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Special Thanks to the Life Span Holistic Sexuality Education for Children with Developmental Disabilities Advisory Panel Nila Benito Florida Developmental Disabilities Council & Florida Center for Inclusive Communities Herman Travis Fishbein, Ed.D UM-CARD Cary Hepburn Juvenile Welfare Board ...
SEXUALITY ACROSS THE LIFESPAN by: DiAnn L. Baxley and Anna L. Zendell Sexuality Education for Children and Adolescents with Developmental Disabilities.
Sexuality One of the fundamental elements of human nature is human sexuality. We are all either male or female and that identity plays a foundational role in our response to life.
1 Women, Addiction, and Sexuality by Stephanie S. Covington, Ph. D. , L. C. S. W. Co-director, Institute for Relational Development L. Straussner and E. Zelvin, eds , Gender Issues in Addiction: Men and Women in Treatment, Jason Aronson, 1997 WOMEN, ADDICTION, AND SEXUALITY Although research has ...
38 nursing standard november 15/vol15/no9/2000 art & science sexuality nursing standard : clinical · research · education Peter Gregory MA, psychotherapist in NHS and private practice, working in the fields of sex and relationship psychotherapy.
No.1 - Understanding Human Sexuality Seminar Series © ARSRC 2004 2 INTRODUCTION The two basic constituents of our topic are 'Sexuality' and 'the Yoruba Culture'.
~ 1 ~ Sexuality Education for Children and Youth With Disabilities N I C H C Y Volume I, Number 3, 1992 News Digest National Information Center for Children
Sexuality Alzheimer's disease changes the functioning of a person's brain. When that happens, the person's sexual behavior can change. Some people may forget appropriate public behavior and undress or fondle themselves.
APA Style | Removing Bias in Language: Sexuality http://www.apastyle.org/sexuality.html 1 of 5 3/22/2004 3:00 PM Books Children's Books Journals Merchandise Monitor on Psychology Videos APA Gold APA-Style Helper Continuing Education Graduate Study Online Prevention & Treatment Journal ...
Sexuality, African Religio-Cultural Traditions and Modernity: Expanding the Lens*****
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The Imperial warehouses
Posted by ampontan on Wednesday, March 5, 2008
THE SMITHSONIAN in Washington D.C. is sometimes referred to as America’s attic. While it is primarily the repository for items of historical value, it is also the storage place for objects that are more curiosity than treasure and part of the country’s cultural legacy only in the aggregate.
There is a group of buildings in Japan that serve a similar function, though they are not open to the public and not widely known. That’s the Gyofu, a cluster of wooden warehouses on the southern end of the Fukiage Gardens in the Imperial Palace.
They were originally used to store the spoils of war. Each of the five buildings in the group has a name that ends with the suffix –fu. In each of the five was kept the booty taken from overseas in military campaigns.
Specifically, the Shintenfu was the repository for items from the Japan-China war, the Kaienfu was for items from the North China Incident (the start of the second war with China), the Kenanfu stored the items from the Japan-Russia war, the Junmeifu held the spoils from the Siberian Intervention (1918-1925), and the Kenchufu was the warehouse for the plunder and souvenirs from the Manchurian and Shanghai incidents.
The Korosei Rock, a symbol of the relationship between T’ang Dynasty China and Bohai (a kingdom that existed in Northern China and the Korean Peninsula from 698-926), was taken from China to Japan during the Japan-Russia War and is still standing in the front garden of the Kenanfu (the building shown in the photo). All the other items from overseas were returned to their countries of origin after the war.
The buildings of the Gyofu still serve as warehouses, however; they are used for the storage of the possessions of the current emperor, some of the art donated to the country by the Imperial Household after the death of the Showa Emperor, and the implements used for palace ceremonies.
According to those who have gotten a glimpse of the interior of these buildings, they just have an open space with no dividing walls or shelving. All the stored items are placed seemingly at random inside.
Though the buildings are old, they were solidly built and are still in good shape. The people responsible for their design and construction were part of the Takumiryo, a group of builders and craftsmen in the former Imperial Household Ministry. That group was also involved with the construction of other parts of the Imperial Palace and the Tokyo National Museum.
The Gyofu are located in a part of the palace grounds where entry is highly restricted, so they are almost never seen by anyone without a reason for being there. But there is one exception: the Suwa teahouse in the East Gardens, a popular site for strollers that is open to the public. The building is actually the Kaienfu, which was moved to this location and rebuilt. It was decided to move it in 1968 when the plans for the East Garden were formulated because its distinctively Japanese appearance was thought to blend in well with the surrounding area.
It’s a shame the rest aren’t available for viewing by the public, but they are just storehouses, so they wouldn’t be the most appropriate place for public exhibitions. Then again, there’s no reason why the Korosei Rock should still be there. It should have been returned to China long ago.
The Chinese would like to have it back, of course, but to their credit, they seem to be asking for the return in the spirit of bilateral friendship rather than making strident demands. Here’s the Japanese-language explanation of the history of the object and the Chinese viewpoint on the website of the Chinese Embassy in Japan, as written by Xinhua. China sent a team to this country to examine the rock, but the Imperial Household Agency, perhaps the most backward government organization in the country, refused to let them see it. They gave the team photographs instead.
It’s an object of historical and cultural importance from China that belongs in China. Why should it be sitting on a plot of land in Japan that most Japanese aren’t allowed to see? Indeed, returning it would be of great benefit to Japan, if only for the positive publicity it would generate among the Chinese.
Keeping it there does not reflect well on the Japanese government. I suspect the Japanese public would agree–if they knew about it.
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1an object used to indicate a position, place, or route:they erected a granite marker at the crash site [as modifier]:marker posts figurativethe most portable marker of class privilege, the wearing of natural fibers
a thing serving as a standard of comparison or as an indication of what may be expected:such studies may provide a unique marker in the quest to understand the brain
a radio beacon used to guide the pilot of an aircraft.
North American informal a promissory note; an IOU:Phyllis owed a marker in the neighborhood of $100,000
2a felt-tip pen with a broad tip.
3(chiefly in soccer) a player who is assigned to mark a particular opponent.
4British a person who records the score in a game, especially in snooker or billiards.
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Ventricular fibrillation is a very rapid, uncoordinated, ineffective series of contractions throughout the lower chambers of the heart. Unless stopped, these chaotic impulses are fatal.
When the ventricles begin to quiver, and do not employ coordinated contractions, the heart is said to be fibrillating. In this condition the ventricles cannot pump blood from the heart. Ventricular fibrillation (V-fib) is the worst kind of abnormal heart rhythm, and is a form of cardiac arrest. It involves the pumping of the lower chambers of the heart, while atrial fibrillation involves the upper chambers.
Causes and symptoms
Ventricular fibrillation is often associated with acute ischemic events (ischemia involves the deprivation of oxygenated blood to an area of tissue), and with chronic ischemic heart disease. It is frequently seen immediately following a heart attack. It may also develop during hypoxia, atrial fibrillation, or improper grounding of electrical devices. An extremely low level of potassium in the blood can also cause ventricular fibrillation.
The first, and usually the only, symptom of V-fib is sudden unconsciousness.
When an individual suddenly collapses, the possibility of ventricular fibrillation should be considered immediately. A quick assessment usually shows no pulse or heartbeat. The diagnosis of ventricular fibrillation is confirmed with an electrocardiogram.
Basic life support with standard cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) must be started within a few minutes, followed as soon as possible with cardioversion. Cardioversion is an electric shock delivered to the heart to stop the fibrillating. Early defibrillation is the key to survival. If left untreated, irreversible brain damage, due to lack of oxygen to the brain, occurs after about five minutes. After the heart resumes its normal rhythm, medications are given to help maintain the rhythm.
Early and effective CPR may provide the time necessary for medical personnel to arrive with a defibrillator. If a defibrillator is able to promptly restore a normal rhythm, up to 25% of victims are able to leave the hospital without evidence of brain damage.
If ventricular fibrillation occurs in the hospital in conjunction with a heart attack, defibrillation has a 95% success rate. If shock and heart failure are present at the time, even with immediate defibrillation, only about 30% of those stricken are successfully restore to a normal heart rate.
A healthy lifestyle to reduce the risk of heart diseases which lead to ventricular fibrillation is the best prevention. For people who have experienced an episode of V-fib, an internal cardioverter-defibrillator may prevent further episodes.
McGoon, Michael D., ed. Mayo Clinic Heart Book: The Ultimate Guide to Heart Health. New York: William Morrow and Co., Inc., 1993.
American Heart Association. 7320 Greenville Ave. Dallas, TX 75231. (214) 373-6300. <http://www.americanheart.org>.
Dorothy Elinor Stonely
Atrial fibrillation—A condition in which the upper chambers of the heart quiver instead of contracting effectively
Cardioversion—A electrical shock delivered to the heart to restore a normal rhythm
Electrocardiogram—A visual representation of the heart beat
Heart failure—A term used when the heart is unable to pump enough blood to supply the needs of the body
Hypoxia—Insufficient oxygen in the cells of the body
Ischemic—Insufficient blood reaching the tissues
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Summary: The human brain is not optimized for the abstract thinking and data memorization that websites often demand. Many usability guidelines are dictated by cognitive limitations.
People can't keep much information in their short-term memory. This is especially true when they're bombarded with multiple abstract or unusual pieces of data in rapid succession. Lest designers forget how easily users forget, let's review why our brains seem to be so weak.
Human beings are remarkably good at hunting the woolly mammoth. Our ancestors did fine work in exterminating most megafauna from Australia to North America armed with nothing better than flint weapons. (In today's more environmentally conscious world, we might deplore their slaughtering ways, but early humans were more interested in catching their dinner.)
Many of the skills needed to use computers aren't highly useful in slaying mammoths. Such skills include remembering obscure codes from one screen to the next and interpreting highly abbreviated form-field labels. It's no surprise that people are no good at these skills, since they weren't important for survival in the ancestral environment.
The human brain today is the same as the human brain 10,000 years ago. Indeed, I thought of using the title "Designing Websites for Cavemen" for our new course on how psychology explains usability guidelines and dictates effective website design. However, doing so would violate the writing guideline against using cute headlines that don't actually explain what a page (or, in this case, a seminar) is about.
Instead, we picked the title, "Usability and the Human Mind: How Your Customers Think."
If I'd gone with the first title, it would have primed your long-term memory to activate terms related to "cavemen" — probably including concepts such as man-eating dinosaurs lodged there by watching too many B-movies. It definitely wouldn't activate concepts related to improving your site's business performance. In contrast, the title we ultimately chose includes the word "customers," which primes the memory in a more appropriate way, attracts more clicks, and puts users in a business-oriented mindset.
Designing for Brainpower Limitations
When it comes to abstract thinking, humans have extremely limited brainpower. For example, short-term memory famously holds only about 7 chunks of information , and these fade from your brain in about 20 seconds.
It's a common misconception that limited short-term memory implies that menus should be similarly limited to 7 items. It's fine to have longer menus (if needed), because users don't have to memorize the full list of menu items. The entire idea of a menu is to rely on recognition rather than recall (one of the basic 10 heuristics for user interface design). There are many other usability issues in menu design, and shorter menus are certainly faster to scan. But if you make a menu too short, the choices become overly abstract and obscure.
Short-term memory limitations dictate a whole range of other Web design guidelines:
- Response times must be fast enough that users don't forget what they're in the middle of doing while waiting for the next page to load.
- Change the color of visited links so that users don't have to remember where they've already clicked.
- Make it easy to compare products , highlighting the salient differences on both the initial category page and in special comparison views. If you require users to move back and forth between separate product pages to deduce differences, they'll get confused — particularly if the pages present the information in an inconsistent format.
Instead of using coupon codes, encode offers in special links embedded in your email newsletters and automatically transfer the coupon to the user's shopping cart. This has two benefits:
- The computer carries the burden of remembering the obscure code and applying it at the correct time.
- It eliminates the "enter coupon code" field, which scares away shoppers who don't have coupons (and who refuse to pay full price when the checkout flow blatantly signals that other users are getting a better deal).
- Offer help and user assistance features in the context where users need them so they don't have to travel to a separate help section and memorize steps before returning to the problem at hand. (See our Application Usability course for more on help and user assistance.)
Although the average human brain is better equipped for mammoth hunting than using websites, we're not all average. In fact, there are huge individual differences in user performance: the top 25% of users are 2.4 times better than the bottom 25%.
At the extreme, only about 4% of the population has enough brainpower to perform complex cognitive tasks such as making high-level inferences using specialized background knowledge. Most likely, you're in this elite group. And, worse yet, so are many other members of your Internet team. (And the rest are definitely in the top 25%, which is also much better than average users.)
That your own short-term memory may hold two more items than most users' might not seem like a lot. But if your website blocks off short-term memory slots by requiring users to remember extraneous information, a little extra STM capacity can make all the difference in usability. You still have enough spare slots to think about the product line, but if your customers exhaust their brain capacity, they'll find your site very frustrating indeed.
Even though it's a bad course title, it's a good overall mnemonic to design for cavemen and their literal-minded and limited-capacity brains. After all, your paying customers are only one step out of the cave.
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To design and mass-produce an automobile selling for around $2,200 is no easy feat. In an exhibition scheduled to take places at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, a team of students from the College of Architecture, Art and Planning (AAP) will demonstrate how Tata Motors’ revolutionary new car, Tata Nano, was built and how it works.
The "Unpacking the Nano" exhibition will be on display at the Johnson Museum from Jan. 15 through March 27 of next year, and it will feature two Tata Nano cars. One of the vehicles will be taken apart to reveal and explain that functions of its parts, called subassemblies. The other vehicle will remain intact to demonstrate the appearance of the finished car.
The team, consisting of AAP students, faculty and alumni working on this exhibition, has created custom shipping crates for the Nano's parts. Each side of the shipping crate doubles as an exhibition panel and includes text, maps, charts and other valuable information about the vehicle, such cost, weight and various statistics.
According to Prof. Alex Mergold, architecture, the team wanted to illustrate the cumulative effects of all the “nuts and bolts.” Mergold also said that the exhibition encourages discussion and examines the potential implications of the new car.
"What does the Nano add up to as a car? A piece of engineering and design, a status symbol, a social construct, a financial asset, an environmental hazard, a solution to India's mobility problem? This thing brings out many debates, and that's what we are hoping to stimulate."
The exhibition highlights "the role of design as an agent of profound social change," said Kent Kleinman, architecture, project co-director and AAP dean. “It also addresses safety, the Nano's role in sustainability in India and other nations, and casts a critical eye toward American automotive culture.”
Though an estimated 250,000 Nanos will be purchased in 2010, the company aims to eventually produce around 2 million cars a year. The four-door car, designed by 70 Tata engineers in 2009, has an aluminum two-cylinder engine, weighs 600 kilograms, and gets up to 65 miles to the gallon.
Tata Motors’ original goal was to meet the price of 100,000 rupees — approximately $2,200 United States dollars — and bring affordable cars to people in India. A safe, more advanced alternative to the bicycles, pull carts and other types of transportation on the streets of India, the Tata Nano was designed to be a convenient way to travel without investing a large amount of money.
According to Spencer Lapp ’09, the final design of the car was different than the design that engineers had expected to create — the car turned out to be more than they hoped for.
"It was started from a blank slate. Tata Motors started with the idea that this car was going to be much less than it eventually became. They tried a design with no doors, plastic curtains and a plastic body. They discovered they could design a car that people would want to drive, not a golf cart," he said.
After deciding not to use outside manufacturing, Tata designers and engineers designed and built the parts themselves, which proved to be a good strategy, said Lapp.
"The value engineering became a very effective strategy; the car's weight essentially drove the cost," he said.
"The design accomplishment is truly extraordinary," according to Kleinman, who discussed the Nano with Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata '59, B.Arch. '62, at a reunion in 2009.
The exhibition, said Prof. Alex Mergold, will not only encourage discussion regarding the car and its social, environmental and economical implications, but also, create new teaching possibilities.
"During the research phase, we ended up with mini-courses on design, engineering, environment, anthropology, sociology — all during only one semester," he said.
After the exhibition ends in March, Kleinman, Mergold and the rest of the team will hold a symposium: "Unpacking the Nano: The Price of the World's Most Affordable Car.”
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9 February 2012
Today we examine three different models of economic development: import-substitution; export-led growth; and a new model based on domestic demand and formulated in response to current global economic troubles.
Prepared by: ISN staff
Yesterday we considered some of the tensions the international economic and financial systems might face if nation-states convert themselves into ‘green’ economies. To say that different conceptions of what makes up green economics will complicate the monetary foundations of social policy is an understatement. Take the intertwined cases of social and economic development, for example. There are three historically significant models of development – the import-substitution model that became prevalent after World War II; the export-led development characterized by post-war Germany, Japan, the ‘Asian Tigers’ and China; and a model based on domestic demand as discussed in Thomas Palley’s “The Rise and Fall of Export-led Growth.” How these models will actually be applied within the evolving economic and financial systems of today is an open question. It is also a worthy topic of discussion for today.
Import substituting industrialization
As well as embodying the geopolitical struggle between two hostile “ism’s” (communism and capitalism-constitutionalism), the second half of the 20th century also reflected a collision between two competing models of development. The first of these models was “import-substituting industrialization” (ISI). The main difference between poor countries and rich countries, proponents of ISI observed, was that rich countries were industrialized whereas poor countries were not. Richer economies were based on manufacturing, whereas poor countries relied solely upon primary industries such as agriculture and raw materials. And while the classical theory of comparative advantage argued that all countries should benefit from a system of economic specialization, new evidence surfaced in the 1950s to suggest that this might not always be the case.
According to economists Raul Prebisch and Hans Singer, poor countries exporting primary goods and products would always face “deteriorating terms of trade” vis-à-vis rich countries. While it did not strictly matter that Portugal produced wine and England wool (in Ricardo's famous example), in the real world it mattered enormously that America produced cars while Brazil produced sugar and rubber. In other words, free trade was actually a trap for poorer nations. In economic parlance, the income elasticity of demand for manufactured goods was far greater than that for primary goods. International trade thus made everyone richer in absolute terms, but people tended to buy more cars than they did sugar and rubber, thereby resulting in Americans becoming relatively richer and Brazilians comparatively poorer.
The obvious solution for this was for poorer nations to industrialize, and thereby produce value-added products that would reap greater returns. Accordingly, the ISI model called upon poor countries to industrialize in the same way the developed world had done – i.e., by 'substituting' domestically manufactured products for foreign imports. But because these ‘infant industries’ could not initially compete in the global market, they had to rely on government-sponsored protective tariffs and the maintenance of a strong currency. Eventually, or so the logic went, the industries would be able to compete internationally and increase the national welfare. Whether this logic proved to be true or not, it is important to remember that the ISI model was indeed a powerful one. With the notable exception of the United Kingdom, every country that industrialized before World War II followed a variation of the model.
Despite its historical pedigree, it’s fair to say that the ISI model is not generally regarded as a great success. Indeed, by the 1980s it had been mostly abandoned in favor of the export-substitution (ESI) model. Adopted initially by post-war West Germany and Japan, ESI encouraged economic openness rather than shielding infant domestic industries from foreign competition. In fact, developing nations were encouraged to expose themselves to international market forces while relying on currency devaluations to become competitive. By opening itself up to competition, or so the argument went, the nation in question would quickly adopt current best practices, encourage the diffusion of technology, and enhance its productivity. Protective tariffs, it was further argued, were out. They only promoted rent-seeking activities (bribery, smuggling, corruption and black-marketeering) that continue to have high social costs.
To avoid these problems, poor countries first needed to identify those products which would give them a global comparative advantage. This meant the products that they could produce at lower opportunity cost than rich countries, not necessarily the products they could make the most efficiently. Next, they needed to structure their economies around the export of these advantaged products to the global marketplace, while remaining safe in the knowledge that any deterioration in trade could be mitigated by prudent government policies. (Ironically, this problem turned out to be much smaller than anticipated because of the legacy of import-substitution itself, which meant that by the 1980s there were only a handful of countries that exported only primary goods).
According to Thomas Palley, the real-world application of export substitution can be broken down into four historical stages. After initially being associated with Germany and Japan, Stage II (between 1970 and 1985) saw the emergence of the Four ‘Asian Tigers’– South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. Throughout this period, all four Tigers experienced growth rates in excess of seven percent per annum, and became advanced high-income economies in the process. Stage III was epitomized by Mexico in the late 1980s and 1990s. Unlike Stage II, export substitution here focused on enticing foreign multi-national corporations (MNCs) through the “suppression of wages and social standards.” This, Palley argues, turned areas of the developing world into ‘global production zones’ (such as Mexico’s ‘maquiladora zone’) for markets in rich countries. The last stage of export substitution – as characterized by China’s economic growth – bears many of the same hallmarks as Stage III. Social standards remain depressed, poor countries become global ‘production zones’ and MNCs remain central to export substitution. The major difference between Stages III and IV, Palley tells us, is how aggressively the state promotes economic growth and development. In the case of China, this includes strategic import tariffs, capital controls, currency manipulation and forced technology-sharing.
Domestic demand- led growth?
As dominant as ESI has been in recent history, like its ISI predecessor it is showing signs of fraying and may even be on the verge of ‘exhaustion.’ While China’s export substitution policies have been successful, Mexico’s policies have led to poorer results. More significantly, the recent global economic recession may signal the end of the road for China too. Export substitution, quite clearly, relies fundamentally on Western consumer demand, which has been in short supply since 2008. With the US “debt-saturated” and Europe and Japan both wedded to export-oriented strategies, the demand for goods in the industrialized world is simply not there, nor likely to return in the foreseeable future. For twenty-five years, Palley writes, those markets were artificially strong and fuelled by rising debt and asset-price inflation. And as this pattern has proved unsustainable, the logic of the export-led model has been increasingly subject to criticism.
So what’s next for economic development? Palley suggests a new development strategy based on cultivating demand in poor countries themselves. In a global economy where Western consumers can no longer be counted on to buy enough of whatever the rest of the world can produce, poor countries will have little choice but to create demand indigenously. This will ultimately entail creating consumers in their own countries who can actually buy the products produced. This, of course, will not be an easy task. From the standpoint of domestic policy, it involves improving social safety nets and raising labor standards, investing in infrastructure, and raising taxes on the rich and lowering them for the poor. Internationally, it means putting an end to policies of currency devaluation, implementing global labor and environmental standards, as well as limiting incentives that attract export-oriented foreign direct investment. Obviously, the political obstacles to such measures are immense. As Palley admits, the adoption of the development strategies based on domestic demand is highly unlikely. Indeed, he sadly concludes that the parties in question will likely persist with export-led strategies until the global economy lurches into a much deeper crisis than the current one we are in.
For more content on "Development: Describing and Prescribing Progress," please see our dossier on the topic.
Creative Commons - Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported
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a device that searches a band of radio frequencies for the presence of radio signals.
See Real Time Analyzer (RTA). SPL (sound pressure level) The level or intensity at a point in a sound field (loudness). The deviation above and below normal atmospheric pressure. The unit of measurement of Sound Pressure... the microbar. One microbar is equal to the sound pressure of 1 dyne per square centimeter, which is a sound level of 74 dB above the threshold of hearing (0.0002 microbar.) It is also equal to approximately one-millionth of normal atmospheric pressure. Sound pressure levels are stated in decibels as follows: Where P is the RMS sound pressure in microbars, and the reference is the threshold of hearing of 0.0002 microbars (50% of young men, 1 to 4 kHz). SPLITTER A box into which one microphone or signal is connected and has two or more individual outputs available for that signal. Used when a separate monitor mix is required.
An instrument that identifies the amplitude of signals at various frequencies.
a analyzers frequency selective power meter that our on levels source power
a device that is used to examine the waveforms of spectral composition of optical, acoustic or electrical data
a device which reads and video-displays the broadcast spectrum
a heterodyned, synthesized instrument with a tracking source
a laboratory instrument that displays signal amplitude (strength) as it varies by signal frequency
a light weight, compact and easy to use portable analyzer ideally suited for field or bench use
a light weight, compact and easy to use portable analyzer i ------------------ Your prompt reply is appreciated
a low frequency, high performance analyzer
an invaluable tool for examining the components of a signal spectrum
a receiver that automatically plots the signals in a frequency span on a display screen for analysis
a suitable instrument for this type of measurement
a tool (may be hardware of software) which shows the frequency content within a sound (or radio wave or whatever)
a tremendously helpful tool for comparing EQ curves, and there are now affordable, software-based ones
a valuable tool for evaluating fixture effectiveness, and we have a few to choose from
a versatile RF troubleshooting test instrument that can troubleshoot these problems
Device that measures the frequency components of a radio signal. It provides a visual image of how the amplitude of a radio signal varies in relation to its frequency.
an instrument used for measuring radiofrequency signal intensity and frequency. When used with a calibrated antenna, a spectrum analyzer is capable of measuring power density.
An instrument which can be used to view signals across a wide range of frequencies.
A measuring instrument capable of displaying the distribution of energy in a signal or sound. With contemporary techniques, frequency resolution can be almost whatever one wants, from 1 Hz (or many other fixed-bandwith options) to a variety of percentage-bandwidth options, such as fractional-octave displays. Most employ FFT methods, and some can display results in 'real time', others not. See: FFT, Real-Time Analyzer.
An electronic device that can show the spectrum of an electric signal.
An instrument which displays the frequency spectrum of an input signal.
An electronic device for automatically displaying the spectrum of the electromagnetic radiation from one or more devices. A cathode ray tube display is commonly used to display this power-versus frequency spectrum. [ Test Equipment Manufacturers
A spectrum analyzer is a series of vertical light bars that "dance" according to the output of different frequency bands. Digital equalizers include a spectrum analyzer on the display to give you an idea of how your response curve looks. A spectrum analyzer also adds a bit of flair to your system as it moves to the beat of the music.
A scanning receiver with a display that, among other capabilities, shows a graph of frequency versus amplitude of the signals being measured.
Electronic device that measures a particular spectrum or frequency band and displays information about that particular spectrum or band.
A spectrum analyzer is an instrument used to analyze the frequency content and characteristics of a signal.
a device that shows the energy level within each section of a given frequency band (or spectrum).
An instrument that measures the frequency spectrum of a signal. Spectrum analyzers are used over a range of frequencies, and may have different names, depending on their applications.
Instrument used to display the frequency domain of a waveform plotting amplitude against frequency.
A device that displays a frequency response curve, in real time, as the curve, changes.
A spectrum analyzer is a device used to examine the spectral composition of some electrical, acoustic, or optical waveform.
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Cleaning up its act: recycling livestock waste
As the city of Kisumu in the west of Kenya comes to life, a child in a torn yellow shirt searches through waist-deep piles of plastic and animal dung in the morning breeze. He is looking for food, for fuel that his family can use to cook a meal, and for waste that can be recycled. The boy is joined by others from across the city's six slums, to search the sprawling rubbish dump stretching across an undeveloped piece of land adjacent to a modern supermarket. Like millions of urban slum dwellers, these children are forced to search for materials that they cannot afford to buy. Fuel particularly is expensive for poor households. The waste dumps present a health hazard, but the materials - including the animal manure - can be put to good use and even provide a source of income.
Keeping livestock in the city is illegal in Kenya, but many urban households rely on them for income and security. However, in urban areas there is little land available to absorb the manure, and many slum dwellers are unaware of how to use dung produced by their livestock. A recent study revealed that over 75 per cent of dung produced in the Kisumu slums is not utilised. With no regular waste removal in Kisumu, the piling up of manure also presents a health hazard, contributing to the transfer of zoonotic disease; rain water often washes manure and other waste into the city's water supply.
Adapting to change
Traditionally pastoralist communities dry dung and use it as fuel. While some urban households also use dung, for example as a mosquito repellent, or to support outside walls, the use of dung as fuel had, until recently, not been adapted to meet the needs of urban households. In Kisumu, however, that situation is now changing, thanks to a project managed by a private company, Lagrotech consultants, with support from the DFID-funded Livestock Production Programme. The project has investigated ways to improve the management of organic waste in three slum areas of Kisumu, based on the development of some simple, farmer-friendly technologies that are now turning Kisumu's waste into a convenient, and marketable fuel. With charcoal expensive and in short supply, slum dwellers have welcomed the alternatives.
Six types of waste-based fuel briquettes have been developed and tested, using a variety of raw materials including sun-dried dung, sawdust, charcoal dust, clay and water. Combinations were tested to produce as little smoke as possible and to make the briquettes safe and efficient for home cooking. The briquettes are made by rolling the combined ingredients, with water, into a ball, for home use, or by moulding the mixture into standard cakes to sell, using plastic piping as a mould.
In an initial study conducted by Lagrotech, it was revealed that waste produced in Kisumu could potentially earn over £80,000 (US$141,000) each year from waste-based fuel, sold at half the cost of commercial fuel. In tests, the briquettes performed nearly as well as commercial charcoal, and as a result, many families involved in developing and testing the fuel briquettes have switched from commercial charcoal to their own organic mix. The dung and charcoal mix was the most popular, emitting the least smoke and burning at a reasonable speed. Most communities are now actively processing and using the fuel, and some families have created their own small business, generating regular income by selling their surplus briquettes at 10 Kenyan shillings (15 US cents) for 2 kg. 'Contact' farmers have been used on a regular basis to further promote these techniques by engaging other urban farmers in the process of making briquettes both for home use and for entrepreneurial enterprise.
Waste management is a major issue for urban slum areas across Africa. As in Kenya, livestock keeping is usually illegal, but unemployment rates are generally high, and animals provide important income and immediate food security. Enclosed spaces and lack of waste disposal facilities mean that slum dwellers have little choice but to watch waste collect in heaps. Utilising waste as fuel briquettes provides families with valuable fuel and the potential to earn some income. Using research adapted to the needs of slum dwellers, Kisumu is not only cleaning up its waste dumps, but is also saving money. The same could be achieved in other African cities.
Date published: March 2006
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Focus on: Making more of livestock (part 1)
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At present, local human activities (overfishing and destructive fishing, marine-based pollution and damage, coastal development, and watershed-based pollution) threaten an estimated 60 percent of the world’s reefs (75 percent when including thermal stress). Without intervention, these pressures have trajectories slated to escalate into the future. By the 2030s, our estimates predict that more than 90 percent of the world’s reefs will be threatened by local human activities, warming, and acidification, with nearly 60 percent facing high, very high, or critical threat levels. By the 2050s, estimates predict that almost no reefs will be under low threat and only about one-quarter will be under medium threat, with the remaining 75 percent at a high, very high, or critical threat levels.
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Location of the event in Siberia (modern map)
|Event||Explosion in forest area (10–15 Mtons TNT)|
|Time||30 June 1908|
|Place||Tunguska in Siberia, Russian Empire|
|Effects||Flattening 2,000 km2 (770 sq mi) of forest; seen by glowing sunsets|
|Damage||Mostly material damages to trees|
|Causes||Probable meteoroid or comet impact|
The Tunguska event was an enormously powerful explosion that occurred near the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in what is now Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, at about 07:14 KRAT (00:14 UT) on June 30 [O.S. June 17], 1908. The explosion, having the epicentre (60.886°N, 101.894°E), is believed to have been caused by the air burst of a large meteoroid or comet fragment at an altitude of 5–10 kilometres (3–6 mi) above the Earth's surface. Different studies have yielded widely varying estimates of the object's size, on the order of 100 metres (330 ft). It is the largest impact event on or near Earth in recorded history. The number of scholarly publications on the problem of the Tunguska explosion since 1908 may be estimated at about 1,000 (mainly in Russian). Many scientists have participated in Tunguska studies, the best-known of them being Leonid Kulik, Yevgeny Krinov, Kirill Florensky, Nikolai Vladimirovich Vasiliev, and Wilhelm Fast.
Although the meteoroid or comet appears to have burst in the air rather than hitting the surface, this event still is referred to as an impact. Estimates of the energy of the blast range from 3 to as high as 30 megatons of TNT (13–130 PJ), with 10–15 megatons of TNT (42–63 PJ) the most likely—roughly equal to the United States' Castle Bravo thermonuclear bomb tested on March 1, 1954; about 1,000 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan; and about two-fifths the power of the later Soviet Union's own Tsar Bomba (the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated).
The Tunguska explosion knocked down an estimated 80 million trees over an area covering 2,150 square kilometres (830 sq mi). It is estimated that the shock wave from the blast would have measured 5.0 on the Richter scale. An explosion of this magnitude is capable of destroying a large metropolitan area. This possibility has helped to spark discussion of asteroid deflection strategies.
At around 07:17 local time, Evenks natives and Russian settlers in the hills northwest of Lake Baikal observed a column of bluish light, nearly as bright as the Sun, moving across the sky. About 10 minutes later, there was a flash and a sound similar to artillery fire. Eyewitnesses closer to the explosion reported the sound source moving east to north. The sounds were accompanied by a shock wave that knocked people off their feet and broke windows hundreds of kilometres away. The majority of witnesses reported only the sounds and the tremors, not the sighting of the explosion. Eyewitness accounts differ as to the sequence of events and their overall duration.
The explosion registered on seismic stations across Eurasia. In some places the shock wave would have been equivalent to an earthquake of 5.0 on the Richter scale. It also produced fluctuations in atmospheric pressure strong enough to be detected in Great Britain. Over the next few days, night skies in Asia and Europe were aglow; it has been theorized that this was due to light passing through high-altitude ice particles formed at extremely low temperatures, a phenomenon that occurred again when the Space Shuttle re-entered the Earth's atmosphere. In the United States, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and the Mount Wilson Observatory observed a decrease in atmospheric transparency that lasted for several months, from suspended dust.
Selected eyewitness reports
At breakfast time I was sitting by the house at Vanavara Trading Post [65 kilometres/40 miles south of the explosion], facing north. [...] I suddenly saw that directly to the north, over Onkoul's Tunguska Road, the sky split in two and fire appeared high and wide over the forest [as Semenov showed, about 50 degrees up—expedition note]. The split in the sky grew larger, and the entire northern side was covered with fire. At that moment I became so hot that I couldn't bear it, as if my shirt was on fire; from the northern side, where the fire was, came strong heat. I wanted to tear off my shirt and throw it down, but then the sky shut closed, and a strong thump sounded, and I was thrown a few metres. I lost my senses for a moment, but then my wife ran out and led me to the house. After that such noise came, as if rocks were falling or cannons were firing, the earth shook, and when I was on the ground, I pressed my head down, fearing rocks would smash it. When the sky opened up, hot wind raced between the houses, like from cannons, which left traces in the ground like pathways, and it damaged some crops. Later we saw that many windows were shattered, and in the barn a part of the iron lock snapped.
Testimony of Chuchan of Shanyagir tribe, as recorded by I.M. Suslov in 1926:
We had a hut by the river with my brother Chekaren. We were sleeping. Suddenly we both woke up at the same time. Somebody shoved us. We heard whistling and felt strong wind. Chekaren said, 'Can you hear all those birds flying overhead?' We were both in the hut, couldn't see what was going on outside. Suddenly, I got shoved again, this time so hard I fell into the fire. I got scared. Chekaren got scared too. We started crying out for father, mother, brother, but no one answered. There was noise beyond the hut, we could hear trees falling down. Chekaren and I got out of our sleeping bags and wanted to run out, but then the thunder struck. This was the first thunder. The Earth began to move and rock, wind hit our hut and knocked it over. My body was pushed down by sticks, but my head was in the clear. Then I saw a wonder: trees were falling, the branches were on fire, it became mighty bright, how can I say this, as if there was a second sun, my eyes were hurting, I even closed them. It was like what the Russians call lightning. And immediately there was a loud thunderclap. This was the second thunder. The morning was sunny, there were no clouds, our Sun was shining brightly as usual, and suddenly there came a second one!
Chekaren and I had some difficulty getting out from under the remains of our hut. Then we saw that above, but in a different place, there was another flash, and loud thunder came. This was the third thunder strike. Wind came again, knocked us off our feet, struck against the fallen trees.
We looked at the fallen trees, watched the tree tops get snapped off, watched the fires. Suddenly Chekaren yelled 'Look up' and pointed with his hand. I looked there and saw another flash, and it made another thunder. But the noise was less than before. This was the fourth strike, like normal thunder.Now I remember well there was also one more thunder strike, but it was small, and somewhere far away, where the Sun goes to sleep.
Sibir newspaper, July 2, 1908:
On the 17th of June, around 9 a.m. in the morning, we observed an unusual natural occurrence. In the north Karelinski village [200 verst north of Kirensk] the peasants saw to the north west, rather high above the horizon, some strangely bright (impossible to look at) bluish-white heavenly body, which for 10 minutes moved downwards. The body appeared as a "pipe", i.e., a cylinder. The sky was cloudless, only a small dark cloud was observed in the general direction of the bright body. It was hot and dry. As the body neared the ground (forest), the bright body seemed to smudge, and then turned into a giant billow of black smoke, and a loud knocking (not thunder) was heard, as if large stones were falling, or artillery was fired. All buildings shook. At the same time the cloud began emitting flames of uncertain shapes. All villagers were stricken with panic and took to the streets, women cried, thinking it was the end of the world. The author of these lines was meantime in the forest about 6 verst [6.4 km] north of Kirensk, and heard to the north east some kind of artillery barrage, that repeated in intervals of 15 minutes at least 10 times. In Kirensk in a few buildings in the walls facing north east window glass shook.
