Amick, Ph.D., Wyle Science, Technology, and Engineering Group, Houston, TX, United States
Thomas Dirlich, Ergonomics Institute & Aeronautics Institute & TUM, Germany
NASA Johnson Space Center, Human Research Program, Houston, TX, United States
Sponsoring Space Agency
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
NASA Research Office - Human Research Program (NASA Research-HRP)
Scientific Discovery, Earth Benefits, Space Exploration
ISS Expedition Duration 1
September 2013 - March 2016; March 2016 - September 2017
NASA does not have sufficient in-flight anthropometric data gathered to assess the impact of physical body shape and size changes on suit sizing.
Microgravity effects on body measurements (lengths, breadths, widths, circumferences, and joint angles of subjects exposed to microgravity in an unsuited condition) will be gathered and documented.
If/how individual neutral body posture (NBP) is influenced by these factors will be determined.
This research will gather preliminary data so that we can better understand the magnitude and variability of the changes to body measurements.
Anthropometric measurements will be collected from crew participants during one pre-flight data collection session, three to six in-flight data collection points (early, mid, and late mission at a minimum), and one post-flight data collection session. In-flight data collection will include photo and video-based measurements for body lengths and postures, as well as measurement of body segment circumferences using a tape measure. Body mass will also be measured using the Russian Body Mass Measurement Device (via data sharing with Space Medicine) or the HRF SLAMMD. Ground-based data collection sessions will be performed in the US Lab mockup and the Anthropometry and Biomechanics facility at JSC and will also include the collection of anthropometric measurements using an anthropometer, tape measure, photographs, and a 3D whole-body laser scanner, as well as a weight measurement. The video portion of the investigation will not be performed pre- and post-flight.
Flight hardware requirements for this study require a kit to be flown with commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware. The kit will include a tape measure, spherical body markers, adhesives for attachment of the body markers, head caps, spandex shorts and top, and blindfolds for NBP.
Comprehensive body measurements have never been recorded in space before. Scientists anticipate changes in crewmembers’ body shapes and sizes due to fluid shifts resulting from microgravity. Long-term changes in crewmembers’ bodies could require new designs for suits, clothing and work stations to maximize health and efficiency during future space missions.
The investigation could help scientists understand the effects of prolonged bed rest, which produces physiological changes similar to those experienced in microgravity. Results could also improve the Neutral Body Posture template, based on the normal curvature of the spine, which is used in a wide range of design standards for ergonomic equipment and medical care.
Operational Requirements and Protocols
- Nine subjects are needed; seven male and two female.
- Three nominal sessions will be performed at FD15, FD80, and R-15 (early, mid, and late during the mission). Three additional reserve sessions will be performed, at FD45, FD105, and FD135, if crew time allows. Scheduling tolerance for the FD15 session is ±5 days, for FD45, 80, 105, and 135 it is ±7 days, and R-15 is ±15 days.
- Real time video downlink is required for verification of camera placement and subject positioning.
- Measurement recordings, photos and videos shall be downlinked after each session.
- Photographs and video should be taken in front of an EXPRESS rack with space available for movement through the different required body positions.
- Body mass measurements are also required at FD15, FD80, and R-15 (all +/- 30 days). All measurements for a given subject must be performed using the same device. This data will nominally be obtained via data sharing from Space Medicine (using the Russian Body Mass Measurement Device); however, use of SLAMMD will be required for all three sessions if any of the three will not available from Space Medicine’s use of the Russian Body Mass Measurement Device.
During in-flight data collection sessions, circumference measurements and photographic and video imagery will be collected during each session. The subject will begin the session by setting up the two cameras. Once the cameras are set up, the operator will place the body markers on the subject. The subject will then stand in front of a specified ISS rack in the US Lab module to collect photographic imagery in three postures: a front facing posture (front), side with right arm extended 45°(side 1), and side with right arm abducted 90° (side 2). The operator will take two sets of pictures per posture. After the still photographs are collected, the operator will then collect each circumference measurement twice using the provided tape measure, and the measurements will be recorded in the Data Collection Tool (DCT). The operator will then take the body markers off of the subject and adjust the cameras to collect video of the subject performing Neutral Body Posture (NBP) while floating. NBP consists of performing three phases: an effort phase, a relaxed phase, and a neutral phase. The effort phase consists of the subject maintaining a starting posture, such as a stretched or crouched posture. The effort phase is then followed by the relaxed phase in which the subject relaxes and transitions between the effort posture and a neutral body posture. This NBP sequence is repeated 10 times per session, altering and randomizing the effort phase posture each time in the session. Once the collection of NBP videos is complete, the subject will disassemble the camera set-up and stow the equipment for the next data collection session. The subject will then complete data transfer to the ground of the photographs, video, and measurements. Subject body mass will also be measured using the Russian Body Mass Measurement Device (via data sharing with Space Medicine) or the HRF SLAMMD within 30 days of the other body measurements.^ back to top
Decadal Survey Recommendations
Information Pending^ back to top
Information Pending^ back to top
This image contains the subject outfitted with body markers and positioned in each of the three poses that will be used for photographic measurements: a front facing posture (left), side with right arm extended 45°(middle), and side with right arm abducted 90° (right). Image courtesy of HRP.
+ View Larger Image
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Pregnant women worry. They worry whether the baby is healthy; they worry if they’re eating right and avoiding everything that could possibly be harmful to the new life growing within. They also worry about the right way to give birth.
They shouldn’t, because there is no right way. Surprisingly, despite its nearly total cultural embrace, the claim that “natural” childbirth, meaning without any medical intervention, is best is ill-founded. The movement started with Grantly Dick-Read, a British doctor who practiced from the 1930s to the 1950s and wrote the books Natural Childbirth and Childbirth Without Fear. Dick-Read was a eugenicist concerned that white women were committing “race suicide” by limiting the size of families. He thought fear of childbirth pain was the problem and insisted that it was fear of the pain that was causing the pain. In other words, it was all in women’s heads.
Thankfully, we’ve moved beyond the fabrications of Dick-Read, but the assumed superiority of “natural” childbirth is still based on some powerful myths, such as:
Myth #1: Childbirth is inherently safe.
Childbirth is and has always been—in every time, place and culture—a leading cause of death of young women. For babies, the day of birth is the single most dangerous day of their entire 18 years of childhood.
(PHOTOS: The Perils of Childbirth in Afghanistan)
Myth #2: Labor is not inherently painful.
Natural childbirth advocates insist that labor pain (“good pain”) is different than other forms of pain. Not true. It is received by the same neurons, passed up the spinal cord, and perceived by the brain in exactly the same way as any other form of pain.
Myth #3: Epidurals are unnecessary and dangerous.
Advocates of “natural” childbirth insist the pain of labor can be managed naturally, or if not, should just be endured. That’s the naturalistic fallacy—the claim that because something is a certain way in nature, it ought to be that way all the time. But in nature, people endure all sorts of pain that we wouldn’t hesitate to treat; there’s no reason to make an exception for labor pain, which is arguably worse. Advocates also insist that epidurals are “dangerous” to both baby and mother. Not true. The risk of death from a labor epidural is less than the risk of death from a lightning strike.
Myth #4: Interventions are “bad.”
Since childbirth is inherently dangerous (see Myth #1,) interventions are simply preventive medicine. Complications are common and often preventable, so it is only logical to monitor pregnant women to prevent those complications, or treat them early rather than late.
Myth #5: Cesareans are almost always unnecessary.
On the contrary, C-sections are usually a necessary choice that prevents fatalities. In countries where the C-section rate is less than 10%, mortality rates are extraordinarily high. For example, according to a 2007 paper on international C-section rates published the journal Paediatric and Perinatal Epidemiology, Egypt with a C-section rate of 11.4% had an early neonatal mortality rate of 16/10,000 and the maternal mortality rate was 84/10,000. Conversely, the United States had a relatively high C-Section rate at 24 percent at the time, but an early neonatal mortality rate of 4/10,000, and a maternal mortality rate of 17/10,000. In 2009, the World Health Organization withdrew its recommendation of an ideal C-section rate of 10-15%, acknowledging that there was never any scientific evidence to support the claim that a rate under 15% is optimal.
The “natural” childbirth movement would have us believe that vaginal birth is inherently superior. It’s not. A birth that results in a live, healthy baby and live, healthy mother is inherently superior, and for a significant proportion of women, that birth is a cesarean section.
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If you don’t readily recognize the word “pulses,” or know it is the official name for the category of food that includes dry peas, chickpeas, beans and lentils, you’re not alone. In fact, most Americans have no idea what pulses are. But many of those same people likely have a can of chickpeas, a bag of dried lentils or some black beans lurking on the shelves of their kitchen cupboards. And now that the United Nations has officially declared 2016 the International Year of Pulses, it’s only a matter of time before this pantry staple also becomes a household word.
Pulses, it turns out, have a lot going for them in terms of nutrition, sustainability and affordability. Here are the top five reasons to start including more of them in your diet.
They’re inexpensive. For just a few dollars, you can buy enough dried pulses to make several servings. The precooked, canned versions are slightly more expensive, but they’re still a bargain source of protein compared to the cost of meat.
They’ll help you lose weight. A study of people on a reduced-calorie diet showed that those who ate the most pulses (about a half-cup a day) lost four times more weight than those who ate the least (less than a tablespoon per day).
They’re versatile. Think beyond beans and rice or lentil soup. Pulses can be used in everything from dips and smoothies to main dishes — and even desserts.
They’re good for the planet. Pulses have a low carbon footprint and use significantly less water than other foods. For instance, while it takes only 43 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of pulses, a farmer will use 800 to 1,000 gallons of water to raise 1 pound of meat.
They’re high-protein, high-fiber foods. Just a half-cup of cooked pulses provides 9 grams of protein and 7 or more grams of fiber. They are also incredibly nutrient-dense — pulses pack high amounts of iron, magnesium, zinc, potassium and B vitamins. They even provide more antioxidants than much-touted antioxidant powerhouses, like berries and pomegranates.
Need more inspiration? Take the Pulse Pledge. When you sign up and commit to eating at least one serving of pulses per week for 10 weeks, you’ll receive information and recipes to help you find delicious new ways to use pulses.
Here are three recipes to help you incorporate pulses into your diet:
Sally Wadyka is a Boulder, Colorado-based journalist who writes about nutrition, health and wellness.
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Tajikistan’s Pamir Highway: A Decaying Lifeline to the East
Ask anyone selling just about anything in Tajikistan’s lonely eastern outpost of Murgab where they got it, and odds are they’re going to give the same answer: Osh, Kyrgyzstan.
At over 3,600 meters above sea level, little grows in dusty Murgab. Food is imported. Locals burn short, dry shrubs and yak dung to keep warm and cook their food. Seven hundred years ago, Marco Polo described the region as “nothing but a desert without habitations or any green thing, so that travelers are obliged to carry with them whatever they have need of.” It seems an unlikely location for any kind of settlement.
The town of approximately 5,000 ethnic Kyrgyz and Tajiks was the site of Pamirskii Post, a Russian garrison established at the end of the 19th century.
Positioned less than 100 kilometers from both the Chinese and Afghan frontiers – and over 4,000 kilometers from Moscow – Murgab grew in the 1930s to supply and support the newly constructed Pamir Highway, which connected the Pamir Mountains with the rest of the Soviet Union. The Soviets hailed their road as an engineering and ideological triumph. The Bolshevik historian M.M. Slavinskii proclaimed, “instead of isolated districts there is now one connected and unified economic whole where there used to be inaccessible periphery.”
For another 60 years, the region depended heavily on Moscow for food and fuel. With the end of the Soviet Union, government subsidies for both the community and the road evaporated.
Despite its decay, the Pamir Highway – officially the M41, which runs 1,252 kilometers between Osh and Dushanbe – remains a lifeline in the desolate alpine plains of eastern Tajikistan. Murgab drivers make the 12-hour journey to buy foods from the lush valleys of Kyrgyzstan and sell them in Pamir towns.
“I can get some fruits and vegetables in Khorog” – capital of Gorno-Badakhshan province, at least six hours in the other direction – “but the quality, variety, and price are much better in Osh,” said a fruit seller in Murgab’s small bazaar.
Although Tajikistan opened its border to Chinese trucks in 2004, those vehicles bypass Murgab completely on their way to Dushanbe, stopping only to rest for the night on the edge of town.
Khalli, an ethnic Kyrgyz driver who regularly ferries tourists the 400 kilometers between Murgab and Osh in his Soviet-made UAZ jeep, has recently begun trying his hand in the market, scooping up watermelons, tomatoes, and grapes while in Osh. “I can buy a watermelon for about six somoni ($1.25) and sell it in Karakol for 15 or 20. In Murgab for 29! Maybe.”
Fruits and vegetables are regularly sold at four to five times their original cost, but it’s that “maybe” that makes all the difference. Drivers like Khalli don’t have much ready cash and their vehicles take a beating on the M41. As the second-highest paved roadway in the world, it’s ravaged each year by the spring thaw and destructive snowmelt. Entire sections have been washed away, requiring regular river crossings; boulders are strewn throughout the passes; and in many sections the crumbled pavement has been abandoned in favor of relatively smoother dirt sidetracks. Few repairs are ever made.
The journey crosses three major mountain passes and, after entering Tajikistan, seldom drops below 3,800 meters. The highest point, Ak-Baital Pass, culminates at 4,655 meters. The border itself is at 4,282 meters and is delineated merely with a sign declaring, “Tajikistan,” and a statue of an ibex. Customs posts stand guard more than 20 kilometers apart at lower – but still chilling – elevations, along unpaved stretches of dirt. A simple metal bar to halt vehicles, a few soldiers in heavy coats, and an ad hoc flagpole suffice to regulate traffic between the two countries.
Although Khalli has made this drive for years, on a recent trip he was unsure how customs agents on either side of the border would respond to his trunk full of goods. “I gave them each a watermelon and that seems to be okay this time,” he said with some relief. “They always want something.”
Turat, another ethnic Kyrgyz from Murgab, shrugs his shoulders about the road. “Nobody is going to fix it for us, but the plows clear the snow in winter and it’s open all year round, with a few exceptions. I can drive to a hospital in Osh; my daughter takes a minibus to Bishkek for university; I have regular business driving tourists between Osh, Murgab, Khorog, and Dushanbe. What do people expect? Tajikistan is a poor country.”
Although he often reminisces about how the Soviet Union supplied everything Tajikistan needed, Turat feels it’s time for the region to find its own opportunities. The road, in any condition, helps with that. “The Pamir Highway is beautiful, and it brings good business for people who know how to look for it,” he said. “Today we are seeing tourists instead of Soviet military vehicles coming over the road. This is a good thing.”
Latest from Kyrgyzstan
Latest from Tajikistan
We would like to hear your opinion about the new site. Tell us what you like, and what you don't like in an email and send it to: firstname.lastname@example.org
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In recent years, increasing numbers of organisations have recognised that there is a powerful case for managing the social, environmental and wider economic impacts of their activities. Many organisations however, are unsure of how best to act.
The purpose of the SIGMA Guidelines
The Guidelines help organisations to:
The SIGMA project has developed the SIGMA Guidelines to provide clear, practical advice to organisations to enable them to make a meaningful contribution to sustainable development.
|effectively meet challenges posed by social, environmental and economic dilemmas, threats and opportunities.|
|become architects of a more sustainable future.|
The development of the guidelines
The SIGMA Project has involved a unique range of leading practitioners, thinkers and opinion formers to ensure the Guidelines are as effective and credible as possible. They were developed through:
|research into best practice and by commissioning new work|
|practical piloting of different drafts of the Guidelines by leading companies and public sector organisations|
|input from stakeholders, particularly from the wide range of organisations represented on our Project Steering Group.|
The Guidelines consist of:
|a set of Guiding Principles that help organisations to understand sustainability and their contribution to it.|
|a Management Framework that integrates sustainability issues into core processes and mainstream decision-making. It is structured into phases and sub-phases.|
SIGMA is the first of its kind, but it links into existing management systems and frameworks such as ISO 14001, Investors in People, the ISO 9000 series, OHSAS 18001 and AA1000 Framework, thus enabling compatibility with existing systems and helping organisations to build on what they already have in place.
The SIGMA Guidelines provide flexible and workable solutions that can be implemented across a wide range of sectors, types of organisation and functions. This document is a guide for practitioners. Its intended audiences are:
|organisations from the private, public and voluntary sectors, regardless of size, industry or stage of development in understanding the sustainability challenge|
|managers responsible for directing, planning or implementing sustainable approaches in their organisations, including functional specialists such as product designers, human resources and business process professionals|
|anyone interested in the contribution organisations can make to sustainable development.|
About the SIGMA Project
The SIGMA Project – Sustainability – Integrated Guidelines for Management – was launched in 1999 by the British Standards Institution, the leading standards body; Forum for the Future, a leading sustainability charity and think-tank; and AccountAbility, the international professional body for accountability, with the support of the UK Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).
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The Database activity in Moodle is a powerful tool for gathering and organizing information. Even better, it’s highly customizable and can be tailored to fit the needs of your course. Below are some ideas for integrating this activity into your course plan.
- Showcase student projects – Upload pictures, documents, and descriptions of past students’ work for inspiration, or ask current students to upload their work to make peer editing much simpler (Check out Example Database: Old Moodle Themes).
- Pool resources – Have students upload PDFs, citations, and abstracts of journal articles and other sources to create a group annotated bibliography to aid in researching for final papers. (Check out video below!)
- Log topics covered in class – Include pages covered from textbook, notes, PowerPoints, and homework assignments so students can keep track of assignments and study aids, and absent students can catch up quickly.
- Create a classic database of literary works – Have students add titles, themes, and characters of books or movies relevant to class topics (Check out Example Database: Moodle Buzz).
- Offer a suggestion box and gather student feedback – Allow students to propose changes or ideas for discussion and gauge other students’ agreement by enabling the Ratings and Comments settings.
- Track characters in a simulation class – Record background information for each character, nation, or player and have students edit the entries to log actions and events as the course progresses.
To create your own Database activity, you’ll set form fields for each piece of data you want to collect and alter templates for viewing entries. Organizing entries is even easier, as you may sort by user, time entered, keyword, or any form field that you create. Through settings for comments and ratings you can create a collaborative tool for students to not only contribute information, but expand on the entries of others. Information entered in most fields (unfortunately, not uploaded documents) can be exported to a spreadsheet and imported into future classes, making it easier to share the efforts of past students.
Templates can be a little tricky, but don’t let that deter you from using this activity in your course. For help with the Database activity, documentation from Moodle or watch the
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Joined: 27 September 2006
By Paul Davies
may be hiding in plain sight. Although they might look like ordinary
bacteria, their biochemistry could involve exotic amino acids or
different elemental building blocks.
Kenn Brown Mondolithic Studios
he origin of life is one of the great unsolved problems of science. Nobody knows how, where or when life originated. About all that is known for certain is that microbial life had established itself on Earth by about three and a half billion years ago. In the absence of hard evidence of what came before, there is plenty of scope for disagreement.