Siberian Life newspaper, July 27, 1908:
Krasnoyaretz newspaper, July 13, 1908:
Kezhemskoe village. On the 17th an unusual atmospheric event was observed. At 7:43 the noise akin to a strong wind was heard. Immediately afterwards a horrific thump sounded, followed by an earthquake that literally shook the buildings, as if they were hit by a large log or a heavy rock. The first thump was followed by a second, and then a third. Then the interval between the first and the third thumps were accompanied by an unusual underground rattle, similar to a railway upon which dozens of trains are travelling at the same time. Afterwards for 5 to 6 minutes an exact likeness of artillery fire was heard: 50 to 60 salvoes in short, equal intervals, which got progressively weaker. After 1.5–2 minutes after one of the "barrages" six more thumps were heard, like cannon firing, but individual, loud and accompanied by tremors. The sky, at the first sight, appeared to be clear. There was no wind and no clouds. However upon closer inspection to the north, i.e. where most of the thumps were heard, a kind of an ashen cloud was seen near the horizon, which kept getting smaller and more transparent and possibly by around 2–3 p.m. completely disappeared.
There was little scientific curiosity about the impact at the time, possibly due to the isolation of the Tunguska region. If there were any early expeditions to the site, the records were likely to have been lost during the subsequent chaotic years—World War I, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Russian Civil War.
The first recorded expedition arrived at the scene more than a decade after the event. In 1921, the Russian mineralogist Leonid Kulik, visiting the Podkamennaya Tunguska River basin as part of a survey for the Soviet Academy of Sciences, deduced from local accounts that the explosion had been caused by a giant meteorite impact. He persuaded the Soviet government to fund an expedition to the Tunguska region, based on the prospect of meteoric iron that could be salvaged to aid Soviet industry. Kulik's party eventually undertook an expedition in 1927.
Upon arrival, Kulik made arrangements with the local Evenki hunters to guide his party to the impact site. Reaching the explosion site was an extremely arduous task. Upon reaching an area just south of the site, the superstitious Evenki hunters would go no farther, fearing what they called the Valleymen. Kulik had to return to the nearby village, and his party was delayed for several days while they sought new guides.
The spectacle that confronted Kulik as he stood on a ridge overlooking the devastated area was overwhelming. To the explorers' surprise, no crater was to be found. There was instead around ground zero a vast zone (8 kilometres [5.0 mi] across) of trees scorched and devoid of branches, but standing upright. Those farther away had been partly scorched and knocked down in a direction away from the centre. Much later, in the 1960s, it was established that the zone of leveled forest occupied an area of some 2,150 square kilometres (830 sq mi), its shape resembling a gigantic spread-eagled butterfly with a "wingspan" of 70 kilometres (43 mi) and a "body length" of 55 kilometres (34 mi). Upon closer examination, Kulik located holes which he erroneously concluded were meteorite holes; however, he did not have the means at this time to excavate the holes.
During the next ten years there were three more expeditions to the area. Kulik found several dozens of little "pothole" bogs, each some 10 to 50 metres (33 to 160 ft) in diameter, that he thought might be meteoric craters. After a laborious exercise in draining one of these bogs (the so-called "Suslov’s crater", 32 metres [105 ft] in diameter), he found there was an old stump on the bottom, ruling out the possibility that it was a meteoric crater. In 1938, Kulik arranged for an aerial photographic survey of the area covering the central part of the leveled forest (some 250 square kilometres [97 sq mi]). The negatives of these aerial photographs (1,500 negatives, each 18 by 18 centimetres [7.1 by 7.1 in]) were burned in 1975 by order of Yevgeny Krinov, then Chairman of the Committee on Meteorites of the USSR Academy of Sciences. It was done under the pretext that they were a fire hazard, but the truth may have been the active dislike by official meteorite specialists of anything associated with an unyielding enigma. However, positive imprints would be preserved for further studies in the Russian city of Tomsk.
Expeditions sent to the area in the 1950s and 1960s found microscopic silicate and magnetite spheres in siftings of the soil. Similar spheres were predicted to exist in the felled trees, although they could not be detected by contemporary means. Later expeditions did identify such spheres in the resin of the trees. Chemical analysis showed that the spheres contained high proportions of nickel relative to iron, which is also found in meteorites, leading to the conclusion they were of extraterrestrial origin. The concentration of the spheres in different regions of the soil was also found to be consistent with the expected distribution of debris from a meteorite air burst. Later studies of the spheres found unusual ratios of numerous other metals relative to the surrounding environment, which was taken as further evidence of their extraterrestrial origin.
Chemical analysis of peat bogs from the area also revealed numerous anomalies considered consistent with an impact event. The isotopic signatures of stable carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen isotopes at the layer of the bogs corresponding to 1908 were found to be inconsistent with the isotopic ratios measured in the adjacent layers, and this abnormality was not found in bogs located outside the area. The region of the bogs showing these anomalous signatures also contains an unusually high proportion of iridium, similar to the iridium layer found in the Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary. These unusual proportions are believed to result from debris from the falling body that deposited in the bogs. The nitrogen is believed to have been deposited as acid rain, a suspected fallout from the explosion.
Earth impactor model
Asteroid air burst
Meteoroids enter Earth's atmosphere from outer space every day, travelling at a speed of at least 11 kilometres per second (6.8 mi/s). The heat generated by compression of air in front of the body (ram pressure) as it travels through the atmosphere is immense and most asteroids burn up or explode before they reach the ground. Since the second half of the 20th century, close monitoring of Earth's atmosphere has led to the discovery that such asteroid air bursts occur rather frequently. A stony asteroid of about 10 metres (30 ft) in diameter can produce an explosion of around 20 kilotons, similar to that of the Fat Man bomb dropped on Nagasaki, and data released by the U.S. Air Force's Defense Support Program indicate that such explosions occur high in the upper atmosphere more than once a year. Tunguska-like megaton-range events are much rarer. Eugene Shoemaker estimated that such events occur about once every 300 years.
Blast patterns
The explosion's effect on the trees near the epicentre of the explosion was replicated during atmospheric nuclear tests in the 1950s and 1960s,[discuss] and was similar to the effects of the conventional Operation Blowdown. These effects are caused by the blast wave produced by large explosions. The trees directly below the explosion are stripped as the blast wave moves vertically downward, while trees farther away are knocked over because the blast wave is travelling closer to horizontal when it reaches them.
Soviet experiments performed in the mid-1960s, with model forests (made of matches on wire stakes) and small explosive charges slid downward on wires, produced butterfly shaped blast patterns strikingly similar to the pattern found at the Tunguska site. The experiments suggested that the object had approached at an angle of roughly 30 degrees from the ground and 115 degrees from north and had exploded in mid-air.
Asteroid or comet
In 1930, the British astronomer F.J.W. Whipple suggested that the Tunguska body was a small comet. A cometary meteorite, being composed primarily of ice and dust, could have been completely vaporized by the impact with the Earth's atmosphere, leaving no obvious traces. The comet hypothesis was further supported by the glowing skies (or "skyglows" or "bright nights") observed across Europe for several evenings after the impact, possibly explained by dust and ice that had been dispersed from the comet's tail across the upper atmosphere. The cometary hypothesis gained a general acceptance amongst Soviet Tunguska investigators by the 1960s.
In 1978, astronomer Ľubor Kresák suggested that the body was a fragment of the short-period Comet Encke, which is responsible for the Beta Taurid meteor shower: the Tunguska event coincided with a peak in that shower, and the approximate trajectory of the Tunguska impactor is consistent with what would be expected from such a fragment. It is now known that bodies of this kind explode at frequent intervals tens to hundreds of kilometres above the ground. Military satellites have been observing these explosions for decades.
In 1983, astronomer Zdeněk Sekanina published a paper criticizing the comet hypothesis. He pointed out that a body composed of cometary material, travelling through the atmosphere along such a shallow trajectory, ought to have disintegrated, whereas the Tunguska body apparently remained intact into the lower atmosphere. Sekanina argued that the evidence pointed to a dense, rocky object, probably of asteroidal origin. This hypothesis was further boosted in 2001, when Farinella, Foschini, et al. released a study suggesting that the object had arrived from the direction of the asteroid belt.
Proponents of the comet hypothesis have suggested that the object was an extinct comet with a stony mantle that allowed it to penetrate the atmosphere.
The chief difficulty in the asteroid hypothesis is that a stony object should have produced a large crater where it struck the ground, but no such crater has been found. It has been hypothesized that the passage of the asteroid through the atmosphere caused pressures and temperatures to build up to a point where the asteroid abruptly disintegrated in a huge explosion. The destruction would have to have been so complete that no remnants of substantial size survived, and the material scattered into the upper atmosphere during the explosion would have caused the skyglows. Models published in 1993 suggested that the stony body would have been about 60 metres (200 ft) across, with physical properties somewhere between an ordinary chondrite and a carbonaceous chondrite.
Christopher Chyba and others have proposed a process whereby a stony meteorite could have exhibited the behavior of the Tunguska impactor. Their models show that when the forces opposing a body's descent become greater than the cohesive force holding it together, it blows apart, releasing nearly all its energy at once. The result is no crater, and damage distributed over a fairly wide radius, all of the damage being blast and thermal.
Three-dimensional numerical modelling of the Tunguska impact done by Utyuzhnikov and Rudenko in 2008 supports the comet hypothesis. According to their results, the comet matter dispersed in the atmosphere, while the destruction of the forest was caused by the shock wave.
During the 1990s, Italian researchers, coordinated by the physicist Prof. Giuseppe Longo from University of Bologna, extracted resin from the core of the trees in the area of impact to examine trapped particles that were present during the 1908 event. They found high levels of material commonly found in rocky asteroids and rarely found in comets.
Kelly et al. (2009) contend that the impact was caused by a comet because of the sightings of noctilucent clouds following the impact, a phenomenon caused by massive amounts of water vapor in the upper atmosphere. They compared the noctilucent cloud phenomenon to the exhaust plume from NASA's Endeavour space shuttle.
In 2010, an expedition of Vladimir Alexeev, with scientists from the Troitsk Innovation and Nuclear Research Institute (TRINITY), used ground penetrating radar to examine the Suslov crater at the Tunguska site. What they found was that the crater was created by the violent impact of a celestial body. The layers of the crater consisted of modern permafrost on top, older damaged layers underneath and finally, deep below, fragments of the celestial body were discovered. Preliminary analysis showed that it was a huge piece of ice that shattered on impact, which seem to support the theory that a comet caused the cataclysm.
Lake Cheko
In June 2007, scientists from the University of Bologna led by professor Giuseppe Longo identified a lake in the Tunguska region as a possible impact crater from the event. They do not dispute that the Tunguska body exploded in midair but believe that a one-meter fragment survived the explosion and struck the ground. Lake Cheko is a small, bowl-shaped lake approximately 8 kilometres north-northwest of the epicentre. The hypothesis has been disputed by other impact crater specialists. A 1961 investigation had dismissed a modern origin of Lake Cheko, saying that the presence of metres-thick silt deposits at the lake's bed suggests an age of at least 5,000 years, but more recent research suggests that only a meter or so of the sediment layer on the lake bed is "normal lacustrine sedimentation", a depth indicating a much younger lake of about 100 years. Acoustic-echo soundings of the lake floor provide support for the hypothesis that the lake was formed by the Tunguska event. The soundings revealed a conical shape for the lake bed, which is consistent with an impact crater. Magnetic readings indicate a possible meter-sized chunk of rock below the lake's deepest point that may be a fragment of the colliding body. Finally, the lake's long axis points to the epicentre of the Tunguska explosion, about 7.0 kilometres (4.3 mi) away. Work is still being done at Lake Cheko to determine its origins.
The conclusions of the Italian scientist were published on the website of the University of Bologna. The main points are that "Cheko, a small lake located in Siberia close to the epicentre of the 1908 Tunguska explosion, might fill a crater left by the impact of a fragment of a cosmic body. Sediment cores from the lake's bottom were studied to support or reject this hypothesis. A 175-centimetre (69 in)-long core, collected near the center of the lake, consists of an upper c. one-metre (39 in)-thick sequence of lacustrine deposits overlaying coarser chaotic material. 210Pb and 137Cs indicate that the transition from lower to upper sequence occurred close to the time of the Tunguska event. Pollen analysis reveals that remains of aquatic plants are abundant in the top post-1908 sequence but are absent in the lower pre-1908 portion of the core. These results, including organic C, N and δ13C data, suggest that Lake Cheko formed at the time of the Tunguska event."
Speculative conjectures
The behaviour of meteoroids in the Earth's atmosphere was less well understood during the early decades of the 20th century. Due to this, as well as the paucity of relevant data resulting from Soviet secrecy during the Cold War, a great many other conjectures about the Tunguska event have sprung up, none of which are accepted by the majority of the scientific community.
Comet 2005 NB56
One study "suggests that a chunk of Comet 2005 NB56 caused the 5–10 megaton fireball, bouncing off the atmosphere and back into orbit around the sun." The scientists involved in the study claim that the object that caused the event will pass close to Earth again in 2045.
Natural H-bomb
In 1989, Serge J.D. D'Alessio and Archie A. Harms suggested that some of the deuterium in a comet entering the Earth's atmosphere may have undergone a nuclear fusion reaction, leaving a distinctive signature in the form of carbon-14. They concluded that any release of nuclear energy would have been almost negligible. Independently, in 1990, César Sirvent proposed that a deuterium comet, i.e., a comet with an anomalous high concentration of deuterium in its composition, could have exploded as a natural hydrogen bomb, generating most of the energy released. The sequence would be first a mechanical or kinetic explosion, triggering a thermonuclear reaction. These proposals are inconsistent with our knowledge of the composition of comets and of the temperature and pressure conditions necessary for initiating a nuclear fusion reaction. Studies have found the concentration of radioactive isotopes in the blast region to be inconsistent with those expected following a nuclear explosion, fusion or otherwise.
Edward Drobyshevski has suggested that the event was caused by the explosion of the hydrogen-saturated part of the nucleus of a comet that struck the Earth's atmosphere, with most of the remaining comet nucleus surviving, and possibly continuing to orbit the sun.
Black hole
In 1973, Albert A. Jackson and Michael P. Ryan, physicists at the University of Texas, proposed that the Tunguska event was caused by a small (around 1017 kg to 1019 kg) black hole passing through the Earth. This hypothesis is considered flawed, as there was no so-called exit event—a second explosion occurring as the black hole, having tunnelled through the Earth, shot out the other side on its way back into space. Based on the direction of impact, the exit event would have occurred in the North Atlantic, closer than the impact event to the seismic recording stations that collected much of the evidence of the event. The hypothesis also fails to account for evidence that cosmic material was deposited by the extraterrestrial body, including dust trails in the atmosphere and the distribution of high-nickel magnetic spherules around the impact area.
In 1941, Lincoln LaPaz, and later in 1965, Clyde Cowan, Chandra R. Atluri, and Willard F. Libby suggested that the Tunguska event was caused by the annihilation of a chunk of antimatter falling from space. As with the other hypotheses described in this section, this does not account for the mineral debris left in the area of the explosion.
Geophysical hypothesis
Astrophysicist Wolfgang Kundt has suggested the Tunguska event was caused by the sudden release and subsequent explosion of 10 million tons of natural gas from within the Earth's crust. The similar verneshot hypothesis has also been suggested as a possible cause of the Tunguska event.
Similar events
The Tunguska event is the strongest, but not the only, example of unexplained explosion events or meteorite air-bursts in recent history. There have been a number of similar events, e.g. the Curuçá in Brazil even as the developments in satellite and radar tracking have reduced the likelihood of undetected meteors.
A much smaller air burst occurred over a populated area in Russia on February 15, 2013, at 7:25:00 Moscow time at Chelyabinsk in the Ural district of Russia, which inflicted more than 1,200 injuries, mainly from broken glass caused by the meteor's shock wave.
Popular culture
See also
- Pasechnik, I. P. Refinement of the moment of explosion of the Tunguska meteorite from the seismic data. – Cosmic Matter and the Earth. Novosibirsk: Nauka, 1986, p. 66 (in Russian).
- P. Farinella, L. Foschini, Ch. Froeschlé, R. Gonczi, T. J. Jopek, G. Longo, P. Michel Probable asteroidal origin of the Tunguska Cosmic Body
- Trayner, C. Perplexities of the Tunguska meteorite
- Lyne, J. E., Tauber, M. The Tunguska Event
- "APOD: 2007 November 14 – Tunguska: The Largest Recent Impact Event". Antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov. Retrieved 2011-09-12.
- Photographs of these scientists may be seen at: http://www.TunguskaMystery.info/Tunguska_Event.html.
- "Sandia supercomputers offer new explanation of Tunguska disaster". Sandia National Laboratories. 2007-12-17. Retrieved 2007-12-22.
- Shoemaker, Eugene (1983). "Asteroid and Comet Bombardment of the Earth". Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences (US Geological Survey, Flagstaff, Arizona: Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences) 11 (1): 461. Bibcode:1983AREPS..11..461S. doi:10.1146/annurev.ea.11.050183.002333.
- Verma (2005), p1.
- Longo, Giuseppe (2007). "18". In Bobrowsky, Peter T.; Rickman, Hans. Comet/Asteroid Impacts and Human Society, An Interdisciplinary Approach. Berlin Heidelberg New York: Springer-Verlag. pp. 303–330. ISBN 3-540-32709-6. More than one of
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- Traynor, Chris, The Tunguska Event, Journal of the British Astronomical Association, 107, 3, 1997
- Watson, Nigel. The Tunguska Event". History Today 58.1 (July 2008): 7. MAS Ultra-School Edition. EBSCO. February 10, 2009 <http://search.ebscohost.com>
- Cornell University (2009, June 24). Space Shuttle Science Shows How 1908 Tunguska Explosion Was Caused By A Comet.
- Kelley, M. C., C. E. Seyler, and M. F. Larsen. (2009), Two-dimensional Turbulence, Space Shuttle Plume Transport in the Thermosphere, and a Possible Relation to the Great Siberian Impact Event. Geophys. Res. Lett, (in press) doi:10.1029/2009GL038362
- N. V. Vasiliev, A. F. Kovalevsky, S. A. Razin, L. E. Epiktetova (1981). Eyewitness accounts of Tunguska (Crash)., Section 6, Item 4
- Vasiliev, Section 5
- Vasiliev, Section 1, Item 2
- Vasiliev, Section 1, Item 3
- Vasiliev, Section 1, Item 5
- Boyarkina, A. P., Demin, D. V., Zotkin, I. T., Fast, W. G. Estimation of the blast wave of the Tunguska meteorite from the forest destruction. – Meteoritika, Vol. 24, 1964, pp. 112–128 (in Russian).
- Longo G. "The 1938 aerophotosurvey". Retrieved 2008-01-03.
- See: Bronshten (2000), p. 56.
- Rubtsov (2009), p.59
- Florenskiy, K P (1963). "Preliminary results from the 1961 combined Tunguska meteorite expedition". Meteoritica 13. Retrieved 2007-06-26.
- Kolesnikov et al. Finding of probable Tunguska Cosmic Body material: isotopic anomalies of carbon and hydrogen in peat, Planetary and Space Science, Volume 47, Issues 6–7, June 1, 1999, Pages 905–916
- Hou et al. Discovery of iridium and other element anomalies near the 1908 Tunguska explosion site, Planetary and Space Science, Volume 46, Issues 2–3, February–March 1998, Pages 179–188
- Kolesnikov et al. Isotopic anomaly in peat nitrogen is a probable trace of acid rains caused by 1908 Tunguska bolide, Planetary and Space Science, Volume 46, Issues 2–3, February–March 1998, Pages 163–167
- Phenomena, Comment & Notes, By John P. Wiley jr., January 1995, Smithsonian magazine
- Subject: "Three Minutes to Impact", To: Cambridge-Conference@..., Date sent: Mon, 10 Feb 1997 23:04:24 -0600 (CST), From: pib@...
- Tunguska event at the Internet Movie Database
- "The Tunguska object—A fragment of Comet Encke". Astronomical Institutes of Czechoslovakia. Bibcode:1978BAICz..29..129K.
- Nemtchinov, I.V.; C. Jacobs and E. Tagliaferri (1997). "Analysis of Satellite Observations of Large Meteoroid Impacts". Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 822 (1 Near–Earth Ob): 303–317. Bibcode:1997NYASA.822..303N. doi:10.1111/j.1749-6632.1997.tb48348.x.
- Utyuzhnikov, S.V. and Rudenko, D.V. An adaptive moving mesh method with application to nontstationary hypersonic flows in the atmosphere[dead link] Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part G, J. of Aerospace Engineering, 2008, 222 (5): 661–671
- Longo, G.; Serra R., Cecchini S. and Galli M., (1994). "Search for microremnants of the Tunguska Cosmic Body". Planetary and Space Science (UK: Elsevier Science Ltd) 42 (2): 163–177. Bibcode:1994P&SS...42..163L. doi:10.1016/0032-0633(94)90028-0.
- Serra, R.; Cecchini S. and Galli M, and Longo G. (1994). "Experimental hints on the fragmentation of the Tunguska cosmic body". Planetary and Space Science (UK: Elsevier Science Ltd) 42 (9): 777–783. Bibcode:1994P&SS...42..777S. doi:10.1016/0032-0633(94)90120-1.
- Kelly, M.C.; C. E. Seyler, M. F. Larsen (Accepted for publication on 2009-06-22). "Two-dimensional turbulence, space shuttle plume transport in the thermosphere, and a possible relation to the Great Siberian Impact Event". Geophysical Research Letters 36 (14): L14103. Bibcode:2009GeoRL..3614103K. doi:10.1029/2009GL038362.
- Ju, Anne (2009-06-24). "A mystery solved: Space shuttle shows 1908 Tunguska explosion was caused by comet". Cornell Chronicle. Cornell University. Retrieved 2009-06-25.
- "Mystery of Tunguska meteorite solved". Pravda. 2010-10-25. Retrieved 2013-02-17.
- "Tunguska Home Page - Members". Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare. 2009-03-05. Retrieved 2013-02-17.
- "A possible impact crater for the 1908 Tunguska Event", Department of Physics, University of Bolongna
- Rincon Paul (2007) "Team makes Tunguska crater claim", BBC (2007-06-27)
- Gasperini, L. et al.; Bonatti, Enrico; Longo, Giuseppe (April 2008). "Reply—Lake Cheko and the Tunguska Event: impact or non-impact?". Terra Nova 20 (2): 169–172. doi:10.1111/j.1365-3121.2008.00792.x. Retrieved 2008-05-27.
- Gasperini, L. et al. (June 2008). "The Tunguska Mystery". Scientific American: 80–86. Retrieved 2008-06-08.
- "Crater From 1908 Russian Space Impact Found, Team Says". News.nationalgeographic.com. 2010-10-28. Retrieved 2011-09-12.
- "Tunguska homepage of the University of Bologna". Th.bo.infn.it. Retrieved 2011-09-12.
- Luca Gasperini, Enrico Bonatti, Sonia Albertazzi, Luisa Forlani, Carla A. Accorsi, Giuseppe Longo, Mariangela Ravaioli, Francesca Alvisi, Alina Polonia and Fabio Sacchetti: Sediments from Lake Cheko (Siberia), a possible impact crater for the 1908 Tunguska Event)
- When Comets Attack: Solving the Mystery of the Biggest Natural Explosion in Modern History, By Mark Anderson, Popular Mechanics
- d'Alessio, S. (1989). "The nuclear and aerial dynamics of the Tunguska Event". Planetary and Space Science 37 (3): 329–340. Bibcode:1989P&SS...37..329D. doi:10.1016/0032-0633(89)90030-5.
- d'Alessio, S.J.D.; Harms, A.A. (1988). "Comet induced nuclear fusion in the atmosphere". Annals of Nuclear Energy 15 (12): 567–569. doi:10.1016/0306-4549(88)90061-8.
- Sirvent, César. "El misterio de Tunguska". Karma-7 magazine (Spain), Feb. 1990, p. 34. The author acknowledges "First of all, it is likely that in the first friction-based explosion the conditions necessary for the reaction of nuclear fusion were not fulfilled. And, in second place, no deuterium comet has ever been discovered, its existence being very unlikely." ("Primero, es probable que en la primera explosión por fricción no se alcanzasen las condiciones necesarias para la reacción de fusión nuclear. Y segundo, jamás ha sido detectado ningún cometa de deuterio, siendo su existencia muy improbable.")
- Greenberg, J.M. (1998). "Making a comet nucleus". Openaccess.leidenuniv.nl. Universiteit Leiden. Retrieved 2011-09-12.
- "When Comets Attack: Solving the Mystery of the Biggest Natural Explosion in Modern History". Popular Mechanics. Retrieved 2011-09-12.
- "Ученый: тунгусская катастрофа связана с водородным взрывом ядра кометы (Scientist: The Tunguska Catastrophe connected to the hydrogen explosion of a comet nucleus)". RIA Novosti (in Russian). 30 March 2009. Retrieved 14 October 2010.
- Jackson, A. A.; Ryan, M. P. (September 14, 1973). "Was the Tungus Event due to a Black Hole?" (PDF). Nature 245 (5420): 88–89. Bibcode:1973Natur.245...88J. doi:10.1038/245088a0.
- Stableford, Brian (2006). Science Fact and Science Fiction. CRC Press. p. 303. ISBN 978-0-415-97460-8. Retrieved 2008-12-24.
- Beasley, William H.; Tinsley, Brian A. (1974). "Tungus event was not caused by a black hole" (PDF). Nature 250 (5467): 555–556. Bibcode:1974Natur.250..555B. doi:10.1038/250555a0.
- Cowan, C., Atluri, C. R. & Libby, W. F., Possible Anti-Matter Content of the Tunguska Meteor of 1908. Nature 206, 861 – 865 (May 29, 1965); doi:10.1038/206861a0
- Choi, Charles Q., Massive Tunguska Blast Still Unsolved 100 Years Later, Fox News, July 1, 2008
- 100 years on, mystery shrouds massive 'cosmic impact' in Russia, Agence France-Presse, June 28, 2008
- Morgan et al., "Contemporaneous mass extinctions, continental flood basalts, and ‘impact signals’: are mantle plume-induced lithospheric gas explosions the causal link?", Earth and Planetary Science Letters 217, January 15, 2004
- Shurmina, Natalia; Kuzmin, Andrey. "Meteorite hits central Russia, more than 500 people hurt". Reuters. Retrieved February 15, 2013.
- Baxter, John; Atkins, Thomas. The Fire Came By: The Riddle of the Great Siberian Explosion, (London) Macdonald and Jane's, 1975. ISBN 0-446-89396-X.
- Baxter, John; Atkins, Thomas; introduction by Asimov, Isaac. The Fire Came By: The Riddle of the Great Siberian Explosion, (Garden City, New York (state)) Doubleday, 1976. ISBN 0-385-11396-X.
- Baxter, John; Atkins, Thomas; introduction by Asimov, Isaac. The Fire Came By: The Riddle of the Great Siberian Explosion, (New York) Warner Books, 1977. ISBN 0-446-893976-X.
- Bronshten, V. A.. The Tunguska Meteorite: History of Investigations, (Moscow) A. D. Selyanov, 2000 (in Russian). ISBN 5-901273-04-4.
- Brown, John C.; Hughes, David. W.. “Tunguska’s comet and the non-thermal carbon-14 production in the atmosphere”, Nature, Vol 268 (May) 1977 pp512–514.
- Chaikin, Andrew. “Target: Tunguska”, Sky & Telescope, Jan 1984 pp18–21. The Kresak/Sekanina debate, in a very widely available journal. Cited in Verma.
- Christie, William H.. “The great Siberian meteorite of 1908”, The Griffith Observer, (Los Angeles) The Griffith Observatory, Vol 6 (April) 1942 pp38-47. This review is widely cited.
- Crowther, J. G.. “More about the Great Siberian Meteorite”, Scientific American, May 1931 pp314–317. Cited in Verma.
- Furneaux, Rupert. The Tungus Event: The Great Siberian Catastrophe of 1908, (New York) Nordon Publications, 1977. ISBN 0-843-90619-7.
- Furneaux, Rupert. The Tungus Event: The Great Siberian Catastrophe of 1908, (St. Albans) Panther, 1977. ISBN 0-586-04423-X.
- Gallant, Roy A.. The Day the Sky Split Apart: Investigating a Cosmic Mystery, (New York) Atheneum Books for Children, 1995. ISBN 0-689-80323-0.
- Gallant, Roy A.. “Journey to Tunguska”, Sky & Telescope, June 1994 pp38–43. Cover article, with full-page map. Cited in Verma.
- Gasperini, Luca, Bonatti, Enrico and Longo, Giuseppe. The Tunguska Mystery 100 Years Later, Scientific American, June 2008.
- Krinov, E. L. Giant Meteorites, trans. J.S. Romankiewicz (Part III: The Tunguska Meteorite), (Oxford and New York) Pergamon Press, 1966.
- Lerman, J. C.; Mook, W. G.; Vogel, J. C.. Nature, Effect of the Tunguska Meteor and Sunspots on Radiocarbon in Tree Rings, (December 9, 1967) | doi:10.1038/216990a0; v.216, pp990–1 (1967).
- Morgan, J. Phipps; Ranero, C.R.; Reston, T.J.. Contemporaneous mass extinctions, continental flood basalts, and ‘impact signals’: are mantle plume-induced lithospheric gas explosions the causal link?, Earth and Planetary Science Letters 217, pp263–284 (2004).
- Oliver, Charles P..“The Great Siberian Meteorite”, Scientific American, Vol 139 #1 (July) 1928, pp42–44. Cited in Baxter and Atkins, also in Verma.
- Ol'khovatov, A.Yu.. “Geophysical Circumstances of the 1908 Tunguska Event in Siberia, Russia”, Earth, Moon and Planets, Vol 93 Nov 2003, pp163–173, .
- Perkins, Sid. “A Century Later, Scientists Still Study Tunguska”, Science News, 21 June 2008 pp5–6. Includes 11 color photographs.
- Rubtsov, Vladimir. The Tunguska Mystery, (Dordrecht and New York) Springer, 2009. ISBN 978-0-387-76573-0; 2012, ISBN 978-1-4614-2925-8.
- Steel, Duncan. “Tunguska at 100”, Nature, 26 June 2008 pp1157–1159. This is one of several articles in a special issue, cover title: “Cosmic Cataclysms”.
- Stoneley, Jack; with Lawton, A. T.. Cauldron of Hell: Tunguska, (New York) Simon and Schuster, 1977. ISBN 0-671-22943-5.
- Stoneley, Jack; with Lawton, A. T.. Tunguska, Cauldron of Hell, (London) W. H. Allen, 1977. ISBN 0-352-39619-9
- Verma, Surendra. The Tunguska Fireball: Solving One of the Great Mysteries of the 20th century, (Cambridge) Icon Books, 2005. ISBN 1-84046-620-0.
- Verma, Surendra. The Mystery of the Tunguska Fireball, (Cambridge) Icon Books, 2006. ISBN 1-84046-728-2. Index has “Lake Cheko” as “Ceko, Lake”, without “h”.
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Tunguska event|
- Article about the events, special attention to Leonid Kulik on MysteryDatabase.com
- Tunguska.ru Russian site with a tiny English section. Includes some gorgeous Tunguska photos.
- Tunguska A research group at University of Bologna that has conducted several recent expeditions to the site.
- Tunguska pictures Many Tunguska-related pictures with comments in English.
- Quasi Three-Dimensional Modeling of Tunguska Comet Impact (1908) Dr. Andrei E. Zlobin, Paper of 2007 Planetary Defense Conference.
- Discovery of probably Tunguska meteorites at the bottom of Khushmo river's shoal Dr. Andrei E. Zlobin, Paper 1304.8070 in arXiv.org (PDF)
- Have Tunguska Meteorites Been Found? I Have My Doubts, Bad Astronomy, Slate Magazine, Dr. Phil Plait, May 6, 2013.
- The Tunguska Event in 1908: Evidence from Tree-Ring Anatomy – Evgenii A. Vaganov, Malkolm K. Hughes, Pavel P. Silkin and Valery D. Nesvetailo, Astrobiology, Volume 4, Number 3, 2004, pp. 391–399
- Preliminary results from the 1961 combined Tunguska meteorite expedition
- Probable asteroidal origin of the Tunguska Cosmic Body A 2001 paper arguing for the asteroidal hypothesis.
- "Russian Alien Spaceship Claims Raise Eyebrows, Skepticism" article, arguing the event was caused by meteor explosion
- "The Vurdalak Conjecture" website explores the science behind the black-hole impact hypothesis.
- 1908 Siberia Explosion. Reconstruction by William K. Hartmann.
- Simulation of such an event & origin of King Tut's glass
- Team makes Tunguska crater claim (BBC News)
- Astronomy Picture of the Day on Tunguska
- Mystery space blast 'solved' (BBC News)
- Sound of the Tunguska event (reconstruction)
- The Tunguska Event 100 Years later NASA
- There Was a Hot Time in Tunguska That Night (2010 web archive of original article)
- A discussion of the Tunguska Event's as a test-site for theory in Triple Canopy (online magazine)
- Huge Tunguska Explosion Remains Mysterious 100 Years (Space.com)
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Listen now 30 mins
Episode 1 of 2
The first of two programmes which follows the engineers and astronomers who worked on the biggest telescope ever sent to space, in one of the most important missions in the history of European spaceflight. Jonathon Amos joins Professor Matt Griffin of Cardiff University and his international team as they aimed to peer through the areas in space that are invisible to other telescopes. This is the story of their aims to solve the mystery behind galaxy and star formation and how these processes eventually gave rise to life-bearing planets like Earth. In this episode, first broadcast in 2009, the team are approaching the biggest milestone in their twenty year project - the launch of their work on a rocket from a spaceport in French Guiana.
This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.
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The Urban Photovoltaic Tree also known as the uTree Concept by Xabier Perez de Arenaza is a spin-off of a previous design named as the Urban Tree from the same designer. The uTree concept is developed to be a modernistic urban sculptural installation that can also expand as a source of power for elements such as traffic lights and public lighting systems. The uTree is basically shaped like a tree and its broad flat leaves are fitted with solar panels that harvest solar power during the day.
The energy collected by the uTrees can either be fed into a grid or stored into a battery for use by public structures for lighting as well as use in public transport systems. Presented at an Energy Club conferences at the IE business school in Madrid earlier this month, the uTree concept is one of the most realistic concepts for urban energy generation since these “trees” can be installed virtually anywhere as they do not require more than a few inches of floor space for the supporting pole and take up a few square feet of overhead space. A rotation engine optimizes energy production by ensuring that the leaves are always facing the sun at the correct angle while easy screwed connections allow each uTree to be easily set up and dissembled.
There are 77 cells per leaf and each generates over 2.5w energy per day. Each tree can generate over 1732.5W in an 8 hour day, which equals 13.86 KWH/day per uTree, or 5058 KWH per tree per year. This kind of energy would be sufficient to feed 20 street lights every night. Given the minimum maintenance they need once they are installed, these uTrees can be easily installed along pavements and streets and even in parks and on rooftops and serve as an alternate method of energy generation that can help communities get their public spaces off the grid.
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Photograph from Nanjing Municipal Museum
FLOWER POWER: A fisherman handle graces an amber cup from the time of the Tianqi emperor (1621-27) in the shape of a lotus leaf, recovered from the tomb of Mu Ru.
A new show at San Francisco's Asian Art Museum highlights treasures from China's Ming dynasty.
By Richard von Busack
In the public mind, three centuries of the imperial Ming dynasty come down to the vase. The porcelain is haunting, underglazed in a sky-blue to glow its creamy white. The once-guarded science of porcelain making is available to every community college's ceramics class, so the divinity of these vases must seem a little faded. In our era of mechanical reproduction, even Grecian urns don't wring any Keats out of the passer-by. There are valuable and beautiful Ming vases on display at the San Francisco Asian Art Museum's summer show, "Power & Glory: Court Arts of China's Ming Dynasty," outlining the arts of the regime (1368-1644). This is an ambitious, expensive and politically fraught borrowing of treasures from three different Chinese museums.
In the ground-floor galleries, the growing richness of the emperors is seen in luscious white nephrite jade, carved into belts and pendants, glowing like starlight. There is a sublime amber cup from the Nanjing tombs, as dark as maple syrup. Overlooking some of the treasures are silk paintings of the emperors in their serene mildness, posed in stiff gowns embroidered with heraldic animals.
Glazed stoneware, preserved from the ages underground, includes a segment of the arched gate of the Temple of Gratitude, circa 1412-31, featuring an elephant with squinting, human eyes. The show also features specimens of gold-threaded "Heavenly Splendor" brocade, woven into a pattern of disbelief-inducing intricacy.