Thirty years ago the prevailing view among biologists was that life resulted from a chemical fluke so improbable it would be unlikely to have happened twice in the observable universe. That conservative position was exemplified by Nobel Prize–winning French biologist Jacques Monod, who wrote in 1970: "Man at last knows that he is alone in the unfeeling immensity of the universe, out of which he emerged only by chance." In recent years, however, the mood has shifted dramatically. In 1995 renowned Belgian biochemist Christian de Duve called life "a cosmic imperative" and declared "it is almost bound to arise" on any Earth-like planet. De Duve's statement reinforced the belief among astrobiologists that the universe is teeming with life. Dubbed biological determinism by Robert Shapiro of New York University, this theory is sometimes expressed by saying that "life is written into the laws of nature."
How can scientists determine which view is correct? The most direct way is to seek evidence for life on another planet, such as Mars. If life originated from scratch on two planets in a single solar system, it would decisively confirm the hypothesis of biological determinism. Unfortunately, it may be a long time before missions to the Red Planet are sophisticated enough to hunt for Martian life-forms and, if they indeed exist, to study such extraterrestrial biota in detail.
An easier test of biological determinism may be possible, however. No planet is more Earth-like than Earth itself, so if life does emerge readily under terrestrial conditions, then perhaps it formed many times on our home planet. To pursue this tantalizing possibility, scientists have begun searching deserts, lakes and caverns for evidence of "alien" life-forms—organisms that would differ fundamentally from all known living creatures because they arose independently. Most likely, such organisms would be microscopic, so researchers are devising tests to identify exotic microbes that could be living among us.
Scientists have yet to reach a consensus on a strict definition of life, but most would agree that two of its hallmarks are an ability to metabolize (to draw nutrients from the environment, convert those nutrients into energy and excrete waste products) and an ability to reproduce. The orthodox view of biogenesis holds that if life on Earth originated more than once, one form would have swiftly predominated and eliminated all the others. This extermination might have happened, for example, if one form quickly appropriated all the available resources or "ganged up" on a weaker form of life by swapping successful genes exclusively with its own kind. But this argument is weak. Bacteria and archaea, two very different types of microorganisms that descended from a common ancestor more than three billion years ago, have peacefully coexisted ever since, without one eliminating the other. Moreover, alternative forms of life might not have directly competed with known organisms, either because the aliens occupied extreme environments where familiar microbes could not survive or because the two forms of life required different resources.
The Argument for Aliens
Even if alternative life does not exist now, it might have flourished in the distant past before dying out for some reason. In that case, scientists might still be able to find markers of their extinct biology in the geologic record. If alternative life had a distinctively different metabolism, say, it might have altered rocks or created mineral deposits in a way that cannot be explained by the activities of known organisms. Biomarkers in the form of distinctive organic molecules that could not have been created by familiar life might even be hiding in ancient microfossils, such as those found in rocks dating from the Archean era (more than 2.5 billion years ago).
Aliens in Italy!
Author: WillSmith456 Replies: 4 Views: 804
|WillSmith456||4||804||18 September 2008 at 1:54pm by samz-14|
Are aliens have bases on the moon ?
Author: WillSmith456 Replies: 3 Views: 889
|WillSmith456||3||889||02 September 2008 at 12:14pm by deep321|
Author: Vitna Replies: 5 Views: 664
|Vitna||5||664||25 July 2008 at 6:55am by shijhu|
Aliens Space Ships Sighted Over London!
Author: WillSmith456 Replies: 0 Views: 774
|WillSmith456||0||774||14 November 2007 at 4:22am by WillSmith456|
Aliens Underground Bases found in America
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|WillSmith456||1||2462||03 November 2007 at 6:01am by WillSmith456|
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[Footnote 4: From the version of the Marquise de Sainte-Aulaire.]
THE NATURE OF EPIC
Rigid definitions in literature are, however, dangerous. At bottom, it is what we feel, not what we think, that makes us put certain poems together and apart from others; and feelings cannot be defined, but only related. If we define a poem, we say what we think about it; and that may not sufficiently imply the essential thing the poem does for us. Hence the definition is liable either to be too strict, or to admit work which does not properly satisfy the criterion of feeling. It seems probable that, in the last resort, classification in literature rests on that least tangible, least definable matter, style; for style is the sign of the poem’s spirit, and it is the spirit that we feel. If we can get some notion of how those poems, which we call epic, agree with one another in style, it is likely we shall be as close as may be to a definition of epic. I use the word “style,” of course, in its largest sense—manner of conception as well as manner of composition.
An easy way to define epic, though not a very profitable way, would be to say simply, that an epic is a poem which produces feelings similar to those produced by Paradise Lost or the Iliad, Beowulf or the Song of Roland. Indeed, you might include all the epics of Europe in this definition without losing your breath; for the epic poet is the rarest kind of artist. And while it is not a simple matter to say off-hand what it is that is common to all these poems, there seems to be general acknowledgment that they are clearly separable from other kinds of poetry; and this although the word epic has been rather badly abused. For instance, The Faery Queene and La Divina Commedia have been called epic poems; but I do not think that anyone could fail to
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Because dogs inspire such strong, powerful feelings, they are perfect subjects for poetry. As any poet knows, the more one feels about the subject, the better the poem will be. Poetry without heart is spotted quickly and discarded easily. True passion is impossible to fake.
Any search for poetry about dogs yields prolific results. This attests to the strong, irreplaceable feelings we have for our species' best friends. Those who own dogs know how quickly they become an essential part of the family. They are not just animals that are owned, but beings with personalities who are cherished and loved.
Many poems extol the virtue of dogs over that of humans. In his "Epitaph to a Dog" Lord Byron writes:
This Praise, which would be unmeaning Flattery
If inscribed over human Ashes
Is but a just tribute to the memory of
BOATSWAIN, a Dog
Clearly the author holds his beloved pet in virtue high over anyone else. Indeed, the hearts of dog owners, as illustrated by Jonathan Swift's inscription written for the collar of a friend's lapdog, lie within their dogs. In fact, dogs are often praised for their higher qualities- loyalty, bravery, forgiveness, etc., and are often used as representatives of such. The beginning of the epitaph for Byron's dog illustrates this nicely, describing him as
...one who possessed Beauty without Vanity,
Strength without Insolence
Courage without Ferocity
and all the virtues of Man without his Vices.
The strength of Byron's attachment to his canine companion cannot be denied. Even those who do not consider themselves dog enthusiasts must admit that the characteristics portrayed by these creatures (both in reality, or represented in fiction) make them intriguing personifications of the very best characteristics for which humans strive.
While many poems extol dogs above humans, just as many use dogs as a study in behavior, to reveal touching truths about (human) nature. The poem "Two Dogs Have I" by Ogden Nash illustrates the relationship between his smaller, elderly dog and the larger, younger puppy. It follows Nash's typical style of rhythm, rhyme and repetition, tripping off the tongue almost like a jig or song. The poem humorously displays the little dog's irritation with and hatred of the big dog as she "grumbles broken curses" and "calls him Pig-dog." Nash's personification is perfect, easily bringing to mind the image of a grumpy, elderly creature in her mannerisms. To balance this, the big dog actually loves the little dog, despite the obviousness of her feelings towards him, and "clings to the little dog / like glue and cement and mortar." To remain fair, Nash justifies the little dog's feelings toward the big dog by explaining how she
...was once the household darling...
He romps like young Adonis
She droops like an old mustache.
Though the subjects are dogs, Nash presents them in human terms, which not only shows his deep feelings for both of them, but allows the reader (who knows neither) to understand and feel close to them as well. The reader, also, can choose whether to think of the poem on dog terms (the dogs' actions, how they have their own personalities and emotions) or on human terms (the dogs as a metaphor for human behavior).
In the final verse, the speaker stumbles across the two dogs in the early morning, discovering them asleep together:
And the little dog slept by the big dog
And her head was on his flank.
Few could manage to remain unmoved at such a reconciliation- a glimpse into a private, unguarded moment revealing love deeper than annoyance and hatred. Nash presents this beautiful moment to us through the medium of his two dogs- representatives of the highest virtues, and as human as ourselves.
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Learn something new every day
More Info... by email
An extraneous variable is an independent variable that may add noise to an experiment or bias the results, disrupting the effect that the chosen independent variable has on the dependent variable. In scientific experiments, the things that variables are highly controlled, but in the softer sciences, such as experimental psychology, it is more difficult to separate those characteristics that are required to be constant from those that must vary with each experiment. The goal in designing experiments is to reduce, as much as possible, the effects of extraneous variables.
There are three types of extraneous variables: subject, experimental, and situational. The subject variable is any variable that is characteristic of the person to be studied: age, health, mood, and physical features, for example. Experimental variables are those introduced by the bias of the psychologist or other observer conducting the psychological tests. Environmental variables come from environmental factors such as any distractions to the test subject from his or her surroundings: poor lighting, noise pollution, or other disruptions to testing. If an extraneous variable is potentially influential, it can be held constant for all subjects, or a spectrum of high to low intensity of a potentially harmful extraneous variable can be found through careful selection of test participants.
An example of a psychological experiment that might be compromised by an extraneous variable is sentence completion. A student whose intelligence quotient (IQ) is known is asked to complete a sentence fragment. The number of words he or she uses to complete the sentence is then recorded for each individual. The psychologist is looking to see if IQ, the independent variable, influences the number of words the student uses to complete the sentence, the dependent variable. An extraneous variable that biases an individual’s results might be whether the student ate breakfast that day, or how cold it was in the test facility, or how often the proctor frowned during the test.
When a researcher selects an independent variable in an experiment, behaviors of unexpected extraneous variables will sometimes be dependent on the intensity of the independent variable. An example of this situation is what is called a confounding variable. An example of such a variable might be the point of view of the test subject. For example, if subjects consist of both males and females, both nature and nurture will influence their perspectives on the test. Some might be comfortable with the experimental behaviors required, while others are not, or some may have pre-knowledge of the test and the expected results, while others do not.
One of our editors will review your suggestion and make changes if warranted. Note that depending on the number of suggestions we receive, this can take anywhere from a few hours to a few days. Thank you for helping to improve wiseGEEK!
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How many ways to form a 6-digit number which the digits cannot be repeated and the leftmost digit cannot be 0?
I found there're two possible answer:
since 0 is not available to the leftmost digit, so there're only 9 choices and 9 choices on the second digit(since 0 is available) in the second digit, 8 choices on third digit, and so on. The total number of way is: 9*9*8*7*6*5 = 136080
but if I start at the rightmost digit, the answer will be different!!!
There are 10 choices at the rightmost digit, 9 choice at the second-rightmost digit, and so on. There are 6 choices at second-leftmost digit, 4 choices left at the leftmost digit (since 0 is unavailable here). The total number of ways is: 10*9*8*7*6*4 = 120960.
Could anyone explain this?
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Definition of porbeagle
: a viviparous mackerel shark (Lamna nasus) chiefly of the North Atlantic and southwestern Pacific oceans with a pointed snout and crescent-shaped tail
Origin and Etymology of porbeagle
First Known Use: 1758
Seen and Heard
What made you want to look up porbeagle? Please tell us where you read or heard it (including the quote, if possible).
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You’ve probably read about or seen CR questions that confuse “causation” with “correlation,” but what does it mean in the real world? And why does it matter?
In statistics, let’s say we have data from two variables: x and y. They have a direct relationship. As one increases, the other increases. This could lead scientists to draw a conclusion that one variable causes the change in the other variable. But this isn’t necessary true! In fact, some third variable may be affecting both x and y! In order to prove causation and validate that one variable is indeed directly influencing the other and is the reason behind the detected correlation, further studies would need to be conducted, altering parameters, and recording outcomes.
The “Secret”: Just because X and Y are connected, doesn’t mean X causes Y.
Let’s take a look at a GMAT question:
A recent study from USC determined that although only 22 percent of students wore USC Trojans paraphernalia to school on a regular basis, over 65 percent of students who passed their finals were wearing USC Trojans clothing at the time. The study concluded that students who wear USC Trojans clothing are more likely to do well on their finals than students who don’t.
Which of the following would best strengthen the study’s conclusion?
(A) Of the students who failed their finals, none of them have ever been seen in class wearing USC-branded clothing.
(B) The week of finals every year is always on the same week as a big football game.
(C) USC clothing is well-insulated and the classrooms at USC are kept highly air-conditioned.
(D) Many students who did not pass their finals regularly attend tailgate parties.
(E) Students at USC tend to show more school spirit than students at other colleges.
Here our “X” is USC clothing and “Y” is better finals scores. The weakness in the argument is that there is no substantial evidence linking students who wear the clothing to better finals scores. None of the answer choices really give us “substantial” evidence to PROVE a causal relationship, but this piece of evidence would support the study’s conclusion if it were true.
If you chose (B), this piece of evidence implies coincidence and thus weakens the conclusion.
If you chose (C), this suggests students chose to wore the clothing on finals day because of the cold classrooms.
If you chose (D), while we may assume students who attend tailgate parties perhaps wear USC-branded clothing more often, if anything this would weaken the conclusion, since we want to prove that the students who wear USC paraphernalia do BETTER on their finals.
If you chose (E), this is outside the scope of the argument.
(A) is the correct response. This is a classic “causation/correlation” argument.
Remember to consider other possible explanations in Critical Reasoning questions. Sometimes all you’ll need to do to get a question correct is recognize the possibility of an alternative. For more articles on causation and correlation, check out this three part series.
Vivian Kerr is a regular contributor to the Veritas Prep blog, providing tips and tricks to help students better prepare for the GMAT and the SAT.
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nformation regarding births, marriages, and deaths was not always recorded and, even when it was, it was not always written down accurately, especially in birth and death records. Approximately 15 per cent of births were not registered, especially in the earlier period. This attitude also applied to deaths, which additionally suffer from the problem of having ages written down incorrectly (or guessed at). You will find a different approach to the registration of Marriages; marriages are legal contracts so they were always registered. However, the informant who registered the record originally may not have supplied completely accurate information. It is also not unknown for the data to be incorrectly transcribed as it is also possible that there may be minor, but significant, errors in the indexes. Always check for alternative spellings.
Indexes for these records are organized on an annual basis until 1877. After that they are organized on a quarterly basis. This means that you may have to remember to check each quarter of the year in any volume, as well as late registrations, registrations under the Army Act, and those under the Marine Register Act (e.g. births at sea, deaths on active service). Many of these last records appear in the holdings for the PRONI in the Locality Catalogue. Some of the indexes are 2 volumes per year, so be sure you have checked the full year!
One point to look out for in the marriage indexes is the cross-referencing under the names of both partners. This is not always the case however, sometimes a marriage is indexed under only one name.
Birth records were recorded by the government beginning in 1864. Keep in mind that only one country existed at that time, so these birth records cover the entire Island, not just the Republic or the North. See LDS Church Locality Catalogue under Civil Registration for registrations of Births 1864-1955 1,031 reels. )
The LDS Family History Library in Salt Lake City has microfilm copies of the following Irish Civil Registration indexes. The films can be read at your local LDS Family History Center.
The original document, bearing your ancestor's signature, may be in the local registrar's office. Superintendent registrars may or may not give out copies of certificates, though they are generally more willing in Northern Ireland.
You can get microfilms of the original civil records BUT not all of them. Only 1864-1881 and 1900-1913 births and pre 1871 marriages and deaths. If you have the exact referenced number (from the index), Irish Heritage Research, Dublin, Ireland will get a copy (not a certificate) for you for 3.00 Irish punts ($5.00 US).
I got a certificate with the exact reference number from the General
Register Office, Dublin for 6.00 IR (5.50 + 50p postage). For
those years not covered:
The General Register Office
8-11 Lombard St.E.
will provide photocopies when full reference information (i.e. volume and page numbers) is provided, for #1.50 Irish.
To look for something on this site, type it in the box and press the search button
[Home] [Genealogy] [History] [Library] [Kinsellas] [Travel] [Links] [Extra] [Email]
© 1996 - 2016 Hy Kinsella All Rights Reserved.
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Technology Lighting the LED Path
Publish Date: 1/6/2011
The latest technology in LED lighting in the OEX LED worklight range is Prime Drive Technology. This Technology has been under development over the years during various projects with the US government and aerospace industry. These projects led to the most advanced line of LED lighting products, now known as PRIME DRIVE.
Two of the latest models in the OEX range containing Prime Drive technology are the LLX25401 which has 5 LEDs and the LLX27601 which has 7 LEDs
Heat is the enemy of LEDs; Prime Drive’s primary directive is to remove the heat from the LED. On the first stage it deals with heat created from the electronic drive circuitry. A complex electronic circuitry was implemented to drive the LED’s. This circuitry results in a more advanced set of electronics that produces minimal heat allowing for most of the heat sink to be allocated to cooling the LED’s themselves.
Self preservation, the second stage in Prime Drive technology, reduces the heat produced by the LED’s themselves. Electronic Thermal Management constantly monitors the core temperature of each LED and adjusts the output to reduce the heat of the LED. Rather than adjusting the current moving through each LED which is very hard on the components and will eventually cause an LED to fail, Prime Drive flashes the LED at a rate much higher than the human eye can detect, known as pulse width modulation (PWM). This allows the LEDs to be driven at 100% while compensating for the heat, resulting in over 30% more light output per LED than any other product in the OEX range.
Inside LED Light with Prime Drive
By utilising the technology that controls Prime Drive, these lights can be dimmed or flashed. Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) works on the same basis that electronic thermal management does. By flashing the LED at 100% power and at a particular frequency (known as duty cycle), the heat from the LEDs is reduced. So as an example if we flash the LED so it is only on 75% of each second but at a rate that is so high we cannot see the actual strobe effect, we reduce the time that the light is in operation and the heat that is produced. So over a 1 hour period the LED is only working for 45 mins therefore reducing the heat generated by 25%. When PWM is used when dimming a light, amperage draw is reduced in respect to the duty cycle, so a 50% duty cycle (dimmed to 50%) will reduce amperage draw to 50%.
As an end result the OEX range of LED worklights with Prime Drive technology, have an extended life expectancy, a lower current draw and a better light output than we have ever seen before.
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This article describes Windsor chairs, noting their evolution, their different styles, their popularity in America (from shops that made them to farmers who created homemade versions), and some prominent chairmakers. It originally appeared in the September 1945 issue of American Collector magazine, a publication which ran from 1933-1948 and served antique collectors and dealers.
If the Windsor chair had been invented in the 20th Century it would have been classified as functional furniture and rightly so. Perfectly adjusted to the human body, using no excess of material, it had all the sturdiness of the modern chairs of metal tubing without their bent-pipe severity.
Yet when it first came to popular notice, back in the early 18th Century, no one called it anything in particular, since the age of labels had not arrived. It was just a simple piece of cottage furniture, made in English country workshops from yew and elm gathered in the forests of Buckinghamshire. Nor was it a new form even then, for strictly speaking there are no new styles, in furniture or anything else, since all will be found to have developed from an earlier and usually cruder idea. The ancestor of the Windsor may be seen in the extra-functional, three-legged example shown here. This type made in the 13th Century and was sturdy enough to support even a knight in full armor.