Perhaps more heavenly and splendid: a Tibetan thangka, a gift from the emperor to the high lamas. This silk satin embroidery depicts Raktayamari, three-eyed "Red Conqueror of Death," in midcopulation with his consort goddess. It has a lavishness and sophistication that might not have been rivaled in the world of 1400.Preferring art on the human scale, I was more taken by a Wu Wei painting. Wu (1459-1508) was officially declared "The Number One Painter" of two imperial regimes, though he was a roughhouser, a Bukowski. Wu's A Monk Enjoying a Moon Painting depicts a wanderer staring in amorous glee at a fine scroll. His physique suggests that the plump friars on German beer bottles had Chinese cousins. This monk has a square chin and a boxer's nose, and he holds the rolled-up lower end of the scroll at a downward angle, like Groucho's stogie.
Over the course of the dynasty, the emperors left Nanjing to establish a new capital in Beijing. Here, the emperor and about 60,000 of his closest friends retired from the world. The Ming flourished at the same time as the European Renaissance. And these Chinese paintings recall incidents and heroes of earlier times, just as European artists looked back to ancient Rome. China, too, had its age of exploration, like Europe. Part of the show discusses the emperor's treasure fleet with mariners who voyaged from Surabaya to Mombasa. "The emperor did not trade," explains the museum's Dr. Michael Knight. "He received tribute and he gave presents."
The difference between the Ming and the European Renaissance is the former's lack of interest in everything outside the palace walls. Rather than initiating the growth of the individual, the Ming reinforced connoisseurship, rank and rigid tradition.
As the Beijing Olympics commence, one hears all the grumbling about how these next decades will be a Chinese century--just as the last was an American century. If this is the case, this show provides some solace. This art provides a tremendous argument for the human race, no matter what language that race speaks.
Or, if you prefer to take warning: the emperor, nicely cocooned in his pagoda from birth to putrefaction, might be a model for today's cybersolipsist, more engaged with his electronic baubles than the world around him. That court provides a distant mirror for today's AM radio or Internet logician, who swears that our own land is the only one worth praising or understanding. This essential lack of curiosity is what helped ease the Ming dynasty into its eternal sleep.
POWER & GLORY: COURT ARTS OF CHINA'S MING DYNASTY runs through Sept. 21 at the Asian Art Museum, 200 Larkin St., San Francisco; 415.581.3500.
Send a letter to the editor about this story.
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Chronology of Italy & Benito Mussolini
|1876-1944||Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, founder of the Futurism movement.|
|1883||(29 July) Birth of Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (Dovia, Predappio).|
|1902||(February) Mussolini starts his career as a schoolteacher (Gualtieri Emilia). (9 July) Mussolini migrates to Switzerland where he works as a mason; frequently homeless, he is sent to prison several times; in contact with the local trade union, he starts writing in different newspapers and journals and gives many speeches.|
|1902-19||Mussolini is imprisoned eleven times in: Switzerland, Germany, Austria and Italy.|
|1904 (end)||Mussolini goes back to Italy where he does his military service with the "X bersaglieri".|
|1905||(February) Mussolini's mother, Rosa Maltoni, dies. One year later, his father, Alessandro, will start a relationship with Anna Guidi, the mother of Rachele.|
|1906||Mussolini resumes his schoolteaching in Tolmezzo and Oneglia where he also writes for the local newspaper, La Lima.|
|1908||(July) Mussolini goes back to his home-town where he participates in a local fight, on the farm labourers' side; he is sent to prison for twelve days.|
|1909||(6 February) Mussolini goes to Trento where he writes in the local weekly, L'Avvenire del Lavoratore and in the Popolo; he also writes and publishes many literary short stories. (20 February) First Futurism Manifesto published in the Parisian Figaro. (26 September) Mussolini is first imprisoned then expelled from Trento by the Austrian authorities after violent polemics with the Catholics. (October 1909) Mussolini goes back to Italy (Forl“) where he writes a novel, Claudia Particella, L'amante del Cardinale, for the Popolo and where he directs the local socialist newspaper La lotta di Classe.|
|1910||(January) Mussolini and Rachele Guidi move in together. (1 September) Birth of Mussolini's and Rachele's first daughter, Edda.|
(24 September) Antimilitarist Mussolini is strongly against the Libian
war; the strike against the war fails in Italy except in Forl“, where
people revolt under the leadership of Pietro Nenni, Aurelio Lolli and
(14 October) Mussolini leads a manifestation against the Italo-Turkish war; he is arrested and spends five months in prison where he writes his autobiography, La Mia Vita.
|1912||(7-10 July) Congress of the Italian Socialist party where Mussolini gives his first important political speech. (1 December) Mussolini becomes director of the Socialist newspaper Avanti! where he develops a stong pacifist and antimilitarist debate; the newspaper sales rise from 40.000 copies to 60.000, then to 100.000 copies.|
|1913||(May) Milanese workers start a strike backed only by Mussolini.|
|1914||(28 July) Austrian declaration of war. (4 August) Deputies of the German Social Democrats agree to finance the war; "The international is dead", writes Mussolini. (18 October) Mussolini writes that the Italian Socialist party should move from "absolute neutrality" to "active neutrality"; he thinks that Italy should go to war or start a revolution but only nationalism is able to stir up the masses. (15 November) Mussolini founds the newspaper Il Popolo d'Italia where he praises the Italian nation. (24 November) Mussolini is expelled from the Socialist party during an assembly in Milan.|
|1915||(17 May) Italian declaration of war celebrated as a victory by Mussolini who also starts to revendicate territories in his articles. (31 August) Mussolini goes to war as a soldier of the "XI bersaglieri" regiment; he writes a diary, Il Mio Diario di Guerra (1915-1917); war becomes for him the essential ingredient for the masses. (17 December) Civil marriage of Mussolini and Rachele Guidi takes place.|
|1916||(27 September) Birth of Mussolini's and Rachele's first son, Vittorio.|
|1917||(23 February) Mussolini is wounded at the war front.|
|1918||(April) Birth of Mussolini's and Rachele second son, Bruno.|
|1919||(23 March) Mussolini founds the Italian Combat Fascists (Fasci Italiani di Combattimento). (12 September) Expedition of Gabriele D'Annunzio to annex Fiume to Italy. (16 November) Italian elections are held: neither Mussolini nor any Fascist is elected.|
|1919-20||Severe confrontations between political and trade unionist forces in Italy.|
(15 May) General elections: 32 Fascist candidates in the National bloc
are elected, including Mussolini. During the electoral campaign, street
fights result in 105 dead, 431 wounded. (21 July) A squadron of 500 Fascists
battles in Sarzana against the population and the police: 18 dead.
(7 November) The Fasci Italiani di Combattimento reforms as the National Fascist Party.
|1922||(3 August) Fascists attack the Milanese town hall and the Avanti! head office. (28 October) A squadron of 40.000 Fascists marches on Rome led by Cesare Maria De Vecchi and Dino Grandi. (29 October) Mussolini is summoned to Rome by the king to form the new government; he arrives the next day. (December) Constitution of Il Gran Consiglio del Fascismo.|
|1924||(6 April) Italian parliamentary elections: triumph of the Fascist party (65% of the votes, 275 deputy seats). (30 May) Giacomo Matteotti, a socialist deputy, declares in a fierce speech that the elections of 6th of April are illegal. (10 June) Matteotti is assassinated in Rome. (27 June) The opposition leaves the Chamber (Aventino secession). (16 August) Dead body of Matteotti is found in Rome.|
|1925||(3 January) Mussolini claims responsibility for the Matteotti murder. The Fascist dictatorship begins. (November 1925) Attempt on Mussolini's life by Tito Zaniboni. (19 December) Religious marriage of Mussolini and Rachele Guidi.|
|1926||(7 April) Attempt on Mussolini's life by Violet Gibson. (11 September) Attempt on Mussolini's life by Gino Lucetti (November 1926) Special laws voted in Rome: reintroduction of the death penalty (for murder attempts against king, queen, hereditary prince and chief of state), constitution of the Special Tribunal, suppression of the opposition press, dissolution of the antifascist political parties and organizations.|
|1927||(April) Organization of Fascist secret police (Ovra) is instituted. Birth of Mussolini's and Rachele's third son, Romano.|
|1928||(May) Antonio Gramsci, head of the Italian Communist Party, is condemned to twenty years in prison. (September) New electoral law requires all Italian voters to register as Fascists. All other parties are forbidden.|
|1929||(11 February) Signing of the Lateranensi pacts between the Fascist government and the Vatican. (1929) Birth of Mussolini's and Rachele's second daughter, Anna Maria.|
|1930||(23 April) Marriage of Mussolini's daughter, Edda, to Count Galeazzo Ciano.|
|1931||(3 February) Attempt on Mussolini's life by Michele Schirru. (October 1931) University professors forced to take oath of loyalty to Fascism.|
|1933||Mussolini and Claretta Petacci meet. (30 November) 2,600 couples marry in mass-wedding in Rome; they are honored by Mussolini.|
|1935||(October) Italian army invades Ethiopia (18 November) international economical sanctions instituted against Italy. (18 December) Italians offer their gold wedding rings to the Fatherland (patria).|
|1936||Mussolini and Claretta Petacci start a love affair. (5 May) Italian troops enter Addis Abeba headed by Pietro Badoglio. (9 May) Proclamation of the Italian Empire by Mussolini. King Vittorio Emanuele III takes the title of Emperor of Ethiopia.|
|1937||(8-24 March) Italian legionaries participating in the Spanish Civil War loose badly on the Guadalajara front. (June) The Rosselli brothers are assassinated by Fascists in France. (24 October) Birth of the Rome-Berlin Axis. (November 1937) Antikomintern Pact between Italy, Germany and Japan is formed.|
|1938||(14 July) The Manifesto della Razza is published in Italy. (August 1938) The Italian journal La Difesa della Razza is launched. (22 August) Racial census taken in Italy.( 5 September) Italian racial effort is taken over by the Consiglio Superiore della Demografia e Razza, the Tribunale della Razza, the Commissione per le Discriminazioni and the Consiglio di Amministrazione dell' EGELI. (6 October) The Grand Fascist Council (Il Gran Consiglio del Fascismo) passes the new racial laws. (17 November) Racial laws are decreed in Italy against Jews.|
|1939||(April) Italian military occupation of Albania. (22 May) Steel-pact between Italy and Germany is signed.|
|1940||(10 June) Italy enters WWII as a German ally. (24 June) Armistice between Italy and France is signed. (28 October) Italian army attacks Greece.|
|1941||(May) Ethiopian Negus regains his throne representing the end of the Italian Empire. (7 August) Mussolini's son, Bruno, dies in a plane crash while on military duty.|
(10 July) Allied forces land in Sicily. (25 July) Destitution and imprisonment
of Mussolini (Ponza, Maddalena); Italians all over the country rejoice.
( 26 July 1943) Formation of the Badoglio government which negotiates secretly with the Allies. (8 September) Armistice in Cassibile (Siracusa) between Italians and Allied forces. (12 September) Mussolini is liberated from his Gran Sasso prison by the German commando Otto Skorzeny, and flown by plane to Vienna, Munich and finally Rastenburg to meet with Hitler. (September) Clandestine constitution in Rome of the Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale (CLN) by anti-fascist parties. (23 September) Mussolini founds the Social Italian Republic in Sal˜ at Lake Garda.
(13 October) Italian government lead by Badoglio declares war on Germany.
|1943-45||7,495 Italian Jews are deported from Italy: 6,885 are killed in the Lager, and only 610 return to their homes|
(8-11 January) Trial and execution in Verona of the five "traitors"
of the Gran Consiglio (Galeazzo Ciano, Mussolini's son-in-law, is among
( 22 January) Allied forces land in Anzio; battles in Montecassino.
( 23 March) Partisans' responsible for bomb attack in via Rasella (Rome): thirty-three German soldiers are killed, ten wounded. (24 March) 335 Italians are executed in the Fosse Ardeatine (Rome) by the German army led by SS Major Kappler. (May) German army withdraws on the Gothic line. (4 June) Allied forces enter in Rome; Badoglio resigns; the new government is presided by Ivanoe Bonomi; Vittorio Emanuele III, king of Italy, abdicates the throne to his son, Umberto II. (6 June) Anglo-American forces land in Normandy (France). (June) Constitution of the Corpi Volontari per la Libertˆ (CVL) unites all military forces of the Italian resistance. (8 August) 15 hostages shot in Piazzale Loreto (Milan) by Fascists and the German army.
(18 April) Mussolini starts out from Lake Garda for Milan. (27 April)
Mussolini, Petacci and henchmen are captured in Dongo. (28 April) Execution
of Mussolini and Petacci in Mezzegra on Lake Como. (28 April) Execution
of Mussolini's henchmen in Dongo. (29 April) Public display of corpses
of Mussolini, Petacci and henchmen in Piazzale Loreto (Milan.)
( 30 April) First autopsy of Mussolini's body (Milan). (14 June) Antifascist coalition for the Italian government headed by Ferruccio Parri (Action Party), takes power, followed a few months later, by Alcide De Gasperi (Christian Democrats).
|1946||(23 April) Italian neofascists steal Mussolini's corpse from its secret grave in Cimitero Maggiore (Milan). (2 June) Italians vote for the Republic: King Umberto II and his family are sent into exile. (12 August) Recovery of Mussolini's stolen corpse (Pavia). (14 August) Second autopsy of Mussolini's body is performed (Milan).|
|1948||First political elections to establish the Italian Parliament are held: the left-wing parties are defeated; 48% of the votes go to the Christian Democrats.|
|1957||(30 August) Private funeral for Benito Mussolini in Predappio, S. Cassiano.|
|1996-97||Erich Priebke is tried twice in Rome by a Military Court for his participation in the execution of 335 Italians at the Fosse Ardeatine.|
Prepared by Maria Pia Di Bella & John Schoeberlein, 1998
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://cidc.library.cornell.edu/dof/chron/chronmus.htm
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<language, parallel> An object-oriented, data-parallel superset of ANSI C with synchronous semantics, for the Connection Machine, designed by Thinking Machines, 1987. C* adds a "domain" data type and a selection statement for parallel execution in domains.
An unimplemented language called "Parallel C" [which one?] influenced the design of C*. Dataparallel-C was based on C*.
Latest version: 6.x, as of 1993-07-27.
["C*: An Extended C Language for Data Parallel Programming", J.R. Rose et al, Proc Second Intl Conf on Supercomputing, L.P. Kartashev et al eds, May 1987, pp 2-16].
["C* Programming Manual", Thinking Machines Corp, 1986].
Try this search on Wikipedia, OneLook, Google
Nearby terms: C « C# « (c) « C* » C++ » C+- » C+@
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http://foldoc.org/C*
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Koengen, Germany -- (SBWIRE) -- 03/20/2013 -- An efficiently designed video tutorial on the generation of solar electricity has now been released on the internet by the name ‘The Solar Sterling Plant’. Based on the reliable concept proposed by a Scottish minister, Dr. Roberts Sterling in the late 1800s, this free electricity generation technique is believed to be capable of revolutionizing the energy industry. People can generate their own clean and renewable energy by simply harnessing the energy of the Sun at an inexpensive cost, saving hundreds of dollars on their monthly electricity bills.
The website succinctly defines the origination of this concept and sheds light on its working. The system uses an array of parabolic dishes that focuses the sun rays on a sterling engine which acts as the conversion unit. The sterling engine is a very simple, elegant and efficient system that takes this intense heat from the Sun and heats hydrogen as a working gas. Upon heating, the gas expands which pushes the piston down, in turn, causing the crankshaft to turn a generator. By alternatively heating and then cooling the gas, the sterling engine generates the electricity with incredible efficiency.
The free electricity system has undergone through extensive and intensive research conducted by a team of experienced personnel before making it available to the general public, who are given full assurance of experiencing unmatched results including massive power generation than using other alternative sources of energy like the traditional solar panels and wind turbines. The concentrated rays of The Solar Sterling Plant generate 12x more energy and are relatively cheaper and easier to build and operate. It works in all weather conditions regardless of the temperature, reducing the individuals’ electricity bill up to 50%. On a larger scale, it can eliminate their electricity bills completely and can even have the power companies paying them. In addition, it does not pollute the environment and is an economical and eco-friendly electricity generation alternative available today. The materials and tools included in setting up the system are easily available throughout the world and costs at an average of $100 per system.
The Solar Sterling Plant is probably an incredible initiative in the energy industry that has enabled thousands of individuals around the globe to save noticeably greater dollar amounts on their regular electricity bills. The video tutorial includes easy-to-follow guidelines and essential diagrams and pictures that make the entire learning procedure manageable and convenient. In addition, full technical support is provided to the customers and they are further backed up by the company’s 100% money back guarantee. Doris Farris, a customer from California writes,
“It’s been six days since I am running my Solar Sterling Plant. All I can say is that even though I am not a ‘DIY’ girl, this system was pretty easy to build. I just followed the instructions and because there are a lot of pictures showing you what to do, I managed to build it in only one weekend. Great support too. Thanks guys.”
Interested individuals can order it from http://www.free-electricity.info/ at a discounted price and can enjoy an instant access to the detailed and illustrated instructions.
Contact Us: 888-4-SBWIRE (US) - 920-321-1250 (International)
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http://www.sbwire.com/press-releases/new-way-for-producing-free-electricity-revealed-225910.htm
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Researchers at Northwestern University have found that normal-weight people who develop Type 2 diabetes have a higher mortality rate than overweight or obese people who develop the disease.
Although weight is one of the factors that puts a person at risk of developing Type 2 diabetes, family history, ethnicity and age may also play a role. Since normal-weight people only account for 5 to 15 percent of new diabetes cases, not much is known about how the disease affects this under-studied group.
Source: CBS News. Read full article. (link)
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http://reason.com/24-7/2012/08/08/fat-type-ii-diabetics-less-likely-to-die
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Specialists from the National Institute of Anthropology and History
(INAH) explore in Tenosique, Tabasco, an archaeological site of Maya affiliation dedicated exclusively to manufacture weapons and tools.
San Claudio was occupied from 200 BC to 900 AD by Maya workers at the service of other community of higher hierarchy, informed archaeologist Jose Luis Romero Rivera, director of the excavation project at the site.
Located in the contact region between Chiapas Mountain Range and Guatemala, this site accounts for quotidian life of ancient Maya population dedicated to weapons and tools manufacture, which were commercialized with other towns.
One of the main activities at the site was flint exploitation; we have found a great amount of this mineral debris all over the place. Due to its relatively easy manipulation, it was used to create sharp tools such as knives, axes and arrowheads.
Flint was a strategic material since metal was not known and they would not count on with obsidian, controlled by most important cities, he added. They created an industry based on exploitation and commercialization of this mineral, displacing obsidian and allowing them to be independent from great commercial networks.
Romero Rivera declared that the site has been researched by the Institute since 1998; it is not one of the great Maya capitals, but a small site probably subdued to Piedras Negras ancient city, located 40 kilometers away from San Claudio.
We have not found inscriptions or architectural elements such as in places like Palenque. There are no tall buildings, but urban organization is delimited by rectangular patios probably used to manufacture objects.
The INAH archaeologist commented that to present, 3 buildings have been explored, of 97 detected at the site; most of them correspond to pyramidal bases and platforms, distributed on a 70 hectares area.
We have not found a defined architectural style at San Claudio, but a strong influence of Peten is present; there are battered bases with rounded corners.
Other aspect that reveals inhabitants of San Claudio were humble people is the discovery (some years ago) of 30 human skeletons buried with small offerings.
Most elaborated burials at San Claudio are tombs made out of limestone slabs, accompanied with simple offerings; the most complex one had 3 bowls, while the most humble funerals had just one bowl or plate that covered the face.
This reveals there were not elite groups, coinciding with the absence of palaces or jade offerings, concluded Jose Luis Romero.
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CC-MAIN-2013-20
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http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=11&int_new=36818&int_modo=1
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en
| 0.961265
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| 3.359375
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evaluation 1. Assessing the value or the act of considering or examining something in order to judge its value, quality, importance, extent, or condition. 2. A statement of value; a sopken or written statement of the value, quality, importance, extent, or condition of something.
Found op http://www.wordinfo.info/words/index/info/view_unit/2262/3
[disambiguation] Evaluation mainly refers to the process of characterizing and appraising something of interest or of determining the value of an expression (mathematics). Other senses include: == Computer science == == Groups or organizations == == Measuring things == == Other == ...
Found op http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaluation_(disambiguation)
(programming) The COBOL85 keyword for a switch statement. (1997-06-10)
Found op http://foldoc.org/evaluation
Evaluation is systematic determination of merit, worth, and significance of something or someone using criteria against a set of standards. Evaluation often is used to characterize and appraise subjects of interest in a wide range of human enterprises, including the arts, criminal justice, foundati...
Found op http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaluation
The work involved in gaining a knowledge of the size, shape, position and value of coal.
Found op http://www.coaleducation.org/glossary.htm
- act of ascertaining or fixing the value or worth of
- an appraisal of the value of something
Found op http://www.imbus.de/glossar/
Found op http://www.encyclo.co.uk/visitor-contributions.php
Quantitative comparison of values. The appraisal of value; the estimation of worth. See Value. -- J.K.F.
Found op http://www.ditext.com/runes/e.html
The continuous process of measuring the impact of a PR campaign from start to finish.
Found op http://www.chazb.com/glossary_of_public_relations_terms.html
Judging the value of something by making a comparison.
Found op http://www.eastlondon.nhs.uk/glossary.html
The process of finding out, after implementation, what the real impacts of a strategy have been and how they compare to what was expected beforehand
Found op http://www.konsult.leeds.ac.uk/public/level1/sec17/index.htm
[journal] Evaluation is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal that covers in the field of evaluation. The editor-in-chief is Eliot Stern (Tavistock Institute). It was established in 1995 and is currently published by SAGE Publications in association with the Tavistock Institute. == Abst...
Found op http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evaluation_(journal)
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http://www.encyclo.co.uk/define/Evaluation
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Discover Earth: Hands-on Science Activities
The Discover Earth activities focus on Earth science topics close to home — such as local weather and the plants, animals, crops, and environmental features unique to your region — as well as a global view of our changing planet. Through hands-on investigations and discussions, young audiences discover that Earth's global environment changes — and is changed by — the local environment. The activities explore three key messages relating to this overall theme: A. We belong to Earth; B. Each region is unique; and C. Your home is changing. The activities were developed with guidelines set forth by the National Science Education Standards and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) benchmarks, and they were designed for audiences in the following four age ranges: 5 to 7, 8 to 9, 10 to 13, and teens. Facilitators are invited to download and use the activities, supporting reading games, and facilitator resources for educational purposes.
June 18, 2013
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http://www.lpi.usra.edu/education/explore/discoverEarth/
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Biodiversity in all its forms can not be fully appreciated unless
it is experienced firsthand at its extremes. The purpose of this
program is to give the student firsthand experience of the unique
biodiversity found in Costa Rica.
This course, sponsored by both The Pennsylvania State University,
Berks-Lehigh Valley College and the Pennsylvania Department of
Education (PDE), will be covering and evaluating all of
the nine areas within the Academic Standards for Environment
and Ecology Education set forth by the PDE (K-12). We will also
look closely at the Environment and Ecology standards set forth
by the Costa Rican government.
|"I will argue that every scrap of biological
diversity is priceless, to be learned and cherished, and never
to be surrendered without a struggle."
EDWARD O. WILSON
Overview | Description
| Objectives | Requirements
| Outline | Itinerary
| Cost | Application
Penn State Berks-Lehigh
This page was last updated on January
Questions or Comments
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<urn:uuid:ec5138f8-4f1e-4263-8404-cd4ef67049bf>
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http://www2.lv.psu.edu/jxm57/costarica/index.html
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This article explores the evolution of the imperial Crown, particularly in respect of the right to advise, and the development of the divisible Crown. The position in New Zealand is compared and contrasted with that in other countries, particularly Canada and Australia. It will be shown that the devolution of the Crown was the principal avenue through which independence was conferred upon the Dominions. Independence is fundamentally a political fact rather than purely a matter of legal rights.
"The Control of Advice to the Crown and the Development of Executive Independence in New Zealand,"
Bond Law Review:
1, Article 7.
Available at: http://epublications.bond.edu.au/blr/vol13/iss1/7
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http://epublications.bond.edu.au/blr/vol13/iss1/7/
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| 0.902059
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Every cell is enclosed by a thin double layer of lipids that separates the distinct internal environment of the cell from the extracellular space. Damage to this lipid bilayer, also referred to as plasma membrane, disturbs the cellular functions and may lead to the death of the cell. For example, downhill walking tears many little holes into the plasma membranes of the muscle cells in our legs. To prevent irreparable damage, muscle cells have efficient systems to seal these holes again. Researchers at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and Heidelberg University have succeeded for the first time in observing membrane repair in real-time in a living organism.
The results were published in the recent issue of the journal Developmental Cell. Using a novel high-resolution imaging method, Prof. Uwe Strähle and Dr. Urmas Roostalu for the first time observed membrane repair in real time in a living animal. They tagged repair proteins with fluorescent proteins in muscle of the transparent zebrafish larvae. With a laser, the researchers burned tiny holes into the plasma membrane of muscle cells and followed the repair of the holes under the microscope. They showed that membrane vesicles together with two proteins Dysferlin and Annexin A6 rapidly form a repair patch. Other Annexins accumulate subsequently on the injured membrane. These studies by Karlsruhe and Heidelberg researchers suggest that the cell assembles a multilayered repair patch from the inside that seals off the cell's interior from the extracellular environment. Moreover, it was found that there is a specialized membrane area that supplies rapidly the membrane that is needed for sealing the plasma membrane hole.
This animal model for membrane repair will contribute to the identification of new proteins in this sealing process and will help elucidate the underlying mechanisms. The results may contribute to the development of therapies for human myopathies and open up new possibilities in biotechnology.
Explore further: X-ray tomography on a living frog embryo
More information: Urmas Roostalu, Uwe Strähle: In Vivo Imaging of Molecular Interactions at Damaged Sarcolemma; Developmental Cell, 13 March 2012, Volume 22, Issue 3. www.cell.com/developmental-cell/current
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http://phys.org/news/2012-03-muscle-cells-membranes.html
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CRL Resources on Dance in Indonesia
The five selected resources from the Center for Research Libraries collection discussed below share a common thematic thread in the dance arts of Indonesia. For the scholar who wishes to know more about The Dance across local cultures in the diverse nation, these titles offer an introduction that ranges from cursory information on Indonesian dance history to in-depth discovery of specific performance practices. On a deeper level, each author approaches the subject matter as an ethnographer, weaving into descriptive narrative their own interpretations of underpinnings in Indonesian dance, most importantly key social, religious, and political overtones. Further, the authors are themselves practitioners of dance performance, and with one exception Indonesian, providing a definite sense of the insider’s perspective.
These resources provide yet another layer of discovery when considered as a whole. Together, they capture an important moment in the Indonesian performing arts in which a shift in discourse is clearly evident. Most of the authors have both a historical connection to a courtly past coupled with a contemporary responsibility for instruction and leadership in the national performing arts conservatory system established in the early 1960s. There is an inherent tension as knowledge production shifts from the courts, particularly those of Solo and Yogyakarta in Central Java, which supported the arts for centuries, to the newly developed state-sponsored academies. The writing further captures a compelling dynamic in which the Indonesian nation is still interpreted through a Central Javanese gaze. Increasingly resisted in recent scholarship, the frame built around Indonesian dance (with the important exception of the work on Balinese dance) is Javanese, exemplifying a cultural dominance over national identity construction from the time of these works.
Soedarsono. Dances in Indonesia.
Jakarta, Indonesia: P. T. Gunung Agung, 1974
Soedarsono, who grew up in the courtly dance traditions of Central Java, played a key role in both the establishment of the first performing arts conservatories of Indonesia and the instruction of an early generation of ethnomusicologists in the United States. Though the title of the work advertises a consideration of dance arts of the nation, the actuality of the text reflects strong consideration of Javanese dance, coupled with a respectful review of Sunda and Bali, and ending with cursory information of cultures beyond the Java-Bali center. Perhaps the greatest strength of this work is its keen observations on the divisions in classical dance performance practice between the courtly Javanese traditions of Solo and Yogyakarta. Richly illustrated in both textual description and photography, Soedarsono crafts a deep understanding of these traditions. This is also the most clearly nationalistic of the works considered here, as Soedarsono interprets the dance stage as a larger metaphor for the pursuit of national harmony through diversity, directly referencing the principles of Pancasila. Discussion of dance in Bali and Sumatra naturally lead to the strong influence of Hinduism and Islam respectively, as the author emphasizes both the diversity of the nation and its strength in collective character.
On a more practical level, the work offers helpful synopses of key theatrical works in almost every tradition that it discusses, including a rich explanation of important terminology. The allied arts, especially music and theater (including puppetry), are rightfully depicted as inseparable from dance traditions. And though they are not approached with the depth they deserve, the dance traditions of Sumatra and the eastern islands are presented with a connoisseur’s respect. This work likely presages the curriculum development of more recent instruction and study in a broad range of Indonesian dances among those conservatories that Soedarsono helped to establish.
Surjodiningrat, Wasisto, Raden Mas. Gamelan, Dance, and Wayang in Jogjakarta.
Jogjakarta, Indonesia: Gadjah Mada University Press, 1971
Though a mathematician by profession, Surjodiningrat shares with the previous author a common bond to life in the court. This work is an early example of a prestigious academic institution, Universitas Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta, adding its voice to discourse on the performing arts. Though it is episodic, Surjodiningrat’s work offers endearing perspectives on artistic life and accounts of dance culture that are often hidden from light. His snapshot accounts frequently offer small morsels that mean a lot. The transmission of dance practice seamlessly leads into discussion of gamelan instruction in the West and the then-recent role of electronic media. This is most likely the earliest and most serious discussion of mediation in the arts (for the time that it was written) including keen observations on the benefits and challenges offered by newer media. Since the time of its publication, and especially in recent years, the scholarship on media in Indonesia (everything from film to cassette culture) has been dissected in the literature.
Surjobrongto, B. P. H. The Classical Yogyanese Dance.
Jogjakarta, Indonesia: Lembaga Bahasa Nasional Tjabakg II, 1970
Surjobrongto offers a charming account of dance practice in Yogyakarta and perhaps the most compelling of those discussed here in its approach to dance method. Originally written as a conference address, the text delivers a moving description of Javanese spirituality in dance. Surjobrongto masterfully frames dance as both an internal struggle and spiritual quest, situating the dancer in descriptions of Javanese symbology usually reserved for religious works. Though sadly faded, dance photographs from the 1930s add to the backwards glance.
Brakel-Papenhuijzen, Clara. The Sacred Bedhaya Dances of the Kratons of Surakarta and Yogyakarta.
Voorburg, The Netherlands: C. Brakel-Papenhuyzen, 1988
Brakel-Papenhuijzen’s comprehensive investigation of a single dance performance tradition is a monument of ethnographic research in dance. Balancing the archival collections of the courts with the first two decades of research in the conservatories, the text reflects close readings of a rich spectrum of resources, from esoteric court manuscripts and poetry to contemporary academic theses. Having dedicated herself to both dance performance practice and scholarship in Java for well over a decade, Brakel-Papenhuijzen presents carefully considered participant-observer ethnography of the increasingly rare bedhaya dance. Documentation of the tradition extends into film capture, which enables thorough notation and graphic representations in the back matter. Unlike the works discussed above, which often paint with broad strokes, this text offers dance tradition under a microscope with fine-grained investigation of minute regional differences.
Bandem, I Madé, and Fredrik Eugene deBoer. Kaja and Kelod: Balinese Dance in Transition.
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Oxford University Press, 1981
A scholar with many connections to gamelan instruction in the West, I Madé Bandem delivers a smartly constructed investigation of dance in Bali connected at all times to religious belief systems on the island. The work takes as its launching point the spatial and temporal organization of the island into kaja (sacred) and kelod (profane), which is deeply infused into life on Bali from the most macro matters of infrastructure to the home and finally in personal spiritual practice. Not to be separated from this sense of place and time is the diverse repertoire of Balinese dance, which is precisely constructed along this spiritual spectrum. The scholar interested in deep religious connections to dance practice comes away from Bandem’s work richly rewarded.
Additional Texts on Gamelan
Because the literature on the gamelan music of both Java and Bali is copious, many of the texts reviewed here assume a cursory knowledge of writing on gamelan. Among texts available from CRL, the following are recommended:
Lindsay, Jennifer. Javanese Gamelan.
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: Oxford University Press, 1979
Lindsay’s introductory work on gamelan until recently was the default text in many music programs around the U.S.
International Gamelan Festival. Proceedings of the First International Gamelan Festival and Symposium.
Vancouver, B.C.: Republic of Indonesia, 1986
An interesting snapshot of early gamelan study and a compelling mix of Indonesian and Western perspectives.
Hood, Mantle. The Nuclear Theme as a Determinant of Paṭet in Javanese Music.
Groningen, Djakarta: J. B. Wolters, 1954
For the reader with a deeper understanding of music theory, Hood’s investigation of mode in Javanese music remains a defining work.
The works discussed here provide terrific insight into dance practices of Indonesia, specifically those of the well-documented traditions of Java and Bali. What remains to be added is the wealth of scholarship that has developed since: most notably the many theses and dissertations that have been produced by the talented students of Indonesian conservatories, now more inclusive in distribution of location and frame of inquiry. Those theses now far outnumber scholarly works of dance ethnography in the West and are sadly neglected. Further, one hopes that this effort at CRL may be duplicated with scholarship on the dance traditions of other Southeast Asian nations.
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The Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering (HCDE) undergraduate curriculum includes an upper-level course on Visual Communication (HCDE 411), in which undergraduate students learn the basics of visual design. During the 10-week course, students learn the vocabulary and nomenclature of visual design, building a foundation in two- and three-dimensional design, typography, and structure. "The key take-home message," says HCDE instructor Jacob Fleisher, "is that visual design, like engineering, is a logical, planned activity—it does not happen by accident."
Beginning with a four-week unit concentrating on the form of design elements, students created visual communication compositions experimenting with value, contrast, negative space, and layout. From there, students studied typography, creating characters in their own typeface. Building on this foundation, students then looked at information architecture and design, combining various elements of design in order to tell a story.
Jacob Fleisher, a designer and user researcher who has previously taught industrial design in the UW’s School of Art, commented on the challenges associated with teaching students of HCDE about visual design: "My greatest initial challenge was to understand HCDE students' interests, motivations, and aspirations, but one of the most gratifying experiences was seeing the sheer intellectual and technical horsepower the students displayed in the problem-solving seen in their final projects, and observing the students' increased ability to articulate the reasoning behind their design decisions."
The course culminated in a two-week final team project. The eight student teams designed products that were meant to meet a real user need in order to demonstrate their abilities in visual design to aid and support communication and successful attainment of their product’s goals. The teams had two weeks to propose and present their product ideas, which they then pitched to a panel of experts.
Each team came up with an interaction design project focusing on a specific problem. The first day of presentations ranged from a mobile application on locating coffee stands with the shortest wait times on the University of Washington campus to interactive kiosks directing lost visitors around campus from one place to another using well-known landmarks to utilizing body scans to create a 3D virtual model to get the best fit when shopping for clothes online to a mobile app for attending the Dare to Dream fundraiser.
The second day of presentations included an interactive tablet menu that provided in-depth information and history of the food served in a restaurant, an interactive system that helps cooks better handle restaurant order tickets, a mobile app that suggests activities for a group while simultaneously creating a scavenger hunt-like experience, and a mobile app music selection system that creates a playlist from event attendee preferences and votes. Panelists provided targeted feedback to each group, critiquing their design, project idea, prototype, and presentation, and providing suggestions for future iterations. One of the panelists, Skip Walter, was thoroughly impressed by the presentations, saying, "The first student team had come close to replicating the design of one of my student teams from an MBA program last spring—in two weeks instead of a full quarter. Amazing."
|One student group created the product Order Up! to streamline ticket processing in the kitchen area of restaurants for their final project. As part of their presentation, the group created this introductory video. Group members were HCDE students Jenny Acevedo-Barga, John Kinney, Reade Lobdill, and Natasha Noltimier-Strauss.|
Panelists were Lindsey Berdan, User Interaction Designer, Fluke Corporation; Bill Flora, Principal, Tectonic; Tad Hirsch, Assistant Professor, Interaction Design, UW; Sena Janky, Industrial and Interaction Design Lead, Fluke Corporation; Jenny Lai, Principal UX Designer, Fluke Corporation; Yingzhao Liu, Principal Interaction Designer, Teague Design; Linda Wagner, Research Director, Carbon Design Group; and Skip Walter, CEO, Factor, Inc., and HCDE External Advisory Board Member.
HCDE Academic Advisor Stephanie White was impressed with the professionalism and overall quality of the projects, saying, "The amount of work that went into these projects is apparent, and the level of detail in the prototypes is astounding. Given that our students tend to be unfamiliar with the less structured format of visual design class critique sessions, along with the fact that they only had two weeks to complete these projects, I'm blown away!"”