From this clumsy beginning the Windsor, or turned chair, developed into the graceful form as we know it today. It reached its highest point in beauty and variety of detail at the hands of American craftsmen. English cabinetmakers had already devised the splayed legs, the saddle-shaped seat, the graceful curved spindle back which terminated in delicately shaped yet sturdy arms and, having turned out a piece of furniture practically perfect for its purpose, they continued to fashion this chair for country cottages and inns with but little change through the years.
True, the Chippendale influence induced some cabinetmakers to put a vase-shaped back splat in place of the spindles normally found in the bow-back type and sometimes cabriole legs were added. The comb-back was another variation that appeared during these years. Such chairs were apt to be made of mahogany, were rarer, and not strictly of the cottage type though the basic idea was still present. However, chairs were obviously made to be sat in by all sorts and conditions of people and a type so nearly perfect for the purpose would naturally find favor with both the cottager and the lord of the manor.
In fact, there is the well-worn tale regarding royalty and this cottage chair with the scene laid in the lea of Windsor castle. A nice bit of romance to account for the naming of the chair, but it will do until something better is thought of. The village of Windsor was of course only one of many places where such chairs were common, but it is quite likely they first came to public and popular notice there.
They reached America by way of Philadelphia about 1700 and, in a country whose original settlers had with few exceptions been more used to cottages than castles, found speedy favor. Our craftsmen began making them and the idea spread along the Atlantic seaboard northward to New England where they were at first known as Philadelphia chairs.
Not a few cabinetmakers who had previously been general practitioners now became specialists, not only of chairs but of Windsor chairs. They were located in Philadelphia, in New York, and in the various towns and cities of New England. The first English examples were practically perfect as to design, but the American chairmakers added a few ideas of their own and brought them to a high state of structural and ornamental detail with various localities making distinct types. Today, one who knows his Windsor chairs can tell whether their makers worked in New England or Philadelphia by noting the turnings of legs and spindles and the shaping of the seat.
Just how many makers of Windsor chairs there were in America in the years before factory production put an end to individual cabinet-making is not known but it is safe to say that there were probably few towns in the areas already mentioned without at least one shop where such chairs were made. Further, the simple type of Windsor was so cheap and easy to make that many a farmer, handy with tools but thin of purse, produced very presentable chairs, settees, and other Windsor type pieces for his own home.
Chairmaker and farmer alike used native woods, such as oak, ash, hickory, pine, and white wood. The two latter woods were favorites for making the seat; hickory was an excellent substitute for the yew of old England. Structurally there might be said to be but three kinds of Windsors, the low-back, the bow-back, and the comb-back, but the variations on these themes were many.
As already stated, English Windsor chairmakers permitted their product to have at least a bowing acquaintance with the prevailing Chippendale designs; with American chairmakers styles came and went but their Windsors remained a law unto themselves. Only during the Sheraton years did any outside style influences filter into the original design and so produced the rod-back type. This dates from the early 19th Century and is not only a variation of the true Windsor but serves as the connecting link between it and the painted fancy chair which belongs to the turned chair family but is neither as sturdy nor as comfortable as the Windsor.
Obviously a perfectly designed chair like the Windsor remains in favor indefinitely, whatever the fashion in other furniture may be. The proof of it is that it is still made today in both England and America. The years of the collectible Windsor, however, range in America from about 1725 through the first quarter of the 19th Century and perhaps a few years beyond. By 1840 though, a decadent form, heavy and unlovely, and, though not as crude, bearing real family resemblance to its ancestor of the 13th Century appeared in country hotels and other public places. So for a time even the Windsors were struck by the prevailing blight in furniture taste that characterized the mid-19th Century.
But during the 18th Century, when chairmakers were putting their best furniture thoughts into the development of the Windsor, many beautiful types appeared. Beginning with the locale where they first appeared in this country the very earliest were of the low-back type having ten to twelve plain spindles fitting in to a U-shaped toprail. From this as a basic point it was easy to evolve the bow-back and the comb-back with their accompanying variations.
To go into great detail regarding the variations and decorative details whipped up by the chairmakers of the Atlantic seaboard, each with ideas of his own, would be unduly prolix and tedious here. Besides, illustrations tell far more than pages of description. Further revelations regarding the many variations on the Windsor theme are to be found in Edgar J. Miller’s American Antique Furniture, Volume I, pages 260 through 271.
Among the American makers of these chairs, the earliest known was one Rich-monde of Philadelphia who was working there as early as 1763. It is believed that he made the chairs in Independence Hall where sat the Second Continental Congress and where the Signers of the historic Declaration convened.
In New York, Andrew Gautier was advertising his Windsor chairs by the 1760’s and apparently they were originally intended for out of door use, were painted to withstand weather, and had as prevailing colors gray and green. In the New York Journal of February 13, 1766, this chairmaker inserted an advertisement embellished with a woodcut of a Windsor chair and stated in part: “To be Sold by Andrew Gautier — A large and neat Assortment of Windsor Chairs, made in the best and neatest Manner, and well painted — fit for Piazza or Gardens — Children’s dining and low chairs, etc.”
Also in New York was Thomas Ash whose advertisement in Rivington’s New York Gazeteer of February 17, 1774, implies that there was demand for his chairs outside of New York, quite likely in the southern colonies. It runs:
“Thomas Ash, Windsor Chair Maker, At the Corner below St. Paul’s Church in the Broad-Way, Makes and sells all kinds of Windsor chairs, high and low backs, garden and settees ditto. As several hundred pounds have been sent out of this province for this article, he hopes the public will encourage the business, as they can be had as cheap and good, if not superior to any imported; he has now by him, and intends keeping always a large quantity, so that merchants, masters of vessels, and others may be supplied upon the shortest notice. N. B. Shop goods will be taken in pay.”
These excerpts from New York advertisements are an indication of what went on in other chairmaking centers. They show that American makers were proud of their products, that they suffered somewhat from English competition (the latter may have been the goad needed for improving on the original models), and also between the lines can be read the rumblings of coming conflict between the mother country and her colonies.
This article originally appeared in American Collector magazine, a publication which ran from 1933-1948 and served antique collectors and dealers.
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- Fijian pronouns. Arrange the Fijian
pronouns (O'Grady ex 7:9, page 282) in a table and give
an appropriate label to each of the rows and columns of
- English pronouns. Do the same for the
English pronouns: I, you, he, she, it, we, they.
- Questions. Answer questions i) and ii)
in ex 7:9.
- Case forms of the English pronouns. Look
at ex 6:4, which gives four different forms for the
Russian first person singular pronoun. Does English have
parallel differences in form for its pronouns? Add a
dimension to your table in 2. above to include these
additional forms, and decide upon appropriate case
labels. (For more information on cases, see O'Grady
chapter 4, section 6.3.)
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RCWs tend to mate for life in permanent territories, and their young often stay around for a year or two to support the next year’s chicks.
Romance and intrigue as documented in our series Knock on Wood have surrounded the effort to reestablish a sustainable breeding population of red-cockaded woodpeckers over the last five years at The Nature Conservancy’s Disney Wilderness Preserve. But success is close, with breeding pairs established. And additional breeding pairs being transported to the preserve each year, making the project goal for the reintroduction on the preserve within sight.
The elusive RCW has been forced to the brink of extinction, and was extirpated, or locally extinct, at The Disney Wilderness Preserve for decades. But thanks to 20 years of careful restoration and management of the preserve’s longleaf pine habitat, it appears able to once again support the species. Vegetation is lush and very pretty due to controlled burns conducted by the Conservancy.
The rare birds are carried in boxes as juveniles from North Florida or Georgia and we carefully provide them with housing and possible mates.
The translocation program is exact: RCWs are carefully captured under strict federal rules from a healthy population and quickly transferred to their new site where they again receive careful handling. Longleaf pine trees pre-prepared with man-made cavities are climbed by biologists and the birds are loaded in during the night. The nest hole is covered with a cloth and a draw string leads down to the forest floor. At sunrise all the cavities are simultaneously opened allowing the birds to immediately see potential mates.
More than just a fascinating bird, the RCW is a keystone species that provides a service to its ecosystem. A total of 27 other species have been documented using RCW cavities, including lizards, frogs, snakes, squirrels and other birds.
Red-cockaded woodpecker (RCW) season lasts from May through July in Florida. The female selects her mate and they will share a territory, often living in nearby tree cavities for seven or eight years or until one dies.
The pair creates a nest high up in the cavity of an old-growth longleaf pine tree. It will be clean and full of wood chips on the inside, and made snake-resistant by rivets of sticky tree sap on the outside. The female then lays a clutch of two to four eggs, usually one each morning, in the male’s cavity. The two share egg-sitting duty.
RCW eggs hatch after 11 days. When a hatchling emerges, it is featherless, blind and appears almost “raw”. Chicks within a relocation program will be banded when eight days old, at which time they will weigh an average of 23 grams. Chicks remain in the nest for about 26 days until ready to fledge.
Chicks are fed a variety of insects constantly by both parents. Each wants a fresh bug about every five minutes – all day long. Parents continue to feed their chicks, even after they have fledged, for up to six months. Sometimes a fledgling from the previous year remains in the cluster to help the family.
In times of drought, bugs become harder to find. It’s a typical “brood reduction” survival mechanism for parents to feed only the healthiest chick. More typically, about two-thirds of the hatchlings survive.
RCWs grow to about seven inches in length with a wingspan of about 15 inches. The bird is named for a small red streak on each side of the black cap of the male only. This is used to determine the sex of a chick after about 12 days. Juvenile males display an obvious red patch; it is noticeable on adult males only when they are angry.
What threats may they see?
• “Klepto-parasites” such as resident bluebirds, flying squirrels and owls trying to steal their cavities
• Rat snakes slithering into the nests with an appetite for eggs and hatchlings
• Drought and a shortage of dinner-table bugs
• Flooding rains and lightning strikes
• The greatest challenge of all: a fledgling’s leap into the unknown.
Thanks for your interest! You can help support our RCW population with a safe and secure online gift.
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http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/unitedstates/florida/placesweprotect/reintroducing-the-red-cockaded-woodpecker.xml
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en
| 0.956477
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| 3.25
| 3
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You're lost in a maze. Assuming you have no breadcrumbs or sense of direction, what do you do?
1. You could move randomly.
2. You could always turn left. (Or right)
Classic methods. But what if there were another way? In a corn maze (or hedge maze), you are lost with a bunch of other people. Could you use them to help you out?
That question is the premise of this simulation.
So I introduce a new method:
3. Fear the Known: Move randomly. But when you reach an intersection, if you see people coming towards you, assume they are coming from a dead end. Go the other way.
Basing your actions on those who are just as lost as you? Could that possibly make sense? Where would the information come from? Would that ever be a better idea than methods (1) or (2)?
What better way to figure it out than test it? With this simulation, you can perform trial after trial in randomly generated mazes. What gets you out of the maze in fewer moves? Strategy (1), (2), or (3)? Try out different size mazes. Try out simple mazes, or mazes with loops. Does it even matter?
Perhaps next time you're lost in a corn maze, you'll have a new strategy under your belt.
Select the type of maze (size and loops/no loops). After that, just let the maze-goers cycle through, and see who does best!
October 2011: Released! And it turns out, the vision I had in a corn field truly does have some merit! Now to see if I can use this strategy next fall.
October 2012: Oops! Rainy days mean nobody else in the maze. Will have to wait another year to give this strategy a try.
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<urn:uuid:091f9fa8-a4e5-4d30-a644-e52f35181139>
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en
| 0.956376
| 380
| 2.5625
| 3
|
Dr. Richard Herbold of Clifton Park, New York’s Capital District Vitality Center: Could you have a B12 deficiency? Some things to know about this vital nutrient
Vitamin B12 deficiency is more common than people realize and can mimic or cause other disorders. A B12 deficiency is linked with memory loss, anemia, cardiovascular disease, and autism, to name a few. B12 is necessary for the brain and nervous system to function and for other aspects of health. It’s believed B12 deficiency is due in most cases not to lack of dietary sources but to poor absorption of the vitamin in the digestive tract.
Could your declining brain function be a B12 deficiency?
Because B12 is so vital for brain function, a B12 deficiency can manifest as numbness and tingling in the hands and feet, shakiness, depression, and loss of memory and cognition that can mimic the beginnings of dementia. It’s especially important to pay attention to a possible B12 deficiency in older people as the ability to absorb the vitamin declines with age. Studies show older people with higher B12 levels show less brain shrinkage and cognitive decline than their B12 deficient counterparts.
As a clinical nutritionist and chiropractic neurologist, I support patients in my Clifton Park, NY office with various chronic health issues. A B12 deficiency is not uncommon in those with chronic health issues or brain function issues. I see patients from Guilderland, Loudonville, Delmar, Colonie, and other areas of the Capital District. When patients come in with complaints from a chronic health condition, we use clinical nutrition, dietary strategies, and other tools to manage the condition. Addressing a B12 deficiency is an important part of the overall approach.
Is your anemia a B12 deficiency?
Other common manifestations of B12 deficiency are symptoms of anemia, which include fatigue, lethargy and weakness. Many people with B12 anemia discover they have an autoimmune disease called pernicious anemia, which inhibits the absorption of B12. In this case managing the autoimmune disease is important as well as supplementing with B12 sublingually or through injection.
A deficiency in B12 is also linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, autism, autoimmune disease, infertility, and more.
B12 deficiency often due to poor absorption
So what causes B12 deficiency? For many people it’s due not to diet but rather to poor absorption of nutrients.
Many people today have damaged guts due to diets high in inflammatory foods, chronic stress, and food intolerances, such as to gluten. It’s difficult for nutrients such as B12 to pass through an inflamed and damaged gut lining into the bloodstream.
Other factors that can lead to a B12 deficiency include a decline in stomach acid (common in elderly), the use of antacids and acid-blocking drugs, the use of metformin and other prescription drugs, alcoholism, and weight-loss surgery.
Repairing and restoring gut health should always be addressed in the event of a B12 deficiency.
At Capital District Vitality Center we can help patients rom Guilderland, Loudonville, Delmar, Colonie, and other areas of the Capital District address a B12 deficiency to better support their condition.
Vegans and vegetarians at risk for B12 deficiency
One group at risk for dietary deficiency of B12 are vegans and vegetarians—B12 is only found in animal foods. Natural plant sources of B12 such as spirulina, algae, seaweed, or grasses are poorly absorbed and may give a false reading of normal B12 on a lab result. This population especially should supplement with B12.
Also, although gut bacteria can synthesize B12, this requires healthy gut function and flora, and most of it is synthesized downstream of the small intestine where B12 is absorbed.
The more bioavailable form of B12 supplementation is methyl B12, or methylcobalamin, as opposed to the more common, synthetic cyanocobalamin. Not only is methyl B12 more neurologically active, it also enhances a liver detoxification process called methylation, which can reduce inflammation.
In my Clifton Park, NY office, I offer patients from Guilderland, Loudonville, Delmar, Colonie, and other areas of the Capital District support for their health and such neurological disorders as depression, anxiety, ADD/ADHD, autism spectrum disorders, and other brain-based issues.
Ask my office about whether a B12 deficiency may be affecting you and what is the best way to manage a B12 deficiency.
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en
| 0.92878
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Bacteria creates hail stones - study
Washington - Hail storms seem to arise out of nowhere, leaving those pummelled by the coin- to fist-sized ice balls to wonder how they came to be. US scientists said on Tuesday that plant bacteria may be to blame.
A Montana scientist collected some large hailstones measuring more than 5cm in diameter after a June storm in 2010, froze them, and later analysed the water that melted away in layers.
"Bacteria have been found within the embryo, the first part of a hailstone to develop," said Alexander Michaud of Montana State University in Bozeman, who presented the research at a meeting of microbiologists in New Orleans.
"The embryo is a snapshot of what was involved with the event that initiated growth of the hailstone," said Michaud, a lead researcher in the field of bioprecipitation, the study of how bacteria may cause rain, snow and hail.
In order for clouds to make ice, from which snow can fall, a particle must be present for the ice crystals to grow around, known as an ice nucleus.
"In order for precipitation to occur, a nucleating particle must be present to allow for aggregation of water molecules," said Michaud.
"There is growing evidence that these nuclei can be bacteria or other biological particles."
A plant pathogen known as Psuedomonas syringae is commonly at the root of precipitation events, because its outer surface is so efficient at collecting water molecules around it, said Brent Christner of Louisiana State University.
"Ice nucleating strains of P. syringae possess a gene that encodes a protein in their outer membrane that binds water molecules in an ordered arrangement," said Christner, who also presented research at the American Society for Microbiology in New Orleans.
This provides "a very efficient nucleating template that enhances ice crystal formation", said Christner.
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http://www.news24.com/SciTech/News/Bacteria-creates-hail-stones-study-20110524
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| 0.954624
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How to Web Enable Seniors
The information age has arrived. Cell phones and word processors rule. However, for an important population segment, the ability to use new technology is obscure.
The digital divide is problematic as a central tenet of health reform is the use of information technology to improve access, drive quality, and reduce costs.
A new paper by Florida State University scientists outlines the barriers older adults experience and provides solutions for resolving the disconnect.
In Current Directions in Psychological Science, Neil Charness and Walter R. Boot claim the key to including the aging population in information technology is to adopt design principles that are age-sensitive.
According to the researchers, there are several age-related changes that affect technology use in older adults, including difficulties with vision, hearing, motor control and cognition.
Specifically, older adults experience reduced visual acuity, color perception and susceptibility to glare. They also encounter a greater difficulty hearing high-pitched sounds and perceive a greater interference from background noises. As for motor skills, ailments such as arthritis can limit a person’s use of technology as well.
Aging is also associated with a general slowing of cognitive processes, decreased memory capacity and attentional control, and difficulties with goal maintenance. It also takes older adults twice as long to learn new information compared to younger adults.
“These changes in function can slow performance and result in a greater number of errors as older adults interact with technology that was not designed with their capabilities in mind,” explained the authors.
The psychologists suggest web designers should avoid backgrounds that create low contrast for text, use larger fonts, minimize scrolling and provide navigation aids and instructional support. They also recommend designers undergo training that takes into account age-related perceptual and cognitive changes.
The authors explain that these changes will alleviate some of the stress of learning and using new technologies, but it will not eliminate difficulties all-together:
“It is reasonable to assume that technology will continue to advance rapidly,” they concluded. “Also, perceptual, cognitive and psychomotor declines will continue to occur with aging.”
So while changes in web design and development will dramatically improve usability for older adults, there will always be hurdles to overcome alongside emerging technologies.
But, as the researchers explain, there is hope that some technological advances, such as video games designed to sharpen cognitive abilities, may ultimately be able to boost technological abilities in the aging population.
Nauert PhD, R. (2015). How to Web Enable Seniors. Psych Central. Retrieved on July 1, 2016, from http://psychcentral.com/news/2009/11/06/how-to-web-enable-seniors/9397.html
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<urn:uuid:b98d6492-93cd-4e8e-b270-512cf99303bb>
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en
| 0.939435
| 555
| 3.171875
| 3
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Teachers in K-3 can
use literature circles!! You just need to make some
modifications for it to work in your classroom, such as:
-The books are
appropriate for emergent readers, such as wordless
books, big books, picture books, etc.
- To make sure
everyone understands the story, the books are often
read-aloud to the children.
- The children
read the whole book before coming to a group. This
is mainly because of the nature of the books which are
meant to be read in one sitting.
- Kids record
their responses in drawing or writing at their own
level. Kids can dictate to another person.
- Young children
need extra help remembering what they want to share.
Post-it notes help kids mark favorite parts of the book.
- Kids meet for
one single meeting to talk about one set of books. Then
new groups are formed around another set of readings.
- The teacher may
be present in primary literature circles. They
guide and facilitate sharing and discussion.
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<urn:uuid:0600866d-52a2-40c2-a49e-4df56a09c25f>
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http://www.busyteacherscafe.com/literacy/literature_circles.htm
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en
| 0.934921
| 225
| 4.21875
| 4
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Michigan and the Civil War
April 11, 2011 - June 30, 2015
Drawn from the MSU Museum's historical collection, the exhibit highlights Michigan connections in the Civil War. Notably, the entire first graduating class of the Michigan Agricultural College (now MSU) was excused before the graduation ceremonies in 1861 so that they could join the Union Army. Another thread: Luther Baker, the man who led the capture of Lincoln's assassin, was a Michigan native who returned to Lansing after the war.
The exhibit includes several artifacts relate to Civil War General John G. Parkhurst from Coldwater, Mich., who spent time in the notorious Confederate Libby Prison. Other artifacts include Civil War uniforms, weapons, camp goods, medical equipment -- including an amputation and surgery kit -- and objects relating to the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.
Related, from MSU Press:
Finalist: 2010 U.S. Army Historical Foundation Distinguished Writing Award
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en
| 0.940994
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The terms gels and hydrogels are used interchangeably by food and biomaterials scientists to describe polymeric cross-linked network structures. Gels are defined as a substantially dilute cross-linked system, and are categorised principally as weak or strong depending on their flow behaviour in steady-state (Ferry, 1980). Edible gels are used widely in the food industry and mainly refer to gelling polysaccharides (i.e. hydrocolloids) (Phillips & Williams, 2000). The term hydrogel describes three-dimensional network structures obtained from a class of synthetic and/or natural polymers which can absorb and retain significant amount of water (Rosiak & Yoshii, 1999). The hydrogel structure is created by the hydrophilic groups or domains present in a polymeric network upon the hydration in an aqueous environment.
This chapter reviews the preparation methods of hydrogels from hydrophilic polymers of synthetic and natural origin with emphasis on water soluble natural biopolymers (hydrocolloids). Recent advances in radiation cross-linking methods for the preparation of hydrogel are particularly addressed. Additionally, methods to characterise these hydrogels and their proposed applications are also reviewed.
1.1. Mechanism of network formation
Gelation refers to the linking of macromolecular chains together which initially leads to progressively larger branched yet soluble polymers depending on the structure and conformation of the starting material. The mixture of such polydisperse soluble branched polymer is called ‘sol’. Continuation of the linking process results in increasing the size of the branched polymer with decreasing solubility. This ‘infinite polymer’ is called the ‘gel’ or ‘network’ and is permeated with finite branched polymers. The transition from a system with finite branched polymer to infinite molecules is called ‘sol-gel transition’ (or ‘gelation’) and the critical point where gel first appears is called the ‘gel point’ (Rubinstein & Colby, 2003). Different types of gelation mechanism are summarised in Figure 1. Gelation can take place either by physical linking (physical gelation) or by chemical linking (chemical gelation). Physical gels can be sub categorised as strong physical gels and weak gels. Strong physical gel has strong physical bonds between polymer chains and is effectively permanent at a given set of experimental conditions. Hence, strong physical gels are analogous to chemical gels. Examples of strong physical bonds are lamellar microcrystals, glassy nodules or double and triple helices. Weak physical gels have reversible links formed from temporary associations between chains. These associations have finite lifetimes, breaking and reforming continuously. Examples of weak physical bonds are hydrogen bond, block copolymer micelles, and ionic associations. On the other hand, chemical gelation involves formation of covalent bonds and always results in a strong gel. The three main chemical gelation processes include condensation, vulcanisation, and addition polymerisation.
1.2. Classification of hydrogel
Hydrogels are broadly classified into two categories:
Permanent / chemical gel: they are called ‘permanent' or ‘chemical’ gels when they are covalently cross-linked (replacing hydrogen bond by a stronger and stable covalent bonds) networks (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002). They attain an equilibrium swelling state which depends on the polymer-water interaction parameter and the crosslink density (Rosiak & Yoshii, 1999).
Reversible / physical gel: they are called ‘reversible’ or ‘physical’ gels when the networks are held together by molecular entanglements, and / or secondary forces including ionic, hydrogen bonding or hydrophobic interactions. In physically cross-linked gels, dissolution is prevented by physical interactions, which exist between different polymer chains (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002). All of these interactions are reversible, and can be disrupted by changes in physical conditions or application of stress (Rosiak & Yoshii, 1999).
1.3. Characteristic of hydrogel
The water holding capacity and permeability are the most important characteristic features of a hydrogel. The polar hydrophilic groups are the first to be hydrated upon contact with water which leads to the formation of primary bound water. As a result the network swells and exposes the hydrophobic groups which are also capable of interacting with the water molecules. This leads to the formation of hydrophobically-bound water, also called ‘secondary bound water’. Primary and secondary bound water are often combined and called ‘total bound water’. The network will absorb additional water, due to the osmotic driving force of the network chains towards infinite dilution. This additional swelling is opposed by the covalent or physical cross-links, leading to an elastic network retraction force. Thus, the hydrogel will reach an equilibrium swelling level. The additional absorbed water is called ‘free water’ or ‘bulk water’, and assumed to fill the space between the network chains, and/or the centre of larger pores, macropores, or voids. Depending on the nature and composition of the hydrogel the next step is the disintegration and/or dissolution if the network chain or cross-links are degradable. Biodegradable hydrogels, containing labile bonds, are therefore advantageous in applications such as tissue engineering, wound healing and drug delivery. These bonds can be present either in the polymer backbone or in the cross-links used to prepare the hydrogel. The labile bonds can be broken under physiological conditions either enzymatically or chemically, in most of the cases by hydrolysis (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002; Hoffman, 2002).
Biocompatibility is the third most important characteristic property required by the hydrogel. Biocompatibility calls for compatibility with the immune system of the hydrogel and its degradation products formed, which also should not be toxic. Ideally they should be metabolised into harmless products or can be excreted by the renal filtration process. Generally, hydrogels possess a good biocompatibility since their hydrophilic surface has a low interfacial free energy when in contact with body fluids, which results in a low tendency for proteins and cells to adhere to these surfaces. Moreover, the soft and rubbery nature of hydrogels minimises irritation to surrounding tissue (Anderson & Langone, 1999; Smetana, 1993).
The cross-links between the different polymer chains results in viscoelastic and sometimes pure elastic behaviour and give a gel its structure (hardness), elasticity and contribute to stickiness. Hydrogels, due to their significant water content possess a degree of flexibility similar to natural tissue. It is possible to change the chemistry of the hydrogel by controlling their polarity, surface properties, mechanical properties, and swelling behaviour.
1.4. Stimuli responsive hydrogels
Hydrogels can also be stimuli sensitive and respond to surrounding environment like temperature, pH and presence of electrolyte (Nho et al., 2005). These are similar to conventional hydrogels except these gels may exhibit significant volume changes in response to small changes in pH, temperature, electric field, and light. Temperature sensitive hydrogels are also called as thermogels (Jarry et al., 2002; Schuetz et al., 2008). These stimuli-sensitive hydrogels can display changes in their swelling behaviour of the network structure according to the external environments. They may exhibit positive thermo-sensitivity of swelling, in which polymers with upper critical solution temperature (UCST; temperature at which mixture of two liquids, immiscible at room temperature, ceases to separate into two phases) shrink by cooling below the UCST (Said et al., 2004). Some of the examples of stimuli sensitive hydrogels are poly (vinyl methyl ether) and poly (N-isopropyl acrylamide) gels, kappa-carrageenan-calcium based hydrogels, etc. (Bhardwaj et al., 2005; Sen, 2005). A summary of recent progress in biodegradable temperature sensitive polymers including polyesters, polyphosphazenes, polypeptides, and chitosan, and pH/temperature-sensitive polymers such as sulfamethazine-, poly(b-amino ester)-, poly(amino urethane)-, and poly(amidoamine)-based polymers is reviewed recently by Nguyen and Lee (2010). Recent progresses in the development and applications of smart polymeric gels have been reviewed extensively by Masteikova, Chalupova et al. (2003) and Chaterji, Kwon et al. (2007).
1.5. Xerogel & aerogel
A ‘xerogel’ is a solid formed from a gel by drying it slowly at about room temperature with unhindered shrinkage (Livage et al., 1988). Xerogels usually retain high porosity (25%) and enormous surface area (150–900 m2/g), along with very small pore size (1-10 nm). One such example of xerogel is boehmite AlO(OH)-monolithic gels with proposed application in space exploration and electronics (Yoldas, 1975). ‘Aerogel’ is derived from a gel (essentially by supercritical drying technique) in which the liquid component of the gel has been replaced with a gas. The result is an extremely low-density solid with several remarkable properties, most notably its effectiveness as a thermal insulator and its extremely low density. It is also called frozen smoke, solid smoke or blue smoke due to its translucent nature and the way light scatters in the material. Some of the examples are carbon and silicon aerogels which can be used in buildings double window glazing as transparent thermal super-insulators (Kistler, 1931).
An easy way to quantify the presence of hydrogel in a system is to disperse the polymer in water using a cylindrical vial and visually observe the formation of insoluble material. Visual monitoring of the solution viscosity by turning the universal up-side down can also provide quick measure of the bulk viscosity. reported in literature .
2.1.1. Method A
Normally the hydrogel content of a given material is estimated by measuring its insoluble part in dried sample after immersion in deionised water for 16 h (Katayama, Nakauma 2006) or 48 h at room temperature (Nagasawa et al., 2004). The sample should be prepared at a dilute concentration (typically ~ 1%) to ensure that hydrogel material is fully dispersed in water. The gel fraction is then measured as follows:
Where, Wi is the initial weight of dried sample and Wd is the weight of the dried insoluble part of sample after extraction with water.
2.1.2. Method B
A more accurate measure of the insoluble fraction (also termed as hydrogel can be determined by measuring the weight retained after vacuum filtration. This is essentially the method prescribed by JECFA (Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives) for hydrocolloids which we have modified by changing the solvent from mild alkaline to water (Al-Assaf et al., 2009). The weight (W1) of a 70 mm glass fibre paper (pore size 1.2 micron) is determined following drying in an oven at 105oC for 1 hour and subsequently cooled in a desiccator containing silica gel. Depending on the test material, 1-2 wt% (S) dispersion can be prepared in distilled water followed by overnight hydration at room temperature. The hydrated dispersion is then centrifuged for 2-5 minutes at 2500 rpm prior to filtration. Drying of the filter paper is carried out in an oven at 105oC followed by cooling to a constant weight (W2). % Insoluble can then be calculated:
Depending on the test material different mesh size can be also used, e.g. the use of a 20-mesh steel screen (1041 µm) to determine the gel fraction (Yoshii & Kume, 2003).
2.2. Swelling measurement
2.2.1. Method A
The Japanese Industrial Standard K8150 method has been used to measure the swelling of hydrogels. According to this method the dry hydrogel is immersed in deionised water for 48 hours at room temperature on a roller mixer. After swelling, the hydrogel is filtered by a stainless steel net of 30 meshes (681 µm). The swelling is calculated as follows (Nagasawa et al., 2004):
Where, Ws is the weight of hydrogel in swollen state and Wd is the weight of hydrogel in dry state. The terms ‘swelling ratio’ (Liu et al., 2005), ‘equilibrium degree of swelling’ (EDS) (Valles et al., 2000) or ‘degree of swelling’ (Liu et al., 2002a) has been used for more or less similar measurements.
2.2.2. Method B
Alternatively, to measure the swelling of hydrogel, in a volumetric vial (Universal) the dry hydrogel (0.05-0.1g) was dispersed into sufficiently high quantity of water (25-30 ml) for 48 hrs at room temperature. The mixture is then centrifuged to obtain the layers of water-bound material and free unabsorbed water. The free water is removed and the swelling can be measured according to Method A above.
2.2.3. Method C
The swelling can also be measured according to the Japanese Industrial Standard (JIS) K7223. The dry gel is immersed in deionized water for 16 h at room temperature. After swelling, the hydrogel was filtered using a stainless-steel net of 100-mesh (149 µm). Swelling is calculated as follows (Katayama et al., 2006):
Where C is the weight of hydrogel obtained after drying and B is the weight of the insoluble portion after extraction with water.
FTIR (Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy) is a useful technique for identifying chemical structure of a substance. It is based on the principle that the basic components of a substance, i.e. chemical bonds, usually can be excited and absorb infrared light at frequencies that are typical of the types of the chemical bonds. The resulting IR absorption spectrum represents a fingerprint of measured sample. This technique is widely used to investigate the structural arrangement in hydrogel by comparison with the starting materials (2004; Mansur et al., 2004; Torres et al., 2003).
2.4. Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM)
SEM can be used to provide information about the sample's surface topography, composition, and other properties such as electrical conductivity. Magnification in SEM can be controlled over a range of up to 6 orders of magnitude from about 10 to 500,000 times. This is a powerful technique widely used to capture the characteristic ‘network’ structure in hydrogels (Aikawa et al., 1998; Aouada et al., 2005; El Fray et al., 2007; 2004; Pourjavadi & Kurdtabar, 2007).
2.5. Light scattering
Gel permeation chromatography coupled on line to a multi angle laser light scattering (GPC-MALLS) is a widely used technique to determine the molecular distribution and parameters of a polymeric system. Hydrogel in a polymeric system can be quantified using this technique (Al-Assaf et al., 2007a). This technique is widely used in quantifying the hydrogels of several hydrocolloids such as gum arabic, gelatine and pullulan (Al-Assaf et al., 2006b; Al-Assaf et al., 2007b; 2006). It can be demonstrated how mass recovery data obtained from GPC-MALLS correlate with actual amount of hydrogel obtained for dextran radiation in solid state (Al-Assaf et al., 2006b) (Figure 2).
2.6. Sol – gel analysis
For radiation cross-linking, the sol-gel analysis is an important characterisation tool as it allows to estimate the parameters such as yield of cross-linking and degradation, gelation dose, etc. and to correlate these with some physico-chemical properties. The relation of sol fraction and absorbed dose according to the Charlesby–Pinner equation (Rosiak, 1998) is given in equation 5. This equation is widely reported for the linear polymers like carboxymethyl cellulose (Liu et al., 2002b).
Where, s is the sol fraction (s = 1-gel fraction). p0 is the degradation density, average number of main chain scissions per monomer unit and per unit dose. q0 is the cross-linking density, proportion of monomer units cross-linked per unit dose. μ2,0 is the initial weight average degree of polymerisation, and D is the radiation dose in Gy.
To avoid an inaccuracy resulting from unknown molecular weight distribution of used polymers, the Charlesby–Rosiak equation (Equation 6) is used. This equation allows for estimation of radiation parameters of linear polymers of any initial weight distribution as well as is applicable to systems when an initial material is monomer or branched polymer (Wach et al., 2003b).
Where, D is the absorbed dose in Gy. Dg is gelation dose – a dose when the first insoluble gel appears. Dv is the virtual dose – a dose required to change the distribution of molecular weight of the certain polymer in such a way that the relation between weight-average and number-average molecular weight would be equal to 2. However, there is limitation to Charlesby–Pinner equation that it does not allow the chain reaction that occurs during the event of ionising radiation into its consideration and, so most of the experimental data of radiation polymerisation do not obey this equation. It is recently shown that chain reactions, rather than polydispersity and structure, explain most of the deviation from ideal Charlesby-Pinner behaviour of irradiated polymers (Jones et al., 1996).
To obtain the gelation dose, yield of cross-linking and scission, following equations are used:
Where, G(x) and G(s) are radiation yield of cross-linking and of scission in mol J-1, respectively. Mw,0 is weight average molecular weights of initial polymer before irradiation. The above equations are valid for polymers with initial most probable molecular weight distribution and degree of polydispersity Mw,0 / Mn,0 = 2 (Rosiak et al., 2003; Wach et al., 2003b). For the degradation process occurring in a polymer solution when it is subjected to irradiation, the yield of scission (mol/J) can be calculated as:
Where c is the concentration of polymer in solution (g/dm3); D is the absorbed dose (Gy); d is the solution density (kg/dm3); Mw,0 and Mw are the weight-average molecular weight of polymer before and after irradiation, respectively. Degradation rate in irradiation is first-order reaction and the rate constants k can be evaluated from the following first order kinetic equation (Wasikiewicz et al., 2005):
Where, M0 and Mt are weight-average molecular weights before and after the treatment for t hours, respectively, m is the molecular weight of polymer monomer unit and k (h-1) is the rate constant.
The rheological properties are very much dependant on the types of structure (i.e. association, entanglement, cross-links) present in the system. Polymer solutions are essentially viscous at low frequencies, tending to fit the scaling laws: G’ ~ ω2 and G” ~ ω. At high frequencies, elasticity dominates (G’ > G”). This corresponds to Maxwell-type behaviour with a single relaxation time that may be determined from the crossover point and, this relaxation time increases with concentration. For cross-linked microgel dispersions, it exhibits G’ and G” being almost independent of oscillation frequency (Omari et al., 2006; Rubinstein & Colby, 2003). This technique has been used to characterize the network structure in seroglucan/borax hydrogel (Coviello et al., 2003), chitosan based cationic hydrogels (Kempe et al., 2008; Sahiner et al., 2006) and a range of other hydrocolloids (Al-Assaf et al., 2006b).
2.8. Other techniques
The main methods used to characterise and quantify the amount of free and bound water in hydrogels are differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). The proton NMR gives information about the interchange of water molecules between the so-called free and bound states (Phillips et al., 2003). The use of DSC is based on the assumption that only the free water may be frozen, so it is assumed that the endotherm measured when warming the frozen gel represents the melting of the free water, and that value will yield the amount of free water in the hydrogel sample being tested. The bound water is then obtained by difference of the measured total water content of the hydrogel test specimen, and the calculated free water content (Hoffman, 2002). Thermo-gravimetric analysis (Lazareva & Vashuk, 1995; Singh & Vashishth, 2008; Torres et al., 2003), X-ray diffraction (2008; Mansur et al., 2004), sol-gel analysis (Janik et al., 2008; Rosiak, 1998; Wach et al., 2003b; Xu et al., 2002) etc. are also used to confirm the formation of cross-linked network gel structures of hydrogel.