HCDE Chair and Professor Jan Spyridakis put her opinion of the final projects more bluntly: "We have the most creative undergrads ever," and Skip Walter added, "There is something wondrous going on in the world. I am looking forward to where this journey is headed."
|Undergraduate students in the Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering (HCDE). The undergraduate curriculum includes an upper-level course on Visual Communication (HCDE 411), in which undergraduate students learn the basics of visual design. The Winter 2012 Visual Communication course was instructed by Jacob Fleisher (front right).|
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The Waitangi Treaty is New Zealand's foundational document. It comes in two versions, British and Maori, and the differences between them have caused many problems. The English text effectively guarantees the British more power than the Maori text. As a translator, I was interested in how this could come about by relatively innocent means, and the likelihood that it was deliberate.
- I suspected there might be a problem of concepts in English not existing in Maori and vice versa and this site confirms that, saying that the Maori didn't have a concept for 'sovereignty', a concept that is closer to 'governance' existed and was used. Maori may not have understood the range and implications of British concepts of rule. Another site suggests that a term closer to sovereignty existed in Maori and was deliberately not used in the treaty, that the terminology was in fact a subject of discussion. The test question is: could the translation have been made better using Maori language as it was at the time. Otherwise of course a workaround such as a definition should have been incorporated.
- Knowing translating, it's easy to suspect incompetence. The translator was apparently a missionary called Williams, probably educated in Britain. It would have been better practice for the translator to be a native Maori speaker, preferably one with knowledge and experience of British culture. Failing that, a small committee of bilingual individuals could have verified the translation. In fact, there was a consultation between the translator and the chiefs but it perhaps bore on the meanings of the Maori version, not the British version.
- Naturally enough, some people suspect deliberate deception, more or less malevolent. Were the British determined enough to 'steal' New Zealand to lie and cheat. Or sufficiently convinced that the worthy end they aimed at justified the means. I think that on the whole they were perhaps not flat out evil, but were happy to 'massage' agreement by careful choice of words.
- Strangely enough, the recounting of the events of the Treaty reveal another kind of massaging. A lot of discussion took place between Maori chiefs and British representatives. It seems that on the whole it was positive and there was a feel-good factor going. I can't help wondering if, especially in a culture where written treaties were not common, the Maori chiefs signed on their approval of the discussion at least as much as the small print of the actual treaty. It's a very natural thing to do psychologically.
- The differences in meaning did not seem extremely relevant initially but became exacerbated later as the situation evolved. More British settlers arrived than had perhaps being envisaged. One of the main difficulties surrounded the sale of Maori land. The Maori could sell their land to the crown exclusively, and at the time this may have been protective. Only a few decades later, the situation was so changed that this stopped the Maori from making large profits on land sales and favored the British state and British settlers. I am not convinced that the treaty is really unclear on this in either language. The real problem is that by this time the Maori had signed themselves into becoming a subject people, with certain rights no doubt, but not the right to renegotiate the agreement.
That initial problem itself bears examination in cultural terms. British settlers were under no authority, but they were effectively protected by British forces regardless of their actions. Under what authority were Maori individuals? What control did chiefs exercise? What would be the usual response to the disorders committed by the British if committed by a Maori of another tribe? Could one appeal to the chief of that tribe to impose order as the Maori did with the British?
It's a complicated encounter between foreign cultures in which British culture clearly dominated, in the very form of the Treaty, but which was probably intended for the benefit of the Maori. The British dominate rather unpleasantly in the painting above, but that's another story. When you think of all the cultural mismatches at work, it's not surprising there were issues.
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The period to which this sketch is limited is now at its close. With the accession of Playfair in 1785 to the Chair of Mathematics in Edinburgh there is the beginning of a decided change in the mathematical outlook. Neither Playfair nor Leslie, his successor in 1805 in the mathematical professorship, can be said to have made contributions of marked importance in the development of mathematics, but both were men of great ability and keenly interested in the advance of mathematical and physical science. Playfair in particular was widely read in the history of mathematics, was in spite of (perhaps it would be more appropriate to say "because of ") his great admiration for Newton, disappointed with the neglect by contemporary mathematicians in England of the great advances that were being made on the Continent, and set himself "to diffuse among his countrymen a knowledge of the progress which science had been making abroad." (Chrystal in Grant's Story of Edin. Univ. Vol. 2, p. 302.)
His Dissertation on the Progress of Mathematical and Physical Science since the Revival of Letters in Europe, contributed to the 4th and later editions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, is, as respects the mathematical sections at least, a remarkably able and accurate narrative for the time at which it was written. Even the disastrous controversy over the rise of the Calculus is handled with a freedom from prejudice that is a sure guarantee of the genuine scientific spirit; it is, I think (with the possible exception of Maclaurin's Fluxions), the first direct statement in English of the essential elements in the case that is free from a decidedly national bias. He rendered great service to the Royal Society in its early days, being General Secretary for many years, and his Obituary Notices of Matthew Stewart, Hutton and Robison are still frequently cited.
His Elements of Euclid was long in use in, Scottish Schools; in it he uses the Parallel Axiom now known by his name, though he expressly states that it had been "assumed by others, particularly by Ludlam in his very useful little tract entitled Rudiments of Mathematics" (p. 439 of the 7th Ed.). His article on Porisms in the 3rd vol. of the Transactions is one of the frequently quoted expositions of that much debated subject. In his efforts to broaden the outlook of mathematicians and to arouse an interest in the historical development of science he had an able colleague in Leslie who, though less balanced and more prejudiced in his judgments, deserves to be gratefully remembered for his interest in the philosophical treatment of the elements of mathematics. It is perhaps worth noting that Leslie's Elements of Geometry was translated into French and German, and had for some years a considerable circulation on the Continent.
There can be no doubt, I think, that in the closing years of the 18th and the early years of the 19th century, Edinburgh was pre-eminent in Scotland for its active and enlightened interest in science, and the Royal Society was the centre from which that interest was maintained. As an indication of the sympathetic and broadminded spirit of Playfair, the Secretary, it may not be out of place to note that it was through his good offices that the first contributions of Wallace, Leslie's successor in the Chair of Mathematics, and of James Ivory, afterwards known for his work on the attraction of ellipsoids, appeared in the 4th volume of the Transactions of the Society. Both men owed much to Playfair's kindly interest, and they justified it by their subsequent contributions to mathematical learning.
The URL of this page is:
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Dry eyes are caused by a lack of tears. Tears are necessary for the normal lubrication of your eyes and to wash away particles and foreign bodies.
Tearing - decreased; Eyes - dry
Common causes of dry eyes include:
- Dry environment or workplace (wind, air conditioning)
- Sun exposure
- Smoking or second-hand smoke exposure
- Cold or allergy medicines
- An eye injury or other problem with your eyes or eyelids (like a drooping eyelid or bulging eyes)
Sjogren's syndrome -- includes dry eyes, mouth, and mucus membranes, and often rheumatoid arthritis or other joint disorder
- Previous eye surgery
The following steps may help:
- Try artificial tears, available as either drops or ointment. Ointments last longer, but are thicker and can cause blurry vision.
- Don't smoke. Avoid second-hand smoke, direct wind, and air conditioning.
- Use a humidifier, especially in the winter.
- Purposefully blink more often. Rest your eyes.
Call your health care provider if:
- You have red or painful eyes.
- You have flaking, discharge, or a lesion on your eye or eyelid.
- You have had trauma to your eye, or you have a bulging eye or a drooping eyelid.
- You have joint pain, swelling, or stiffness.
- You also have a dry mouth.
- Your dry eyes do not respond to self-care measures within a few days.
Your health care provider will take a medical history and perform a physical examination, including a careful eye examination.
To help better understand your dry eyes, your health care provider may ask the following:
- How long have you had dry eyes? Does it involve one or both eyes?
- Do you have it all of the time or does it only occur at certain times, with certain activities, or in certain places?
- Does the dryness seem related to wind, dust, chemicals, sun, or light exposure?
- Does it affect your vision?
- Does it cause pain?
- Do your eyelids close easily?
- Have you noticed any drainage from your eyes?
- Does anything make your dry eyes worse?
- Does anything make your dry eyes better?
- Have you tried artificial tears? Do they help?
- Are you taking any medications? Which ones?
- Have you had surgery or an injury to your eyes or nose?
- Do you have allergies?
- Have you been using any new cosmetics?
- Do you have any other symptoms like dry mouth or joint discomfort?
Your health care provider may perform tearing tests that can help diagnose dry eyes. Artificial tears may be prescribed.
If you have dry eyes, you will feel a burning, scratching, or stinging sensation. You may also have strained or tired eyes after reading, even for short periods of time. If you wear contacts, they will likely feel uncomfortable. Having dry eyes for a while can lead to tiny abrasions on the surface of your eyes.
Tu EY, Rheinstrom S. Dry eye. In: Yanoff M, Duker JS, eds. Ophthalmology. 3rd ed. St. Louis, MO: Mosby Elsevier;2008:chap 4.
Carsons S. Sjögren's syndrome. In: Firestein GS, Budd RC, Harris ED Jr., et al, eds. Kelley's Textbook of Rheumatology. 8th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: Saunders Elsevier;2008:chap 69.
Review Date: 10/31/2009
Reviewed By: Linda Vorvick, MD, Medical Director, MEDEX Northwest Division of Physician Assistant Studies, University of Washington, School of Medicine. Also reviewed by David Zieve, MD, MHA, Medical Director, A.D.A.M., Inc.
The information provided herein should not be used during any medical emergency or for the diagnosis or treatment of any medical condition. A licensed medical professional should be consulted for diagnosis and treatment of any and all medical conditions. Call 911 for all medical emergencies. Links to other sites are provided for information only -- they do not constitute endorsements of those other sites. © 1997- 2009 A.D.A.M., Inc. Any duplication or distribution of the information contained herein is strictly prohibited.
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Campbell implies, oddly, that because both efficiency of energy use and energy consumption have increased over the past 125 years, energy efficiency causes increased consumption.
Firstly, there are many reasons for increased consumption: economic, military, political, the invention of new energy-eating whimwhams, etc.
Secondly, increased energy efficiency derives partly from increased knowhow, partly from political factors (such as OPEC) and partly from the certain knowledge that there will be various sorts of trouble if we don't get more from less. Without increased efficiency, the increase in fuel use would be vastly greater than it actually has been. Imagine the 1990s economy with the technology of 1870.
Thirdly, Campbell calls in evidence the 19th century economist Stanley Jevons. However, unlike physics, economics is not the same throughout time and space. Indeed, the alleged 'association' between increased efficiency and increased use reminds one of Jevons's assertion that there was an 'association' between ...
To continue reading this article, subscribe to receive access to all of newscientist.com, including 20 years of archive content.
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Are you still thumbing through hundreds of pictures to identify wildflowers? That's the way I started learning plants, but now there is a much easier way!
Plants that are related to each other have similar characteristics for identification. Botanists have simply looked for patterns in plants and created groups called "families" according to those patterns. In the northern latitudes where there are hard freezes during winter, there are only about 100 broad patterns representing tens of thousands of plant species. Once you identify the family your wild flower belongs to then you can still use your color picture book to identify the species, but now you only have to look through a few pictures to find a match, not hundreds. Learn how right here:
Learning to Identify Plants by Families It will forever change the way you look at plants
Grandma Josie always loved to walk her dogs down in the meadows, following cow trails through the thickets of willow and juniper along the creek. I loved to walk with her, and together we collected wild herbs for teas, such as yarrow, blue violets, peppermint, red clover and strawberry leaves. We drank herbal tea every day. When I was sick she gave me yarrow tea with honey in it, plus she buried cloves of garlic in cheese to help me get them down. Grandma kindled my love for plants. She taught me the plants she knew. Then I wanted to learn about all the rest.
We collected unfamiliar flowers on our walks, and paged through books of color pictures to identify them. It was not a fast process, but I was a kid and had the luxury of time. If I could not find the name of a specimen in our books, then I brought it into the herbarium at the university and asked for help. They keyed out the plant and gave me the Latin name for it. At home I researched the name through all of my books to learn anything I could about the uses for that species. In this way I learned most of significant plants of southwest Montana before I was out of high school, or so I thought.
Years later, I launched Hollowtop Outdoor Primitive School, LLC and hosted an herbal class at our place. I thought I "knew" most of the plants discussed in the class, but Robyn, the herbalist, used an approach I had never seen before. We happened across several members of the Rose family, and Robyn pointed out the patterns-- that the flowers had five petals and typically numerous stamens, plus each of them contained tannic acid and were useful as astringents to help tighten up tissues. An astringent herb, she told us, would help close a wound, tighten up inflammations, dry up digestive secretions (an aid for diarrhea) and about twenty other things. In a few short words she outlined the identification and uses for the majority of plants in this one family.
Some of my books listed the family names of the plants, but never suggested how that information could be useful. I realized that while I knew many plants by name, I never actually stopped to look at any of them! This may sound alarming, but it is surprisingly easy to match a plant to a picture without studying it to count the flower parts or notice how they are positioned in relation to each other. In short, Robyn's class changed everything I ever knew about plants. From there I had to relearn all the plants in a whole new way. I set out to study the patterns among related species, learning to identify plants and their uses together as groups and families.
My quest turned into a book Botany in a Day, to share with other people this "patterns method" of learning plants. On plant walks with a favorable selection of specimens to look at, I've been able to cover the critical patterns for identification and uses of seven or eight major families of plants, representing tens of thousands of species worldwide in just two hours.
I tell my students it is okay if they do not know the name of a single plant at the end of the walk, but I expect them to recognize family characteristics and be able to make logical guesses as to how those plants might be used. When we come to an unknown specimen in our walks, I don't tell the group what it is, they tell me, according to the patterns they have learned.
There are about 100 families of plants across the frost-belt of the continent, with at least 30 additional families occurring farther south where it never freezes. Through this article I will introduce you to seven of the largest and easiest-to-recognize families of plants, which are found worldwide. In the next hour or two you will learn the basic patterns of identification and many of the uses for more than 45,000 species of plants worldwide. Take a little bit of time to practice these patterns where ever you go-- in gardens or weed patches, botanical gardens, the nursery, the florist, or the wild. When you learn to instantly recognize these and other family patterns, the world of plants will never look quite the same again. The following pages are meant to be read in order, as new ideas are introduced on each page to prepare you for the following page. Some of these pages include lots of pictures and may take a while to load.
"Botany in a Day is hands down the best plant book I have ever come across. I wish I had this book years ago. Thanks for all the time and effort you put into it. You have made plant identification so much
easier, compared to a lot of my other books."
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Herpes simplex type I (one), or HSV-1 (H-S-V one), is a virus that most often affects the mouth, lips, and face, causing tiny, fluid-filled blisters. These lesions are called 'cold sores' or 'fever blisters', and in fact, later outbreaks may be triggered by fever or viral infection. HSV-1 is usually acquired during childhood from family members or friends. A person can become infected by kissing; sharing cups, towels, lip balms, or eating utensils; or by contact with respiratory secretions like coughs or sneezes. Dentists, nurses, and doctors can also get herpes type I infections on their fingers through contact with infected patients. Though HSV-1 isn't considered a sexually transmitted disease, it can be spread to the genitals through oral sex. By age 20, most people are thought to harbor the virus, but only certain individuals will have outbreaks of blisters. The virus remains in the body indefinitely. In those who have recurrent attacks, symptoms are usually milder than during the initial outbreak. Prior to the formation of blisters, a person may feel itching, tingling, or sensitivity in the area. While HSV-1 is most contagious when active, oozing blisters are present, it may also be shed in saliva when no blisters are observed.
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DAGNEAU DOUVILLE DE QUINDRE, LOUIS-CÉSAIRE, merchant, militia colonel; baptized 8 Oct. 1704 at Sorel (Que.), son of Michel Dagneau Douville and Marie Lamy; m. Françoise-Marie-Anne Picoté de Belestre in Montreal, 4 Dec. 1736; buried at Detroit 2 Feb. 1767.
As early as 1727 Louis-Césaire Dagneau Douville de Quindre was trading among the Miamis. The late 1730s found him sending canoes to Michilimackinac and, in partnership with Claude Marin de La Perrière, leasing the lucrative Michipicoton post (near Michipicoten Harbour, Ont.) from Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de La Vérendrye. Between 1740 and 1742 he moved his wife and children from Montreal to Fort Saint-Joseph (probably Niles, Mich.) and there, with his partner Marin, carried on an extensive trade with the Miamis and Potawatomis.
The two associates transferred their operations to Michilimackinac in 1747 and became leading suppliers for the garrison at that strategic point. It was an uneasy year for the French posts as almost every Indian band in the west threatened and plotted their destruction, and de Quindre sent his wife back to the safety of Montreal. At Detroit there was open insurrection led by Orontony, but at Michilimackinac prompt, forceful action by the commandant, Jacques Legardeur de Saint-Pierre, kept the peace with the neighbouring Ojibwas and Ottawas.
Probably in the early summer of 1749 de Quindre moved to Detroit, where settlement was being encouraged and the post reinforced. According to Mme Bégon [Rocbert] the family was in financial difficulties and Mme de Quindre, now without resources, was obliged to leave Montreal to rejoin her husband. He began trading and became a major supplier to the Detroit garrison. In the next few years he provided it with many canoes, much clothing, and huge supplies of grain. The relationship he developed with the commandant, Pierre-Joseph Céloron de Blainville, probably led Céloron to arrange in 1752 for Île aux Cochons (Belle Isle) in the Detroit River to be ceded to him. Residents of Detroit, however, protested successfully, claiming that the island had always been common grazing ground. In 1753 the commandant was able to reward him with the largest of 12 land grants made on the west side of town.
Céloron was probably instrumental also in de Quindre’s appointment as the colonel of the Detroit militia, a position of much local prestige. The role of the force, which in 1755 numbered 220, was to aid the few regular troops of the garrison at times of crisis. In 1759 a detachment headed by de Quindre joined François-Marie Le Marchand de Lignery in his unsuccessful attempt to relieve Fort Niagara (near Youngstown, N.Y.), which was under siege by Sir William Johnson* and a force of English and Indians.
De Quindre and his brother, Major Guillaume Dagneau Douville de Lamothe of the Detroit militia, were captured. (When Johnson visited Detroit in 1761, the two former prisoners were among his dinner guests.)
After the peace de Quindre adjusted to English rule and did not assist the Indians during Pontiac’s uprising of 1763. He is said to have aided the English cause, but evidence is slim. At his death in 1767, he was one of the settlement’s wealthiest residents, with an estate valued at 5,000 livres. Although Detroit is often considered to have been a crude frontier community, the inventory of his goods indicates that he lived in considerable comfort. He was survived by several children, one of whom, Guillaume-François Dagneau de Quindre de La Picanier, is said to have become an officer in the British army.
AN, Col., C11A, 117, f.3; 118, f.142; 119, ff.236, 304v. ANQ, NF, Registres d’intendance, X. DPL, Burton hist. coll., Christian Denissen, [Genealogy of French families of Detroit] (26v., typescript, n.d.), D/1, 3288–89. St Ann’s Parish (Mackinac Island, Mich.), Registre des baptêmes, mariages et sépultures de Sainte-Anne-de-Michillimakinak, 1695–1821; an annotated version under the title “The Mackinac register” is in Wis. State Hist. Soc. Coll., XVIII (1908), 469–513; XIX (1910), 1–149, but it contains some inaccuracies. “The British regime in Wisconsin – 1760–1800,” ed. R. G. Thwaites, Wis. State Hist. Soc. Coll., XVIII (1908), 229–34. “Correspondance de Mme Bégon” (Bonnault), APQ Rapport, 1934–35, 68. Johnson papers (Sullivan et al.), XIII, 115, 251. “Petition of sundry inhabitants of Detroit,” Michigan Pioneer Coll., X (1886), 237. “The St. Joseph baptismal register,” ed. George Paré and M. M. Quaife, Mississippi Valley Hist. Rev., XIII (1926–27), 201–39.
Massicotte, “Répertoire des engagements pour l’Ouest,” APQ Rapport, 1929–30; 1930–31. Tanguay, Dictionnaire. Champagne, Les La Vérendrye. Silas Farmer, The history of Detroit and Michigan . . . (Detroit, 1884), 20. M. C. W. Hamlin, Legends of le Détroit (Detroit, 1884), 290–91. Télesphore St-Pierre, Histoire des Canadiens du Michigan et du comté d’Essex, Ontario (Montréal, 1895), 178.
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Internaut | Antidote to DNS cache poisoning
Commentary: To protect against Domain Name System poisoning, consider these strategies
Chances are your agency is in the middle of locking down all its Domain Name System servers. Security vulnerabilities discovered this summer have caused government agencies to rush to implement the appropriately named DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC). But keep in mind that there are a range of DNS vulnerabilities that could threaten the government's business continuity.
So let's examine DNS and the security problems a bit more closely.
As you might know, the Internet DNS is the international system for translating domain names into numeric locations. It also provides the official hierarchical naming system for all connected networks.
Many descriptions of DNS start with the world's top-level domains, including .gov, .mil, .org, .com, .edu and more. But sometimes it's easier to comprehend DNS from the bottom up. Taking that view is also a good way to understand why a government DNS server that lacks the new ' and now required ' DNSSEC can be vulnerable to fraud or spoofing.
So let's start the journey from an end user's computer.
When people need to reach your government agency via the Internet, they probably type www.YourAgencyName.gov into their Web browsers. Their computers, in turn, must find a way to translate that name into a numeric IP address. That's how the Internet finds your server.
Most Internet service providers maintain at least one DNS server. In fact, a local DNS server connection is part of each computer's TCP/IP properties when it is set up for Internet connectivity. The ISP's local DNS server is usually the first place the Web surfer's computer goes to look for the address translation.
If you work in a big organization, you probably have a local DNS server right in your building.
Traditionally, the local DNS server first tries to use its cache of resource record information to answer queries. Because those types of servers remember previous lookups in a cache, they are sometimes called caching name servers or caching resolvers. If the end user is trying to connect to a popular domain name, chances are it's already in the local DNS server's memory. That is called a recursive query.
But if there is no local record for the requested domain name, the DNS server can query other DNS servers on the network and send an answer back to the client. That is called an iterative query.
Somewhere between a recursive query and an iterative query, things can be spoofed or "poisoned." An attacker can send fake DNS information in response to a query. This fools the local DNS server into accepting the wrong information for a domain name. This is called cache poisoning
because the server remembers the incorrect information in its cache. It will continue to provide the wrong information in future lookups.
Think of the Internet DNS as a distributed database system. Top-level domains and subdomains have to maintain one or more authoritative DNS servers that store records about domain names and the names of devices within that domain.
The DNS server at the top of the domain serves as the root. It is the ultimate authority, with the latest domain name information updated daily or even more often.
An iterative DNS lookup might need to reach all the way back upstream to the authoritative DNS root when it looks up domain names.
The good news is that authoritative name servers at the top of the DNS pyramid are not vulnerable to cache-poisoning attacks unless those servers are configured as both authoritative and recursive name servers.
The bad news is that depending on how high up in the DNS food chain a cache is poisoned, the bad data can trickle down to many other servers as domain names are looked up.
DNSSEC was created to better protect local DNS servers. That's why the federal government is hustling to install the solution on all DNS servers. But there are other things that can be done.
To protect against DNS poisoning, consider the following strategies:
- The authoritative name server on a government network should never be configured to also serve as a recursive name server.
- Install the official DNSSEC on your DNS server. Those extensions add data-origin authentication and data-integrity assurances.
- Look for patches for your server that randomly select a source port for DNS queries. Cache poisoning is more difficult if the port is not known.
- If possible, set your local DNS servers to greatly reduce the number of recursive lookups they perform.
- Fixing the government's servers is one thing. But cache poisoning can occur elsewhere on the Internet. That means a government employee connecting to a government network from an external ISP (from home or while on the road) could be vulnerable to DNS issues when trying to reach a government domain. Thus, managers should educate employees in how to spot spoofed Web pages, and they should consult ISPs to make sure they are working to address DNS security issues.
For a quick test, go to recursive.iana.org and point the test server at your home domain. That will tell you if your DNS servers are configured in a risky way.
More information is available at the government's U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team Web site
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Sungrazers shed light on comet break-up
An analysis of comets called sungrazers suggests conventional theories about how comets break up may be wrong, according to a US astronomer.
Dr Zdenek Sekanina, a senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has studied images of sungrazers - small comets that pass close to the sun - and concluded these may break up far away from the sun.
His research is published in this week's issue of The Astrophysical Journal.
Most sungrazing comets are tiny - the smallest could be less than 10 metres across (compared to other comets with a nucleus of between 1 and 10 kilometres) - and move in a highway-like formation of comets that pass near the sun and disintegrate.
In contrast, the sungrazer images reveal many sungrazer comets arrive at the sun in clusters and on parallel paths. Normally, these tiny fragments would have disintegrated if on an earlier trip they had come so close to the sun. Therefore the parents of these tiny sungrazers must have broken up after their previous encounter with the sun and continued to break up far from the sun on their journey through the solar system, according to Dr Sekanina.
The idea of comets breaking up in a fairly orderly pattern is a new one, Dr Sekanina writes, describing how one comet cascades into large families of smaller comets in a process that could be an important part of a comet's natural life cycle.
This replaces a previous theory that comets broke up occasionally and only very close to the sun, as the strong pull of gravity cracked their loosely piled chunks of dust and ice.
In the past seven years of observation by The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), about 400 sungrazers in the immediate vicinity of the sun have been observed, although Dr Sekanina estimates there may currently be as many as 200,000.
The sungrazers move in tight pairs and occasionally SOHO has been able to capture them simultaneously. By devising a standard model for split comets using the offsets between the sungrazers, Dr Sekanina is able to work out when they separated and when their 'parents' did.
It is not just sungrazers that can break up far from the sun, notes Dr Sekanina. New observations of comet 57P/du Toit-Neujmin-Delporte show fragmentation has also resulted in a 'highway' of tiny comets. The separation occurred beyond the orbit of Mars.
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Scholars have always been baffled by petroglyphs.
Long ago, these primitive renderings depicting people, animals, canoes and other objects were painstakingly carved onto rocks or old lava flows, but their exact meanings remain a mystery.
Are they the result of some sacred rituals practiced by the early Hawaiians? Were they used to record family genealogy? Were they meant to provide directions to certain places? Or could it be that petroglyphs were simply doodlings carved by bored or weary natives?
No one knows for sure. Curiously, petroglyphs aren’t mentioned in chants or myths that have been handed down through the generations, making it even more difficult for historians to piece together the petroglyph puzzle.
Petroglyphs can be found throughout Hawaii. On Lanai, ancient rock carvings may be viewed in an area near Shipwreck Beach (north of Lanai City. Depicted appears to be a hunting scene with 13 men, a horse, a dog and either a wild pig or cow. There are also many petroglyphs showing men, women and children in an assortment of poses; they’re depicted performing a number of activities, including surfing, fishing and hunting.
One petroglyph shows a man with a dog and Axis deer. It’s believed that the first wave of Polynesian settlers to Hawaii brought dogs with them. Axis deer were brought to the islands from India in the mid-1800s. Today, there are more than 8,000 Axis deer on Lanai.
Another petroglyph reserve is located in the southern part of Lanai. From Lanai City, head toward Manele Bay on Manele Bay Road, then turn left on the first dirt road. The petroglyphs are just beyond the large water tank on the slopes of the hill. Most of the petroglyphs found in this three-acre area are found on the south faces of the boulders.
Even though the exact meanings of these images may forever be a mystery lost in time, they remain important vestiges of Hawaii’s past. Always show respect for the petroglyphs and take care not to damage them.
© 1997-2011 Aloha from Hawaii
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WebMD Medical News
Laura J. Martin, MD
Dec. 17, 2012 -- Milk is an important source of vitamin D and calcium in young children’s diets. But drinking more than two glasses a day may lower how much iron is stored in their bodies, raising the risk for anemia, a new study suggests.
When researchers looked at daily milk intake as it related to iron and vitamin D levels in about 1,300 preschoolers, they found that drinking 2 cups of milk a day seemed optimal for most children, says lead researcher and pediatrician Jonathon L. Maguire, MD, of St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto.
Vitamin D and iron are important nutrients for growing children. Iron plays a critical role in brain development. Iron deficiency has been linked to problems in movement. Vitamin D is important for many reasons, including bone health.
Milk is one of the best sources of vitamin D and calcium, while iron-fortified cereals and meats are among the best sources of iron.
Drinking 3 cups or more of milk was associated with slightly lower ferritin levels in the blood, but the levels were still within the normal range for most children. Ferritin levels indicate how much iron is stored in the body.
The more milk the children drank, the lower their ferritin levels tended to be.
“Milk is an important source of nutrition for young children, but the message to parents is that too much of a good thing may come with a trade-off,” Maguire says.
Though parents of preschoolers often ask how much milk their young children should be drinking, Maguire says the answer is not that clear.
He points out that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends limiting cow’s milk to about 2 cups a day for preschoolers, but the group’s committee on nutrition also calls for vitamin D supplements for children who drink less than about 4 cups a day (1,000 mL).
It isn’t clear if drinking milk directly blocks iron absorption or if its impact is less direct.
“Cow's milk doesn’t have much iron, and it may be that kids who drink a lot of it are not eating other foods that are rich sources of iron,” Maguire says. “We really don’t know.”
In the study, published in the journal Pediatrics, each 8-ounce cup of milk a child drank was associated with a 3.5% drop in ferritin levels.
“That may not sound like a lot, but it can add up, especially in children with other risk factors for iron deficiency,” Maguire says.
The researchers noted that vitamin D supplements may be important for darker-skinned children or for children who get little vitamin D from the sun. The body makes vitamin D when exposed to sunlight.
Pediatrician Steven Abrams, MD, a member of the AAP committee on nutrition, says parents shouldn’t stress too much about exactly how much of a certain food their child eats, as long as the child is eating a variety of healthy foods.
“Most of the children in this study who drank a lot of milk were not iron deficient,” he says. “The effect of milk on iron status was pretty small.”
In a statement addressing the study, the National Dairy Council pointed out that it is not clear if drinking milk has a direct impact on iron levels.
“This study supports the role and importance of milk in helping children meet their nutrient needs, specifically vitamin D, when following recommended guidelines for milk consumption,” the statement reads.
SOURCES: Maguire, J.L. Pediatrics, Dec. 17, 2012.Jonathon L. Maguire, MD, MSc, pediatrician, St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.Steven Abrams, MD, professor of pediatrics, Baylor College of Medicine; member, American Academy of Pediatrics committee on nutrition.News release, American Academy of Pediatrics.
The Health News section does not provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. See additional information.
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Published in Virus Weekly, August 8th, 2000
"Recently, a new paramyxovirus, now known as Nipah virus (NV), emerged in Malaysia and Singapore, causing fatal encephalitis in humans and a respiratory syndrome in pigs," B.H. Harcourt and others in the Center's Respiratory and Enteric Viruses Branch reported in the journal Virology.
At first glance, the new virus appeared to be both antigenically and genetically related to the previously identified...
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Scary-Good Fun For Kids!
Here's a cornucopia of great crafts and games to make Halloween a festive time for kids at home and in the classroom. (We have so many that we've split them into three sections -- don't miss parts 1 and 2!)
Egg cup spiders
Give each child a cardboard egg carton cup and four 4" pipe cleaner pieces. Help the children poke their pipe cleaners through their egg cups to make spider legs. Have them bend the legs slightly downward. Let the children paint their spiders black and glue on plastic moving eyes.
Cat of Many Colors
"Once there was a cat all white who wished that he were black as night. He was thirsty as could be, and in the cupboard, what did he see? Grape juice right before his eyes! He drank it. Then to his surprise, he turned from white to something new. Deep dark purple was his hue. He peered into his little cup, saw tomato juice and lapped it up. He soon became the brightest red. He thought, "maybe I should go to bed." But he wasn't tired, and so he looked for somewhere else to go.
He spied an orange on the floor, and pounced on it, and played some more. As he played this little game, orange was what he became. He played with some blueberries, too. So suddenly the cat turned blue. A sour lime sat on the ground. The kitty licked it and he found that he felt strange and not so keen, for he had turned the color green. Now he was a sad little fellow. So he ate a banana and turned the color yellow. Just then he saw a tasty treat, another food he had to eat. A long black piece of licorice gave the little cat his wish. He ate it all, and soon he was black from his head to his paws! Why did this happened? You guessed it right if you blamed it on Halloween night."
Teacher pretends not to know what Halloween is, and keeps describing the wrong holiday; children correctly label the holiday described. Example -- "Oh, Halloween is when the bunny leaves candy and you color eggs." Use Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Fourth of July, etc.
The Pumpkins Are Here
Give each child a pumpkin cutout that has been mounted on a craft stick. Then as verse is recited, have children hold their pumpkins as indicated by the words. "The pumpkins are here; the pumpkins are there. The pumpkins, the pumpkins are everywhere. The pumpkins are up; the pumpkins are down. The pumpkins, the pumpkins are all around. The pumpkins are in; the pumpkins are out. The pumpkins, the pumpkins are all about. The pumpkins are low; the pumpkins are high. The pumpkins, the pumpkins all say, 'Good-bye.' "
Trick or Treat
Place slips of paper in a brown lunch bag. On each write down a different "trick" such as "hop on one foot" or "close your eyes and touch your nose." Have each child in turn, say, "trick or treat" and draw a paper from the bag. When she performs the "trick" say "treat" and give her either a Halloween sticker or a couple pieces of candy corn.
Teacher/parent gives lead sentence; each child continues story in turn. Difficult for younger children but good introduction to critical and creative thinking skills. Samples: "Joey Jack O Lantern wants to run away because he is afraid of Halloween Night, so he... " "Gus the Ghost is very sad because everyone is afraid of him, so he decides to..." "Wanda the Witch has lost her broom and she can't fly without it, so she...."
Move as if you are: Carrying a great big pumpkin. A witch combing her long, stringy hair. A little baby ghost. Putting on your Halloween costume. Carving a little tiny pumpkin. Going up and down a porch's steps trick or treating. Jumping up to say Boo-oo-oo.
Witch, Witch, Ghost
Played exactly like "Duck, duck, goose" -- just change the names. I play this game all the time but I change the names to fit my theme.
Old Witch and Her Black Cat Game
Children sit on the floor in a half circle. One child, the witch, stands a short distance away with her back to the cats. One of the children is pointed to, by the teacher and the child "meows." The witch turns around and tries to quess which child is the black cat. Continue until everyone has a turn.
Black Cat Hunt
Hide many paper black cats around the classroom so that children do not have to move objects to find them. Have children each hold hands with a partner. Each pair of children must find as many black cats as they can without letting go of their partner's hand. After the hunt, everybody meows, and receives "cat food" from the teacher. (Candy corn.)
Teacher/parent is the Silly Witch with the broom. "It is Halloween Night and it is very dark outside. I am a very silly witch and I am going to cast a very silly spell on you. I am going to wave my broom and turn all of you into frogs. Now, how do frogs move around? They Jump. Everytime I wave my broom, you will all jump around. When I put my broom down, you will all stop." Great opportunity for teacher to display her acting talents.
Place paper pumpkins, all different colors, and without stems, on floor. Give each child a stem that matches one of the pumpkins. Then form a circle, and walk around the pumpkins as you chant: Pumpkin, pumpkin without a stem, laying in the pumpkin patch. Here comes (name a child) with a stem of (child names color) to match. (Child then matches stem to correct pumpkin. Continue.)
Finger puppet ghosts
Put white adhesive tape on each child's index finger (over top) and add eyes with black permanent marker. Have children recite and act out with ghost fingers. Little ghost(2), flying through the air. Little ghost(2) tickling my hair. Little ghost (2) flying way down low. Little ghost (2) tickling my toe. Little ghost (2) circling all around. Little ghost (2) please sit down. And-- The ghosts fly in. The ghosts fly out. The ghosts are certainly all about. The ghosts fly high and then dive low. They're always spooky whereever they go."
The Very Hungry Pumpkin
Put paper pumpkins of different colors in the middle of the circle. Begin a story by telling the children that an orange pumpkin (hold up orange one) was very hungry, and so he ate a banana and turned------. Children say "yellow" and one picks up the yellow pumpkin and hands it to the teacher. Teacher holds it and continues with other food items such as an apple, lime, chocolate ice cream, the sky, peas, etc. etc. Continue the same way. At the end, ask children to think of a food the pumpkin could eat, so he could turn orange again.
I love to use pumpkins in a variety of ways for learning fun with 2's and 3's. During the first part of October, we pick the mini pumpkins that grew in the garden over the summer) are harvested and then the fun begins. We count them, name them, draw faces on them, stack them, give them rides in the wagon and we have even taken them on our walks.
Fabric softener sheet ghosts
Ever wondered what to do with old fabric softener sheets? Why not make a spooky little Ghost! And they smell great too! Don't have enough sheets? Use white tissue paper instead.
Paper bag wig
Use a large paper bag that fits over head. Cut a large rectangle from front section of bag for face. Fringe bottom of bag. Curl fringe by rolling tight around a pencil.
Pumpkin and Halloween activities
The pumpkin is a member of the squash family. Pumpkins grow on vines and bushes. Most pumpkins are orange, but some are white, yellow or other colors.
What's inside a pumpkin?
Mr Pumpkin Head
Get a real pumpkin and supply washable markers, and props such as glasses, paper mustache, hats, scarves and wigs. Let each child have turn to decorate and dress up pumpkin. When next child's turn, just wash the markers off!