3. Application of hydrogel
Hydrogel of many synthetic and natural polymers have been produced with their end use mainly in tissue engineering, pharmaceutical, and biomedical fields (Hoare & Kohane, 2008). Due to their high water absorption capacity and biocompatibility they have been used in wound dressing, drug delivery, agriculture, sanitary pads as well as trans-dermal systems, dental materials, implants, injectable polymeric systems, ophthalmic applications, hybrid-type organs (encapsulated living cells) (Benamer et al., 2006; Nho et al., 2005 ; Rosiak et al., 1995; Rosiak & Yoshii, 1999). A list of hydrogels with their proposed corresponding applications is shown in Table 1.
4. Methods to produce hydrogel
Cross-linked networks of synthetic polymers such as polyethylene oxide (PEO) (Khoylou & Naimian, 2009), polyvinyl pyrollidone (PVP) (Razzak et al., 2001), polylactic acid (PLA) (Palumbo et al., 2006),, polyacrylic acid (PAA) (Onuki et al., 2008), polymethacrylate (PMA) (Yang et al.), polyethylene glycol (PEG) (Singh et al.), or natural biopolymers (Coviello et al., 2007) such as alginate, chitosan, carrageenan, hyaluronan, and carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) have been reported. The various preparation techniques adopted are physical cross-linking (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002), chemical cross-linking (Barbucci et al., 2004), grafting polymerisation (Said et al., 2004), and radiation cross-linking (Fei et al., 2000; Liu et al., 2002b). Such modifications can improve the mechanical properties and viscoelasticity for applications in biomedical and pharmaceutical fields (Barbucci et al., 2004; Nho & Lee, 2005; Rosiak et al., 1995; Rosiak & Yoshii, 1999). The general methods to produce physical and chemical gels are described below.
4.1. Physical cross-linking
There has been an increased interest in physical or reversible gels due to relative ease of production and the advantage of not using cross-linking agents. These agents affect the integrity of substances to be entrapped (e.g. cell, proteins, etc.) as well as the need for their removal before application. Careful selection of hydrocolloid type, concentration and pH can lead to the formation of a broad range of gel textures and is currently an area receiving considerable attention, particularly in the food industry. The various methods reported in literature to obtain physically cross-linked hydrogels are:
4.1.1. Heating/cooling a polymer solution
Physically cross-linked gels are formed when cooling hot solutions of gelatine or carrageenan. The gel formation is due to helix-formation, association of the helices, and forming junction zones (Funami et al., 2007). Carrageenan in hot solution above the melting transition temperature is present as random coil conformation. Upon cooling it transforms
to rigid helical rods. In presence of salt (K+, Na+, etc.), due to screening of repulsion of sulphonic group (SO– 3), double helices further aggregate to form stable gels (Figure 3). In some cases, hydrogel can also be obtained by simply warming the polymer solutions that causes the block copolymerisation. Some of the examples are polyethylene oxide-polypropylene oxide (Hoffman, 2002), polyethylene glycol-polylactic acid hydrogel (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002).
4.1.2. Ionic interaction
Ionic polymers can be cross-linked by the addition of di- or tri-valent counterions. This method underlies the principle of gelling a polyelectrolyte solution (e.g. Na+ alginate-) with a multivalent ion of opposite charges (e.g. Ca2+ + 2Cl-) (Figure 4). Some other examples are chitosan-polylysine (Bajpai et al., 2008), chitosan-glycerol phosphate salt (Zhao et al., 2009), chitosan-dextran hydrogels (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002).
4.1.3. Complex coacervation
Complex coacervate gels can be formed by mixing of a polyanion with a polycation. The underlying principle of this method is that polymers with opposite charges stick together and form soluble and insoluble complexes depending on the concentration and pH of the respective solutions (Figure 5). One such example is coacervating polyanionic xanthan with polycationic chitosan (Esteban & Severian, 2000; 2001; 1999). Proteins below its isoelectric point are positively charged and likely to associate with anionic hydrocolloids and form polyion complex hydrogel (complex coacervate) (Magnin et al., 2004).
H-bonded hydrogel can be obtained by lowering the pH of aqueous solution of polymers carrying carboxyl groups. Examples of such hydrogel is a hydrogen-bound CMC (carboxymethyl cellulose) network formed by dispersing CMC into 0.1M HCl (Takigami et al., 2007). The mechanism involves replacing the sodium in CMC with hydrogen in the acid solution to promote hydrogen bonding (Figure 6). The hydrogen bonds induce a decrease of CMC solubility in water and result in the formation of an elastic hydrogel. Carboxymethylated chitosan (CM-chitosan) hydrogels can also prepared by cross-linking in the presence of acids or polyfunctional monomers (2008). Another example is polyacrylic acid and polyethylene oxide (PEO-PAAc) based hydrogel prepared by lowering the pH to form H-bonded gel in their aqueous solution (Hoffman, 2002). In case of xanthan-alginate mixed system molecular interaction of xanthan and alginate causes the change in matrix structure due to intermolecular hydrogen bonding between them resulting in formation of insoluble hydrogel network (2007).
4.1.5. Maturation (heat induced aggregation)
Gum arabic (Acacia gums) is predominately carbohydrate but contain 2-3% protein as an integral part of its structure (Williams & Phillips, 2006). Three major fractions with different molecular weights and protein content have been identified following fractionation by hydrophobic interaction chromatography with different molecular weights and protein content (Islam et al., 1997). These are arabinogalactan protein (AGP), arabinogalactan (AG) and glycoprotein (GP). Aggregation of the proteinaceous components, induced by heat treatment, increases the molecular weight and subsequently produces a hydrogel form with enhanced mechanical properties and water binding capability (Aoki et al., 2007a; Aoki et al., 2007b). The molecular changes which accompany the maturation process demonstrate that a hydrogel can be produced with precisely structured molecular dimensions. The controlling feature is the agglomeration of the proteinaceous components within the molecularly disperse system that is present in of the naturally occurring gum. Maturing of the gum leads to transfer of the protein associated with the lower molecular weight components to give larger concentrations of high molecular weight fraction (AGP) (Figure 7). The method has also been applied on to other gums such as gum ghatti and Acacia kerensis for application in denture care (Al-Assaf et al., 2009).
Physical cross-linking of a polymer to form its hydrogel can also be achieved by using freeze-thaw cycles. The mechanism involves the formation of microcrystals in the structure due to freeze-thawing. Examples of this type of gelation are freeze-thawed gels of polyvinyl alcohol and xanthan (Giannouli & Morris, 2003; Hoffman, 2002; 2004).
4.2. Chemical cross-linking
Chemical cross-linking covered here involves grafting of monomers on the backbone of the polymers or the use of a cross-linking agent to link two polymer chains. The cross-linking of natural and synthetic polymers can be achieved through the reaction of their functional groups (such as OH, COOH, and NH2) with cross-linkers such as aldehyde (e.g. glutaraldehyde, adipic acid dihydrazide). There are a number of methods reported in literature to obtain chemically cross-linked permanent hydrogels. Among other chemical cross-linking methods, IPN (polymerise a monomer within another solid polymer to form interpenetrating network structure) (2003) and hydrophobic interactions (Hennink & Nostrum, 2002) (incorporating a polar hydrophilic group by hydrolysis or oxidation followed by covalent cross-linking) are also used to obtain chemically cross-linked permanent hydrogels. The following section reviews the major chemical methods (i.e. cross-linker, grafting, and radiation in solid and/or aqueous state) used to produce hydrogels from a range of natural polymers.
4.2.1. Chemical cross-linkers
Cross-linkers such as glutaraldehyde (2008), epichlorohydrin (2002), etc have been widely used to obtain the cross-linked hydrogel network of various synthetic and natural polymers. The technique mainly involves the introduction of new molecules between the polymeric chains to produce cross-linked chains (Figure 8). One such example is hydrogel prepared by cross-linking of corn starch and polyvinyl alcohol using glutaraldehyde as a cross-linker (2008). The prepared hydrogel membrane could be used as artificial skin and at the same time various nutrients/healing factors and medicaments can be delivered to the site of action.CMC chains can also be cross-linked by incorporating 1, 3-diaminopropane to produce CMC-hydrogel suitable for drug delivery through the pores (2004). Hydrogel composites based on xanthan and polyvinyl alcohol cross-linked with epichlorohydrin in another example (2002). κ-carrageenan and acrylic acid can be cross-linked using 2-acrylamido-2-methylpropanesulfonic acid leading to the development of biodegradable hydrogels with proposed use for novel drug delivery systems (Pourjavadi & Zohuriaan-Mehr, 2002). Carrageenan hydrogels are also promising for industrial immobilisation of enzymes (Campo et al., 2009). Hydrogels can also be synthesized from cellulose in NaOH/urea aqueous solutions by using epichlorohydrin as cross-linker and by heating and freezing methods (Chang et al., 2010; Chang & Zhang, 2011).
Grafting involves the polymerisation of a monomer on the backbone of a preformed polymer. The polymer chains are activated by the action of chemical reagents, or high energy radiation treatment. The growth of functional monomers on activated macroradicals leads to branching and further to cross-linking (Figure 9).
18.104.22.168. Chemical grafting
In this type of grafting, macromolecular backbones are activated by the action of a chemical reagent. Starch grafted with acrylic acid by using N-vinyl-2-pyrrolidone is an example of this kind of process (Spinelli et al., 2008). Such hydrogels show an excellent pH-dependent swelling behaviour and possess ideal characteristic to be used as drug and vitamin delivery device in the small intestine.
22.214.171.124. Radiation grafting
Grafting can also be initiated by the use of high energy radiation such as gamma and electron beam. Said, Alla et al. (2004) reported the preparation of hydrogel of CMC by grafting CMC with acrylic acid in presence of electron beam irradiation, in aqueous solution. Electron beam was used to initiate the free radical polymerisation of acrylic acid on the backbone of CMC. Water radiolysis product will also be helpful to abstract proton form macromolecular backbones. Irradiation of both (CMC and monomer) will produce free radicals that can combine to produce hydrogel. They proposed the application of such acrylic acid based hydrogel for the recovery of metal ions like copper, nickel, cobalt, and lead. Also, they reported the application of hydrogels in dressings for temporary skin covers.
Zhai, Yoshii et al. (2002) also reported the preparation of starch based hydrogel by grafting polyvinyl alcohol PVA. Starch was first dissolved into water to form gel-like solution and then added to PVA solution, continuously stirred to form homogeneous mixture after heating at 90oC for 30 mins. The result showed there was a grafting reaction between PVA and starch molecule besides the cross-linking of PVA molecule under irradiation. Amylose of starch was found to be a key reactive component. The properties of starch/PVA blend hydrogel too were governed by amylose component of starch.
Cai, Zhang et al. (2005) have reported the preparation of thermo- and pH-sensitive hydrogels by graft copolymerisation of chitosan (CS) and N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPA). The results showed that the grafting percentage and grafting efficiency increased with the increase of monomer concentration and total irradiation dose. The CS-g-NIPA hydrogels showed good thermo- and pH-sensitivity and swelling property.
4.3. Radiation cross-linking
Radiation cross-linking is widely used technique since it does not involve the use of chemical additives and therefore retaining the biocompatibility of the biopolymer. Also, the modification and sterilisation can be achieved in single step and hence it is a cost effective process to modify biopolymers having their end-use specifically in biomedical application (Lugao & Malmonge, 2001). The technique mainly relies on producing free radicals in the polymer following the exposure to the high energy source such as gamma ray, x-ray or electron beam. The action of radiation (direct or indirect) will depend on the polymer environment (i.e. dilute solution, concentrated solution, solid state).
4.3.1. Aqueous state radiation
Irradiation of polymers in diluted solution will lead to chemical changes as a result of ‘indirect action’ of radiation. Equation 11 shows that the radiation is mainly absorbed by water. The water radiolysis generates reactive free radicals which can interact with the polymer solute:
Radiation chemical yield (G value) is defined as the number of a particular species produced per 100 eV of energy absorbed by the system from ionising radiation (Clark, 1963). This unit has been redefined in SI mode units by multiplying the old values by 1.036 x 10-7 in order to convert the yield to mol J-1. The radiation chemical yield of these species are now well established as being 2.8, 0.6, 2.7, 0.7, 0.5 and 2.7 x 10-7 mol J-1 for ●OH, ●H, e- aq, H2O2, H2 and H+ respectively (Sonntag, 1987).
A frequently used technique is to irradiate in nitrous oxide saturated solutions when the hydrated electrons (e- aq) are converted into ●OH radicals:
Under the above conditions the ●OH radical yield is 5.6 x 10-7 mol J-1 whereas the H atoms are formed with yield of ~ 0.6 x 10-7 mol J-1.
Therefore radiation chemical techniques can be used for the quantitative generation of free radicals in aqueous solution. Table 2 gives details of natural polymers and monomers which have been irradiated in diluted solutions and solid state. Changes in molecular weight, rheology, viscometry, UV spectroscopy, and FT-IR have been used to follow the radiolysis reactions.
All the materials given in Table 2, irrespective of their structure and conformation degrade when irradiated in diluted aqueous solution. This is because at a low polymer concentration (i.e. below critical overlap concentration) the chain density of the polymer is not sufficient enough for the chain to recombine and form cross-link network. The two main radicals present in saturated aqueous system react with carbohydrates (RH) by abstracting carbon-bound H-atoms (Equation 13). The hydroxyl radical is not specific in its action and so there are radical sites formed at many position in a carbohydrate solute (Figure 10). In such systems it is the hydroxyl radical which is the main H-abstracting entity. The hydroxyl radicals react with hyaluronan with a rate constant k2 = 0.9 x 109 mol-1 dm3 s-1, whereas H atoms rate is a lower order of magnitude k2 = 7 x 107 mol-1 dm3 s-1 (Myint et al., 1987). Figure 11 shows the various hydrolysis, rearrangement, and fragmentation reactions during aqueous radiolysis of cellobiose to gives possible chain break (Sonntag, 1987).
Hydrated electrons (e-aq) formed upon water radiolysis react with the hydrocolloids only if the system contains no oxygen. They do not have the ability to abstract electrons from carbohydrate polymers, as for example carrageennan (Abad et al., 2007), hyaluronan (Myint et al., 1987) and CMC where the rate constant for the disappearance of the hydrated electron was measured as 4–5.2 x 106 mol-1dm3s-1 (Wach et al., 2005). This rate constant approaches the normal disappearance rate of hydrated electrons in water alone in the absence of CMC, demonstrating that its reactivity with CMC is negligible.
In oxygenated solution the hydrated electron react with oxygen to produce superoxide radical (O.- 2), (Equation 14).
Additionally, in oxygenated solutions the hydrogen atoms form peroxyl radicals (Equation 15) which is unreactive with most organic compounds unless they contain weekly bonded hydrogen (Bielski & Gebicki, 1970).
The role of superoxide radicals have been considered to be important in arthritis diseased conditions due to their interaction with the body biopolymers. Two possible mechanisms for the generation of hydroxyl radicals through the reaction of superoxide radicals via metal catalaysed processes and its dismutation and subsequent reaction with hydrogen peroxide were reviewed (Al-Assaf et al., 1995).
In case of radiolysis of oxygenated solution of D-glucose, six primary peroxyl radicals are formed which rapidly undergo HO2 -. elimination and subsequently lead to chain break (Sonntag, 1987).
4.3.2. Radiation in paste
The cross-linking of hydrocolloids in aqueous paste-like conditions state has received considerable attention recently. Under these conditions the concentration of the polymer is high such that both direct action of the radiation can form free radicals and also there is also sufficient water present to be radiolysed to form ●OH and related radicals. There is thus a high concentration of radicals in close association with the original polymer and other secondary formed polymer radicals. Thus cross-linking to form new polymers can form by way of radical-radical reaction and polymer - polymer radical reactions. If the original polymer concentration is not sufficient to promote radical-radical reactions then degradation will result. The presence of water promotes the diffusion of macroradicals to combine and form cross-linked hydrogel network. Also, the radiolysis of water generate free radicals (hydrogen atoms and hydroxyl radicals), which increase the yield of macroradicals by abstracting H-atoms from the polymer chain. The concentration at which the modification can be achieved varies according to the structure, degree of substitution, distribution of substitution group and initial molecular weight. For example, a higher DS is effective for cross-linking of CMC due to the fact that intermolecular linkages are result of ether function (Shen et al., 2006; Wach et al., 2003a). Similar results have been reported on aqueous state irradiation of methylcellulose and hydroxypropyl cellulose (Horikawa et al., 2004; Wach et al., 2003b), carboxymethyl starch (Yoshii & Kume, 2003; Yoshii et al., 2003), gum arabic (Katayama et al., 2006), carboxymethylated chitin and chitosan (Wasikiewicz et al., 2006; Zhao et al., 2003a). The % hydrogel produced together with the proposed application from various investigations are summarised in Table 3.
4.3.3. Solid state radiation
Irradiation of hydrocolloids in solid state induces the radical formation in molecular chains as a result of the direct action of radiation. Here mainly two events take place (i) direct energy transfers to the macromolecule to produce macroradicals and (ii) generation of primary radicals due to the presence of water (moisture). During the solid state radiolysis of hydrocolloids, scission of glycosidic bond is the dominant reaction which eventually leads to decrease the molecular weight of macromolecules (Wach et al., 2003a). Generally, the degradation rates depend on the concentrations of reactants and temperature, like other chemical reactions. In addition, the rates depend on the purity, presence of substituted group and molecular weight of hydrocolloid (Makuuchi, 2010). The course of the degradation of carbohydrates in the solid state is illustrated in Figure 12. The main effects are fragmentation, hydrolysis (due to presence of moisture) or and rearrangement leading to low molecular weight products.
The reported radiation degradation yield (Gd) of κ-, ι-, and λ-carrageenans irradiated in solid and at 1% aqueous solution at atmospheric conditions were almost the same for all types of carrageenan. Gd was in the range of 2.3–2.7 x 10-7 mol J-1 and 1.0–1.2 x 10-7 mol J-1 for solid and aqueous state irradiation, respectively which shows the solid state radiation of carrageenan more susceptible to degradation. However, Gd was relatively low (0.3 x 10-7 mol J-1) for paste-like state (4% concentration) probably due to simultaneous cross-linking place in such system (Abad et al., 2009). Similarly, the Gd in aqueous form was also affected by the conformational state of κ-carrageenan. The helical conformation gave a lower Gd (0.7 x 10-7 mol J-1) than the coiled conformation (Gd = 1.2 x 10-7 mol J-1). A helical structure has some interchain stabilisation effects which increases the possibility of free radical interchain cross-linking (Abad et al., 2010). For galactomannans the values are found relatively lower (0.85–1.07 x 10-7 mol J-1) suggesting these hydrocolloids are less susceptible to degradation. Several hydrocolloids such as α-D-glucose (Moore & Phillips, 1971; Phillips, 1963; Phillips et al., 1966; Phillips, 1968), cellulose and derivatives (Fei et al., 2000; Horikawa et al., 2004), amylose and starch (Phillips & Young, 1966; Phillips, 1968; Yoshii & Kume, 2003), chitin and chitosan (Kuang et al., 2008; Wasikiewicz et al., 2005) have reportedly undergone degradation when subjected to solid state radiation. The results for a range of polysaccharides are shown in Table.