After Halloween, use your carved jack-o-lantern for print making. Cut the pumpkin into chunks and let children design pulp by using nails. Press on ink pads then on construction paper. Appearing
Teacher/parent draws ghost on white paper with white crayon. Children then paint paper with dark water colors or diluted tempera paint wash. Encourage child to paint entire page. Ghosts appear through paint.
Scrap paper jack-o-lantern
Draw a circle on black construction paper. Paint circle with glue. Tear scraps of orange paper into small pieces. Arrange scraps on glue. Add torn scraps of yellow paper for eyes, nose and mouth.
Cut pumpkin from orange felt. Have variety of black felt shapes in box for features. Include, half circles, crescents, ovals, triangles, circles and squares. Teacher instructs child to make face of jack-o-lantern using particular shapes. For ex. "Decorate jack-o-lantern using two triangles for eyes, square for nose and crescent for mouth." A variation is to draw several jack-o-laterns models using outline of shapes for features. Child matches felt shapes to model.
Display skeleton decoration which can be purchased or drawn. Count number of ribs, bones in hand, leg bones, arm bones. Graph.
10 Little pumpkins
Cut 10 pumpkin shapes out of orange felt and place on flannel board. Remove the shapes one at a time as you recite the poem. "Ten little pumpkins all in a line one became a jack-o-lantern, then there were nine. Nine little pumpkins peeking through the gate. an farmer came and took one, then there were eight. Eight little pumpkins, a green goblin took one, then there were seven. Seven little pumpkins full of jolly tricks, a white ghost took one, now there are six. Six little pumpkins glad to be alive, a black cat took one and then there were five. Five little pumpkins by the barn door, a hoot owl took one, then there were four little pumpkins (as you can plainly see). One became a pumpkin pie then there were three. Three little pumpkins feeling very blue, one rolled far away, then there were two. Two little pumpkins alone in the sun, one said "So long", and then there was one. One little pumpkin left all alone. A little boy chose him, then there were none. Ten little pumpkins in a patch so green made everyone happy on Halloween."
Pumpkins in a jar
Put candy or eraser pumpkins in a jar. Each child takes a guess (teacher should keep record of each guess). At the end of the day count pumpkins.
Jar of pumpkin seeds
Same as above with children guessing the number of pumpkin seeds.
Order by size
Have several pumpkins for children to order from smallest to largest (paper pumpkins can be used also) .
Write" How many pumpkins tall are you?" on the top of long strip of craft paper. Glue paper pumpkins on the paper and number them from bottom up. Tape the chart on wall so children can measure their height.
Make a graph of what kind of face to carve on a class pumpkin -- happy, sad or scary.
Use stickers or stamps to make a pattern on a sentence strip or any strip of paper.
Bat, bat, come under my hat
"Bat, bat, come under my hat For here's a slice of bacon When I bake, I'll give you a cake If I am not mistaken."
Five little goblins on a Halloween night
"Five little goblins on a Halloween night Made a very, very spooky site. The first one danced on his tippy-tip-toes. The next one tumbled and bumped his nose. The next one jumped high up in the air. The next one sang a Halloween song. Five goblins played the whole night long."
Five little pumpkins
"Five little pumpkins (hold up fingers for pumpkins) sitting on a gate. The first once said 'Oh my! It's getting late.' The second one said, 'There are witches in the air.' The third once said 'But we don't care.' The fourth once said 'It's Halloween fun.' Ooooooh went the wind. And out when the lights (clap hands to the word "out") and the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight (roll arms)."
The 12 days of Halloween
"At the first house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the second house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the third house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... three pralines, two lollipops and large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the fourth house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the fifth house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the sixth house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the seventh house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... seven candied apples, six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the eighth house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... eight chewy caramels, seven candied apples, six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the ninth house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... nine orange gumdrops, eight chewy caramels, seven candied apples, six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the 10th house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... 10 shiny pennies, nine orange gumdrops, eight chewy caramels, seven candied apples, six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the 11th house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... 11 creamy nougats, 10 shiny pennies, nine orange gumdrops, eight chewy caramels, seven candied apples, six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy.
At the 12th house on Halloween my neighbor gave to me... 12 cherry bonbons, 11 creamy nougats, 10 shiny pennies, nine orange gumdrops, eight chewy caramels, seven candied apples, six peanut clusters, FIVE POPCORN BALLS! Four peppermints, three pralines, two lollipops and a large piece of chocolate taffy!"
(Sung to "Are You Sleeping") "Mr. Pumpkin, Mr. Pumpkin, Eyes so round, eyes so round. Halloween is coming, Halloween is coming, To my town, to my town."
Friendly ghost song
(Sung to "Are You Sleeping"): "I'm a friendly ghost, I'm a friendly ghost. Watch me fly, watch may fly. I can fly right through the air. See how all the people stare. Way up high, in the sky."
Hinx, minx, the old witch winks
"Hinx, minx, the old witch winks. The fat begins to fry. Nobody's home but Jumping Joan Father, mother and I. Stick, stock, stone dead. Blind men can't see. Every knave will have a slave. You and I must be he."
I said my pajamas
"I said my pajamas. I slipped on my prayers. I went up my slippers. I took off my stairs. I turned off the bed. I jumped in the light. The reason for this is, You gave me a fright!"
"I am a pumpkin, big and round (use arms to show size of pumpkin). Once upon the time I grew on the ground (point to the ground). Now I have a mouth, two eyes, a nose (point to features on your face). What are they there for, do you suppose? (Right forefinger to forehead, thinking gesture). When I have a candle inside (hold up right forefinger), shining bright I'll be a Jack-O-Lantern on Halloween night! (Thumbs in armpits-bragging gesture)."
Late on a dark and stormy night
"Late on a dark and stormy night, three witches stirred with all their might. Two little ghosts said, 'How do you do?' The wizard went tiptoe, tiptoe, booooo!"
On a dark, dark night
"On a dark, dark, night, in a dark, dark wood, in a dark, dark house, in a dark, dark room, in a dark, dark cupboard, on a dark, dark shelf, in a dark, dark box, there was a GHOST!"
"Pumpkin, pumpkin sitting on a wall (have children sit down). Pumpkin, pumpkin tip and fall (have children tip over). Pumpkin, pumpkin rolling down the street (child rolls on floor). Pumpkin, pumpkin trick or treat!"
The haunted house
(Sung to the tune of "Wheels on the Bus"): "The ghost in the house goes 'Boo! Boo! Boo!' 'Boo! Boo! Boo!, Boo! Boo! Boo!' The ghost in the house goes 'Boo! Boo! Boo!' on Halloween.
The steps in the house goes 'Creek, creek, creek...' The cats in the house go 'Meow, meow, meow...' The mice in the house go 'Squeak, squeak, squeak..' The people in the house go 'Eek, eek, eek... .'"
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Making The Case For Stakeholders
Scientific evidence can help collaborations or coalitions make the case about the need for and efficacy of strategies to reduce the prevalence of chronic disease in their communities, especially for those strategies whose health outcomes are not often immediate.
Our Healthier Communities Initiatives are built on the concept that local communities can work together to give all community members healthy choices and support the pursuit of healthy lifestyles. More than 160 Ys are working in collaboration with community leaders to make changes in policies and the physical surroundings in those communities so that healthy living is within reach for individuals of all ages and backgrounds.
Young people benefit from drinking water, especially in place of sugar-added drinks. Schools can affect kids' health through beverage policies that raise awareness and increase the availability of healthier beverages. Providing accessible drinking water has been shown to increase water consumption.
Studies have found that providing accessible drinking water increases water consumption dramatically at schools, especially when water containers are also available. Campaigns to promote the health benefits of water positively have influenced awareness and consumption. In addition, changes in school beverage policies have increased the availability and consumption of healthier beverages. Increased concentration and better performance at sports have also been reported with water consumption. Water consumption is also associated with reduced overweight.
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Copyright © 2013 YMCA of the USA. All rights reserved.
The YMCA is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to put Christian principles into practice through programs that build healthy spirit, mind and body for all.
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Rao, Veena and Nanjundiah, Vidyanand (2011) J. B. S. Haldane, Ernst Mayr and the Beanbag Genetics Dispute. In: Journal of the History of Biology, 44 (2). pp. 233-281.
J._B._S._Haldane.pdf - Published Version
Restricted to Registered users only
Download (406Kb) | Request a copy
Starting from the early decades of the twentieth century, evolutionary biology began to acquire mathematical overtones. This took place via the development of a set of models in which the Darwinian picture of evolution was shown to be consistent with the laws of heredity discovered by Mendel. The models, which came to be elaborated over the years, define a field of study known as population genetics. Population genetics is generally looked upon as an essential component of modern evolutionary theory. This article deals with a famous dispute between J. B. S. Haldane, one of the founders of population genetics, and Ernst Mayr, a major contributor to the way we understand evolution. The philosophical undercurrents of the dispute remain relevant today. Mayr and Haldane agreed that genetics provided a broad explanatory framework for explaining how evolution took place but differed over the relevance of the mathematical models that sought to underpin that framework. The dispute began with a fundamental issue raised by Mayr in 1959: in terms of understanding evolution, did population genetics contribute anything beyond the obvious? Haldane's response came just before his death in 1964. It contained a spirited defense, not just of population genetics, but also of the motivations that lie behind mathematical modelling in biology. While the difference of opinion persisted and was not glossed over, the two continued to maintain cordial personal relations.
|Item Type:||Journal Article|
|Additional Information:||Copyright of this article belongs to Springer.|
|Keywords:||population genetics;evolution;evolutionary synthesis;models; mathematical biology|
|Department/Centre:||Division of Biological Sciences > Centre for Ecological Sciences|
|Date Deposited:||18 Jul 2011 08:50|
|Last Modified:||18 Jul 2011 08:50|
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This week, world leaders will gather in Geneva to commemorate 60 years of the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees.
Yet it is an anniversary that the world’s 15.1 million refugees have little reason to celebrate. Today, states are increasingly shutting their borders and restricting the assistance they give to refugees and people seeking asylum.
By Christopher Stokes, MSF Belgium General Director
Read the briefing paper: The 60th anniversary of the UN Refugee Convention: refugee crises in 2011 and challenges for the future
|Refugees from the recent conflict in Libya are assessed by MSF staff in Lampedusa, Italy. Photo: Mattia Insolera|
At the core of the Refugee Convention lies the idea of asylum. The increasingly restrictive policies of governments – while not necessarily in contravention of international,regional or national legislation – violate the spirit of the convention and the meaning of asylum. In turning their back on refugees, states end up playing a repressive rather than a protective role.
In South Africa, Médecins Sans Frontières has witnessed Zimbabweans without passports being barred entry at the main border post, denying them the possibility of applying for asylum. As a result, many seek an unofficial route into South Africa, exposing them to myriad dangers, from drowning in the Limpopo river, to attack by crocodiles, to falling victim to violent criminal gangs who roam the borderlands. In the first six months of 2011 alone, our staff treated 42 people who had been raped by gang members while trying to cross the border. We fear there are many more victims who did not seek our assistance.
Europe, which was the focus of the Refugee Convention at its inception in 1951, performs no better in its treatment of asylum seekers. This year, the popular uprisings in North Africa pushed some 57,000 refugees, asylum seekers and migrants to flee across the Mediterranean to Italy and Malta. Perhaps as many as 2,000 people perished at sea. Those who survived the journey found themselves detained in reception centres in appalling conditions. In March this year, 3,000 new arrivals were forced to sleep on the docks on the island of Lampedusa for several days, sharing 16 toilets and surviving on just 1.5 litres of water per day.
Aiming to curb the landings on its coasts, the Italian government quickly moved to sign bilateral agreements with the new Tunisian interim government and the Libyan Transitional Council, despite the ongoing war in Libya. These agreements amounted to pushing back potential asylum seekers from Europe’s shores to North Africa. Italy, along with several other European countries, was party to the Libyan conflict, and thus bore an even greater responsibility to ensure that people fleeing the war were given decent reception conditions and access to an efficient and fair asylum procedure.
Even for those who are successful in their applications for asylum, refugee status is often not enough to survive. Shunned and deprived of assistance, many refugees are condemned to migrate further, in search of a way to provide for themselves and their families. Today this is more true than ever as – unlike 60 years ago – developing countries now host the vast majority of the world’s refugee population.
|Somali refugees take apart their makeshift shelter in the outskirts of Dagahaley camp in Dadaab. They are preparing to be moved to Ifo 2 camp. Photo: Lynsey Addario/|
Medical and humanitarian activities have a tangible, but ultimately limited, impact on the welfare of refugees, asylum seekers and all those fleeing violence or economic collapse in their home country. Wider questions of assistance, protection and long term solutions urgently need to be addressed. People are increasingly mobile, and their motivations to cross borders are diverse. Governments need to come up with solutions that do not see migration management working at cross-purposes with refugee protection.
In the meantime, the Refugee Convention remains the most important tool for refugee protection and assistance. When all states actively demonstrate their commitment to refugees through policies that are in line with the spirit of the convention, then world leaders and refugees alike will really have something to celebrate.
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Where the (Waste) Water Goes
So where exactly does the water go when you flush your toilet? The short answer, if you live around here, is the San Francisco Bay. But what about the steps in between — where are those plants that clean and disinfect that water first? And which of the treatment plants have had problems with unintentional spills of untreated water into the Bay? To answer those questions, we created the first-ever online map of Bay Area publicly-owned sewage treatment plants and spills.
Our timing couldn't have been better; just this month, the State Water Resource Control Board released its own set of interactive spills maps. These maps, which are updated every 24 hours, show the locations and details of any wastewater spills that come from the sewer lines that lead to the plants. The State's map does not include any spills from wastewater (sewage) treatment plants themselves, however — luckily that's exactly what we've been working on!
(View this map– Wastewater Woes: Treatments & Spills– in a larger size)
The information was not very easy to come by. While spills from treatment plants sometimes get a lot of press, often they slip by mostly unnoticed. And there's no central database that collects all the information about these spills in one place. We combed through news reports, records provided by the State and Regional Water Resources Control Board, and the state Office of Emergency Services incident reports to piece together information about recent spills.
While our map won't get updated every 24 hours, the staff at the watchdog group Baykeeper intend to keep it current with new info. So go ahead, poke around. Find the plant nearest you, see where spills have been happening. And next time you watch water run down the drain, you'll know exactly where it's going.
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Marriage in Islam - An Introduction
Marriage in the dictionary is explained as the name given to when a man and a woman "formally unite for the purpose of living together". In Islam, it is an act which is given great importance both from a religious view point and a social viewpoint.
The subject of marriage is vast and contains many topics; these topics include:
01. If one chooses not to marry or is unable to get married.
02. When to get married.
03. Love marriages, arranged marriages and force marriages.
04. How to choose a suitable spouse.
05. How to get married.
06. Leading a happy, married life.
07. Rights & responsibilities of the husband.
08. Rights & responsibilities of the wife.
09. Etiquettes involved in a married life.
10. Upbringing of children.
11. Responsibilities towards one's children.
12. Marrying more than one wife (*new*)
Marriage is an act which completes and encompasses the many teachings of Islam. It has been thus narrated in a Hadeeth that when a person marries, he has complete half of his religion and so he should fear Allah regarding the remaining half.
Shame, modesty, moral and social values and control of self desire are just a few of the many teachings of Islam. Furthermore, these are just a few of the many worships that a person can complete by performing the ritual of marriage. Through marriage a person can be saved from many shameless and immoral sins and through marriage he has is more able to control his desire. Therefore, the Prophet (Sallallahu Alayhi Wa Sallam) has said:
"O young men! Whoever is able to marry should marry,
for that will help him to lower his gaze and guard his modesty."
The creation of mankind has been made such that man requires a spouse to complete all that a man requires. Whilst Adam (Alayhis Salaam) was in Jannah he felt a particular loneliness and in response to this loneliness Allah Ta'ala created Hawa (Alayhas Salaam) as a companion for him. This clearly shows that Allah chose women to act as a companion for man and so that they can remove that loneliness and live in harmony. Allah has created our spouses from a part of us. It is a bond that is created by Allah Himself so that we can find peace and tranquillity within our spouses.
Allah has stated in Surah al-Rum:
"And among His signs is that He has created for you mates from among yourselves,
that you may dwell in tranquillity with them;
and He has put love and mercy between you.
Verily in that are signs for those who reflect."
[Surah al-Rum - 30:21]
In conclusion, it is simple to deduce that marriage is a form of worship as well as a social necessity. We have been asked to increase the Ummah (followers) and the only permissible way in Islam is through Marriage.
Marriage is a strong oath that takes place between the man and women in this world, but its blessings and contract continues even in Jannah.
Marriage is the way of our beloved Prophet (Sallallahu Alayhi Wa Sallam), and whosoever goes against this practice has been reprimanded.
Hadhrat Anas ibn Malik narrates:
A group of three men came to the houses of the wives of the Prophet asking how the Prophet worshipped (Allah), and when they were informed about that, they considered their worship insufficient and said:
"Where are we from the Prophet as his past and future sins have been forgiven."
Then one of them said: "I will offer the prayer throughout the night forever."
The other said: "I will fast throughout the year and will not break my fast."
The third said: "I will keep away from the women and will not marry forever."
Allah's Apostle came to them and said,
"Are you the same people who said so-and-so?
By Allah, I am more submissive to Allah and more afraid of Him than you;
yet I fast and break my fast, I do sleep and I also marry women.
So he who does not follow my tradition in religion, is not from me (from my followers)."
Therefore, Islamically, we are all encouraged to get married and not turn away from the ways of our beloved Prophet (Sallallahu Alayhi Wa Salaam).
It should be remembered that this duty of marriage is for both men and women. Just as men complete half their religion through this act, it is also the same for women.
Insha Allah, other topics will be discussed soon. If there are any other topics under the topic of Nikaah/Marriage that you would like to be discussed please leave a comment.
Source: Simply Islam Blogspot
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Flood Safety Awareness Week
POSTED: Wednesday, March 18, 2009 - 5:45pm
UPDATED: Thursday, June 3, 2010 - 11:58pm
Floods are consistently the most common, costly and deadly natural disaster Americans face each year—ninety percent of all natural disasters in the nation involve flooding and Louisiana residents cannot afford to ignore this threat. Flood Safety Awareness Week (March 16-20), is a perfect time to consider local flood risks and learn important information about steps you can take to protect yourself and your family.
“Because homeowner policies in Louisiana do not provide coverage for damage due to floods, it is important to look into getting a separate flood insurance policy, no matter where you live in the state,” said Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon. “All it takes is a few inches of water to cause major damage to your home and its contents.”
Many in Louisiana believe that flooding is localized to coastal areas and low lying areas designated as a ‘flood zone.’ However, there are many flood risks to consider including hurricanes, rapid accumulation of rainfall, over flowing rivers and lakes, broken levees, outdated or clogged drainage systems and building and development, which can change the natural drainage creating new flood risks.
Louisiana is no stranger to flooding. In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina caused a 15-20 foot storm surge which inundated the coast and, along with the failure and overtopping of levees, flooded 80 percent of the city and damaged 275,000 homes. Katrina caused over $100 billion in damage and took more than 1300 lives. However, Louisiana’s hurricane flood risk is not limited to the coastal regions. As hurricanes move inland and are downgraded to tropical storms they create heavy rainfall which can cause flooding to many areas of the state.
Last spring Louisiana residents living along the Mississippi River had concerns over the river flooding its banks due to the spring snow thaw and heavy rains along the northern parts of the Mississippi River.
“ Ask your insurance agent about purchasing a policy with the National Flood Insurance Program,” Donelon adds. “But don’t wait until a storm is coming to purchase flood insurance. It may take 30 days after purchase for a flood insurance policy to go into effect.”
In partnership with NOAA, the NFIP has developed a webpage featuring an interactive map depicting historical information about how floods have impacted millions of Americans in recent years. The site also provides tools and resources for understanding your risk and knowing what to do: before a flood, during a flood, and after a flood. To learn more about Flood Safety Awareness Week and to utilize these resources, click here.
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Perspective article – nanostructured carbon-based electrodes could be the answer…
The fast evolution of portable electronic devices and micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) requires energy sources that have high power, high energy, long cycle life, and the adaptability to various substrates.
Two excellent candidates are lithium-ion batteries, which can store high energy on a gravimetric and volumetric basis but have relatively low power, and electrochemical capacitors (ECs) which are ideal for high power applications, but are limited for energy storage. There is now a need to develop materials with both high power and energy storage capabilities.
Currently, the excellent performance of nanostructured electrodes with thickness of a few microns can be integrated on Si chips or flexible plastic substrates, suggesting promising energy sources for portable electronic devices and micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS). If these nanostructured electrodes can be successfully scaled up to a thickness of hundreds of microns without losing performance, they could be promising for incorporation into electric vehicles, heavy machinery, and load-leveling applications.
Read the feature review today:
Nanostructured carbon-based electrodes: bridging the gap between thin-film lithium-ion batteries and electrochemical capacitors
Seung Woo Lee, Betar M. Gallant, Hye Ryung Byon, Paula T. Hammond and Yang Shao-Horn
Energy Environ. Sci., 2011, DOI: 10.1039/C0EE00642D
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Each T cell attacks a foreign substance which it identifies with its receptor. T cells have receptors which are generated by randomly shuffling gene segments. Each T cell attacks a different antigen. T cells that attack the body's own proteins are eliminated in the thymus. Thymic epithelial cells express major proteins from elsewhere in the body. First T cells undergo "Positive Selection" whereby the cell comes in contact with self-MHC expressed by thymic epithelial cells, those with no interaction are destroyed. Second, the T cell undergoes "Negative Selection" by interacting with thymic dendritic cell whereby T cells with high affinity interaction are eliminated through apoptosis (to avoid autoimmunity), and those with intermediate affinity survive.
Histologically, the thymus can be divided into a central medulla and a peripheral cortex which is surrounded by an outer capsule. The cortex and medulla play different roles in the development of T-cells. Cells in the thymus can be divided into thymic stromal cells and cells of hematopoietic origin (derived from bone marrow resident hematopoietic stem cells). Developing T-cells are referred to as thymocytes and are of hematopoietic origin. Stromal cells include thymic cortical epithelial cells, thymic medullary epithelial cells, and dendritic cells.
The thymus provides an inductive environment for development of T-lymphocytes from hematopoietic progenitor cells. In addition, thymic stromal cells allow for the selection of a functional and self-tolerant T-cell repertoire. Therefore, one of the most important roles of the thymus is the induction of central tolerance.
The thymus is largest and most active during the neonatal and pre-adolescent periods. By the early teens, the thymus begins to atrophy and thymic stroma is replaced by adipose (fat) tissue. Nevertheless, residual T lymphopoiesis continues throughout adult life.
The thymus was known to the ancient Greeks, and its name comes from the Greek word θυμός (thumos), meaning "anger", or "heart, soul, desire, life", possibly because of its location in the chest, near where emotions are subjectively felt; or else the name comes from the herb thyme (also in Greek θύμος or θυμάρι), which became the name for a "warty excrescence", possibly due to its resemblance to a bunch of thyme.
Due to the large numbers of apoptotic lymphocytes, the thymus was originally dismissed as a "lymphocyte graveyard", without functional importance. The importance of the thymus in the immune system was discovered in 1961 by Jacques Miller, by surgically removing the thymus from three day old mice, and observing the subsequent deficiency in a lymphocyte population, subsequently named T-cells after the organ of their origin. Recently, advances in immunology have allowed the function of the thymus in T-cell maturation to be more fully understood.
The two main components of the thymus, the lymphoid thymocytes and the thymic epithelial cells, have distinct developmental origins. The thymic epithelium is the first to develop, and appears in the form of two flask-shape endodermal diverticula, which arise, one on either side, from the third branchial pouch (pharyngeal pouch), and extend lateralward and backward into the surrounding mesoderm and neural crest-derived mesenchyme in front of the ventral aorta.
Here the thymocytes and epithelium meet and join with connective tissue. The pharyngeal opening of each diverticulum is soon obliterated, but the neck of the flask persists for some time as a cellular cord. By further proliferation of the cells lining the flask, buds of cells are formed, which become surrounded and isolated by the invading mesoderm. Additional portions of thymus tissue are sometimes developed from the fourth branchial pouches.
During the late stages of the development of the thymic epithelium, hematopoietic bone-marrow precursors migrate into the thymus. Normal thymic development thereafter is dependent on the interaction between the thymic epithelium and the hematopoietic thymocytes.
The thymus continues to grow between birth and puberty and then begins to atrophy; this thymic involution is directed by the high levels of circulating hormones. Proportional to thymic size, thymic activity (T-cell output) is most active before puberty. Upon atrophy, the size and activity are dramatically reduced, and the organ is primarily replaced with fat (a phenomenon known as "organ involution"). The atrophy is due to the increased circulating level of sex hormones, and chemical or physical castration of an adult results in the thymus increasing in size and activity. Patients with the autoimmune disease Myasthenia gravis commonly (70%) are found to have thymic hyperplasia or malignancy. The reason or order of these circumstances has yet to be determined.
|birth||about 15 grams;|
|puberty||about 35 grams|
|twenty-five years||25 grams|
|sixty years||less than 15 grams|
|seventy years||as low as 5 grams|
The thymus is of a pinkish-gray color, soft, and lobulated on its surfaces. At birth it is about 5 cm in length, 4 cm in breadth, and about 6 mm in thickness. The organs enlarges during childhood, and atrophies at puberty. Unlike the liver, kidney and heart, for instance, the thymus is at its largest in children. The thymus reaches maximum weight (20 to 37 grams) by the time of puberty. The thymus of older people is scarcely distinguishable from surrounding fatty tissue. As one ages the thymus slowly shrinks, eventually degenerating into tiny islands of fatty tissue. By the age of 75 years, the thymus weighs only 6 grams. In children the thymus is grayish-pink in colour and in adults it is yellow.
The thymus will, if examined when its growth is most active, be found to consist of two lateral lobes placed in close contact along the middle line, situated partly in the thorax, partly in the neck, and extending from the fourth costal cartilage upward, as high as the lower border of the thyroid gland. It is covered by the sternum, and by the origins of the sternohyoidei and sternothyreoidei. Below, it rests upon the pericardium, being separated from the aortic arch and great vessels by a layer of fascia. In the neck, it lies on the front and sides of the trachea, behind the sternohyoidei and sternothyreoidei. The two lobes differ slightly in size and may be united or separated.
Each lateral lobe is composed of numerous lobules held together by delicate areolar tissue; the entire organ being enclosed in an investing capsule of a similar but denser structure. The primary lobules vary in size from that of a pin's head to that of a small pea, and are made up of a number of small nodules or follicles.
The follicles are irregular in shape and are more or less fused together, especially toward the interior of the organ. Each follicle is from 1 to 2 mm in diameter and consists of a medullary and a cortical portion, and these differ in many essential particulars from each other.
The cortical portion is mainly composed of lymphoid cells, supported by a network of finely-branched epithelial reticular cells, which is continuous with a similar network in the medullary portion. This network forms an adventitia to the blood vessels.
In the medullary portion, the reticulum is coarser than in the cortex, the lymphoid cells are relatively fewer in number, and there are found peculiar nest-like bodies, the concentric corpuscles of Hassall. These concentric corpuscles are composed of a central mass, consisting of one or more granular cells, and of a capsule formed of epithelioid cells. They are the remains of the epithelial tubes, which grow out from the third branchial pouches of the embryo to form the thymus. Each follicle is surrounded by a vascular plexus, from which vessels pass into the interior, and radiate from the periphery toward the center, forming a second zone just within the margin of the medullary portion. In the center of the medullary portion there are very few vessels, and they are of minute size.
The medulla is the location of the latter events in thymocyte development. Thymocytes that reach the medulla have already successfully undergone T cell receptor gene rearrangement and positive selection, and have been exposed to a limited degree of negative selection. The medulla is specialised to allow thymocytes to undergo additional rounds of negative selection to remove auto-reactive T-cells from the mature repertoire. The gene AIRE is expressed by the thymic medullary epithelium, and drives the transcription of organ-specific genes such as insulin to allow maturing thymocytes to be exposed to a more complex set of self-antigens than is present in the cortex.
The nerves are exceedingly minute; they are derived from the vagi and sympathetic nervous system. Branches from the descendens hypoglossi and phrenic reach the investing capsule, but do not penetrate into the substance of the organ.
In the two thymic lobes, hematopoietic precursors from the bone-marrow, referred to as thymocytes, mature into T-cells. Once mature, T-cells emigrate from the thymus and constitute the peripheral T-cell repertoire responsible for directing many facets of the adaptive immune system. Loss of the thymus at an early age through genetic mutation (as in DiGeorge Syndrome) results in severe immunodeficiency and a high susceptibility to infection.
The stock of T-lymphocytes is built up in early life, so the function of the thymus is diminished in adults. It is largely degenerated in elderly adults and is barely identifiable, consisting mostly of fatty tissue, but it continues its endocrine function. Involution of the thymus has been linked to loss of immune function in the elderly, susceptibility to infection and to cancer.
The ability of T-cells to recognize foreign antigens is mediated by the T cell receptor. The T cell receptor undergoes genetic rearrangement during thymocyte maturation, resulting in each T-cell bearing a unique T-cell receptor, specific to a limited set of peptide:MHC combinations. The random nature of the genetic rearrangement results in a requirement of central tolerance mechanisms to remove or inactivate those T cells which bear a T cell receptor with the ability to recognise self-peptides.
- A rare population of hematopoietic progenitor cells enter the thymus from the blood, and expands by cell division to generate a large population of immature thymocytes.
- Immature thymocytes each make distinct T-cell receptors by a process of gene rearrangement. This process is error-prone, and some thymocytes fail to make functional T-cell receptors, whereas other thymocytes make T-cell receptors that are autoreactive.
- Immature thymocytes undergo a process of selection, based on the specificity of their T-cell receptors. This involves selection of T-cells that are functional (positive selection), and elimination of T-cells that are autoreactive (negative selection). The medulla of the thymus is the site of T Cell maturation.
|type:||functional (positive selection)||autoreactive (negative selection)|
In order to be positively-selected, thymocytes will have to interact with several cell surface molecules, MHC/HLA, to ensure reactivity and specificity.
Positive selection eliminates (apoptosis) weak binding cells and only takes high medium binding cells. (Binding refers to the ability of the T-cell receptors to bind to either MHC class I/II or peptide molecules.)
Negative selection is not 100% complete. Some autoreactive T-cells escape thymic censorship, and are released into the circulation.
Cells that pass both levels of selection are released into the bloodstream to perform vital immune functions.
Disease associations
The immune system is a multicomponent interactive system. It effectively protects the host from various infections. An improperly functioning immune system can cause discomfort, disease or even death. The type of malfunction falls into one or more of the following major groups: hypersensitivity or allergy, auto-immune disease, or immunodeficiency.
Allergy results from an inappropriate and excessive immune response to common antigens. Substances that trigger an allergic response are called allergens. Allergies involve mainly IgE, antibodies, and histamine. Mast cells release the histamine. Sometimes an allergen may cause a sudden and severe, possibly fatal reaction in a sensitive individual; this is called anaphylaxis.
As the thymus is the organ of T-cell development, any congenital defect in thymic genesis or a defect in thymocyte development can lead to a profound T cell deficiency in primary immunodeficiency disease. Defects that affect both the T cell and B cell lymphocyte lineages result in Severe Combined Immunodeficiency Syndrome (SCIDs). Acquired T cell deficiencies can also affect thymocyte development in the thymus.
DiGeorge syndrome
DiGeorge syndrome is a genetic disorder caused by the deletion of a small section of chromosome 22. This results in a midline congenital defect including thymic aplasia, or congenital deficiency of a thymus. Patients may present with a profound immunodeficiency disease, due to the lack of T cells. No other immune cell lineages are affected by the congenital absence of the thymus. DiGeorge syndrome is the most common congenital cause of thymic aplasia in humans. In mice, the nude mouse strain are congenitally thymic deficient. These mice are an important model of primary T cell deficiency.
Severe combined immunodeficiency syndromes (SCID) are group of rare congenital genetic diseases that result in combined T lymphocyte and B lymphocyte deficiencies. These syndromes are caused by defective hematopoietic progenitor cells which are the precursors of both B- and T-cells. This results in a severe reduction in developing thymocytes in the thymus and consequently thymic atrophy. A number of genetic defects can cause SCID, including IL-7 receptor deficiency, common gamma chain deficiency, and recombination activating gene deficiency. The gene for the disease called ADA (adenine deaminase) is located on chromosomes 20.
The HIV virus causes an acquired T-cell immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) by specifically killing CD4+ T-cells. Whereas the major effect of the virus is on mature peripheral T-cells, HIV can also infect developing thymocytes in the thymus, most of which express CD4.
Autoimmune disease
Autoimmune diseases are caused by a hyperactive immune system that instead of attacking foreign pathogens reacts against the host organism (self) causing disease. One of the primary functions of the thymus is to prevent autoimmunity through the process of central tolerance, immunologic tolerance to self antigens.
Autoimmune polyendocrinopathy-candidiasis-ectodermal dystrophy (APECED) is an extremely rare genetic autoimmune syndrome. However, this disease highlights the importance of the thymus in prevention of autoimmunity. This disease is caused by mutations in the Autoimmune Regulator (AIRE) gene. AIRE allows for the ectopic expression of tissue-specific proteins in the thymus medulla, such as proteins that would normally only be expressed in the eye or pancreas. This expression in the thymus, allows for the deletion of autoreactive thymocytes by exposing them to self-antigens during their development, a mechanism of central tolerance. Patients with APECED develop an autoimmune disease that affects multiple endocrine tissues.
Myasthenia gravis
Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disease caused by antibodies that block acetylcholine receptors. Myasthenia gravis is often associated with thymic hypertrophy. Thymectomy may be necessary to treat the disease.
Two primary forms of tumours originate in the thymus.
Tumours originating from the thymic epithelial cells are called thymomas, and are found in about 10-15% of patients with myasthenia gravis. Symptoms are sometimes confused with bronchitis or a strong cough because the tumour presses on the recurrent laryngeal nerve. All thymomas are potentially cancerous, but they can vary a great deal. Some grow very slowly. Others grow rapidly and can spread to surrounding tissues. Treatment of thymomas often requires surgery to remove the entire thymus.
People with an enlarged thymus, particularly children, were treated with intense radiation in the years before 1950. There is an elevated incidence of thyroid cancer and leukemia in treated individuals.
Cervical thymic cyst
Cervical thymus is a rare malformation. Thymic tissue containing cysts are rarely described in the literature, ectopic glandular tissue included in the wall of cystic formation can trigger a series of problems similar to those of thymus.
Thymic cysts are uncommon lesions, about 150 cases being found. While thymic cyst and ectopic cervical thymus are identified most frequently in childhood, the mean age at which thymoma is diagnosed is 45 years. However, studies have shown the existence necroptice thymic tissue masses in the neck (asymptomatic intravital) more frequently, the incidence reaching nearly 30%. These observations may mean absence of clinical observation.
Thymectomy is the surgical removal of the thymus. The most common reason for thymectomy in the United States is to gain surgical access to the heart in surgeries to correct congenital heart defects that are performed in the neonatal period. In neonates, but not older children or adults, the relative size of the thymus obstructs surgical access to the heart. Surprisingly, removal of the thymus does not result in a T cell immunodeficiency. This is because sufficient T cells are generated during fetal life prior to birth. These T cells are long-lived and can proliferate by homeostatic proliferation throughout the lifetime of the patient. However, there is evidence of premature immune aging in patients thymectomized during early childhood.
Other indications for thymectomy include the removal of thymomas and the treatment of myastenia gravis. Thymectomy is not indicated for the treatment of primary thymic lymphomas. However, a thymic biopsy may be necessary to make the pathologic diagnosis.
Second thymus
The thymus is also present in most vertebrates, with similar structure and function as the human thymus. Some animals have multiple secondary (smaller) thymi in the neck; this phenomenon has been reported for mice and also occurs in 5 out of 6 human fetuses. As in humans, the Guinea pig's thymus naturally atrophies as the animal reaches adulthood, but in the athymic hairless guinea pig (which arose from a spontaneous laboratory mutation) possessed no thymic tissue whatsoever, and the organ cavity is replaced with cystic spaces.
In other animals
The thymus is present in all jawed vertebrates, where it undergoes the same shrinkage with age and plays the same immunological function as in human beings. Recently, a discrete thymus-like lympho-epithelial structure, termed the thymoid, was discovered in the gills of larval lampreys. Hagfish possess a protothymus associated with the pharyngeal velar muscles, which is responsible for a variety of immune responses. Little is known about the immune mechanisms of tunicates or of Amphioxus.
When used for consumption, animal thymic tissue is known as (one of the kinds of) sweetbread.
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- θυμός, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, on Perseus
- Online Etymology Dictionary
- Nishino M, Ashiku SK, Kocher ON, Thurer RL, Boiselle PM, Hatabu H (2006). "The thymus: a comprehensive review". Radiographics 26 (2): 335–48. doi:10.1148/rg.262045213. PMID 16549602.