126.96.36.199. Cross-linking in solid state
The application of radiation processing of synthetic polymers to introduce structural changes by cross-linking and special performance characteristics is now a thriving industry. In contrast treatment of polysaccharides and other natural polymers with ionizing radiation either in the solid state or in aqueous solution leads to degradation as described above. Therefore, a method to modify structure, without introducing new chemical groupings, could prove of advantage, particularly if the process could be achieved in the solid state. This has been possible in synthetic polymers by exposure to high energy ionizing radiation, arising mainly through the pioneering work of Charlesby (Rosiak & Yoshii, 1999). The method is now routinely used for the cross-linking of polymers. Polymer chains can be joined and a network formed. The method is used for crystal lattice modification for semiconductors and gemstones, etc., by which the crystalline structure of a material is modified. The sheathing on wire and cable is routinely cross-linked with radiation to improve a number of important properties and radiation cross-linked polymers are commonly used to make heat-shrinkable tubing, connectors, and films.
188.8.131.52.1 Natural polymers
Recently a process has been reported to modify natural polymers (e.g. hydrocolloids such as CMC, gum arabic, dextran, gelatine, etc) in solid state by high energy radiation (Al-Assaf et al., 2006b; Al-Assaf et al., 2007b) to obtain their hydrogel (Figure 13).
The new method allows the controlled modification of the structure of polysaccharide and other related materials in the solid state using ionizing radiation in the presence of a mediating alkyne gas. The method has been applied to a range of polysaccharides of differing origin and structure, to proteins either directly derived from animal connective tissue sources such as collagen, gelatin, and from human and animal products, such as casein, combinations of one or more such polysaccharides with proteins of plant origin. These polymers when irradiated in presence of acetylene gas, it leads to the cross-linking and hence formation of macromolecules with increased molecular weight and functionalities. Highly branched polysaccharide structures could produce a 4-fold increase in molecular weight with doses up to 10 kGy and hydrogels with doses up to 50 kGy, whereas straight chain structures can yield a similar change with doses as low as 1–3 kGy. Proteins require doses up to 25 kGy to achieve a similar result. The proposed cross-linking mechanism for solid state radiation is illustrated in Figure 14. For ease of presentation the two macromolecular chains are represented as R1H and R2H. The direct radiation action forms a free radical (●R1) which then adds to the acetylene to give a radical with a double bond. This addition to the acetylene is slow and the reactive radical with a double bond abstracts hydrogen atom form a nearby polysaccharide chain to give two radicals, one on the original acetylene adduct and one on a nearby polysaccharide chain (●R2). These
recombine to give a cross-linked stable radical. This radical has fair degree of mobility and either recombines with acetylene, radical generated as a result of the action of ionizing radiation or another similar radical to form a cross-linked network (Al-Assaf et al., 2007b).
Irradiation of carboxymethyl cellulose in solid state showed that the structural changes can again be achieved using the radiation processing. Result showed that initial mean Mw of 1.55 x 105, is increased three-fold to 4.44 x 105 Da. Moreover the polydispersity is increased from 2 to 2.8 with an increase in Rg from 36 to 52 nm. Hydrogel is formed at the higher doses and is visible in solution. Gelation of CMC solution can be controlled to give stable gels ranging in consistency from soft pourable to very firm. At a frequency of 0.1 Hz there is a 10-fold increase in G’ and G”. The method allows controlled increase in molecular weight and gel formation which are increased linearly with the radiation dose. Result on solid state radiation of dextran showed 83% of hydrogel formation at a dose of around 50 kGy. An increase in Mw from initial value of 2.34 x 106 Da to a maximum of 4.58 x 106 Da was observed. The modified dextran showed a marked increase in viscoelastic properties compared to it control. Radiation of another slightly blanched hydrocolloid, pullulan showed that on radiation processing the average Mw doubles from 3.17 x 105 to 6.81 x 105 Da and moreover, there is conversion of the original material to form hydrogel to an extent of 30% of the original material. Measurements of G’ shows the enhancement of the rheological properties in manner expected for the higher molecular weight polysaccharide. Result on a protein (gelatine) showed that using the solid state process, the molecular weight of gelatine can be increased in a controlled manner to produce a range of products with varying molecular weights and solution/gelling properties. The same behaviour has been achieved with casein in the form of its sodium salt. The modifications already demonstrated can be applied also to the widest range of commercial polysaccharides, including xanthan, pectin, carrageenan, gellan, welan, guar gum, locust bean gum, alginate, starch, heparin, chitin and chitosan (Phillips et al., 2003; Phillips et al., 2005).
A recent study on carrageenan modification in the solid state demonstrated that the hydrogel formation and the increase in viscoelasticity upon irradiation of κ-carrageenan are achieved without using a gelling agent (Gulrez et al., 2010). The optimum dose range to achieve modification is 5-10 kGy since at high dose degradation results in reduction of gel fraction. Irradiation of carrageenan led to production of nearly 78% hydrogel with an improvement in viscosity nearly four-fold to that of control material. The results showed improvement in viscoelasticity at moderate doses which can be defined as a result of increase in hydrodynamic radius of carrageenan gel solution. The results showed that radiation modified κ-carrageenan hydrogels are stronger than control sample. The strength of κ-carrageenan gels increased with increased radiation dose and reached to maximum at 5 kGy. The superior mechanical properties of the irradiated sample compared with the control can be explained as the aggregation of relatively longer superhelical rods in case of modified sample (Figure 15).
184.108.40.206.2. Synthetic/natural polymer blends
The same technique was applied on various mix systems of water soluble polymers of synthetic and natural origin and the result showed the synergistic effect on the functionalities of these mix systems. One such example is the radiation of mixture (1:1) of polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP) and gum arabic (GA) in solid state. The reheology measurement carried out for 10% aqueous solution of this system showed significant improvement in viscoelasticity of mixed polymers (synergy) compared to either of its constituents (Figure 16).
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Last week I discussed Japanese naming conventions for first names. This week, it's family land ville!
Most of you are probably familiar with the Eastern convention of putting the family name first, then the given name last. (Japanese people, at least, usually do not have middle names.) This puts prominence on the family name, which is a more important identifier than even the given name. Chances are, if you're Japanese, you'll be called only by your family name for most of your life - this includes by close friends, depending on your gender and dynamics. (Boys/Men are more likely to solely call each other by family name, whereas Girls/Women may use given names in close relationships.) Your last name will also probably give away what region you're from.
Popularity and the Top 10
Here's a quick and dirty skinny about Japanese family names: like given names, they come in "puzzle pieces," although family names tend to go in any order. (You'll see examples of this below.) Their kanji and associated meanings are almost always natural or geographical, and denote where a family may have once lived. (In contrast, think about how many Western names come from very old professions, like "Smith" and "Baker.") There are some odd hundred-thousand possible family names in Japan, but, as you can imagine, some are WAY more common than others. To begin deconstructing family names, let's start with the top ten family names in the nation, courtesy of here:
(Please note that almost all these family names have various kanji spelling and meanings. The ones used below are just the most common ones.)
1. Satou (佐藤) "Helpful Wisteria."
2. Suzuki (鈴木) "Bud Tree"
3. Takahashi (高橋) "High Bridge"
4. Tanaka (田中) "Middle of the Field"
5. Watanabe (渡辺) "Crossing the Border"
6. Itou (伊藤) "That One Wisteria"
7. Nakamura (中村) "Middle of the Village"
8. Yamamoto (山本) "Foot of the Mountain"
9. Kobayashi (小林) "Small Woods"
10. Saitou (斉藤*) "Adjusted Wisteria"
*This is a difficult name to translate. The first kanji essentially means "equal," "similar to," etc.
As you can see, almost all these names have to do with geographical locations and natural elements. ("What's with all the Wisteria?" you may be asking. The wisteria is a very popular flower appearing throughout Japanese history, and could be considered one of the visual icons of Japanese culture. "Tou" as a suffix appears in other Japanese names such as "Katou," and as "Fuji" in many prefixes, like "Fujiko" for a girl's name and "Fujita" for a family name.) Other geographical names including these pieces are "Yamada," (山田) "Nakayama," (中山) "Honda," (本田) and "Nakata." (中田) But of course, they don't stop there. Cardinal directions (/Kita, Minami, Nishi, and Higashi) all make frequent appearances in Japanese surnames.
Meanings of Whole Names
So now that you're familiar with both first names and last names in Japanese, we can take a look at how they affect a person's whole name!
Remember Yuka (Gentle Aroma / 優香) and Ryota (Big Dragon / 龍太), two kids we had in our post last week? Let's pretend they're sister and brother and see what their names are like with some of the most popular surnames above!
1. Satou Yuka (佐藤優香) "Gentle Aroma of the Helpful Wisteria"
2. Suzuki Yuka (鈴木優香) "Gentle Aroma of the Bud Tree"
3. Takahashi Yuka (高橋優香) "Gentle Aroma From the High Bridge"
4. Tanaka Yuka (田中優香) "Gentle Aroma of the Middle Field"
5. Watanabe Yuka (渡辺優香) "Gentle Aroma Crossing the Border"
6. Itou Yuka (伊藤優香) "The Gentle Aroma of That One Wisteria"
7. Nakamura Yuka (中村優香) "Gentle Aroma From the Middle of the Village"
8. Yamamoto Yuka (山本優香) "Gentle Aroma From the Foot of the Mountain"
9. Kobayashi Yuka (小林優香) "Gentle Aroma Of the Small Woods"
10. Saitou Yuka (斉藤優香) "Gentle Aroma of the Adjusted Wisteria"
To save myself the typing, just take out "Gentle Aroma" from above and replace it with "Big Dragon." Bam! Done.
Some of those meanings are kinda "what," and that's to be expected. I mean, think about us, most of us Westerners don't even have a first and last name in the SAME LANGUAGE. *ahem* But yes, sometimes choosing a name for a child is more about the syllabic sound and flow, rather than the meaning. Recently whole name meanings tend to matter less, especially with the trend of first name meanings also mattering less.
Amount of Kanji
All the names above utilize a clean and even four kanji, which is the standard amount of kanji for any given person's name. However, this is not a rule, or even a suggestion! Five and three kanji names are also common. But in my experience, names tend to balance out to around an even four. If a surname is only one kanji, then a person's given name is likely to be three kanji long, and vice versa. Two kanji name exist, but are rare, similar to six kanji names. And since the kanji are ultimately what dictates the meaning of a name in Japanese, some parents have a lot to consider when naming a new child.
Familiarizing yourself with Japanese family names is one of the easiest ways to learn Japanese kanji, since many of them use simple and common ones. They are also likely to tell you the long-ago origin of a family, and in the case of very rare names, can even tell you what region of the country a person is probably from. "Hasegawa" is a common name in Gifu Prefecture not often as found in other places.
Of the ten names listed above, odds are 1/10 Japanese people have one of them. Probably more in actuality. The beauty of them is that they can be "spelled" in many different ways, just like Western names.
From A Writer's Perspective
I both love and loathe picking out surnames for my Japanese characters. Most of them are so common that I have to be careful that two characters I don't intend to be related have the same name, or even a name that sounds too similar. (Recently had this issue with a character who I wanted to name Nakayama, since I have another character already established with the name Nakamura.*) There's also laws to follow and consider, such as any female character who gets married is required by law to change her name to that of her husband's. (Isn't that just lovely?)
*And nobody wants to be mistaken for that guy.
Hope you enjoyed part 2 of this series! Part 3 (and the final one) will come next week, where we'll take a look at nickname conventions!
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Systems analysis reveals critical security flaw
In January 2008, a large company was undergoing an audit by a major public accounting firm when its auditor found a few world-writable files—or files anyone could alter—in the company's UNIX file system. This amounted to a potentially serious security flaw. To protect sensitive financial data, the company uses Symantec Enterprise Security Manager to identify just this type of issue, and immediately catch any vulnerabilities or deviations in the security policies of its applications and servers. Enterprise Security Manager should have been flagging the same files for security violations, but it wasn't.
The company called Symantec for support, and was told they would receive a quick response due to the critical nature of the audit situation. The task of diagnosing the problem was assigned to Nick, an experienced engineer.
"The customer needed to know if the product was configured incorrectly or if there was a bug in our software," Nick says. "Either way, the company needed a response within 24 hours or it could potentially fail the audit, which could open it to legal liability."
Nick began to delve into the wildcarding syntax that controls how Enterprise Security Manager looks for files, telling it to stop at a particular directory level, continue down the directory tree, or look for specific file names. He suspected that the company might be trying to apply wildcard settings in the wrong place, since these settings can be specified in more than one area and module of Enterprise Security Manager.
Resolution within 24 hours
Nick ran a series of tests in a mockup environment to try to reproduce the problem. Because of the customer's high security requirements, he was not given access to its systems, which made diagnosis more challenging. Nick was able to reproduce the errors, and determined that the company had been entering the same wildcard settings in two different areas of Enterprise Security Manager. The first place the company was entering this wildcarding was cancelling out the second, causing certain files to be ignored. When the customer specified the correct wildcard nomenclature only once—and in the correct area—Enterprise Security Manager began flagging the files as expected.
There were several files, however, that the auditor's script was still flagging but Enterprise Security Manager was not. After examining the directories these files were under, Nick noticed a commonality—they were all secured with a UNIX "sticky bit." This means that no matter what the individual file permissions, nothing in the directory can be touched by anyone other than the directory owner or system superuser. Although the files were actually secure, the auditor's script was not designed to detect the sticky bit. Fortunately, the customer was able to convince the auditor that the script needed to be modified, and then subsequently passed the audit.
Effective front-line support
"Normally this kind of an issue would go to our back-line support because the product was not performing as the customer had been led to believe," says Nick. "The fact that we were able to resolve this issue on our front line is a great example of the dependable, fast support for which we strive."
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The Paracas skulls: they’re not aliens (or nephilim)!
Published: 27 April 2014 (GMT+10)
Flickr/ Marcin Tlustochowicz (CC BY 2.0)
We’ve received a lot of questions about the Paracas skulls in Peru, which look like human skulls, only deformed. However, they are claimed to have DNA unlike any living creature on earth, let alone humans. C.S. from the UK provides a typical example:
“Are you going to make an article on the Paracas skulls from Peru? Do you have any information on them now?
Like are they just humans or apes? It is said their DNA doesn’t match anything on record.
I’m seeing a lot of things about this in forums I frequent and I’d like to have an answer to refute these so called aliens.”
We know that there were humans in Peru at the time of the Paracas skulls. Maybe these people were unusually tall, and their skulls were unusually large, but there is also proof that some genetic diseases which cause unusual skull size. Even among people living today, there are huge variations in human stature (from 4 1/2 feet tall pygmies in Africa to 7+ feet tall basketball players). And skulls can be intentionally deformed, and it is well known that some Mexican and South American cultures did this by placing heavy weights on a child’s soft skull. In other cultures children's skulls were tightly wrapped in bandages to create this appearance. Such practices were often done as a status symbol of sorts. So if we find what look like the distorted skulls of possibly diseased and/or purposefully deformed humans, the logical conclusion is not that “we must have found aliens!”
And this is aside from the unlikelihood of life on other planets and the improbability of making the leap from life to human-like consciousness. Even if life evolved on other planets, travelling to earth would be problematic because it would be impossible to travel the distances involved within normal lifespans.
When we examine the content of the claims, and who is making them, we find lots of reasons to be skeptical of the hype about the skulls. The announcement was not made in a scientific journal, but via the media—the same media that promotes mermaids, Bigfoot, and other sensational claims. Brien Foerster, one of the men who made the announcement, the assistant director of a private museum with no relevant credentials, runs ‘paranormal’ tours in Peru. The geneticist who did the testing wants to be anonymous, at least for now, so his expertise cannot be used to bolster the claim until he is willing to make it public.
And there is reason to be skeptical of the claim that the DNA is unlike anything we’ve ever seen. First of all, why would aliens have DNA? If life evolved elsewhere, what are the chances its information code would look anything like DNA, or produce something as human-like as the skulls?
These DNA claims are similar to the ‘Atacama child’, which we covered in our review of the Sirius documentary. In reality, DNA analysis of the Atacama child revealed that it was human, not alien. Some Christians are also keen to invoke the skulls as pre-Flood nephilim relics. We have a thorough article on this topic called Who were the ‘sons of God’ in Genesis 6? (an extract from Gary Bates's book Alien Intrusion: UFOs and the Evolution Connection. Please read this before making comments about this topic.
Christians should be cautious about buying into such sensational claims, especially when the conclusions are anti-biblical in nature.
Hi Lita, I read your article with enthusiasm as I had knowlege of the Paracas skulls, but no response. I also read Gary's article on the Sirius documentary. If evolutionist's proposal is that both aliens and humans originated via the big bang/evolution, this creates an enormous problem on how they are both possible from the same origin besides many other controversies?! If they claim that we were somehow "created" by aliens then they deny their "pond scum" theory for the origin of life! It would also be interesting to know how they suppose alien spacecraft arrived here in the first place, because alien "sightings" are only observed on and around earth?! Spacecraft leaving earth is "observable" and therefore the reciprocal alien craft should also be observable travelling through space?! Also, if aliens are so advanced why would they look like deformed humanoids? If they existed before humans then that turns evolution backwards?! Lots of questions, no evolutionary answers! Great article! Keep up the good work!
How disappointing to see CMI take a closed-minded stance against evidence which could potentially bolster the historicity of the Bible. Genesis confirms that angel-human hybrids did exist both before *and after* the flood of Noah. Just read the account. It says "and also afterward". After what? The logical conclusion is that they existed after the flood, and of course the Bible goes on later to even recount episodes of the Israelites coming in contact with giants (Nephilim).
CMI needs to be cautious- just as they recommend for their readership- about being too rash in dismissing evidence just because it doesn't fit with their preconceived notions. If you look at what Brian Forster actually says, you will see he presents good reasons to reject these skulls as being the result of cranial deformation. CMI- stop falling prey to groupthink.
Paul, there is an in-depth article that explains what "and also afterward" means in Genesis 6, and also refutes the idea that Israelites enountered Nephilim after the Flood. It is at http://creation.com/images/pdfs/articles/sons-of-god-genesis-6.pdf. We specifically asked people to read this before commenting.
We don't dismiss the evidence lightly or without thinking about it. If you had read the other articles we've written on the topic--and which this article linked to--you would understand why we take the stance we do, even if you continue to disagree. Simply disagreeing with your position does not mean we've fallen prey to 'groupthink'.
I think you are largely missing the point most salient to Christian apologists: - is there evidence that some of these skulls could be genuinely anomalous and evidence for some sort of "sons of God"/ Nephilim-human hybrids? If cranial cavity/ capacities are genuinely outliers w.r.t standard deviations from normal and there is no evidence of hydrocephalus, if suture lines are missing or very unusual then one can make a case maybe not for extra terrestrials but biblical "extra-dimensionals". The distinction is very important to make. Are we seeing something a biblical literalist can interpret far better than any naturalist/ materialist; including the SETI sky searching crowd.