- Miller JF (2002). "The discovery of thymus function and of thymus-derived lymphocytes". Immunol. Rev. 185: 7–14. doi:10.1034/j.1600-065X.2002.18502.x. PMID 12190917.
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- Swiss embryology (from UL, UB, and UF) qblood/lymphat03
- Sutherland JS. Activation of thymic regeneration in mice and humans following androgen blockade. J Immunol 2005 15;175(4):2741-53
- Kumar, Parveen, Michael Clark (2002). Clinical Medicine 5th edn. Saunders. p. 1222. ISBN 0-7020-2606-9.
- Gray, H. (1918). (bartleby.com) "4c. The Thymus". Anatomy of the Human Body. Philadelphia: Lea & Febiger.
- BU Histology Learning System: 07403loa
- BU Histology Learning System: 07401loa
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- Huete-Garin, A.; S.S. Sagel (2005). "Chapter 6: "Mediastinum", Thymic Neoplasm". In J.K.T. Lee, S.S. Sagel, R.J. Stanley and J.P. Heiken. Computed Body Tomography with MRI Correlation. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. pp. 311–324. ISBN 0-7817-4526-8.
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- Octavian Dincă, Cristina Pădurariu, Alexandru Bucur (Oct 2011). "A rare entity — cervical thymic cyst" (HTML). Rev. chir. oro-maxilo-fac. implantol. (in (Romanian)) 2 (3): 1–5. ISSN 2069-3850. 38. Retrieved 2012-06-06.(webpage has a translation button)
- Journal of Clinical Investigation. "Evidence of premature immune aging in patients thymectomized during early childhood". JCI. Retrieved 2012-06-11.
- Journal of Clinical Investigation. "Evidence of premature immune aging in patients thymectomized during early childhood". JCI. Retrieved 2012-06-11.
- Terszowski G et al. (2006) Evidence for a Functional Second Thymus in Mice. Science. 2 March 2006. PMID 16513945
- Surprise organ discovered in mice, Nature News, 2 March 2006
- Bajoghli, et al. 2011 Nature, 470: 90–94; http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v470/n7332/full/nature09655.html
- Riviere, et al. 1975. American Zoologist. 15:39-49; http://www.jstor.org/stable/3882269
- Sawada 1992. Bull. Yamaguchi Med. Sch. 39:83–88; http://petit.lib.yamaguchi-u.ac.jp/G0000006y2j2/file/2252/20100507164619/A020039000309.pdf
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The First Computer Program
February 8, 2011
Beginning in the 1820s, and continuing until his death in 1871, Charles Babbage, an English mathematician (he was for ten years the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, a chair once held by Sir Isaac Newton and currently held by Stephen Hawking), engineer, scientist and inventor was fascinated with the idea of a machine that could perform arithmetic calculations. His first machine, the Difference Engine, first described in 1822, used finite differences to compute the values of polynomials. His second machine, the Analytical Engine, first described in 1837, was much more ambitious, consisting of a control unit, an arithmetic processor, and a storage space for intermediate calculations, and could be programmed to perform specific calculations by use of punched cards. Both machines were mechanical, not electrical, powered by steam. Neither machine was built prior to his death, due to a lack of money and the expertise to manufacture the needed parts with the required precision.
Augusta Ada King (née Byron), Countess of Lovelace, daughter of the English poet Lord Byron and an amateur mathematician, was fascinated by Babbage’s plans for the Analytical Engine. In 1842, at Babbage’s request, she translated a manuscript about the Analytical Engine by the Italian mathematician Luigi Menabrea (who later became the Prime Minister of Italy), adding her own notes, which were more extensive than the original manuscript. Note G describes the use of the Analytical Engine to compute the Bernoulli numbers; it is complete and rigorous, and is now recognized as the first computer program, making the Countess the first computer programmer.
The Countess’ translated manuscript and notes, available from FourmiLab, make fascinating reading, a terrific way to pass a cold winter evening. She was clearly in full command of her subject, and anticipated much of computer architecture and modern computer programming languages a full century before they were discovered. For instance, if you ignore the stilted language, this quote could have been written last week:
In studying the action of the Analytical Engine, we find that the peculiar and independent nature of the considerations which in all mathematical analysis belong to operations, as distinguished from the objects operated upon and from the results of the operations performed upon those objects, is very strikingly defined and separated.
It is hard to overstate the Countess' accomplishment. She had no high-level programming language, no libraries, no integrated development environment, not even an assembler or a debugger; she was working on "bare metal" — literally! The only documentation she had was that which she wrote herself. And she was working in untrodden territory, as there were no textbooks about programming, no tutors, no "Learn X in 21 Days" to help her. She didn't even have a machine to run her program. It is amazing that she wrote the program at all; incredibly, modern computer scientists have examined the program and declared it bug-free, and today’s programmers must simply stand in awe. The Countess was not only the first computer programmer, she was also an extremely talented one.
The program that the Countess chose to demonstrate the Analytical Engine was a program to compute the Bernoulli numbers and is based on Equation 8 of Note G:
Thus, B1 = -1/2 when n = 1, B3 = 1/6 when n = 2, B5 = -1/30 when n = 3, B7 = 1/42 when n = 4, B9 = -1/30 when n = 5, B11 = 5/66 when n = 6, B13 = -691/2730 when n = 7, B15 = 7/6 when n = 8, B17 = -3617/510 when n = 9, B19 = 43867/798 when n = 10, and so on. The successive Bernoulli numbers are computed in order, each feeding the computation of the next, the various numerators and denominators being computed according to the pattern in the formula.
Your task is to write a program to calculate the Bernoulli numbers, using the method of the Countess’ Note G. When you are finished, you are welcome to read or run a suggested solution, or to post your own solution or discuss the exercise in the comments below.
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Definition of collaring
p. pr. & vb. n. - of Collar 2
The word "collaring" uses 9 letters: A C G I L L N O R.
Direct anagrams of collaring:
Words formed by adding one letter before or after collaring (in bold), or to acgillnor in any order:
r - corralling
All words formed from collaring by changing one letter
Browse words starting with collaring by next letter
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Vazquez-Alvarez, Yolanda and Hewlett, Nigel (2007) The "Trough Effect": an ultrasound study. Phonetica, 64 (2-3). pp. 105-121. ISSN 1423-0321
|PDF - Repository staff only - Requires a PDF viewer such as GSview, Xpdf or Adobe Acrobat Reader|
Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1159/000107912
Bilabial stops often show a lowering of the tongue in symmetrical VCV sequences. The causes of this phenomenon, sometimes called the ‘trough effect’, are unknown. However, it could have important implications for the study of timevarying aspects of speech events. Ultrasound is a non-invasive technique that has allowed us to image the shape of the tongue in real time and measure the actual tongue displacement that occurs in the C of a VCV sequence. Five repetitions of symmetrical V1CV2 sequences with the bilabial stops /b, p/ were obtained from 10 British English speakers. Results showed not only differences in the direction and degree of the tongue displacement but also differences in the tongue contour configuration between subjects. This study demonstrates the effectiveness of ultrasound as a technique in phonetic research, making possible the analysis of tongue surface movement for large amounts of data from multiple subjects.
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Geologically speaking, the Vestmannaeyjar are quite young. Volcanic activity in the area probably started about 100-200,000 years ago. However, it is believed that the islands of the archipelago are considerably younger than this, from the last 10-20,000 years.
The islands were all created by the volcanic activity originating on the seabed. Nonetheless, Heimaey, the main island, is probably the only island that has been formed by the combination of several eruptions.
The volcanic belt on which the islands lie covers 700-900 square kilometres, and there are about 80 known craters in this area, of which only 17 or 18 are above sea level. Most of these volcanoes have erupted in recent times (geologically-speaking), that is to say during the last 10-12 thousand years.
Observations indicate that that at a depth of 10-30 kilometres below this volcanic area, there is a magma chamber of molten lava which supplies the central volcanoes with raw materials. As mentioned above, Heimaey was formed from several eruptions that took place during the past few thousand years.
The oldest parts of the island are the so-called "Norðurklettar" (Northern cliffs), that is Dalfjall, Klif and Há, and on the other side of the island, the cliffs Heimaklettur, Miðklettur and Ystiklettur. These cliffs are thought to have been formed by an eruption during the last ice age, at least 10 to 12 thousand years ago.
This eruption led to the formation of two separate islands which the sea then eroded and shaped for the next 4,000 years. About 6000 years ago, another eruption created a third island, Stórhöfði, which is where the lighthouse and weather station are today, at the south end of Heimaey.
The two large outer islands to the east of Heimaey (Elliðaey and Bjarnaey) were probably formed at about the same time. After this activity, there were a few hundred years of peace, as can be seen in the layer of plant fossils and other remains that lie under a younger layer of soil on top of Stórhöfði.
Radio carbon dating shows that these fossils date back about 5,400 years.
Then about 5000 years ago an explosive eruption started at Stakkabótagígur, a crater on the north-east side of Stórhöfði. This formed the largest crater in the area which is one kilometre in diameter. During this eruption, the island of Stórhöfði increased in size, and the volcanic craters on Heimaey itself were formed shortly thereafter, when Helgafell, the mountain behind the present township erupted.
At this time a lava shield was formed from thin layers of scoria lava (Hawaiian: aa), and a regularly shaped scoria-crater developed on top of the lava, about 227 metres above sea level. The lava flow from Helgafell connected Sæfell, Dalfjall and Klif.
It also closed the seaway south of the Norðurklettar and provided the conditions for Eiðið, the natural breakwater between Klif and Heimaklettur, to be formed by erosion. Eiðið "grew" in the shape of a gravel isthmus running from Kliff to Heimaklettur, gradually connecting the two islands. The youngest and the most obvious addition to the present island was formed during the Heimaey eruption that began on the night of January 23rd, 1973.
It started when a 1600 metre long fissure opened on the east side of town, spewing forth more than 30 million tons of ash and lava within the first 12 hours.
The eruption lasted a little less than 5 months and the total amount of volcanic materials that accumulated were 0,25 km², as compared to 1 km² during the earlier Surtsey eruption. As the fissure closed, the eruption became concentrated on one spot and a new scoria-crater similar to that of Helgafell formed.
This new mountain has been named Eldfell, Fire Mountain. During the Eldfell eruption, Heimaey increased in size by about 2,2 km². The lava field covers a total area of about 3,3 km².
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Cancer Control Month - April
The number of new cases of cancer in the United States is increasing each year. People of all ages get cancer, but nearly all types are more common in middle-aged and elderly people than in young people. Skin cancer is the most common type of cancer for both men and women. The next most common type among men is prostate cancer; among women, it is breast cancer. Lung cancer, however, is the leading cause of death from cancer for both men and women in the United States. Brain cancer and leukemia are the most common cancers in children and young adults.
The more we can learn about what causes cancer, the more likely we are to find ways to prevent it. Scientists study patterns of cancer in the population to look for factors that affect the risk of developing this disease. In the laboratory, they explore possible causes of cancer and try to determine what actually happens when normal cells become cancerous.
For in-depth and up-to-date information about cancer, cancer causes, and cancer prevention, please see the following MedicineNet.com areas:
Last Editorial Review: 4/9/2004
Get the latest health and medical information delivered direct to your inbox FREE!
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by Melissa Brunner
Kansas ranks among the top 10 in a new study on government transparency, accountability and
anti-corruption mechanisms. That might sound good, until you consider that a grade of "C" was good enough to place that high. Not only that, but Kansas received an "F" grade in lobbying disclosure and state insurance commission, and a "D-" for ethics enforcement agencies.
The study was conducted by the Washington-based Center for Public Integrity, Public Radio
International and Global Integrity. They reviewed what they term "corruption indicators." No state received an "A," so it's not like Kansas is alone in taking its knocks from the group. Bottom line, the group says, there are no winners.
The group says its investigation "is a test of the structure that governs the government, documenting the laws on the books and investigating the actions that enforce those laws." You can find the complete results here: http://www.stateintegrity.org/
Meantime, what do you believe would make a truly transparent government? I say let's start with easy to understand web sites with access to meeting agendas, minutes, bill/ordinance language and more. Oh, and with a search function that works! Your ideas?
Designed by Gray Digital Media
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"A Trade Like Any Other": Female Singers and Dancers in Egypt
by Karin van Nieuwkerk
Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995. 226 pp.$35 ($15, paper).
Serpent of the Nile: Women and Dance in the Arab World
by Wendy Buonaventura
London: Saqi Books, 1989 (paper edition, 1994). 207 pp. $XX
Reviewed by Daniel Pipes
Middle East Quarterly
Belly dancing, like almost everything else, has a history; and like so much else in recent centuries, it has been deeply influenced by contact with the West. The very term "belly dancing," translated from the French danse du ventre, only came into use a century ago. As early as 1834, Muhammad `Ali, the ruler of Egypt, banished female dancers (and prostitutes) from Cairo, in the vain effort to keep them out of sight of foreigners. Vain, because the women migrated to the south of Egypt, and so did their foreign admirers, making such towns as Esna, Luxor, and Aswan the centers of a racy night life. Until the 1920s, dancers wore simple clothes; the cabaret costume of "spangled bikini top, low-slung gauzy skirt with side slits, and bare midriff . . . owed its inspiration largely to Hollywood." In the late nineteenth century, a select few dancers made their fortune by travelling to Europe and the United States and performing at world exhibitions; most famously, Little Egypt (actually a Syrian) was the sensation of Chicago in 1893, in part because she on occasion would lift her skirt above her left knee. Little Egypt spawned many American imitators, who subsequently traveled East, bringing with them Western dance innovations. One renowned dancer reportedly performed for both Hitler and Mussolini. In recent years, the dreary hand of professionalization has fallen on the dancers; legally to dance for the public in Egypt, a woman must have a degree in dancing from a dancing school.
Van Nieuwkerk concentrates on the sociology of the female entertainers; Buonaventura provides the pictures that make the academic analysis come to life. In all, a pair of fascinating books on a delightful topic.
Related Topics: Egypt | Daniel Pipes | December 1995 MEQ
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This text may be reposted or forwarded so long as it is presented as an integral whole with complete and accurate information provided about its author, date, place of publication, and original URL.
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The following is a general discussion of the uses of technology in providing distance therapy. I think much of what the author has to offer is valuable as a point of discussion, though as I have been doing research on the same subject, I am not as cautious as she is with the value of distance therapy.
With advances in technology, distance learning on college campuses has exploded over the last decade. And as time passes, the mental health community is taking note.
Students want to study when they want and how they want. Distance learning makes education available to those who wouldn’t otherwise be able to get off of work, travel to class or spend hours in lectures.
That same increase in convenience and availability could have a real impact for people seeking psychological treatment. Is distance treatment ready to take off?
People who must maintain jobs, care for children or aging parents, don’t have cars or access to public transportation or want to learn material that is not offered where they live can all benefit from distance learning. These are often the same reasons people struggle to access mental health services.
And there is a large body of research that suggests distance learning and traditional classroom learning provide the same quality of education. Distance learning is no longer considered a sub-standard educational option.
So, how can these benefits apply to receiving psychological treatment?
Treatment available online or at a distance could certainly help people with difficulties in getting to therapy sessions and incorporating treatment into a busy lifestyle. It would also enable people to access specific treatment modalities not otherwise available to them.
And, according to the American Psychological Association, psychologists have begun using electronic communication such as email, Skype and various forms of videoconferencing to augment treatment. But, while technology surges ahead, licensing laws and guidelines for providing safe and ethical distance treatment are still catching up.
A recent article reporting on the use of phone therapy in Monitor on Psychology suggests that talking on the phone with a therapist can provide the same, or even better, results for some.
In this study, conducted by University of Cambridge researchers, British adults with mild and moderate depression and anxiety disorders who received cognitive behavioral-based therapy via the phone benefited as much, if not more, than those who received face-to-face therapy. Those with severe symptoms did not see the same results.
This study also found that telephone therapy was less expensive than traditional therapy and was conducted as part of a national initiative in Britain aimed at increasing people’s access to therapy.
The telephone is only one of many options for providing distance treatment. The number of mental health tools available is rapidly increasing. And many in the field agree that it’s time for practitioners to embrace technology and what it has to offer in delivering interventions.
One-on-one treatment cannot be replaced. Nor should it. However, the need for treatment providers to meet the changing and growing mental health needs of the population has caused the ΑΡΑ Insurance Trust and the Association of State and Provincial Psychology Boards to launch a task force to develop guidelines for tele-psychology practice.
So what are some of the alternatives to one-on-one therapy? According to a cover story in the APA Monitor they include the following:
- Behavioral intervention technologies, such as those that deliver care via the Internet or mobile phones
- Computer programs for depression and other disorders, which typically teach principles of cognitιve-behavioral therapy or some other evidence-based treatment
Although these treatment options are appealing and there is a growing body of research to suggest that many are effective, it is important to proceed with caution. It is essential to ensure that individuals get the right treatment and that treatments offered have been studied and found effective.
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To Design A Purposeful Story By Many
Researching Reboot Stories’ experiments with open design and story I came to think of it as Purposeful Storytelling. Stories have long been used for the purpose to inform, sell or persuade, but we’re onto something that involves story to ignite action and THEN do all of the above. I mean using storytelling to solve problems, to create a fun experiential learning environment and use it as a tool to convey a complex solution.
Lance Weiler, Jorgen van der Sloot and I played a bit with designs and prototyping sessions. Our 60-minute Open Design Challenge (ODC) is a little bit different each time since we’re refining the process with each session. But we always use storytelling, game mechanics and collaboration to design around a Wish for The Future.
The ODC has three purposes.
1. participants experience what agility and collaboration means in today’s global culture industry
2. we R&D a system to solve problems by using collaboration, game mechanics and story
3. we test and refine storytelling as way to transfer knowledge, create empathy for content and call to action
We developed two versions, one to ideate solutions to complex problems and the other one to co-design a transmedia storyworld. Here’s a rundown of how we did the latter – a StorySprint – at DIY Days Ghent.
First, the entire group had 4 minutes to generate 100 wishes around the premise to make the world work for 100% of humanity. Yep. We broke the group down into eight categories (urbanization, economy, education, humanity, culture, health, sustainability, government) to have each group focus on one area. A couple of minute later, we read out the wishes and decided the best wish collectively by cheering. Then – in the same manner – we turned the wish into a design question and a theme for our story.
“Attempting the impossible widens the mind. Lateral thinking happens when you can’t possibly imagine an immediate answer to a question.”
Then we broke out into three groups: one would build a prototype that helps solving the design question; the storytellers craft a hero’s journey; the third group were the story architects. Their task was to communicate between the groups and to converge the outcomes on a storyboard. We gave every group a simple template that explained the basics of storytelling, design thinking and scribing.
Utilize time pressure.
53 minutes left. Imagine everything happening at the same time: Some story architects started planning their storyboard while others chose a target audience aka stakeholders, which we communicated to the two other groups. Within the first 5 minutes the story architects received the main characters from the storytelling group, which they passed on to the prototypers after they had given their first pitch to the scribes (within first 10 minutes). Generally, nobody was allowed to talk without creating something with their hands at the same time. We provided play-doh, pens, butcher paper, paddlepops and other props. We like doing that because tactile activity enhances creativity by igniting both sides of the brain.
“Mayhem and confusion. The ODC leaves participants partly in the unknown to simulate how reality, too, only unfolds gradually. Chaordic time pressure requires us to adapt to change flexibly and creatively.”
The idea was that prototyping and storytelling group couldn’t communicate directly, only through the story architects. This way we simulated how information gets filtered and re-interpreted – like in a collaboration between various teams in a company or creative collective.
To communicate between groups, we had storytellers and prototypers pitching to the story architects. This was combined with a narrative game, in which the answer could only be ‘yes, no or maybe’. This had the purpose that content had to be anticipated and interpreted: empathy in practice. We made sure that information didn’t always flow clearly in order to imitate real life situations. At certain points we appointed narrators to help clarifying crucial aspects, in case the scribes would get stuck.
“Everyone has to listen closely to the sparse information they get and through anticipation of the other groups’ objectives they would learn to interprete in integrate information in an agile way that leaves room for optimization and spontaneous change.”
The 2nd pitch later on would allow the story architects to ask questions but no answers were allowed. This had the effect that the prototypers went back and refined their work according to what was still too complex for an audience to grasp. After ten more minutes the story architects got another brief to tweak and bend story and prototype into one coherent storyboard.
The storytellers and prototypers explained their approaches while the story architects listened and converged both pitches with annotated drawings on the wall. Then we had the story architects tell how they saw the story play out using what they had gotten from the other groups. They pitched using their storyboard, which was a scripted wall, like an RSAnimate. The outcome was so creative and intriguing that 16 participants signed up to bring the project to life.
“We can simulate collective intelligence by ascribing each group one of the three fundamental human brain functions (cf. Peter Kruse): connect deep knowledge (storytellers) and spontaneous creativity (transmedia prototypers) by building new unexpected synapses (story architects).”
This session was developed by Ele Jansen (www.learndoshare.net, Sydney), Lance Weiler (www.rebootstories.com, New York) and Jorgen van der Sloot (www.freedomlab.org, Amsterdam). We’re refining the process further to develop a solid rapid prototyping model for experience design but also for kids as a playful approach to collaborate and to learn creative problem solving skills in conjunction with story. Results will be used on two levels: lessons learned about process feed into Ele’s PhD research and into our design for Lance’s Story Design Lab at Columbia University. They will also be published on www.learndoshare.net. The prototypes that are generated throughout each Open Design Challenge will be featured www.wishforthefuture.com for others to pick up on it and develop it further (launch end of October 2012).
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Individual differences |
Methods | Statistics | Clinical | Educational | Industrial | Professional items | World psychology |
In statistics and mathematical epidemiology, relative risk (RR) is the risk of an event (or of developing a disease) relative to exposure. Relative risk is a ratio of the probability of the event occurring in the exposed group versus the control (non-exposed) group.
For example, if the probability of developing lung cancer among smokers was 20% and among non-smokers 10%, then the relative risk of cancer associated with smoking would be 2. Smokers would be twice as likely as non-smokers to develop lung cancer.
Statistical use and meaning
Relative risk is used frequently in the statistical analysis of binary outcomes where the outcome of interest has relatively low probability. It is thus often suited to clinical trial data, where it is used to compare the risk of developing a disease, in people receiving a new medical treatment versus people receiving an established (standard of care) treatment or a placebo. It is particularly attractive because it can be calculated by hand in the simple case, but is also susceptible to regression modelling, typically in a Poisson regression framework.
In a simple comparison between an experimental group and a control group:
- A relative risk of 1 means there is no difference in risk between the two groups.
- A RR of < 1 means the event is less likely to occur in the experimental group than in the control group.
- A RR of > 1 means the event is more likely to occur in the experimental group than in the control group.
The log of relative risk is usually taken to have a sampling distribution that has an approximately normal distribution. This permits the construction of a confidence interval which is symmetric around , i.e.
where is the standard score for the chosen level of significance and SE the standard error. The antilog can be taken of the two bounds of the log-CI, giving the high and low bounds for an asymmetric confidence interval around the relative risk.
In regression models, the treatment is typically included as a dummy variable along with other factors that may affect risk. The relative risk is normally reported as calculated for the mean of the sample values of the explanatory variables.
Association with odds ratio
Relative risk is different from the odds ratio, although it asymptotically approaches it for small probabilities. In fact, the odds ratio has much wider use in statistics, since logistic regression, often associated with clinical trials, works with the log of the odds ratio, not relative risk. Because the log of the odds ratio is estimated as a linear function of the explanatory variables, the estimated odds ratio for 70-year-olds and 60-year-olds associated with type of treatment would be the same in a logistic regression models where the outcome is associated with drug and age, although the relative risk might be significantly different. In cases like this, statistical models of the odds ratio often reflect the underlying mechanisms more effectively.
Since relative risk is a more intuitive measure of effectiveness, the distinction is important especially in cases of medium to high probabilities. If action A carries a risk of 99.9% and action B a risk of 99.0% then the relative risk is just over 1, while the odds associated with action A are almost 10 times higher than the odds with B.
In statistical modelling, approaches like poisson regression (for counts of events per unit exposure) have relative risk interpretations: the estimated effect of an explanatory variable is multiplicative on the rate, and thus leads to a risk ratio or relative risk. Logistic regression (for binary outcomes, or counts of successes out of a number of trials) must be interpreted in odds-ratio terms: the effect of an explanatory variable is multiplicative on the odds and thus leads to an odds ratio.
Size of relative risk and relevance
In the hypothesis testing framework, the null hypothesis is that RR=1 (the putative risk factor has no effect). The null hypothesis can be rejected in favor of the alternative hypothesis of that the factor in question does affect risk if the confidence interval for RR excludes 1.
Critics of the standard approach, notably including John Brignell and Steven Milloy, believe published studies suffer from unduly high type I error rates, and have argued for an additional requirement that the point estimate of RR should exceed 2 (or, if risks are reduced, be below 0.5) and have cited a variety of statements by statisticians and others supporting this view. The issue has arisen particularly in relation to debates about the effects of passive smoking, where the effect size appears to be small (relative to smoking), and exposure levels are difficult to quantify in the affected population.
In support of this claim, it may be observed that, if the base level of risk is low, a small proportionate increase in risk may be of little practical signifance. (In the case of lung cancer, however, the base risk is substantial).
In addition, if estimates are biased by the exclusion of relevant factors, the likelihood of a spurious finding of significance is greater if the estimated RR is close to 1. In his paper "Why Most Published Research Findings Are False" , John Ioannidis writes "The smaller the effect sizes in a scientific field, the less likely the research findings are to be true. [...] research findings are more likely true in scientific fields with [...] relative risks 3–20 [...], than in scientific fields where postulated effects are small [...] (relative risks 1.1–1.5)." "if the majority of true genetic or nutritional determinants of complex diseases confer relative risks less than 1.05, genetic or nutritional epidemiology would be largely utopian endeavors."
However, a blanket requirement that RR>2, taking no account of base rates or sample size, is a fairly crude solution to the problem, and one that appears unduly favorable to opponents of regulation. For this reason, most statisticians continue to use the standard hypothesis testing framework, though with more caution than would be indicated by a standard textbook account.
Statistical significance (confidence) and relative risk
Whether a given relative risk can be considered statistically significant is dependent on the relative difference between the conditions compared, the amount of measurement and the noise associated with the measurement (of the events considered). In other words, the confidence one has, in a given relative risk being non-random (i.e. it is not a consequence of chance), depends on the signal-to-noise ratio and the sample size.
Expressed mathematically, the confidence that a result is not by random chance is given by the following formula by Sackett:
For clarity, the above forumla is presented in tabular form below.
Dependence of confidence with noise, signal and sample size (tabular form)
|Parameter||Parameter increases||Parameter decreases|
|Noise||Confidence decreases||Confidence increases|
|Signal||Confidence increases||Confidence decreases|
|Sample size||Confidence increases||Confidence decreases|
In words, the confidence is higher if the noise is lower and/or the sample size is larger and/or the effect size (signal) is increased. The confidence of a relative risk value (and its associated confidence interval) is not dependent on effect size alone. If the sample size is large and the noise is low a small effect size can be measured with great confidence. Whether a small effect size is considered important is dependent on the context of the events compared.
In medicine, small effect sizes (reflected by small relative risk values) are usually considered clinically relevant (if there is great confidence in them) and are frequently used to guide treatment decisions. A relative risk of 1.10 may seem very small, but over a large number of patients will make a noticeable difference. Whether a given treatment is considered a worthy endeavour is dependent on the risks, benefits and costs.
- Confidence interval
- Odds ratio
- Hazard ratio
- Number needed to treat (NNT)
- Number needed to harm (NNH)
- ↑ See e.g. Stata FAQ on CIs for odds ratios, hazard ratios, IRRs and RRRs at http://www.stata.com/support/faqs/stat/2deltameth.html
- ↑ Medical University of South Carolina. Odds ratio versus relative risk. Accessed on: September 8, 2005.
- ↑ Sackett DL. Why randomized controlled trials fail but needn't: 2. Failure to employ physiological statistics, or the only formula a clinician-trialist is ever likely to need (or understand!). CMAJ. 2001 Oct 30;165(9):1226-37. PMID 11706914. Free Full Text.
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Swimmers - along with scuba divers and body surfers - have been using fins for decades,but only recently have coaches and swimmers alike begun to appreciate what these excellent training tools can do to help people of all ability levels improve their swimming.
Increase fitness and Cardiovascular Conditioning Although swimming is considered one of the best aerobic or cardiovascular-conditioning exercises, many people forget to use their legs where the largest muscles are located. Since the greatest cardiovascular benefits come from including the highest percentage of the body's muscles - that's why cross-country skiing and rowing are considered two of the most demanding sports - it makes sense that swimmers who activate the large muscle mass of the legs by kicking will benefit from a more demanding workout that burns more calories and increases fitness levels.
Add fins to the equation and the increased load they add to the legs means that as long as exertion levels remain high, the cardiovascular system gets an even more intense workout with even greater fitness benefits. Unlike all other fins, even those with open toe drains, "Only Force Fin swimming fins are designed to concentrate the force of the blade further back on the foot, using the muscles of the whole leg, not just the lower leg."
Increase Ankle Flexibility Have you ever noticed that runners, cyclists or triathletes new to swimming who start a serious swim program have a hard time just kicking and going anywhere? In fact, they sometimes go backward! One reason is that their ankles are so inflexible that when they kick, their feet act like hooks, catching the water and pulling the frustrated swimmer in the wrong direction.
Good swimmers, on the other hand, can hyperextend (plantar flex) their ankles, pointing their toes so that the top of the foot forms a straight line with the shin. Because of the extra load from the increased surface area that fins provide, swimming or kicking with fins forces ankle extension during the power phase (pushing down when swimming freestyle) of the kick. Repeated fin use eventually stretches the ankles, increasing their flexibility for moving in all directions and helping the kick become more propulsive and efficient.
The extra load from the increased surface area that fins provide, swimming or kicking with fins forces ankle extension during the power phase (pushing down when swimming freestyle) of the kick. Repeated fin use eventually stretches the ankles, increasing their flexibility for moving in all directions and helping the kick become more propulsive and efficient.
Ankle flexibility is one key to efficient kicking. To measure your flexibility, sit on the floor with legs extended and pching the floor, point your toes as far forward as you can while having lace a stiff piece of paper against the side of the foot. With heels tousomeone trace this side view.
Measure the distance from the base of your big toe to the ground or floor; your goal should be from one to four inches.
Using a regular program of kicking with FORCE FIN swimming fins, re-measure and chart your progress.
Develop Leg Strength Kicking with fins is like lifting weights: the added resistance of the water on the blade of the fin increases the workload on your leg muscles. Your body adapts by increasing the strength and endurance of the muscles involved. Stronger muscles move more water making you swim faster, all other things being equal.
A word about specificity: It's important to realize that muscular strength for swimming needs to be "specific." Good runners, cyclists, roller bladers, etc. can have very strong leg muscles, but the muscles have developed for running, cycling or roller blading, not for swimming. Fins develop leg strength specifically for swimming, and in a way that few other activities can.
Improve Body Position and Technique Fins add extra propulsion to the stroke, which increases a swimmer's speed through the water. Good swimmers tend to plane on top of the water while poor swimmers tend to drag their legs and swim in a more vertical position slowing them down.
One of the goals of swimming faster with fins is to swim faster when the fins are taken off! By transferring the feeling of swimming faster and higher with fins to swimming without them, a swimmer makes use of a phenomenon know as neuromuscular patterning. The muscles and the nerves can actually remember the feeling of swimming faster and will try to duplicate the pattern the next time out. The more times the pattern is repeated (swimming faster and higher in the water with fins), the easier it is to duplicate it. The end result: the swimmer's technique and neuromuscular coordination improves.
WHY USE FORCE FIN SWIMMING FINS?
We've been designing and making improvements to fins for over 25 years, with hundreds of thousands of satisfied customers, and many major product design awards under our belts, we can honestly say that we are the experts in fin design. That's all we do, and we think our innovative fins are without equal in terms of comfort, efficiency, durability, performance, versatility and sheer value for your money.
We offer a variety of fins and each as been developed in response to your needs, comments and suggestions. Studying marine animal locomotion and human biomechanics, we have researched and designed our fins to take advantage of the laws of nature and physics. Not to mention common sense.
Force Fin swimming fins utilize the body's strength and put it where it's needed. The human body is built to have more strength when kicking down (during freestyle), than when kicking up. The downward or power phase of the kick emphasizes the powerful quadriceps muscle group at the front and side of the upper leg. The upward, recovery phase uses the weaker hamstrings at the back of the thigh. While still developing both sets of muscles, our blade design assists -- or helps take the load off -- the upward recovery phase that uses the weaker muscles, maximizing energy efficiency.
Open Foot Pocket Design Unlike all other fins, even those with open toe boxes, only FORCE FIN swimming fins are designed to concentrate the force of the blade further back on the foot, using the muscles of the whole leg, not just the lower leg.
Try this simple test to see the difference between how our fins work compared to other brands.
While seated, cross your ankle over your knee, grab your toes and pull them in the direction of the sole of your foot. Do you feel the stretch and tension running from the top of your foot up and along the shin? Those are the primary muscles that other fins work because the fin blade extends from your toes.
Now, grab the foot in both hands - one holding the heel, the other holding the top of the foot - pull again toward the sole of the foot and resist with the leg. The tension has moved up to the upper leg, hasn't it?
Because of their unique design based on human biomechanics, Force Fins and Slim Fins work the larger muscles of the upper leg in addition to the lower leg. These are the muscle groups you need to develop for a strong kick and a better workout.
Patented Blade Design Our fins do not have flat blades like most other brands. Instead the blade curves up or away from the bottom of your foot to provide more resistance on the power or downward (during freestyle) phase of the kick. The blade then snaps back to assist on the recovery. This two-stroke cycle does several things for a swimmer:
The snap of the blade helps increase kicking tempo keeping correct arms-to-legs coordination intact. There's no worry about the kick slowing down unnaturally as with all other fins.
The rebound of the blade during the recovery phase helps bring the legs higher in the water (during free-style), raising the lower body to the surface in the desirable high-in-the-water position, where you encounter less drag and can swim faster and more efficiently.
By kicking against a load that provides for a separate power and recovery cycle as opposed to the traditional power-power cycle of other fins, oxygen depletion is reduced, the legs and body work more aerobically and less anaerobically, and swimmers can maintain their workout efforts for longer periods of time. Independent research has shown less lactic acid buildup (lactic acid is the proof of anaerobic activity) and more oxygen absorption with Force Fins. Flat fins bring on symptoms of fatigue and cramping more quickly.
"The curves and flexibility of our blade design help keep the legs properly
oriented for more efficient power, even as they fatigue.
As you kick down, the blade pushes against the water engaging muscles of the whole leg. The water is pushed behind and through the split in the fin to provide initial forward thrust.
At the end of the downstroke, the fin recoils, setting up to rebound to its original position during the recovery or return kick stroke.
Assited by the rebound, the fin throws and directs water behind, faster than you can kick it with any other fin. The fin's tips fold inward to aid the upward recovery and to prepare your leg for the next downward power stroke.
At the same time, it resets and recovers your leg into position for its next forward kick stroke.
Inspired by Nature Have you ever seen a fast-swimming fish with a blunt or squared-off tail? Neither had we. That's why we patterned our fins after the split-V shape of fish tails that more efficiently channel the water. The other brands of swimming fins still use the cheaper-to-make, straight-across design.
Other fins, flat fins want to go through the water along the path of least resistance, which is sideways! Don't believe it? Hold a flat, heavy object at the surface of the water, let go and watch what happens. It turns on its edge and heads for the bottom. Or, if it's light like a sheet of paper, it will zig-zag or "dish" its way down. Neither action is going to help your kicking. With flat fins - even small or cutoff flat fins - a swimmer is constantly fighting all this twisting and torquing, and any effort spent this way is wasted.
We also noticed that other fins worked basically like boards tied to your feet; they were stiff and inflexible. Again, we took our cue from nature and physics, and we came up with very flexible fins using innovative materials like polyurethane instead of rubber. The curves and flexibility of our blade design help keep the legs properly oriented for more efficient power, even as they fatigue.
FORCE FINS or SLIM FINS? Force Fins are our original design, and being somewhat larger than Slim Fins, they provide a more concentrated leg workout (more resistance). They are a more versatile fin, in that they can be used for other sports, such as snorkeling, SCUBA and float tube fishing. From a swimming perspective, they are a very specific training tool and are excellent for butterfly, "new-wave" breaststroke, and the backstroke dolphin kick.
Slim Fins are narrower than the Force Fin and are specifically designed for pool swimming - especially freestyle - applications. With Slim Fins, the blades don't touch, flip turns are no problem, and high stroke turnover or cadence is easily maintained. Slim Fins can be used either while swimming or in kicking-only drills. They receive the highest recommendations from swimming coaches and professionals, and will do the best job for and are the best choice for most swimmers.
Other swim fin choices: Multi Force are a short bladed swim training fin, with a foot pocket that adjusts to fit
a wide variety of feet, with an added twist. You can add Force Wings to vary the output of your fin, to work harder or faster. You can even fine-tune the Wings to target specific muscles or stroke correction needs. They are great for reconditioning, lap swimming and threshold training.