Christians should be the last people to knee jerk scoff at the possibility of actual fallen angel human interactions/ giants/ six fingered anti-Christs.
Careful of what you dismiss a priori; lest it be exactly what a Christian should expect to find.
brother in Christ, south of the border
If these were Nephilim skulls, they would have to be buried under lots of Flood sediments, because they were all killed in the Flood. And no one thinks these skulls are anywhere near that old. For a refutation of claims of post-Flood Nephilim, see http://creation.com/images/pdfs/articles/sons-of-god-genesis-6.pdf.
Hi saw in a documentary showing that some of the skull plate patterns were different in some of the skulls shaped like this. By skull plates I mean the seams where the skull formed. Do you know of this?
The claim is that the parietal suture is missing--but note the correct term in anatomy is sagittal suture. One source I consulted says that many of the skulls obviously have them; the others still have them, but due to the severe deformity of the skull it isn't where it ought to be, and they were photographed at 'convenient' angles.
Nowhere in the original article or data does it state that any of the Paracas were aliens. It does say that they may not have been Homo sapiens.
Regardless of what the original data claim, all of the hype about them is based on them being aliens or Nephilim, or some sort of hybrid. So that's what our article addressed, because that's what people have been asking us.
there are ways to tell which skulls were formed that way artificially. Cant remember the term used for the 4 or 5 lines in ours skulls from the plates joining together.. but these sculls dont have them. The fake ones still have those lines. I thought that would be important to mention here. Thanks
Actually, the skulls have all the sutures human skulls are supposed to have, but due to extreme deformity, some of them are not where they are supposed to be.
Great article. Given the facts that we know about this, such as that the person who did the DNA tests won't reveal his/her identity, I see no reason to believe that these skulls aren't made of plastic or some other hoax. The photos could even just be photo-shopped for all we know. I think that more research needs to be done to debunk this kind of nonsense.
Check with an anthropologist, as I recall people in South America would wrap the child's skulls to produce the shapes seen as a sign of their royalty or status of some sort. I just recall the conversation, I am not conversant in such things. Thanks for your articles!!
I appreciated Lita Cosner's article on the Paracas skulls, and I agree with what she has said. The facial bones appear very human, and significant deformity of the cranium can be obtained by the methods she mentioned. Even simple cradle boarding as done here in the Southwest US can lead to a very flat occiput (back of skull). If infant, child, and adult skulls were found with the similar deformity it could argue for a genetic malformation. As the bones in the photo appear to be well calcified it argues against a nutritional defect. Finally, a simple review of burials, textiles, and pottery associated with these skulls demonstrates that they were a sophisticated people group. It has nothing to do with so called aliens.
John G Leslie PhD, MD, PhD
I have studied the Paracas and Nazcan cultures for around twenty five years. Even excavated tombs in Ica Chinca. The Paracas people were small about five feet and practiced cranial deformation shaping of the skull to look like coneheads. A cradle cranial shaping board was found in a tomb in Paracas. The culture was roughly 500BC to 600AD. I sent mummy tissue to a lab in Dallas and they are 100 percent human. Soon I will be taking tissue samples from a cone head a complete mummy and this will be filmed. The tissue will be sent to a lab and results published, Ive seen many many mummies from Paracas Nazca and ICA. They are all human.
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Carl Sandburg was a 20th-century American writer, known for his free verse poems celebrating the American people, countryside, and industry in the heartland of the United States, and for his six-volume biography, Abraham Lincoln.
Carl August Sandburg was born in Galesburg, Illinois, on January 6, 1878. He was the son of poor Swedish immigrants, August Sandburg, a railroad blacksmith's helper, and Clara Mathilda Anderson. His hard-working parents instilled in him and his six siblings the necessity of hard work and education, as well as a reverence for the American Dream.
When Carl entered first grade, he Americanized his Swedish Christian name, thereafter signing his school papers and his early writings as Charles A. Sandburg. He left school after his eighth-grade year and, at the age of 13, became a day laborer. Carl shined shoes, delivered milk and newspapers, and performed other odd jobs.
In 1896, Sandburg made his first significant journey, a trip to Chicago on a railroad pass that he had borrowed from his father. He would later return to cover the city as a reporter and become known as one of its most celebrated poets. The following year, Sandburg decided to see the country and worked his way west as a hobo, stowing away on top and inside railroad boxcars, traveling through Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, and Colorado in search of odd jobs.
After a few months, Sandburg returned to Galesburg. During a brief period as a housepainter, he became restless and enlisted in Company C, Sixth Infantry Regiment of the Illinois Volunteers, for service in the Spanish-American War. He was assigned to duty in Puerto Rico from July through August 1898.
Although he lacked a high school diploma, in October 1898, Sandburg's status as a war veteran qualified him for admission tuition-free to Lombard College in his hometown. He then received a conditional appointment to the U.S. Military Academy in 1899 and traveled to West Point to take the entrance examinations. To his dismay, he failed the mathematics and grammar tests. He returned to Galesburg to study at Lombard until May 1902.
Sandburg worked his way through college, and managed to attract the attention of Professor Philip Green Wright, who not only encouraged Sandburg's writing, but paid for publication of his first volume of poetry, a pamphlet titled Reckless Ecstasy, published in 1904. Sandburg attended Lombard for four years, but did not receive a diploma.
Beginnings: marriage and career
Following college, Sandburg moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he worked as an advertising writer and newspaper reporter. In 1908, he met Lillian Steichen, sister of the photographer Edward Steichen. Charles and Lillian fell in love and were married the same year in Milwaukee.
The couple had three children. His wife encouraged Sandburg to reclaim his christened name, so he became Carl Sandburg once and for all. At that time in his life, Sandburg was a socialist sympathizer and worked for the Social-Democrat Party in Wisconsin. He later served as secretary to the first socialist mayor of Milwaukee, from 1910 to 1912.
During World War I, Sandburg worked for the Newspaper Enterprise Associates as the Stockholm, Sweden, reporter.
In 1917, Sandburg later moved to Chicago where, in 1917, he became an editorial writer for the Chicago Daily News. His poetry first began to attract attention when he was published in the magazine, Poetry. With the printing of his Chicago Poems (1916), Cornhuskers (1918), Smoke and Steel (1920), and Slabs of the Sunburnt West (1922), his reputation as a poet was firmly established.
Sandburg was a devoted and kind-hearted family man. Before World War I, he had begun to write comical, sometimes poignant American fairy tales for his children. Two events encouraged him to develop those stories into a book: the sorrow and strife that he witnessed during the First World War, and his eldest daughter's epilepsy, for which there was as yet no seizure-suppressing medication.
From the sadness of that time sprang a wonderful series of storybooks for young people, the Rootabaga Stories published in 1922, Rootabaga Pigeons (1923), Rootabaga Country (1929), and Potato Face (1930). Sandburg also wrote two books of poems for children: Early Moon and Wind Song.
The Lincoln project
In the 1920s, Sandburg began some of his most ambitious projects, including his study of Abraham Lincoln. From childhood, Sandburg had loved and admired the legacy of President Lincoln. For 30 years he had sought out and collected material, and gradually began writing the six-volume biography of the fallen president.
Through the 1930s, Sandburg continued to write about life in America with Mary Lincoln, Wife and Widow published in 1932, The People, Yes in 1936, and the second part of his Lincoln biography, Abraham Lincoln: The War Years, published in 1939, for which he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. Sandburg was awarded a second Pulitzer Prize in 1950, for his Complete Poems.
In 1952, Sandburg was awarded the American Academy of Arts and Letters gold medal in biography and history, one of several honors and awards. He settled down to finish writing his memoirs at his 245-acre farm in Flat Rock, North Carolina, purchased in 1945. In 1953, Sandburg published Always the Young Strangers, the autobiographical account of the first 20 years of his life.
Sandburg set aside work on the second volume of his autobiography, Ever the Winds of Chance, to collaborate with his brother-in-law, Edward Steichen, on an unprecedented photographic exhibition, The Family of Man, which made its debut in 1955.
The work included 503 pictures gathered by Steichen from several countries, to serve as a "mirror of the essential oneness of mankind throughout the world." It was a courageous affirmation of the ideal of global community and, for both Sandburg and Steichen, a culmination of the work of their lives.
In 1959, Sandburg delivered a Lincoln Day address before a joint session of Congress. Later in the year, he traveled with Steichen on a State Department tour to open The Family of Man exhibition in the Soviet Union.
Sandburg resided in Hollywood, California, during much of 1960, working as George Stevens' creative consultant on the film The Greatest Story Ever Told. His last book of poetry, titled Honey and Salt, was published in 1963. The following year, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
A national memory
Much to Sandburg's delight, more than a half-dozen public schools were named in his honor.
Following his death in 1967, Sandburg's home of 22 years in Flat Rock was preserved by the National Park Service as the Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site. Carl Sandburg College is located in Sandburg's birthplace of Galesburg.
See also Wallace Stevens .
---- Selected Quotes ----
Quotes by Carl Sandburg.
Yesterday is done. Tomorrow never comes. Today is here. If you don't know what to do, sit still and listen.
- - - Books You May Like Include: ----
Savage Peace: Hope and Fear in America, 1919 by Ann Hagedorn.
Written with the sweep of an epic novel and grounded in extensive research into contemporary documents, Savage Peace is a striking portrait of America...
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Image courtesy of JPL/NASA
About 2.5 billion years ago (BYA), after the iron in the ocean was gone to form iron ore deposits
, oxygen began accumulating in the atmosphere. Soon, enough oxygen accumulated in the early atmosphere for a change in the genetic code which resulted in the formation of eukaryotic cells. These are cells in which the organelle are outside of the nucleus, and the nucleus has a separate and distinct place within the cell. Both heterotrophs (early animals) and autotrophs (early plants) adapted to the new cells.
In sophisticated cells with a nucleus, not only respiration, but even photosynthesis is more efficient, so the production of oxygen in the environment of the early Earth accelerated. That made it possible for respiration (for animals which breathe oxygen) to begin in simple organisms. The new life forms which came to be were single-celled organisms like protozoans, amoeba, etc, animals which we now classify as part of the, Protista Kingdom .
By the end of the Proterozoic, new life forms evolved which were multi-cellular and colonial.
Shop Windows to the Universe Science Store!
"Ready, Set, SCIENCE!: Putting Research to Work in K-8 Science Classrooms
", from the National Research Council, provides insight on the types of instructional experiences help K-8 students learn science with understanding. Check our other books
in our online store
You might also be interested in:
Eventually, as with the development of photosynthesis along sulfur and methane pathways, where sulfur and methane products are produced, photosynthesis along the oxygen pathway, where oxygen is produced,...more
Respiration is the name of the general process by which living organisms convert sugars and oxygen into biochemical energy. The process occurs in all organisms, including animals, plants, fungi, and bacteria...more
Photosynthesis is the name of the process by which autotrophs (self-feeders) convert water, carbon dioxide, and solar energy into sugars and oxygen. It is a complex chemical process by which plants and...more
Members of the Kingdom Protista are the simplest of the eukaryotes. Protistans are an interesting assemblage of organisms classified for what they are not. Protistans lack characteristics shared by plants,...more
Jupiter's atmospheric environment is one of strong gravity, high pressure, strong winds, from 225 miles per hour to 1000 miles per hour, and cold temperatures of -270 degrees to +32 degrees (freezing temperature)....more
In July, 1996, it was announced that Dr. David McKay, along with a team of scientists at Johnson Space Center (a division of NASA), had discovered possible fossils of bacteria in an ancient rock from Mars....more
Saturn's atmospheric environment is one of strong gravity, high pressure, strong winds, from 225 miles per hour to 1000 miles per hour, and cold temperatures of -270 degrees to +80 degrees. With winds...more
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Field Guide to Solar & Renewable Energy Features & Tax Credits
(Updated March 2016)
As energy prices continue to rise, solar and other renewable sources are becoming more affordable options for not only large utility-grade users, but also consumers. States help make the switch even more affordable with tax credits and other benefits currently on tap through at least 2016. This new field guide explores the basics of solar energy, how to get in the game, as well as current credits available both from federal and local authorities. (A. Creitz, Information & Web Content Specialist)
E – EBSCO articles available for NAR members only. Password can be found on the EBSCO Access Information page.
Looking for more formal training in renewable energy and green building practices? NAR's Green designation provides real estate professionals with the knowledge and awareness of green building principles applied in residences, commercial properties, developments, and communities so that they can list, market, and manage green properties as well as guide buyer-clients in purchasing green homes and buildings.
For more information, visit the Green Resource Council page.
Solar Energy Basics, (National Renewal Energy Laboratory, July 2014).
Solar subsidies help against financing headwinds, (Research Technology Management, Mar./Apr. 2014). E
The far-reaching benefits of the energy property tax credit, (HouseLogic, Feb. 18, 2014). — This tax season is the last you can claim it, unless Congress renews it for 2014, which is possible but not certain.
Solar Energy Technologies, (U.S. Department of Energy, Aug 16, 2013). — Solar energy technologies produce electricity from the energy of the sun.
La. Solar tax credit price tag far above estimates, (Business Week, Aug. 9, 2012).
Using Solar Energy, (Solarbuzz.com, 2011). — Find out how the technology can be used, learn about the common types of systems and discover how quickly a solar system will pay for itself.
Tracking the Sun III: The Installed Cost of Photovoltaics in the U.S. from 1998-2009, (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Dec. 2010). — A new report from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory shows that the average cost of going solar in the U.S. decreased significantly in 2010 following global module price declines in 2009. These latest reductions are part of a downward solar cost trend that is due in part to federal, state and local policies that build American demand for renewable energy.
Adding Solar & Renewable Energy
Planning a Home Solar Electric System, (Energy.gov, 2015).
Are solar panels worth the investment? (Washington Post, Mar. 26, 2014). — You’ll have to judge for yourself.
How to lease your own home solar power system, (Kiplinger’s Personal Finance, July 2012) — The big news in solar is the rise of leasing, which makes home systems more affordable and can save you money right away on your electric bill.
One of state's largest solar electrical systems powers Palatine home, (Chicago Daily Herald, May 29, 2011).
A Bright Spot for Solar, (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Apr. 21, 2011) — U.S. Department of Energy's Berkeley Lab study finds that photovoltaic systems boost the sales price of California homes.
Capturing the Sun, (Journal of Property Management, 2010). E
Is Solar-thermal Hot Water for You?, (HouseLogic, Oct. 7, 2010) — Roof-top solar panels that create hot water with sunshine significantly reduce energy bills and are relatively easy to install and maintain.
Solar/Renewable Energy Tax Credits
Please note: While accurate at time of publication, tax credit information can change. Please check with Federal, State & Local authorities for the most up-to-date information.
Federal Tax Credits for Consumer Energy Efficiency, (Energy Star, 2015) — Available federal tax credits for various energy efficiencies are detailed with information on requirements, deadlines, and how to get the credit.
Rooftop Solar Leases Scaring Buyers When Homeowners Sell, (Bloomberg, June 23, 2014) — While purchasing solar panels can increase the value of your home, leasing them can cost you up to 10 percent.
Energy Tax Credits, (HouseLogic, 2014) — A frequently updated resource of articles from HouseLogic.
What you need to know about the extended federal tax credits for energy efficiency, (Energy.gov, 2013).
State Incentives for Renewables and Efficiencies, (DSIRE, 2013) — DSIRE is a comprehensive source of information on state, local, utility and federal incentives and policies that promote renewable energy and energy efficiency. Established in 1995 and funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, DSIRE is an ongoing project of the N.C. Solar Center and the Interstate Renewable Energy Council.
Tax Incentives for Going Green, (CPA Journal, Nov. 2010). — A summary of the tax incentives available for green projects and guidance for maximizing the available tax benefits, five of which apply to businesses, one that applies to both businesses and individuals, and two that apply only to individuals. E
eBooks & Other Resources
A Solar Buyer's Guide for the Home and Office (Kindle Book, OverDrive Read, EPUB eBook)
The Solar House: Passive Heating and Cooling (OverDrive Read, EPUB eBook)
The following eBooks and digital audiobooks are available to NAR members:
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Solar Power for your Home (Adobe eReader)
The Homeowner's Guide to Renewable Energy (Kindle, Adobe eReader)
Field Guides & More
These field guides and other resources in the Virtual Library may also be of interest:
Have an Idea for a New Field Guide?
Click here to send us your suggestions.
The inclusion of links on this field guide does not imply endorsement by the National Association of REALTORS®. NAR makes no representations about whether the content of any external sites which may be linked in this field guide complies with state or federal laws or regulations or with applicable NAR policies. These links are provided for your convenience only and you rely on them at your own risk.
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I know there's あいうえお, but what about at the consonant level? Also, are there any common mnemonics used by Japanese children to remember these?
- Anybody can ask a question
- Anybody can answer
- The best answers are voted up and rise to the top
Hiragana syllables are always schematised in a given order which is this one (from right to left, as you may already know):
After a while I started Japanese, I also found this video, the Japanese Alphabet song (only for hiragana), that can be interesting for absolute beginners.
One of the best ways to remember Hiragana (and Katakana as well), in my opinion, is to write vocabulary words using Hiragana. It might seem banal, but it works.
The order used today pretty much everywhere is called Gojūon, and this is what Alenanno has described, but there's also a traditional order, with its own song, called Iroha. This order is actually based on the poem (instead of the other way around), and interestingly enough, it is possible because the poem managed to include every letter of the traditional alphabet exactly once. It was less useful than the Gojūon, because you needed to remember the song to use it, and over time the kana have lost two of the letters in Iroha (ゑ and ゐ) and gained a new one (ん).
The order is
あ か さ た な は ま や ら わ
If you have a Japanese cell phone, you can use the keypad to check the order, which runs from the 1 to 0 keys. If you have an iPhone, you can activate a Ten Key Japanese keyboard in the Keyboard settings, which is in the same order.
You can also listen to this cheesy Japanese hip-hop song by Kreva to hammer it into your head. The chorus is:
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Modeling Tool Helps Designers Drape Digital Forms Across Physical Bodies [Video]
A new type of architectural modeling explores the differences between physical and digital environments.
In the world of design and fabrication, developers have continually taken on the challenge of recreating physical environments in the digital world so that designers can anticipate how their objects will pan out once they are fabricated. Creating a context for virtually-imagined objects has now become possible with 3D scanning, but of course the rules that form the 3D-scanned environment are subject to many limitations, not least of which the number of contingencies a human could possibly account for. With her Reverberating Across The Divide project, Madeline Gannon of Carnegie Mellon University has torn down these constraints by creating an environment where geometry and time, instead of physics, dominate.