HOW ARE THEY MADE? Manufactured in the USA and backed by over 30 years of research and development, Force Fin swimming fins are made of ultraviolet-, abrasion- and chemical-resistant polyurethane and heat-treated for 16 hours at temperatures where other fins melt. This process allows the molecules to cross-link giving the blade its snappy, high-performance characteristics and extreme durability. Unlike other brands, Force Fin swimming fins will not melt on hot pool decks or mark the sides of pools, and should last season after season, even when used daily. We could go on forever describing the unique benefits of using Force Fin swimming fins to improve your swimming. But there's only one way to really find out why our fins are the best swimming fins in the world: try a pair you will be happy!
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Know your site and plant to the existing site conditions.
Is your planting area in the sun or shade, or does it get some of both? Is the soil dry, moist, or wet? Is the soil sandy, loamy, or clay based (not sure? see "Get a soil test" below)? Use one of our native plant guides or the online Native Plant Center to choose plants that will grow and thrive in the conditions in your planting area.
a soil test. For a few dollars, you can have your soil tested to determine the type of soil you have (sand, clay,
loam, etc.), and its pH and fertility status. The lab will also make recommendations for amending
the soil to make it into “average garden soil.” However, it is not necessary to amend the soil for planting native species. By planting to the existing conditions, you won’t need to bring in additional soil, compost or other organic material, fertilizer, or lime. There are a wide variety of plants that will thrive in most conditions, even the driest, poorest soil you can find, or very wet clay soil. If, however, the soil test shows extreme pH – very acidic (pH of less than 5, as it might be for example under oak trees) or very basic (pH 8 or above), your plant choices will be fairly limited. In that case, you might choose to follow the instructions for making the soil more neutral. If the soil is hard, compacted fill dirt brought in during construction, you might want to improve it by adding organic matter and work the ground so that it can more easily be planted. If you alter the site, then select plants suited to the new conditions.
To find a lab that analyses soil samples, try contacting your state or local Cooperative
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American Indian Storytelling
By Jefferson Currie II
Reprinted with permission from the Tar Heel Junior Historian, Spring 2002.
Tar Heel Junior Historian Association, NC Museum of History
"Shhhhhhhh!" Legend has it that Coharie Indian mothers would make that sound when outsiders would approach their village, hoping to quiet their children until the strangers passed. The Coharie were trying to stay on the fringe of European settlement, maintaining anonymity from the larger outside community. The "shhhhhhhh" sound is also the sound of wind whispering through the pine trees of eastern North Carolina. To this day, when the wind blows through the trees, Coharie people hear two things—the wind and their past. This story uses the environment to tell us part of the history of the Coharie people, but the story also has another meaning. When passed down from parent to child to grandchild, this story affirms Coharie cultural identity. It says, "This is who we are."
In American Indian communities, people tell legends, folktales, and fables. They tell these stories for many reasons: to recount the history of the people, to tell where they came from, or to relate the exploits of a particular hero. Often stories are told to educate children about cultural morals and values. Stories also help to explain the supernatural and peculiar aspects of animals and the environment.
The stories of an Indian group make that group unique, but stories will be known only as long as they are told. When someone ceases to tell a story, part of the cultural knowledge is gone.
Storytelling also allows people to get to know one another. Cherokee storyteller Freeman Owle says that storytelling is "two-way interaction" between the listener and the storyteller. He says that when the children of today watch television, they get only oneway interaction. "They have no input, they have no identity, they have no place, and they have no one there with them." In American Indian communities, as long as the stories are being told, that identity will exist, that sense of knowing who you are and where you came from.
Tribal history is important to the Haliwa-Saponi Indians in Halifax and Warren counties, and they have a story that tells how the people came to live in an area that they call the Meadows. After the Tuscarora fought a war with the North Carolina colonists in the early 1700s, many of the defeated Tuscarora started moving north to join other Iroquoian tribes in New York. On their way to New York, some of the Tuscarora camped near Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina. With many of their people wounded and sick, and their children crying, the Tuscarora decided not to go north. These people moved to the Meadows, a place where they would be away from the colonists, a place where they could live in peace. Over time, more Indian people moved into the Meadows area, forming what is today the Haliwa-Saponi Tribe. Such stories help children to know who they are and where they came from. The story shows the long history of the people and makes the bonds within the community stronger.
Stories can also teach strength of character, as in the many fables (morality tales using animals) from the Cherokee of western North Carolina. One of these fables, told by Kathi Smith Littlejohn, describes how the opossum lost its tail.
Back many years ago, the opossum had a very beautiful tail, but he loved his tail too much, not noticing that other animals had tails just as beautiful. The other animals didn't like how the opossum acted, so they decided to get rid of his tail. The opossum was chosen to be the lead dancer at the next dance, so he went to the cricket to get his tail made more beautiful. The cricket started to comb the opossum's tail, and the opossum fell asleep. As the opossum slept, the cricket shaved his tail and put a big bow on the end of it, telling the opossum to remove the bow at the dance, and the tail would be beautifully done. When the opossum started dancing, he removed the bow, and all the other animals laughed at what was now a very ugly, bony tail. The opossum was so embarrassed that he rolled over and played dead.
The story above offers a lesson. It indicates that conceitedness is not a good characteristic to have and that it will ham us if it continues. Such stories are told purposely but are often dropped into the middle of a conversation so that a person will not be embarrassed by his or her behavior.
Cherokee stories often discuss spirit beings called the Little People. The Little People, or Nunnehi, are, in the words of Robert Busyhead, protectors. Kathi Smith Littlejohn describes the Nunnehi as being like us but smaller. The Nunnehi help us, but they also play tricks on us, "so you'll laugh and keep young in your heart."
In the Lumbee community in Robeson County, many stories concern the legendary folk hero and outlaw Henry Berry Lowry. Lowry disappeared in 1872, but many stories say that for years after his disappearance, Lowry would often be seen visiting friends or going to funerals. Because no one knows what became of Lowry (although some say he was killed, and some say he just left the area), the stories of his appearances in the community make his legend even more impressive.
Throughout North Carolina's American Indian communities, stories are being told. Passed down from generation to generation, these stories serve to strengthen the bonds within the community. We hope that, through the stories of their elders and their own eyes on the world around them, North Carolina's American Indian people will continue to keep alive the old tales and to create new ones.
At the time of this article's publication, Jefferson Currie worked as an assistant curator at the North Carolina Museum of History.
Eagle Walking Turtle. 1997. Full moon stories: thirteen native American legends. New York: Hyperion Books for Children.
Macfarlan, Allan A. 2001. North American Indian legends. Mineola, N.Y.: Dover Publications.
Schwartz, April, and Tim Tingle. 2004. American Indian story telling protecting, preserving, and sharing the flame. [La Crescenta, Calif.]: Content Management Corp.
1 January 2005 | Currie, Jefferson
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c. 1600, from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, “to be or not to be.”
This is a pretty big one. Google returns 13 million plus hits for it, and snowclone.pl gives 700+ different variations on X, including rent, file, cut, drink, teach, speak, grow, herd, cheat, certify, etc etc. The X slot is very flexible (it’s mainly limited to the class of verbs, but nouns appear in it too), which helps put variants of this snowclone nearly on the order of “X is the new Y”. Literature critics, sports writers, and teenage bloggers alike may employ it, because who doesn’t want to demonstrate familiarity with the Bard?
Hamlet’s original utterance is morose and philosophical, of course. You can’t get much more emo than pondering suicide, considering whether not “to be.” Since X is so semantically flexible, however, modern variants do not recall this feeling of overwhelming responsibility. Of course, a user of the snowclone may wax philosophical on subject X, anyway, depending on how Shakespearean he’s feeling.
This snowclone has migrated to German, as well, as reported by Emmanuel Dammerer: “X oder nicht X” shows landroller (scooter) and auslaufen (to leave or run out) in the X slot. I noticed a lot more reference to “the question” (“To or not to be: that is the question. / Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune…”) in the German instances than the English ones, interestingly, though this may reflect something of the nature of snowclone.pl’s output (it’s hard to rely only on Google results because “or not to” is such a vague phrase) as much as actual usage.
Edited to add: This snowclone was covered back in October 2005 on Language Log. Arnold Zwicky points out something that I try to keep in mind when considering the instances in print, that a “to X or not (to X)” statement may be a natural contrastive disjunction, and not intended to echo Shakespeare. E.g., in a sentence like “To debride or not to debride is dependent on accurate assessment of the wound and patient condition”, a reference to the Bard is not meant, so though it looks like a snowclone, it isn’t really one.
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The young Roman general Germanicus has just been poisoned by his jealous adoptive father, the emperor Tiberius. On his deathbed, Germanicus asks his friends to avenge his murder and his wife to endure her sorrow bravely. The subject of this, Poussin's first major history painting, comes from the Annales of the Roman historian Tacitus. The event occurred in 19 AD.A key work in Western painting, this tragic picture presents a moral lesson in stoic heroism, seen especially in the restraint and dignity of the mourning soldiers. This painting became the model for countless deathbed scenes for two centuries to come, particularly for Neoclassical art around 1800. Many powerful human themes figure here: death, suffering, injustice, grief, loyalty, and revenge.Poussin drew on Roman antiquity for the form as well as the subject of this painting. The composition, with its shallow spatial arrangement, is based on a Roman sarcophagus relief. Poussin spent most of his life in Rome, where he created a classical style that strongly influenced both French and Italian art.
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Deadly contagious diseases nearly forgotten today in the United States were a constant threat a century ago. In the fall of 1909, Bangor was particularly bothered by scarlet fever and typhoid fever. The city’s reaction, as reported in its two daily newspapers, helps us understand how far we’ve come in the fight against dread diseases.
The Prospect School, which was located on a section of Prospect Street between Harlow and Center that no longer exists, was closed for 10 days after three children came down with mild cases of scarlet fever, reported the Bangor Daily Commercial on Sept. 27. 1909. The children, who attended sub-primary through fifth grades in two rooms, were sent home. The school was fumigated. “No cases have been reported from any other school in the city and there is no danger of an epidemic,” said the newspaper.
The Center Street School was closed and fumigated next after three more cases were found, announced the Commercial on Oct. 18. There were a few other cases of scarlet fever scattered around the city, but there was no epidemic, said the newspaper. The actions of the school board and doctors were taking care of things.
In early November, city authorities announced they also were battling a far more dangerous disease — typhoid fever. Not since the spring of 1904, when hundreds of people were sickened from drinking Penobscot River water and nearly 50 died, had the city seen such an outbreak.
The city’s board of health issued an advisory on both the typhoid and scarlet fever outbreaks reported in the Bangor Daily News on Nov. 4. Except for two instances, all the typhoid cases were confined to one neighborhood, it said. The board was investigating the source, which remained “obscure.”
In the meantime, the board recommended boiling drinking water and rinsing vegetables to be eaten raw under boiling water. Households in which the disease already existed should isolate patients’ dishes, boil their bedding and disinfect their “excreta” with a carbolic acid solution. Since flies spread the disease, they should be kept out of the house. This was back in the days when whole families were quarantined if a member became ill with certain contagious diseases.
Moving on to scarlet fever, the board said all children with sore throats “or … any kind of an eruption on any part of the body” should be taken to a doctor. Measles and chicken pox had similar symptoms to scarlet fever in the early stages.
That afternoon, the Commercial added more details to the rather sketchy health department advisory. About 20 people had been diagnosed with typhoid, said the newspaper. Nearly all of them lived in the area around the school. The board was planning to canvass the neighborhood in an effort to find out what the cases had in common.
Suspicion already surrounded the artesian well at the Longfellow School on Center Street. The school was located where the St. Joseph Hospital emergency department is today. Ironically, the digging of wells was supposed to protect people from typhoid and other dread diseases found in the Penobscot River, which was the city’s official water supply. Some families took their drinking water from the well at the Longfellow School and other wells around the city.
The next day, on Nov. 5, the two newspapers reported that the board had ordered the well closed for testing. Without exception, all of the typhoid victims had drunk water from the well. The infected area included Center Street between Montgomery and Poplar streets, upper Norfolk, Congress and Leighton streets, and upper Broadway. The number of cases might be as high as 30.
The sewage drain leading from the residence of Lawrence Rooney, where the disease first had been diagnosed, was going to be dug up and checked as well as the drain from the school. The Rooney home was located “opposite the Longfellow School.”
The first death, that of Mrs. F. O. Sawyer of Grant Street, was reported five days later. Her husband and little son also were ill. Anxiety was mounting. Several of the cases were critical.
Meanwhile, it had been determined that the schoolhouse drain and a nearby drain, presumably the Rooneys’, were in good condition, although officials still believed the well water was the cause of the outbreak. A rumor that a sewer pipe had been broken when the well was first drilled was unfounded, said the newspapers.
On Nov. 18, it was reported by the Commercial that the epidemic was getting worse. There were now 35 cases of typhoid in the city, mostly in the same area, according to John Goldthwait of the board of health. Many Bangoreans doubtlessly were boiling their water and scalding their raw vegetables.
The scarlet fever scare continued as well. One of the city’s largest elementary schools, the Palm Street School, was closed, said the Commercial on Nov. 18. (Some reports said it was being closed for the second time that fall because of the disease.) The teachers were “discouraged” at this 900-pupil school (soon to be renamed the Abraham Lincoln School) because of all the schoolwork that would have to be made up.
The source of the illness it turned out was a child from the same family from which a younger child had been diagnosed with scarlet fever at the Prospect Street School in September. After being quarantined for 37 days, the family had moved to the Palm Street School’s enrollment area, apparently bringing the disease with them.
Between March 1, 1909, and March 1, 1910, Bangor experienced 36 “mild cases” of scarlet fever and 56 cases of typhoid with three deaths, according to the report of the city’s board of health. There also were 14 “mild cases” of diphtheria. No mention was made of the many people who died of tuberculosis and other contagious diseases or of cancer or heart disease.
The city passed an ordinance to employ doctors to conduct regular medical check-ups of children in the schools to find illnesses before they got out of hand. By adopting such a procedure, Bangor “falls into line with the more important cities in the country,” said the Commercial on Nov. 10.
The exact cause of the typhoid outbreak remained uncertain. State officials failed to find any evidence of typhoid in the well water at the Longfellow School after three tests, it was announced in the Bangor Daily News on Nov. 24. The well would remain closed for the time being, however, to see if there were any more cases in the area. Officials still were convinced the well had been the source of the disease.
An illustrated collection of Wayne E. Reilly’s columns titled “Remembering Bangor: The Queen City Before the Great Fire” is available at bookstores. Comments about this column can be sent to him at firstname.lastname@example.org
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Growing up in Scotland (GUS): the impact of children's early activities on cognitive development summary report
The Growing Up in Scotland study (GUS) is an important longitudinal research project aimed at tracking the lives of a cohort of Scottish children from the early years, through childhood and beyond.
The study is funded by the Scottish Government and carried out by the Scottish Centre for Social Research (ScotCen). Its principal aim is to provide information to support policy-making, but it is also intended to be a broader resource that can be drawn on by academics, voluntary sector organisations and other interested parties.
Focusing initially on a cohort of 5,217 children aged 0-1 years old and a cohort of 2,859 children aged 2-3 years old, the first wave of fieldwork began in April 2005.
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I remember a military type, a friend who served as a Canadian peacekeeper (Infantry) in the Balkans, describing night-vision goggles and mentioning they are loud. After all, it’s imaging equipment and that requires a power source or, in this case, a source of noise. The Dec. 29, 2012 news item on Nanowerk about improved imaging for night vision goggles doesn’t mention noise but hopefully, the problem has been addressed or mitigated (assuming this technology is meant to be worn),
Through some key breakthroughs in flexible semiconductors, electrical and computer engineering Professor Zhenqiang “Jack” Ma has created two imaging technologies that have potential applications beyond the 21st century battlefield.
With $750,000 in support from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR), Ma has developed curved night-vision goggles using germanium nanomembranes.
The Dec. 28, 2012 University of Wisconsin-Madison news release, which originated the news item, describes the Air Force project and another night vision project for the US Department of Defense,
Creating night-vision goggles with a curved surface allows a wider field of view for pilots, but requires highly photosensitive materials with mechanical bendability-the silicon used in conventional image sensors doesn’t cut it.
… Ma’s design employs flexible germanium nanomembranes: a transferrable flexible semiconductor that until now has been too challenging to use in imagers due to a high dark current, the background electrical current that flows through photosensitive materials even when they aren’t exposed to light.
“Because of their higher dark current, the image often comes up much noisier on germanium-based imagers,” says Ma. “We solved that problem.”
Ma’s dark current reduction technology has also been recently licensed to Intel.
In another imaging project, the U.S. Department of Defense has provided Ma with $750,000 in support of development of imagers for military surveillance that span multiple spectra, combining infrared and visible light into a single image.
“The reason they are interested in IR is because visible light can be blocked by clouds, dust, smoke,” says Ma. “IR can go through, so simultaneous visible and IR imaging allows them to see everything.”
Inexpensive silicon makes production of visible light imagers a simple task, but IR relies on materials incompatible with silicon.
The current approach involves a sensor for IR images and a sensor for visible light, combining the two images in post-processing, which requires greater computing power and hardware complexity. Instead, Ma will employ a heterogeneous semiconductor nanomembrane, stacking the two incompatible materials in each pixel of the new imager to layer IR and visible images on top of one another in a single image.
The result will be imagers that can seamlessly shift between IR and visible images, allowing the picture to be richer and more quickly utilized for strategic decisionmaking.
It’s impossible to tell from the description if this particular technology will be worn by foot soldiers or human military personnel but, in the event it will be worn, it does well to remember that it will need a power source. Interestingly, the average soldier already carries a lot of weight in batteries (up to 35 pounds!) as per my May 9, 2012 posting about energy-harvesting textiles and the military.
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Uses of medjool date palms
A medjool date palm has a wide variety of uses among which includes medicine as well as construction of shelter and various transport devices. For many centuries the Arabs have always considered date palms to be very special not only because they provide them with food but they also provide raw materials which can be used for many purposes. We are going to look at some of the uses of date palms particularly medjool date palms;
Medjool date palms in medicine
Scientists in the U.S. have been carrying out extensive research on California dates and they have revealed that medjool date palms can be used for the production of tannins. Tannins are widely used in medicine for treating kidney diseases. Tannins have proven to be effective at fighting notorious viruses such as poliovirus and herpes simplex virus. Tannins also have antibacterial properties which can be used to fight undesired bacterial growth in the GIT. Tannins are also used in medicine as anti-inflammatory agents that treat esophageal and duodenal ulcers.
Medjool date palms for stockfeeds
Date palms can be used as stockfeeds in regions where pastures are difficult to cultivate. Young date palms can be given to camels and goats as stockfeed. Date palm seeds can also be ground to make very nutritive feed for livestock. Even in areas where pastures are plenty date palms can still be given to livestock as they supplement a wide variety of essential nutrients.
Medjool date palms in the manufacturing industry
A Medjool Date palm can be extruded to produce oil that can be used in manufacturing soaps and cosmetics. Date palm seeds can be used as a source of oxalic acid. The sap of date palms can be extracted to make syrup that is used in manufacturing foodstuffs.
Medjool date palms in religion
Date palm leaves are used by Christians during Palm Sunday. Palm leaves have a spiritual significance in Christianity and where used to decorate the path Jesus moved on when entering his home town.
Medjool date palms in construction
Medjool date palms can be used as poles to construct houses while palm leaves are used in making roofs. Date palms are also used in making rafts and fishing boats. Date palms are also used in constructing small bridges as the material is not very durable and can only withstand small weights.
Medjool date palms in making ornaments
Medjool date palms can be used to make decorative ornaments such as baskets, mats, fans, screens and hats.
Medjool date palms can be used for many things and if you want to know more visit www.medjool-dates.com, where all your questions about medjool dates will be answered.GHTime Code(s): nc
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- Sometimes It's Necessary to Gain Weight
- Top 5 Reasons Your Workouts Are Not Working
- Spinal Cord Injury
- Physical Activity and Healthy Eating: The Perfect Combination for Weight Management
- Obesity is a Major Concern for Youth and Adults with Disabilities
- To Weigh or Not to Weigh
- Down Syndrome and Nutrition
- Current injury or disability as a barrier to being more physically active.
- Weight Smart - New Monthly Column!
- Calorie Counting
- Here We Go Again: Another New Year's Resolution to Shed Those Dreadful Pounds!
- Eating Breakfast as a Weight Management Tool
- Setting Goals and Sticking with Them
- Week 2 Video Tip
- Nutrition for Parkinson's Disease
- Reality TV vs. Real Weight Loss
- High Protein? Low Fat? How Do I Know Which One?
- Children with Disabilities and Obesity
- The Efficacy of a 9-Month Treadmill Walking Program on the Exercise Capacity and Weight Reduction for Adolescents with Severe Autism
Body mass index (BMI) is measure of body fat based on height and weight that applies to both adult men and women.
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Sep. 29, 2012 A new study reveals that cognitive therapy over the phone is just as effective as meeting face-to-face. The research was published September 28, in the journal PLoS ONE.
Researchers at the University of Cambridge together with the National Institute for Health Research Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research & Care (NIHR CLAHRC) and NHS Midlands & East also found that providing talking therapy over the phone increases access to psychological therapies for people with common mental disorders and potentially saves the NHS money.
For the study, data from 39,000 patients in seven established Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) services (an initiative which aims to expand the availability of psychological therapies) in the East of England were used to compare Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) delivered face-to-face versus over the phone. For all but an infrequent, identifiable clinical group with more severe illness, therapy over the phone was as effective as face to face, and the cost per session was 36.2% lower.
Patients may be unable to access health services due to transport problems, work commitments and physical disability, among many reasons. So increasing availability of talking therapies over the phone will make mental health services more accessible to patients.
On the back of the study results, NHS Midlands & East has instigated a regional training programme to standardise service delivery and ensure therapists are competent at phone contacts. The training programme has recently been extended into a partnership with a third party organisation.
Professor Peter Jones, Principal Investigator of the study from the University of Cambridge, said: "Providing therapy over the phone will not only help individuals gain much-needed access to mental health treatment, it will provide a more cost effective way of providing these services at a time when everyone is concerned about cutting costs."
Mental health illnesses affect one in four adults in Britain every year. Additionally, the NHS spends more on mental health than it does on cancer, heart disease, stroke and asthma put together (a total of £9.95 billion in 2010-2011), with general practitioners spending more than a third of their time on mental health issues.
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
- Hammond GC, Croudace TJ, Radhakrishnan M, Lafortune L, Watson A, et al. Comparative Effectiveness of Cognitive Therapies Delivered Face-To-Face or Over the Telephone: An Observational Study Using Propensity Methods. PLoS ONE, 2012 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0042916
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
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Gums bleeding? No problem.
The discovery of the Egyptian toothpaste concoction was presented in 2003 at a dental conference in Vienna, where some of the dentists sampled a replication of the ancient blend. "I found that it was not unpleasant," one dentist told the Telegraph. "It was painful on my gums and made them bleed as well, but that's not a bad thing, and afterwards my mouth felt fresh and clean" [source: Zoech].
As we mentioned previously, the Egyptians had a lot of trouble with their teeth, in large part because their bread had grit and sand in it, which wore out their enamel. While they didn't have dentistry, they did make some effort to keep their teeth clean. Archaeologists have found toothpicks buried alongside mummies, apparently placed there so that they could clean food debris from between their teeth in the afterlife. Along with the Babylonians, they're also credited with inventing the first toothbrushes, which were frayed ends of wooden twigs.
But the Egyptians also contributed a innovation to dental hygiene, in the form of toothpaste. Early ingredients included the powder of ox hooves, ashes, burnt eggshells and pumice, which probably made for a less-than-refreshing morning tooth-care ritual [source: Colgate.com]. Archaeologists recently found what appears to be a more advanced toothpaste recipe and how-to-brush guide written on papyrus that dates back to the Roman occupation in the fourth century A.D. The unknown author explains how to mix precise amounts of rock salt, mint, dried iris flower and grains of pepper, to form a "powder for white and perfect teeth" [source: Zoech].
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<urn:uuid:f6f03d25-119c-4138-975e-3d0c44e2dee6>
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http://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/inventions/5-amazing-ancient-egyptian-inventions10.htm
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Timothy and Mavra
The holy martyrs Timothy and Mavra (also spelled Maura) were a newly-married Christian couple who suffered martyrdom in the year 286, under Arianos, the pagan governor of Thebaid, during the reign of Diocletian, in Thebes, Egypt.
Under some accounts Timothy was a priest of the Church, but in most he was a reader. He was married to Mavra, a devout Christian woman from a very pious Christian family. Timothy was known for his great piety and knowledge of the Holy Scriptures. Many times at night after the day’s work, villagers would gather around Timothy where he would read to them from the Scriptures.
After only twenty days of marriage, Timothy was summoned to the pagan governor Arianos, to be brought to trial for his Christian teaching and missionary work. At first, he was asked to surrender all of his sacred books in order for them to be destroyed. Timothy refused, for he knew their value and power. “If a father who loves his children,
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Big Lunar Eclipse
|Play Audio||Download Audio||Join Mailing List|
June 24, 2010: This Saturday morning, June 26th, there's going to be a lunar eclipse—and for many residents of the USA, it's going to be a big one.
The eclipse begins at 3:17 am PDT (10:17 UT) when the Moon enters the sunset-colored shadow of Earth. By 4:38 am PDT (11:38 UT), the moment of greatest eclipse, 54% of the Moon's diameter will be covered. From beginning to end, the event lasts almost three hours.
Although the eclipse is only partial, it will be magnified in size and charm by the "Moon Illusion"--a result of the eclipse occurring close to the horizon from viewing sites in the USA.
For reasons not fully understood by astronomers or psychologists, low-hanging Moons look unnaturally large when they beam through trees, buildings and other foreground objects. In fact, a low Moon is no wider than any other Moon—cameras prove it—but the human brain insists otherwise.
Who are we to argue?
The effect will be particularly strong in western and central parts of the USA and Canada where the Moon will be setting as the eclipse reaches maximum. (Observing tip: Look low and to the west just before dawn.) The fact that the extra size is just an illusion in no way detracts from the beauty.
People in New England and northeastern Canada will justmiss it. The Moon sets shortly before the eclipse begins.
Halfway around the world, observers in India, Japan, and parts of East Asia will experience the same phenomenon. They'll see the eclipse on Saturday evening as the Moon is rising. The Moon Illusion will be fully active as Earth's shadow sweeps across low-hanging lunar terrain.
It almost makes you feel sorry for people living on the dreamy islands of the South Pacific. There the eclipse takes place directly overhead, high in the midnight sky where the Moon Illusion does not work. That's okay. A partial lunar eclipse is a beautiful thing all by itself.
Enjoy the show!
Author: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA
NASA's Solar and Lunar Eclipse home page -- maintained by Fred Espenak of the Goddard Space Flight Center
June 26th Partial Lunar Eclipse -- complete details
Partial Lunar Eclipse Photo Gallery -- Spaceweather.com
Summer Moon Illusion -- Science@NASA
Moonrise and moonset times -- from the US Naval Observatory
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Evaluate an expression.
Syntax Eval (StringExpr) Key StringExpr Any expression that returns a string or a number.
The argument stringexpr must be an expression that is stored in a string. If you pass to the Eval function a string that doesn't contain a numeric expression or a function name but only a simple text string, a run-time error occurs. For example, Eval("Smith") results in an error.
Eval("1 + 1") returns 2.
Eval("1=2") returns False (-1)
Eval("5 * 10") returns 50
strResult = Eval("MY_Function()")
MsgBox strResult 'displays the result of the function
Dim strName As String
strName = "Forms!frmPatients!txtPatientsName"
' Returns the patients name,
' i.e. the same as Msgbox Me!txtPatientsName
In general, if there is a more direct way of evaluating an expression without using Eval() you should use it.
“More people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks, which shows you how good we are at evaluating risk” ~ Bruce Schneier
Access Form References - Evaluating references to controls on forms and subforms.
Nz - Detect a NULL value.
© Copyright SS64.com 1999-2013
Some rights reserved
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According to a national study by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, 40 million Americans over the age of 12 are addicted to substances (alcohol, drugs, nicotine). Another 80 million are "risky substance users"--they use them in a way that threatens health and safety. Given these numbers--and the hope of cutting them down--should drug addiction be treated like a disease?
In order to address the ever-growing problem of addiction and try to establish rehabilitation, experts are weighing in. It's a complex debate: some argue that addiction is a choice while others say it's a disease.
Neuroscientist Marc Lewis--a former drug addict and author of Memoirs of an Addicted Brain--writes that addiction can act "like a disease," reports the Los Angeles Times:
"If you are tuned into the helplessness, the insidious, relentless growth of addiction, if you see addiction as something that takes over one's body, one's mind, maybe one's soul, then the disease model is going to be meaningful to you." The problem with that line of thinking, according to Lewis, is that it comes with the implication that "you can't do anything about it--at least not without help."
Meanwhile, Gil Kerlikowske, the director of the National Drug Control Policy, says that "addictive diseases" should be treated as public health issues--imploring for Americans to stop the stigma associated with addiction, and calling for community-based support programs:
"Our Nation's drug problem should be treated as a public health issue, not just a criminal justice issue. Too many laws and regulations that were established for the purpose of punishing or deterring drug use make no distinction between the person who continues to use drugs and the person who is on the pathway to recovery."
What do you think--should drug addiction be treated like a disease?
More on drugs:
* Well, Here's a Good Reason to NOT Spend Four Hours Smoking Super-Strength Pot
* How Drug Addiction Affects Your Health (and Your Looks): Shocking Before and After Photos
* Cocaine Is Already Scary, But Now It May Also Fry Your Skin
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Related Product Guides
Optical Mirror Mount Basics
An Optical Mirror Mount is a device used in optics research that securely holds a mirror in place while allowing for precision tip and tilt adjustment. Due to the sensitive nature of optics research, optical mirror mounts are typically mounted to an optical table to provide a high level of vibration isolation. Mirror mounts can be adjusted by hand with a micrometer head or adjustment screw, and can be motorized for automation by using a linear actuator. Adjustment mechanisms include Kinematic, Gimbal, and Flexure.
Optical Mirror Mount Resources
Use the right side bar to find links to mirror mount application notes and technical notes
Mirror Mount Design Considerations
Below we will cover many of the considerations that go into the design of an advanced optical mirror mount. The adjustment mechanism is a good place to start.
Mirror Mount Adjustment Mechanisms
Kinematic Mirror Mounts
Kinematic mirror mounts are, by far, the most common type, owing to excellent stability and relatively low cost. The kinematic mechanism is the best for providing the required performance for the vast majority of experiments performed in labs today. It does, however, have drawbacks: cross-coupled adjustment, beam translation and limited angular travel. The location and orientation of the axes of rotation are usually behind the optic and non-stationary. This causes the axes move with every adjustment such that they do not stay orthogonal to the optical axis, so cross-coupled motion occurs during adjustment. Secondly, since the axes of rotation are behind the optic when adjustments are made, both rotation and translation of the optic occur. Finally, the angular travel range of most kinematic mounts does not exceed +/- 10 degrees due to the physical limitation of the springs and adjustment screws used. The limitations in the kinematic mount incentivized the creation of the gimbal mechanism which overcame these problems.Figure 1Kinematic Constraints
Any optical mirror mounts position can be defined uniquely in terms of six independent coordinates - three translations and three rotations, with respect to some arbitrary fixed coordinate system. A mirror mount is said to be kinematic when the number of degrees of freedom (axes of free motion) and the number of physical constraints applied to the mount total six. This is equivalent to saying that any physical constraints applied are independent (non-redundant). A kinematic optical mount, therefore, has six independent constraints.
The most common type of kinematic mount is the cone, groove, and flat mount schematically illustrated in Figure 1. Consider the optic as being attached to the coordinate system of the three spheres in the figure and its corresponding mount having the cone, vee, and flat. If the optic is first seated in the cone, three degrees of freedom (x, y, and z translations) are eliminated without redundancy.
At this point, the optic can still rotate freely about all axes. Next, the second sphere is seated in the groove, which is aligned towards the cone. This constrains or eliminates two more degrees of freedom, pitch and yaw, as shown in the Figure. The alignment of the groove towards the cone is important in order not to over-constrain one or more of the translation degrees of freedom. Finally, there is only one degree of freedom left to constrain, roll about the x-axis. This is accomplished by seating the third sphere on the flat. Six non-redundant constraints make this a kinematic mount.
The advantages of a kinematic mount are: increased stability, distortion free optical mounting and, in the case of a kinematic base, removable and repeatable re-positioning. It is easy to imagine with the mount of Figure 1, that the plate containing the cone, vee, and flat could thermally expand at a different rate than the optic without introducing any distorting load to the optic. The mount would simply expand about the ball and cone. The second and third balls would both slide on the groove and flat, respectively. If, on the other hand, the mount were non-kinematic (for example, if the groove were rotated 90° about z) as the plate expanded or contracted along the x direction, it would tend to warp the optic since the second ball could no longer slide in the groove.
It is common to make kinematic mounts adjustable, by attaching a screw drive to the second and third spheres (Figure 1) to provide angular adjustment of the optic with respect to the base. This is the basis of design for Newports Kinematic Mirror Mounts. One drawback to this type of mount is the location and orientation of the axes of rotation of the mount. They are usually behind the optic and non-stationary. That is to say that the axes move with every adjustment. This introduces two problems that must be overcome. First, since the axes move, they do not stay orthogonal to the optical axis, so cross-coupled motion occurs during adjustment. Rotation purely in one of the directions orthogonal to the optical axis requires adjusting both axes of the kinematic mount. Secondly, since the axes of rotation are behind the optic when adjustments are made, both rotation and translation of the optic occur. Use of a gimbal mount eliminates both of these problems.Figure 2Gimbal Mounting
A gimbal mechanism has axes of rotation which are orthogonal and fixed in space. The rotation axes are made to intersect at the center of the front surface of the optic in the mount which not only allows for non-coupled rotation adjustment of the optic, it also eliminates beam translation as shown in Figure 2. Gimbal mounts also have travel ranges that are significantly larger than their kinematic counterparts. Since the rotation is typically guided by an axel, many gimbal designs have a full 360 degrees of angular travel in both axes. Mounts using the gimbal mechanism, however, tend to be larger more expensive. As a result, hybrid designs combining the best attributes of kinematic and gimbal mechanisms have immerged which have the stability and lower cost of a kinematic design and avoid cross coupling and beam translation.
A flexure is a positioning mechanism which uses the elastic deformation of a material to provide angular translation. Mounts which use a flexure mechanism benefit from compact size and resistance to shock owing to welded unibody construction. For this reason, flexure mounts are popular for incorporation into instrumentation and other such systems. The flexure mount has limited travel range, typically half that of a kinematic mount and is more susceptible alignment drift from temperature fluctuations.
Mirror Mount Drive Types
Mirror mounts with Allen-Key drives are used for set-and-forget applications where few or no follow-up adjustments are made. The lack of a knob helps to discourage unwanted tampering. Allen key adjusters can be adjusted in tight locations where a persons hand is too large to fit and can also be offered with typically lockable versions.
Mirror mounts with Knob drives should be selected for applications where frequent adjustments will be made. Keep in mind that the diameter of a knob affects adjustment sensitivity. Larger diameter knobs, provide better sensitivity but also take up more space. We also offer Actuator Knobs that can be attached to an Allen-Key drive to make it knob adjustable.
Micrometer Head Drive
Mirror mounts with Micrometer Head drives should be selected for applications where exact position needs to be recorded and referenced. Although micrometers have position scales on their spindles, their thread pitch is only 51 TPI, half that of a standard adjustment screw limiting their sensitivity.
Linear Actuator Drive
Mirror mounts with Motorized Linear Actuators can be used for automated positioning, and adjusments where reaching an allen-key or knob may be difficult. You may also be able to make more precise adjustments when using a linear actuator with a motion controller.
Mirror Mounts Without the Drive Included
We offer optical mirror mounts with the drive not included so you can add your own drive, change drives as required, or add one of our linear actuators to convert it to a motorized optical mount.
Mirror Mirror Material Characteristics
Stiffness is a measure of the amount of stress (force/area) required to cause a given amount of strain (normalized deformation). Stress and strain are proportional and related by the equation σ = Eε, where σ and ε are stress and strain respectively and E is Youngs Modulus, which is material dependent. A material is stiffer for larger values of E and more compliant for smaller values. For example, stainless steel is approximately three times stiffer than that of aluminum (see table). Aluminum, on the other hand, is 1.3 times more compliant than brass. Specific stiffness (Youngs Modulus divided by the material density) is important when settling time or vibration immunity is an issue. Components with the same shape and specific stiffness will have the same fundamental resonant frequencies. Higher specific stiffness results in higher resonant frequencies, faster settling times, and a reduction in vibration disturbances.