Using a Kinect interface, which allows for sophisticated gestural controls, and a 3D agent generated using open-source software like Processing and Toxiclibs, Gannon created a chronomorphologic modeling environment – one that creates new forms by tracking an object’s movement through space and time. Similar to 19th-century chronophotography, which you may recognize as the early high-speed photography that for the first time tracked a horse’s running gait and a cat’s movement through air, Gannon’s early example of a chronomorphological project used the Kinect interface to drag the form of a squid around the form of a human neck. With the help of a “spring skeleton” that prevents the squid from intersecting with itself (just as an actual solid object can’t), Gannon created a series of stunning studies that show the endless possibilities of a repeated shape.
The complex studies can then be 3D printed as jewelry, as Gannon’s project shows, or as any sort of form that benefits from being constrained by the external world. This is only the beginning of this new field: the only limits are the human imagination. Check out how it works below.
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Forensic Art or Native Art? Harvey Pratt Does Both
Harvey Pratt has turned his special skills into two specialized occupations: Native American artist and police forensic artist. Pratt, a member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes of Oklahoma, first got notice as a school kid from the woman who discovered the Kiowa Five.
“I went to St. Patrick’s Indian Mission boarding school in Anadarko, Oklahoma. The priest there saw me drawing and he bought me some supplies. And then he contacted Susie Peters,” Pratt said.
Peters, a Kiowa Agency field matron whose job it was to help school Native American women in the domestic arts of the day, noticed the artwork of young Kiowa artists, and formed an art club. From this club would emerge the Kiowa Five, whose art would eventually be shown around the world in the 1920s and 1930s.
“She came out and looked at some of my art work...and I had no idea who she was, you know it didn't mean anything to me but I do remember her coming out and looking at my things, and saying he ‘obviously, he has talent. We need to encourage him!’”
Pratt went to college as an art major but only found harsh criticism to the point that he thought, “Well hell, obviously I can't be an artist, so I changed my major.”
Pratt joined the Marines and was sent to Vietnam. His fellow soldiers noticed him, as he put it, “doodling.” They asked him to design their insignia, which was embroidered on their uniforms.
“When I got out of the Marine Corps I went back to school, I changed majors again and I became a police officer,” Pratt said.
Pratt’s career in forensic art includes 5,000 witness description drawings, 1,000 soft tissue reconstructions, and 200 skull reconstruction and age progressions on fugitives and missing people.
“When you start thinking back on law enforcement as an artist, you know, it’s just, just a lot of different things in the forensic art and it was job satisfaction as far as doing the police art,” Pratt said.
“It was kind of a struggle but I was always doing art, I kept doing art and my brother was doing some, Charles Pratt, was doing some stuff by then,” he said. “I saw he was having a certain amount of success so I kind of continued to paint and I started selling a few things here and there. I had a couple of galleries that helped me and started exhibiting my work and then I started doing some shows. So it just kind of evolved.”
Pratt’s long career in forensic police art has put him into some high profile cases from Oklahoma’s Steak House Murders to Ted Bundy to a case currently in the news, that of James “Whitey” Bulger. Pratt was even asked to age progress Osama Bin Laden.
Pratt is recognized equally in both worlds. He was the “Honored One” at the Red Earth Festival in 2005 and for a time he was the interim director of the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation and last year was inducted into the Oklahoma Law Enforcement Hall of Fame.
He has even been asked to do the unusual, interpret people’s recollections of Big Foot sightings for the book The Hoopa Project by David Paulides. But for now, Pratt is looking forward to participating in his hometown’s art festival, Guthrie Art Escape, this October 5 & 6 in Guthrie, Oklahoma.
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San Francisco, California, USA
London, United Kingdom
On 15 February 2013, a rock from space exploded over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk, injuring over 1500 people and making headline news worldwide. On the same day, a larger piece of space debris, the asteroid known as 2012 DA14, missed our planet by less than 30,000 kilometres – an incredible near miss. These events are a stark reminder of the threat posed to Earth by ‘rocks from space’. In this talk, astronomer Dr Jonti Horner explains where the different groups of threatening objects come from and traces their story back to the formation of the solar system. Dr Horner will also discuss the threat they pose to the Earth, and the other planets in the solar system.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Jonti Horner is an astronomer who currently works in the Department of Astrophysics and Optics, in the University of New South Wales. He arrived in Australia from Oxford University in October 2010 to work in the exoplanet group, spending part of his time looking for planets around other stars! He also carries out theoretical research into the origin and evolution of the small bodies in our Solar system - objects such as comets, asteroids, and meteoroids and is also involved in projects examining the formation of planets around other stars, and looking into the nature of habitability on the Earth and beyond.
Date: 13 August
Time: 6.00pm start, doors open from 5.45pm.
When & Where
Our events are designed to educate, entertain and excite.
The Australian Museum is a place of exploration and discovery, inspiring responsibility for our world by promoting knowledge, understanding and enjoyment of science, nature and culture.
1 William St, Sydney NSW
(02) 9320 6000
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Dorothy Day, who died in 1980, was an anarchist, a pacifist, and the co-founder of the Catholic Worker, a movement devoted to helping the poor and the homeless. Described by historian David O’Brien as “the most influential, interesting, and significant figure” in U.S. Catholic history, Day is currently being considered for canonization in the Catholic Church. Before her conversion to Catholicism in 1927, however, Day lived what the late Cardinal O’Connor of the Archdiocese of New York has referred to as "a life akin to that of the pre-converted Augustine of Hippo." That bohemian life included common-law marriage and an abortion. Some may feel that Day’s promiscuity precludes her cause for sainthood. But in his February 2000 letter to the Vatican in support of Day’s canonization, O’Connor contended “that her abortion should not preclude her cause, but intensifies it.” She is a model, he continued, “for women who have had or are considering abortions” because she “regretted” that action “every day of her life.”
This private conversation with Catholic Worker member Daniel Marshall occurred in 1977 at a farm in Tivoli, New York. According to Marshall:
Earlier this month, Father James Martin, the Jesuit priest, author, and go-to-guy on Roman Catholicism for Stephen Colbert (Colbert once called him “The Colbert Report chaplain”), reported on “A New Conversation” about Dorothy Day and abortion.
I seized the opportunity to ask Dorothy to write in the paper about abortion as possibly the central moral issue of our time. She paused and gently answered, "I don't like to push young people into their sins" . . .
Then Dorothy said, "You know, I had an abortion. The doctor was fat, dirty and furtive. He left hastily after it was accomplished, leaving me bleeding. The daughter of the landlords assisted me and never said a word of it. He was Emma Goldman's lover; that's why I have never had any use for Emma."
I hung on every word that she said, not only because she was Dorothy, but because, although I had heard a rumor that she had an abortion, I was aware that few people knew of it from her. I understood from Dorothy that she was asking me to comprehend what the consequences would be of a public statement from her on abortion and also that the public consequences might be a distraction from the issue and the cause. What she thought of abortion was clear as a bell from what she said.Link (here) to the entire story at CNN
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Éamon de Valera (pronounced /ˈeɪmən dɛvəˈlɛrə/) (born George De Valero) (14 October 1882 – 29 August 1975) was one of the dominant political figures in 20th century Ireland. His political career spanned over half a century, from 1917 to 1973; he served multiple terms as head of government and head of state, and is credited with a leading role in the authorship of the present-day Constitution of Ireland. He was a significant leader of Ireland's struggle for independence from the United Kingdom, and the anti-Treaty opposition in the ensuing Irish Civil War. In 1926, he founded Fianna Fáil, which continues to be the largest political party in Ireland. Over the years, the principal element of his political creed evolved from militant republicanism to social and cultural conservatism. De Valera was also the co-owner of The Irish Press, a newspaper supportive of Fianna Fáil.
De Valera was born in the New York Nursery and Child's Hospital in New York City in 1882 to an Irish mother; he stated that his parents, Catherine Coll (subsequently Mrs Wheelwright), an immigrant from Bruree, County Limerick, and Juan Vivion de Valera, a Cuban settler and sculptor, were married on 18 September 1881 at St. Patrick's Church located within the Greenville Section of Jersey City, NJ. However, exhaustive trawls through church and state records give no birth, baptismal, or death certificate information for anyone called Juan Vivion de Valera or de Valeros, an alternative spelling. The historian Sean Murphy has listed the long-term search for facts about Mr de Valera, allowing that he may have come from New Mexico, and was perhaps returning there at the time of his death.
On de Valera's original birth certificate, his name is given as George De Valero and his father is listed as Vivion De Valero. The first name was corrected in 1910 (possibly 1916) to Edward and the surname to de Valera.
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Fuel From Thin Air? The skinny on making gasoline from air and water : Biofuels Digest: "We take carbon, we combine it with hydrogen, put it in a reactor to make methanol, then we take the methanol and put that in another reactor to make petrol. The processes of making synthetic petrol from carbon are well known and have been around for many, many years. The Germans were doing it during the Second World War. The South Africans were doing it during the apartheid years. But they were taking their carbon source from coal. We’re taking our carbon source from the atmosphere.”"
'via Blog this'
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The United States is a country founded by immigrants. From the surge of immigration during the late 1800s and early 1900s to the current political debate on immigration reform, the issue has been a key one in our country for nearly 150 years. EducationWorld has scoured the Internet to bring you the most insightful and comprehensive educational videos on the topic of immigration.
For each video, we include a description and grade level. We also note the video's capacity for engagement (“cool factor”).
Source: The Best Film Archives / YouTube
The Best Film Archives is a YouTube channel that provides original documentaries on various topics, rare WWII footage and much more. Many of the videos are full-length, running at least 30 minutes. The group does not produce the films it posts; rather, it aggregates historical programming.
Grade level: Middle and high school
Run time: 28:27
Description: Narrated by the venerable Gene Hackman, this film takes students through the process of immigrating to the United States via Ellis Island. The journey starts with the reasons many people left Europe, describes what the voyage across the Atlantic Ocean was like, and outlines what was involved in navigating the immigration process at Ellis Island. Archival film footage and original photographs help paint the picture of turn-of-the-century immigration, and first-hand accounts help to put students in the shoes of the immigrants.
Cool factor: Gene Hackman is always cool, and the footage of the cramped steamships and endless lines of people waiting to be processed do more to humanize the experience than can any textbook.
Source: Crash Course U.S. History
Crash Course World History is a YouTube channel featuring short, fast-paced video lessons about world history. Videos move quickly, at times almost frantically, making them more like entertaining overviews than serious lessons. With that said, the information presented is sound and often contradictory to “legends” that are often accepted as fact.
Grade level: Late elementary, middle and high school
Run time: 12:45
Description: This fast-paced look at the United States’ second immigration boom is filled with fascinating facts about why people left their homelands, where they settled, and what they contributed to their new country. Host John Green also digresses a bit into global immigration, which helps to put the U.S. experience into context. There is so much information here that it requires multiple viewings to fully absorb, but the video is so entertaining that nobody will mind.
Cool factor: High. In addition to presenting historical information in an entertaining fashion, the video is peppered with pop culture references.
Source: “The Rachel Maddow Show”
“The Rachel Maddow Show” is a daily news and opinion program that airs on MSNBC. The show features a mix of live guests, feature reporting and editorial commentary.
Grade level: Middle and high school
Run time: 16:29
Description: With the current state of U.S. immigration in flux, this video brings viewers into the lives of families that have been broken up as a result of current immigration laws. It highlights the plight of parents, spouses and siblings forced to live apart as family members wade through the current immigration bureaucracy.
Cool factor: Moderate. This is a straightforward news program, so there isn’t a lot of room for witty banter. The glimpse into the real-world effects of current immigration laws can, however, be an eye-opener for students.
Source: The Washington Post
Founded in 1877, the Washington Post is the most widely circulated newspaper published in Washington, D.C. The paper has won 47 Pulitzer Prizes as well as 18 Nieman Fellowships and 368 White House News Photographers Association awards.
Grade Level: Middle and high school
Run Time: 1:44
Description: Immigration is one of the top three issues on President Obama’s agenda. But will House Republicans cooperate? This is the question the Post aims to answer in this brief clip. There is ample speculation here, but it is based on solid sources, with a keen eye on the political machinations behind such an ambitious legislative action.
Cool factor: Moderate. Again, this is a cut-and-dried news piece, so there’s little room for the irreverent.
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Posts tagged language of instruction
CBC reported that Quebec’s Liberal government plans to reintroduce legislation to replace Bill 104, which the Supreme Court of Canada ruled over the summer was unconstitutional. This marks the beginning of another chapter in the ongoing drama surrounding the language of instruction debate in Quebec.
As a very brief history, the linguistic legal battles in Quebec began around the language of legislation and the administration of justice. Consider section 133 of the Constitution Act:
Either the English or the French Language may be used by any Person in the Debates of the Houses of the Parliament of Canada and of the Houses of the Legislature of Quebec; and both those Languages shall be used in the respective Records and Journals of those Houses; and either of those Languages may be used by any Person or in any Pleading or Process in or issuing from any Court of Canada established under this Act, and in or from all or any of the Courts of Quebec… The Acts of the Parliament of Canada and of the Legislature of Quebec shall be printed and published in both those Languages.
In 1977, the Parti Québécois government of René Lévesque (links to wikipedia) brought in The Charter of the French Language, which defined French as the sole official language of Quebec and created broad language rights for every person in the province, particularly related to commercial signs and the language of instruction for schoolchildren. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, English-speaking lawyers in Quebec succeeded in having the Supreme Court of Canada strike down certain provisions of the Charter of the French Language as unconstitutional, specifically those dealing with the language of legislation and the administration of justice.
Chapter VIII of the Charter of the French Language deals with the language of instruction and includes in s. 73 criteria enabling certain children to receive education in English. After the advent of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Supreme Court of Canada, in Quebec (AG) v. Quebec Protestant School Boards, ruled that some of the provisions contained in the original version of s. 73 were unconstitutional. The provincial government revised the eligibility criteria, and in Gosselin v. Quebec (AG) the Supreme Court of Canada held that those revised criteria were constitutionally valid. Section 73 now reads as follows:
The following children, at the request of one of their parents, may receive instruction in English:
(1) a child whose father or mother is a Canadian citizen and received elementary instruction in English in Canada, provided that that instruction constitutes the major part of the elementary instruction he or she received in Canada;
(2) a child whose father or mother is a Canadian citizen and who has received or is receiving elementary or secondary instruction in English in Canada, and the brothers and sisters of that child, provided that that instruction constitutes the major part of the elementary or secondary instruction received by the child in Canada;
(3) a child whose father and mother are not Canadian citizens, but whose father or mother received elementary instruction in English in Québec, provided that that instruction constitutes the major part of the elementary instruction he or she received in Québec;
(4) a child who, in his last year in school in Québec before 26 August 1977, was receiving instruction in English in a public kindergarten class or in an elementary or secondary school, and the brothers and sisters of that child;
(5) a child whose father or mother was residing in Québec on 26 August 1977 and had received elementary instruction in English outside Québec, provided that that instruction constitutes the major part of the elementary instruction he or she received outside Québec…
Bill 104 was enacted to tighten the loopholes used by some parents to squeeze their children into the English school system. In October of this year, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in Nguyen v. Quebec (Education, Recreation and Sports) that Bill 104 is unconstitutional. This recent announcement by the provincial government will continue the debates carried out in these decisions.
A footnote for those unfamiliar with Quebec linguistic politics: a language law remains a “Bill” in public discourse among English publications in Quebec because even after it is passed it is hotly contested.
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Since the late 1980's, California wine growers have been faced with destruction of their vines by infestation of a root louse named phylloxera (biotype B). The louse kills vines by feeding on their roots. There is no way to eradicate the pest, and infested areas must eventually be replanted on a phylloxera-resistant or tolerant rootstock. The infestation is present in eight California counties, and is particularly severe in Napa and Sonoma Counties where thousands of acres of premiere vineyards have already been destroyed or are scheduled for future replacement.
The typically rapid progression of phylloxera infestation was characterized for the 1989-1993 time period across a ~1000 acre Mondavi property using retrospective color infrared aerial photography.
During the 1993 growing season, field and aircraft data were collected from Napa Valley test sites with special sensors designed to study earth resources, including plant stress manifested as reductions in vegetation canopy density. Infestations are detectable in this remotely sensed imagery, even in the early stage when phylloxera are underground eating vine roots but the above ground plant still appears healthy.
Airborne image data were acquired in 1993, 1994, and 1995 over the study ranch. These images (310K) are only part of the ranch. Each image was acquired with a different sensor with different spatial (pixel) resolutions. The 1993 image has a spatial resolution of about 2m, the 1994 image about 5m, and the 1995 image about 3m. The images from 1993 and 1994 were normalized to each other and used to compute a vegetation index. This index image was then divided into twelve ranges of values, each representing a different amount of vegetation biomass or canopy density. The images were then colored so the areas with the little vegetation or bare soil are dark red, then through tan, yellow, light green, and deep green, corresponding to increasing canopy cover and plant health. Black rectangles in these images denote the field work (85K) study plots, where leaves and root diggings were collected. The 1993 binned image (8K) shows some damaged areas, but is otherwise pretty uniform. The 1994 binned image (10K) shows that only one year later the damage has spread and now affects much of the block. This decrease in vegetation canopy was counterbalanced by an increase in density in the uninfested parts of the block, resulting in an overall increase in canopy for the block as a whole. The difference image (12K) highlights the areas with a decrease in plant canopy in red and orange, and yellow, while areas with little change are pale green and those with an increased canopy in are shown in blues. The images can also be viewed as a group.
Some work has also been done to predict the extent of the damage within the vineyard blocks. This analysis was done by looking at the pixels in proximity to the 1993 stressed areas (3K). If the predicted distance was too small, then there was an error due to underestimating the spread. If the predicted distance was too great, then there was an error due to overestimating. For the study block the minimum error of about 26% occurred at about 8m. The 1994 prediction (3K) compares reasonably well with the image of the 1994 stressed areas (3K). The error may be reduced if other variables are taken into account, such as soil type or elevation, and etc. The images can also be viewed as a group. Because the spread of phylloxera is exponential, the predicted distance varies from block to block depending on the initial level of investation.
Vineyard managers work on the scale of the block, so the difference image was summarized by using the mean difference in each block. In this image (3K) the color scheme is the same as in the per pixel difference image above, but here the red areas are blocks that been pulled. The orange blocks should be pulled next and the yellow blocks are questionable. The pale green block is the study area and had a small increase, while the cyan block had a large increase.
Airborne imagery was collected over several vineyard regions in Napa and Sonoma counties 1995. An example of these 3m spatial resolution data from Carneros Region (74K) shows mostly variation in soil conditions. Except for the triangle in the upper right, there is not much vegetation canopy in this area. This image has also been processed into a binned vegetation index image (31K). Some 0.5m data were also acquired over the study area (82K). This image is close to the spatial resolution of color infrared photography. At this resolution the individual vines can be easily recognized. An interesting feature in this image is the violet rectangle in the bottom right. Note that lines on the tennis court can be distinguished.
Back to the Ecosystem Science and Technology Branch page
This page has had
accesses since 25 March 1996.
Last updated: September 1998
Please send any comments or suggestions concerning this page to
Brad Lobitz (blobitz(at)mail.arc.nasa.gov)
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