Temperature changes cause size and shape changes in a mounting component. The amount of size and shape change is dependent on the size of the component, the amount of temperature change, and the material used. The equation relating dimensional change to temperature change is ΔL = αLΔT where α is the material dependent coefficient of thermal expansion. The thermal expansion of stainless steel is roughly half that of aluminum. This can be important when the mounting component is being used in an application requiring interferometric stability. Note that aluminum is the best choice when temperature change across the component is non-uniform. The thermal conductivity of aluminum is ten times greater than that of stainless steel so heat can be dissipated more readily, thus reducing the magnitude of the thermal gradients and distortion. The distortion caused by non-uniform temperature changes is proportional to the coefficient of thermal expansion divided by the coefficient of thermal conductivity. Thus, aluminum distorts on the order of three times less than stainless steel in a non-uniform temperature environment.
|Stiffness, k (MPSI)
|Density, ρ (lb/in.3)
|Specific Stiffness, k/ρ (M in.)
|Coefficient of Thermal Expansion, α (µ in./in./°F)
|Coefficient of Thermal Conduction, c (BTU/hr-ft-°F)
|Relative Thermal Distortion (α/c)
Material instability is the change of physical dimension with time so called cold flow or creep. For aluminum and stainless steel, the period of time required to see this creep may be on the order of months or years.
Usually, the mechanical design of the component contributes much more to the instability than does the choice of material. For example, the lubrication on the micrometers threads can begin to migrate over time causing a slight shift in the micrometer.
Summary of Materials Evaluation
Each of the materials used in positioning components have their own unique set of advantages and disadvantages. Unfortunately, a universal material that meets all requirements does not exist. We summarize here the characteristics of the materials outlined in the chart.
Aluminum: Aluminum is a lightweight material, resistant to cold flow or creep, with good stiffness-to-weight ratio. It has a relatively high coefficient of thermal expansion, but it also has a high thermal conductivity, making it a good choice in applications where there will be thermal gradients or where rapid acclimatization to temperature changes is required. Aluminum is fast machining, cost effective, and widely used in component structures. Aluminum is non-rusting and generally corrosion-resistant in a laboratory environment, even when the surface is unprotected. It has an excellent finish when anodized. However, anodized surfaces are highly porous, making them unsuitable for use in high vacuum. Vacuum applications require the use of unfinished aluminum surfaces.
Stainless Steel: Steel has a high modulus of elasticity, giving it very good stiffness (nearly three times that of aluminum), and good material stability. It also has about half the thermal expansion of aluminum, making it an excellent choice in typical laboratory environments where there are uniform changes in temperature. Machining of steel is much slower than aluminum, making steel components considerably more expensive. Corrosion of steel is a serious problem. Stainless steel alloys avoid the corrosion problems of other steels. Stainless steel is well suited to high vacuum applications, but the design of the component must also incorporate other factors.
Anodized aluminum provides excellent corrosion resistance and a good finish. Black is the color most often used on optical mounts. The anodized surface is highly porous. For this reason, only unanodized aluminum is used in high vacuum applications. However, this porosity results in a matte surface that does not specularly reflect light, adding to its value in optical mounts. Anodizing hardens the surface; improving scratch and wear resistance.
Steel parts are generally plated or painted. Platings are often chrome, nickel, rhodium, or cadmium. A black oxide finish is often used on screws and mounting hardware to prevent rust. Painted components should be avoided. Paint will eventually flake off, contaminating the optics or the moving parts of the positioner.
Stainless steel alloys avoid the rust problems of other steels. They are very clean materials that do not require special surface protection. A glass-bead blasted surface will have a dull finish that does not specularly reflect.
Many optical mirror mounts can be vacuum prepared. Please look for the Vacuum Compatible statement on the specific product page. Vacuum Compatible products are prepared for 10-6 Torr. If you require products specially prepared for 10-3 Torr, or greater than 10-6 Torr environments, please contact our technical staff for a quotation.
Preparation for vacuum environments depends on the vacuum you wish to maintain. The word vacuum does not adequately specify the conditions for a specific application. Acceptable levels of outgassing, mass loss and volatile condensable materials can vary with the application, pumping capacity, temperature, etc. It is, therefore, essential that the specific requirements be reviewed and understood prior to placing any component in a vacuum environment.
10-3 Torr environments: In general terms, a vacuum of 10-3 Torr requires minimal change to many of our products with the exception of possible lubricants. In this environment, it is not uncommon to use anodized parts and limited use of plastics should not pose any problems.
10-6 Torr environments: Components used in a vacuum of 10-6 Torr are specially prepared for this environment. Many of the materials used in standard components will outgas in a high vacuum, resulting in a virtual leak, which limits the ability to maintain a high vacuum. Highly porous anodized aluminum surfaces can trap large amounts of air molecules, resulting in significant outgassing. For those components, within this catalog, specified as Vacuum Compatible we perform the following in preparation:
Products with anodized aluminum are created without anodize. As such, we only use unanodized aluminum, stainless steel or equivalent materials. Plastic knobs and handles are either removed or replaced (at additional cost) with high vacuum materials such as steel or Delrin. In some cases, you may choose to maintain the plastic knob due to incremental costs associated with producing an alternative design. In spite of plastics permeability it is common to use plastics in vacuum systems because of their insulating properties and price. Holes not tapped through are vented; or special vented hardware is used. Hardware and lubricants are changed to special vacuum compatible materials. Finished units are completely cleaned and sealed in appropriate packaging material. Additional vacuum preparation steps, or preparation for vacuums of greater than 10-6, require special handling, including baking the product in a vacuum. If you have requirements at this level, please contact our technical staff to discuss the options available and, if appropriate, pricing.
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Asia (Roman province)
The Roman province of Asia or Asiana (Greek: Ασιανή), in Byzantine times called Phrygia, was an administrative unit added to the late Republic. It was a Senatorial province governed by a proconsul. The arrangement was unchanged in the reorganization of the Roman Empire in 211.
Asia province originally consisted of Mysia, the Troad, Aeolis, Lydia, Ionia, Caria, and the land corridor through Pisidia to Pamphylia. Aegean islands except Crete, were part of the Insulae (province) of Asiana. Part of Phrygia was given to Mithridates V Euergetes before it was reclaimed as part of the province in 116 BC. Lycaonia was added before 100 BC while the area around Cibyra was added in 82 BC. The southeast region of Asia province was later reassigned to the province of Cilicia. During, the empire, Asia province was bounded by Bithynia to the north, Lycia to the south, and Galatia to the east.
Antiochus III the Great had to give up Asia when the Romans crushed his army at the historic battle of Magnesia, in 190 BC. After the Treaty of Apamea (188 BC), the entire territory was surrendered to Rome and placed under the control of a client king at Pergamum.
With no apparent heir, Attalus III of Pergamum having been a close ally of Rome, chose to bequeath his kingdom to Rome. Upon Attalus’s passing in 133 BC, Manius Aquillius formally established the region as Asia province. The bequest of the Attalid kingdom to Rome presented serious implications for neighboring territories. It was during this period of time that Pontus rose in status under the rule of Mithridates VI. He would prove to be a formidable foe to Rome’s success in Asia province and beyond.
Rome had always been very reluctant to involve itself in matters to the east. It typically relied on allies to arbitrate in the case of a conflict. Very rarely would Rome send delegations to the east, much less have a strong governmental presence. This apathy did not change much even after the gift from Attalus in 133 BC. In fact, parts of the Pergamene kingdom were voluntarily relinquished to different nations. For example, Great Phrygia was given to Mithridates V of Pontus.
While the Senate was hesitant in involving itself in Asian affairs, others had no such reluctance. A law passed by Gaius Gracchus in 123 BC gave the right to collect taxes in Asia to members of the equestrian order. The privilege of collecting taxes was almost certainly exploited by individuals from the Republic. In case a community was unable to pay taxes, they borrowed from Roman lenders but at exorbitant rates. This more often than not resulted in default on said loans and consequently led Roman lenders to seize the borrower’s land, their last remaining asset of value. In this way and by outright purchase, Romans dispersed throughout Asia province.
Mithridates and Sulla
By 88 BC, Mithridates VI of Pontus had conquered virtually all of Asia. Capitalizing on the hatred of corrupt Roman practices, Mithridates instigated a mass revolt against Rome, ordering the slaughter of all Romans and Italians in the province. Contemporary estimates of casualties ranged from 80,000 up to 150,000. Three years later, Lucius Cornelius Sulla defeated Mithridates in the First Mithridatic War and in 85 BC reorganized the province into eleven assize districts, each central to a number of smaller, subordinate cities. These assize centers, which developed into the Roman dioceses, included Ephesus, Pergamum - the old Attalid capital, Smyrna, Adramyttium, Cyzicus, Synnada, Apamea, Miletus, and Halicarnassus. The first three cities - Ephesus, Pergamum, and Smyrna - competed to be the dominant city-state in Asia province. Age-old inter-city rivalry continued to inhibit any sort of progress towards provincial unity.
Military presence
Other than to quell occasional revolts, there was minimal military presence in Asia province, until forces led by Sulla set forth in their campaign against Mithridates VI. In fact, Asia province was unique in that it was one of the few ungarrisoned provinces of the empire. While no full legions were ever stationed inside the province, that is not to say that there was no military presence whatsoever. Legionary detachments were present in the Phrygian cities of Apamea and Amorium. Auxiliary cohorts were stationed in Phrygian Eumeneia while smaller groups of soldiers regularly patrolled the mountainous regions. High military presence in rural regions around 3rd century AD caused great civil unrest in the province.
After Augustus came to power, he established a proconsulship for the province of Asia, embracing the regions of Mysia, Lydia, Caria, and Phrygia. The proconsul spent much of his year-long term traveling throughout the province hearing cases and conducting other judicial business at each of the assize centers. Rome’s transition from the Republic to the early Empire saw an important change in the role of existing provincial cities, which evolved from autonomous city-states to Imperial administrative centers. The beginning of the principate of Augustus also signaled the rise of new cities in Mysia, Lydia and Phrygia. The province grew to be an elaborate system of self-governing cities, each responsible for its own economics, taxes, and law in its territory. The reign of Augustus further signaled the start of urbanization of Asia province, as public building became the defining characteristic of a city.
Emperor worship
Emperor worship was prevalent in provincial communities during the Roman empire. Soon after Augustus came to power, temples erected in his honor sprang up across Asia province. The establishment of provincial centers of emperor worship further spawned local cults. These sites served as models followed by other provinces throughout the empire. Emperor worship served as a way for subjects of Asia province to come to terms with imperial rule within the framework of their communities. Religious practices were very much a public affair and involved citizens in all its aspects including prayer, sacrifice, and processions. Rituals held in honor of a particular emperor frequently outnumbered those of other gods. No other cult matched the imperial cult in terms of dispersion and commonality.
The 3rd century AD marked a serious decline in Asia province stemming in part from epidemic disease, beginning with the Antonine plague, the indiscipline of local soldiers and also the diminishing instances of voluntary civic generosity. The Gothic invasions of the 250s and 260s, part of the Crisis of the Third Century, contributed to failing feelings of security. Furthermore, as political and strategic emphasis shifted away from Asia province, it lost much of its former prominence.
In the 4th century, Diocletian divided Asia province into seven smaller provinces. During the 5th century and, until the mid-sixth century the cities and provinces western Anatolia experienced an economic renaissance. But after the after the great plague of 543 many cities towards the interior of the province declined to the point where they were indistinguishable from common villages by the time of the Persian and Arab invasions of the 7th century. On the other hand, leading cities from the early empire including Ephesus, Sardis, and Aphrodisias retained much of their former glory and came to serve as the new provincial capitals. Asia remained a center of Roman and Hellenistic culture in the east for centuries. The territory remained part of the Byzantine Empire until the end of the 13th century.
- "Asia, Roman province." The Oxford Classical Dictionary. 3rd ed. 1996: p. 189-90
- The Oxford Classical Dictionary. pp. 189f
- Mitchell, Stephen. Anatolia. Volume 1. (New York: Oxford University Press), 1993. p. 29
- Anatolia. p. 29
- Anatolia p. 30
- Appian, History of Rome: The Mithridatic Wars.
- Anatolia p. 121
- Anatolia p. 198
- Anatolia p. 100
- Anatolia p. 112
See also
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Roman Asia|
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Branding Toolbox. A short guide to "new" branding...
What the heck is it all about? You gotta read. This section reflects our answers to all these questions we hear over and over again, every day. So, let's say, we've got tired of repeating and we've decided to have all the answers online for everybody to read. And if you want them in your hands, we have them all printed as well in a little booklet that you can receive by the snail mail (request here) or you can download it (click here) as a PDF. That's it. All you ever wanted to know about branding, short and sweet...
Ivan Pavlov won a Nobel Prize for his research into branding in 1904.
Remember the story?
Day after day, Pavlov would ring a bell as he rubbed meat paste onto the tongue of a dog. The dog soon began to associate the taste of the meat with the sound of the bell until salivation became the dog's conditioned response. In psychological terms, this is known as "implanting an associative memory." In other words, it's "branding" in all its glory.
There are three keys to implanting an associative memory into the minds of your customers:
Consistency: Pavlov never offered food without ringing the bell, and he never rang the bell without offering food.
Frequency: Pavlov did it day after day after day.
Anchoring: When implanting an associative memory, the new and unknown element (the bell) has to be associated with a memory that is already anchored in the mind (the taste of meat). Frequency and consistency create "branding" only when your message is tied to an established emotional anchor. Pavlov's branding campaign was anchored to the dog's love for the taste of meat. If the dog did not love meat, the frequent and consistent ringing of the bell would have produced no response other than to irritate the dog.
The public is your dog.
If you desire a specific response from it, you must tie your identity to an emotional anchor that is already known to elicit the desired response. If you make such an association with consistency and frequency, branding will occur.
In essence, if advertising is "getting your name out", then branding is "attaching something to your name." A brand is the sum of all the mental associations, good and bad, that are triggered by a name. What does your name stand for in the mind of the public? What associations are triggered by your name? Getting your name out isn't worth much when there's no mental image attached to your name.
Branding is much more than name recognition, a color scheme, a logo and a slogan. Brand essence is the complex mental image summoned by a name, even when that name is heard silently in the mind. Unlike a mere visual image, a mental image is a complex composite of sight, sound, smell, taste, touch, opinion and mood. Brand essence is everything a brand stands for in the heart of the customer.
What does your brand stand for in the heart of your customer?
Don't mistake company size for brand strength. Wal-Mart and Dell are big, profitable companies, but neither is a particularly strong brand. Low prices and quick delivery measure only operational excellence; they tell us nothing about the heart of the company or the devotion of its customers. Conversely, Starbucks and Apple are smaller companies but bigger brands.
The best branding campaign ripples outward from a company's core culture and nonnegotiable standards. This brand essence is then transmitted through every contact point with the customer: advertising, merchandising, décor, staffing and policies. The degree to which your corporate values resonate in the heart of your customer is the measurement of the strength of your brand.
Your brand must be anchored to core values buried deep in the heart of your customer. To what values is your brand linked? The powerful Harley-Davidson brand wasn't built on the motorcycle itself, but on the values of nonconformity and the freedom of the open road. Owning a Harley is a statement of rebelliousness and self-determination. It is a magical talisman that grants you entrance to the Island of Pirates. Has there ever been a boy who didn't dream of being a pirate?
Would you like to know what your brand stands for in the heart of your customer? Are you sure? The truth can be painful... next >>
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Do you want to learn something new, but don’t have the time to attend expensive classes? Whether you’re interested in picking up a new language, refreshing your grammar skills or simply curious about the world around you, the following educational apps will expand your mind without increasing your budget.
Grammar Up – Eknath Kadam
Good communication is the key to many careers and relationships. Improve both grammar and vocabulary with the Grammar Up app for iPad and iPhone. The full version costs $4.99 and features a series of multiple-choice quizzes with over 1,800 questions covering categories such as verb tense, word choice and conditionals. A free version is also available that lets you track your progress.
Paper – FiftyThree
Improve your drawing skills and release your inner artist with Paper. Winner of the 2012 Apple Design Awards for Best iPad app, Paper was downloaded 1.5 million times within the first two weeks of its release. So, what’s the hype about? Paper’s clean design, convenient tools and filters help both designers and beginners create beautiful works of art. Email or print your final creations, or use them for storyboarding or presentations. The basic drawing function is free, but additional color or brush tools must be purchased for $1 or $2 each.
Star Walk Astronomy – Vito Technology Inc.
Where can you use the latest science app? Just look up! Download the Star Walk app for iPad, point your device toward the sky and discover stars, constellations and satellites in real time. Star Walk also won an Apple Design Award, and allows users to identify over 200,000 celestial bodies with extensive information about stars and constellations. This app includes a calendar to keep you informed of upcoming cosmic events, and the Time Machine feature can be used to see star maps for years into the future or at historic moments of the past. For just $4.99, this visually stunning app is perfect for astronomy students or people who simply enjoy the night sky.
Babbel Language Learning – Babbel
One way to learn a foreign language is to continually practice reading, writing and speaking as often as you can. If you want to learn a language, a good mobile app will allow you to practice on the go. Free iPhone apps from Babbel come in seven languages: German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portugese, Swedish and English. These apps are aimed to boost your vocabulary, and provide access to 3000 words used in sample sentences and pronounced by a native speaker. Babbel’s apps compliment their web-based courses, but you don’t need to be a course subscriber to use the apps.
WikiHow – wikiHow, Inc.
Finally, if you’re unable to decide on one new skill to acquire, why not learn how to do just about everything? WikiHow contains 140,000 different how-to articles that can solve many of your DIY project questions—from knitting a scarf to replacing a flat tire. Simply type your query’s keywords into the app, and you’ll receive an article on your topic that includes descriptive steps with photos or videos, a list of supplies needed, warnings and related wikiHow articles for further investigation. This app is free for both Android and iPhone, and the iOS version also contains a “Survival Kit” with articles inspired by real-life emergency situations including self-defense, wilderness survival, home emergencies and first aid.
These educational apps are perfect for learning fun and useful information on the go. Give one a try today!
Photo credit: iStockphoto/wragg
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Located just north of the equator, Malaysia borders Thailand, Indonesia and Brunei, and has maritime boundaries with Indonesia, Singapore and the Philippines.
Both West (or Peninsular) Malaysia (area 131,794 square km) and East Malaysia (198,000 square km) consist of rugged forested mountainous interiors descending to coastal plains. The total area is about half that of New South Wales. Malaysia's highest peak is Mount Kinabalu at 4,100 meters in East Malaysia. Malaysia's climate is hot (up to 34°C) and humid (2 to 4 meters of rain annually).
According to the Department of Statistics Malaysia, Malaysia's population was 28.25 million as of July 2010. The country's ethnic groups include Malay (55 per cent), indigenous (11.9 per cent), ethnic Chinese (24.4 per cent), ethnic Indians (7.4 per cent) and others (1.3 per cent). Sunni Islam is the predominant religion but a range of religions are represented, including Buddhism, Hinduism and Christianity. The official language is Bahasa Malaysia (Malay) but English is widely used, as are Chinese and Tamil dialects within those communities.
The Federation of Malaya was established on 31 August 1957. On 16 September 1963 the Federation was enlarged by the accession of Singapore, Sabah (formerly British North Borneo) and Sarawak. The name 'Malaysia' was adopted from that date. Singapore left the Federation on 9 August 1965.
Malaysia is a federal constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary democracy. The Head of State is the Yang di-Pertuan Agong (King). The Head of Government is the Prime Minister, who is also the head of the Cabinet.
Malaysia's 13 states are: Johor, Kedah, Kelantan, Melaka, Negeri Sembilan, Pahang, Perak, Perlis, Pulau Pinang, Sabah, Sarawak, Selangor and Terengganu. There are three Federal Territories: Labuan, Putrajaya and Wilayah Persekutuan – the capital, Kuala Lumpur, is located in Wilayah Persekutuan. Nine of the 13 states have hereditary rulers (eight Sultans and one Rajah) who share the position of King on a five-year rotating basis. The King's functions are largely ceremonial since constitutional amendments in 1993 and 1994.
Legislative power is divided between federal (bicameral) and state (unicameral) legislatures. The Federal Parliament comprises the House of Representatives (Dewan Rakyat) and the Senate (Dewan Negara). The House of Representatives has 222 members elected for five-year terms in single-seat constituencies. The Senate consists of 26 members elected by State Legislative Assemblies and 44 appointed by the King on the advice of the Prime Minister. The tenure of office is a three-year term for a maximum of two terms. States have their own elected Legislative Assemblies. Federal and state elections are generally held concurrently, with the exception of state elections in Sarawak, which are held separately.
The governing Barisan Nasional (National Front) coalition comprises the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), the Malaysian Chinese Association, the Malaysian Indian Congress, plus a number of other parties including some based in East Malaysia. This coalition, in which UMNO is the dominant voice, has been in power at the federal level in one form or another since the first elected government in 1955.
The Barisan Nasional Government is led by Prime Minister Dato' Sri Najib Razak, who succeeded former Prime Minister Tun Abdullah Badawi on 3 April 2009.
Barisan Nasional was returned to power with a reduced majority of 133 seats in the General Election on 5 May 2013, down from the 140 seats won in the 2008 Elections. The Opposition Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Pact) alliance won 89 seats.
Malaysia's foreign policy
The principles of national sovereignty and mutual respect for territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, and non-interference in domestic affairs of other countries are central tenets of Malaysia's foreign policy. This is reflected in Malaysia's membership of the United Nations and prominent roles in organisations such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which Malaysia chaired from 2003 to March 2008, and the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which Malaysia chaired from 2003 to 2006.
Malaysia was one of ASEAN's five original members (founded in 1967).
Since independence in 1957, Malaysia has been transformed from a commodity-based economy focusing on rubber and tin to one of the world's largest producers of electronic and electrical products. Malaysia is a significant trading nation as measured by trade as a share of gross domestic product (GDP), with its goods and services exports amounting to around 100 per cent of GDP.
According to the Malaysian Government, manufactured goods made up 67 per cent of Malaysia’s exports in 2012, with electronic and electrical products comprising 32.9 per cent of the value of total merchandise exports for the year.
Malaysia is also the world's second-largest exporter of palm oil and one of the region's major oil and gas exporters.
According to key development indicators, Malaysia is now a high middle-income, export-oriented economy, with per capita GDP (in current prices) of US$10,085 in 2012, life expectancy of 74 years and gross primary school enrolment of 100 per cent of the school-age population.
Malaysia's economic development policies are enunciated in a number of guiding documents which include: Vision 2020; the National Mission (2006-2020); the Tenth Malaysia Plan (2011-2015); the New Economic Model (2010); and the Economic Transformation Program (2010).
Vision 2020, launched in 1991, sets out Malaysia's plan to achieve developed-economy status by 2020. Specific targets include increasing real GDP eightfold between 1990 and 2020 – translating to average annual growth of seven per cent – and increasing per capita income by a factor of four.
The National Mission provides a framework for Malaysia to achieve Vision 2020. It builds on previous policies including the National Vision Policy (introduced in 2001), the National Development Policy (introduced in 1991) and the New Economic Policy (introduced in 1970). These policies were designed to eradicate poverty and advance the economic position of Bumiputeras ('sons of the soil' – mainly Malays but also other indigenous groups). While the Government's target of 30 per cent Bumiputera ownership of capital has not been achieved (and the timeline has been extended to 2020), there has been a significant shift in the balance of ownership, coinciding with the emergence of an influential new class of Bumiputera entrepreneurs.
The Tenth Malaysia Plan (2011-2015) is the Malaysian Government's economic blueprint. The plan places an emphasis on becoming a high-income nation, inclusiveness and sustainability.
Since his appointment in April 2009, Prime Minister Najib has set out a number of reforms aimed at liberalising the economy, especially the services sector. Service sector liberalisation has included the removal of the 30 per cent Bumiputera equity ownership requirement in 27 service sub-sectors, issuance of new foreign commercial banking and insurance licenses, and the removal of the 30 per cent Bumiputera equity requirement for publicly listed companies. In October 2010, Prime Minister Najib also launched an Economic Transformation Program, which proposes to facilitate private-public partnership projects that would promote Malaysia's economic growth. In December 2010, the National Economic Advisory Council published the concluding part of two papers on a New Economic Model for Malaysia, presenting an overall framework for transforming Malaysia from a middle income to an advanced nation by 2020.
Recent economic performance and outlook
Malaysia's economy is the third-largest in South-East Asia behind Indonesia and Thailand. Real GDP growth in 2012 was 5.6 per cent, following growth in 2011 of 5 per cent.
Malaysia continues to have a large trade surplus (with continuous monthly trade surpluses since November 1997). Inflation was 3.2 per cent in 2011 and 1.6 per cent for 2012.
Malaysia has run a budget deficit since 1998. Following a RM 60 billion ($25 billion) stimulus package in response to the global economic crisis, the budget deficit increased to 7.4 per cent of GDP in 2009. There was a budget deficit of 4.5 per cent of GDP in 2012.
Malaysia's trade and foreign investment policy
Malaysia is a strong supporter of the multilateral trading system, in particular the World Trade Organization. Malaysia participates actively in regional economic arrangements such as the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). Malaysia is also a member of the Cairns Group – which advocates more liberalised global trade in agriculture. Malaysia's major trading partners are the United States, Singapore, Japan and China.
Malaysia has concluded and implemented bilateral FTAs with Australia, Japan, Pakistan, New Zealand, Chile and India. ASEAN has concluded FTAs with China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, India and New Zealand. Malaysia is also pursuing bilateral FTA negotiations with the European Union and Turkey. Malaysia and Australia are negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, along with the United States, New Zealand, Singapore, Brunei, Peru, Vietnam, Chile, Canada, Japan and Mexico. Malaysia is also part of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), an ASEAN centered proposal for a regional free trade area.
Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) has played a large part in Malaysia's development. Over the past decade, Malaysia attracted annual net FDI inflows averaging 3 per cent of GDP, compared with 6.4 per cent in the 1990s. The Government has sought to channel investment into export-oriented manufacturing and capital-intensive and high technology industries.
In the 19th century Malays participated in the pearling industry off Australia's north coast. William Light, the son of Francis Light (who acquired Penang on behalf of the British East India Company in 1786), planned the city of Adelaide in 1837. Today, Georgetown in Penang and Adelaide commemorate this link as sister cities.
Australian troops have fought on a number of occasions alongside Malaysians. This included during the Malayan Campaign of World War II, as part of the Commonwealth force that defeated the Malayan Communist insurgency during the Malayan Emergency (1950-60) and during the period of Confrontation (1963-66).
Australia was closely associated with the establishment of the Federation of Malaya in 1957 and sponsored Malaya's application for membership of the United Nations. Sir William McKell, a former Governor-General of Australia, together with four other Commonwealth jurists, helped draft the nation's Constitution. Australia also took a close and positive interest in the formation of Malaysia.
Malaysia celebrated the 50th anniversary of its independence in 2007. The then Governor-General, His Excellency Major General Michael Jeffery AC CVO MC, represented Australia at independence (Merdeka) celebrations in Kuala Lumpur on 31 August 2007. With support from the Australia Malaysia Institute (AMI), the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) released a bilingual photographic publication entitled Australia-Malaysia: Celebrating 50 Years, which chronicles some of the important events and achievements shared by Australia and Malaysia over more than five decades.
Australia's formal relations with Malaysia date back to 1955 when our Commission (later High Commission) was established in Kuala Lumpur. Australia was one of 15 countries to establish formal diplomatic relations with the Federation of Malaya in 1957 soon after independence. The current relationship draws on many long-standing associations including:
- parliamentary, legal and administrative systems with many similar features and common membership of the Commonwealth;
- people-to-people links including students, business councils and immigration;
- regular and close consultations in a variety of policy fields such as a bilateral Foreign Ministers' Meeting and a ministerial-level Joint Trade Committee; and
- bilateral defence and security cooperation, including through the Malaysia-Australia Joint Defence Program and the Five Power Defence Arrangements.
The Australian Parliament's Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade tabled a report into Australia's Relationship with Malaysia in March 2007. The report noted the changing nature of Australia's relationship with Malaysia – from one of support in the early years of Malaysia's formation to the present wide-ranging and extensive collaboration across all fields.
Australia's relationship with Malaysia is underpinned by strong people-to-people links and a significant program of two-way, high-level visits across a broad range of portfolios.
Prime Minister Gillard visited Malaysia from 31 October to 1 November 2010, her first bilateral visit to the region, and met Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin (due to Prime Minister Najib's illness at the time). Following this visit, Prime Minister Najib made an official visit to Australia from 2 to 4 March 2011 during which the Prime Ministers witnessed the signing of memorandums of understanding on education and sports cooperation. The visit also highlighted the breadth and depth of Australian-Malaysian cooperation reflected in the Joint Statement issued following the meeting.
The Governor-General, HE Ms Quentin Bryce AC, visited Sabah in East Malaysia from 14 to 16 August 2010 to represent Australia at memorial ceremonies marking the 65th Anniversary of the Sandakan Death Marches.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Senator Bob Carr, visited Malaysia from 3 to 7 November 2012. During his visit, Senator Carr met the Malaysian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dato’ Sri Anifah Aman, in Sabah, and the Malaysian Minister of Home Affairs, Dato’ Sri Hishammuddin Hussein, in Kuala Lumpur. Senator Carr announced a new cultural exchange program between Malaysia and Australia and highlighted a range of other cooperation pursued through the Australia-Malaysia Institute.
The Hon Kevin Rudd MP made two official visits to Malaysia as Prime Minister. During his first official visit in July 2008 he met then Prime Minister Abdullah and the King of Malaysia, His Majesty Tuanku Mizan Zainal Abidin, and agreed to a series of initiatives to extend the bilateral relationship, building on cooperation in defence and education. Mr Rudd met Prime Minister Najib during his second visit to Malaysia in July 2009 and agreed to extend existing cooperation in areas such as combating people smuggling, and a range of new areas for cooperation including clean energy technologies.
The Minister for Trade and Competitiveness, Dr Craig Emerson, visited Malaysia on 22 May 2012 to sign the Malaysia-Australia Free Trade Agreement (MAFTA) with the Malaysian Minister of International Trade and Industry, Dato' Sri Mustapa Mohamed. Dr Emerson also visited Malaysia on 30 March 2012 to discuss MAFTA. Dr Emerson and Dato' Sri Mustapa co-chaired the 16th Australia-Malaysia Joint Trade Committee meeting in Kuala Lumpur in January 2012 (see below).
Defence and security links
Australia's defence relationship with Malaysia dates back to well before Malaysia's independence in 1957, and reflects a common commitment to the security and stability of the region. The relationship is based on practical cooperation including the Malaysia-Australia Joint Defence Program, an ongoing Australian presence at the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) Base at Butterworth, and common membership of the Five Power Defence Arrangements (FPDA).
Bilateral defence cooperation occurs through the Malaysia-Australia Joint Defence Program, which formally commenced in 1992 under this name (although Australian defence assistance to Malaysia dates back to 1964). The program includes the training of Malaysian military personnel in Australia, the attachment of Armed Forces personnel from each country to the other, and annual combined field exercises. Australia is Malaysia's major source of external military training.
Formally established in 1971, the FPDA commits Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom to consult on a response to any armed attack or threat against Malaysia or Singapore. The FPDA marked its 40th anniversary in 2011 and provides a valuable framework for conducting combined training exercises. More recently, the FPDA has expanded its focus to address non-conventional security threats facing the region, including terrorism and maritime security.
Australia and Malaysia cooperate closely on a range of security issues, with good links between police and immigration agencies. In August 2002, Australia and Malaysia signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation to combat international terrorism. Bilateral agreements on mutual assistance in criminal matters and extradition entered into force on 28 December 2006. Australia and Malaysia signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Combating Transnational Crime and Developing Police Cooperation on 13 May 2009 and a Memorandum of Understanding on Maritime Security on 12 July 2011.
Australian expertise in education and training is highly regarded in Malaysia. Bilateral links in this sector date back before the Colombo Plan. Education for many Malaysian students has traditionally been provided at universities in Australia, but university twinning arrangements and Australian campuses in Malaysia now allow Malaysian students to undertake Australian courses in Malaysia. Three Australian universities have campuses in Malaysia – Monash University, Curtin University and Swinburne University of Technology.
Around 22,000 Malaysian students enrolled in Australian education institutions onshore in 2012, and around 21,000 Malaysian and international students are studying for Australian qualifications in Malaysia. Malaysia ranks second as a source country for international students in higher education in Australia and fourth overall across all sectors. It is estimated more than 300,000 Malaysians have undertaken courses in Australia.
Reflecting the strength of bilateral education ties, Australia and Malaysia signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Education during Malaysian Prime Minister Najib's official visit to Australia in March 2011, to encourage and promote cooperation in school/institution links and exchanges, teacher training and professional development, technical and vocational education and a range of other areas. Australia and Malaysia signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Higher Education in November 2012.
During his official visit to Malaysia in July 2008, Mr Rudd announced the launch of a pilot Sister Schools Program which links six schools in Malaysia with six in Victoria. In July 2009, the then Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Stephen Smith, announced the expansion of this program to double the number of participating schools in Australia and Malaysia. The program aims to fill a gap in Australia's education relationship with Malaysia – while there has long been a strong relationship at the level of tertiary education, much less interaction has occurred at the primary and secondary levels. The Sister Schools Program is managed by the Australia-Malaysia Institute (see below).
The Malaysian Australian Alumni Council (MAAC) is a national organisation in Malaysia for Malaysian alumni associations of Australian universities. The MAAC spearheads the Malaysia Australia Colombo Plan Commemoration Scholarship initiative, which provides for a two-way exchange of scholars between Australia and Malaysia to undertake their tertiary education at institutions in both countries.
According to the Department of Immigration and Citizenship, 135,610 Malaysian-born people were living in Australia at June 2010. This compares with a figure of 92,330 in the 2006 Census.
In the year to 31 January 2012, there were 241,600 short-term visitor arrivals from Malaysia, making it Australia's second-largest source of visitors from South-East Asia after Singapore.
An air services agreement is in place between Australia and Malaysia. In November 2007, Malaysian airline AirAsia commenced direct flights between Malaysia and Australia.
Work and holiday arrangement
Australia has a Work and Holiday arrangement with Malaysia which allows both Australians and Malaysians aged between 18 to 30 years to holiday and work in each other's country for up to12 months. For information about the requirements for this visa and how to apply, visit the Malaysian High Commission website.
The Australia-Malaysia Institute was established by the Australian Government in April 2005 to strengthen people-to-people and institutional links with Malaysia, and to deepen mutual understanding and cooperation. It offers a grants program and organises visits by young leaders and journalists, and interfaith visits, between Australia and Malaysia.
Australia-Malaysia economic and trade relations
In terms of two-way goods and services trade, Malaysia is Australia's third-largest trading partner in ASEAN and our 10th-largest partner overall. In 2012, total merchandise trade between Australia and Malaysia was $14.7 billion with Australian exports of $5.1 billion and imports of $9.6 billion. Total two-way services trade in 2012 was $3 billion with Australian exports of $1.6 billion and imports of $1.3 billion.
Major merchandise exports from Australia to Malaysia include crude petroleum, copper, coal and aluminium. Australia is a major provider of education services to Malaysia. Major Malaysian merchandise exports to Australia include crude petroleum, monitors, projectors and televisions, computers and telecommunications equipment and parts.
Malaysian investment in Australia by 2012 was $14.9 billion. Australian companies continue to pursue opportunities in Malaysia, with the stock of Australian foreign investment in Malaysia at $7.9 billion in 2012.
The Australia Malaysia Business Council (AMBC) and the Malaysia Australia Business Council (MABC) are important coordinating bodies for commercial linkages, and conduct regular dialogue with both governments, including through participation in the Joint Trade Committee meetings. They are an important source of information and advice for businesses active in Australia and Malaysia and play an important role in promoting strong networks in the respective private sectors.
Australia and Malaysia have a double taxation agreement.
Malaysia-Australia Free Trade Agreement (MAFTA)
The Minister for Trade and Competitiveness, Dr Craig Emerson, and Malaysia's Minister of International Trade and Industry, Dato' Sri Mustapa Mohamed, signed the Malaysia-Australia Free Trade Agreement (MAFTA) in Kuala Lumpur on 22 May 2012. The agreement came into force on 1 January 2013.
MAFTA provides for improved access for Australian exporters to the Malaysian market and builds on the commitments made by both countries under the ASEAN-Australia-New Zealand FTA (AANZFTA). Under the Agreement, 97.6 per cent of Australia's exports (2011 figures) will immediately be tariff-free, rising to 99 per cent from 2017.
The decision on 7 April 2005 to begin MAFTA negotiations built on an already strong and broad-ranging bilateral relationship. It also followed consideration by both governments of comprehensive scoping studies into the likely impact of a bilateral FTA. The studies reached the conclusion that MAFTA would deliver significant benefits to both countries.
Australia-Malaysia Joint Trade Committee
The annual Australia-Malaysia Joint Trade Committee (JTC) meeting provides a regular forum for the two countries to discuss their respective views on international and regional trade and economic issues, as well as to explore ways to expand the bilateral trade and economic relationship.
The Australian Minister for Trade and Competitiveness, Dr Craig Emerson, attended the 16th JTC in Kuala Lumpur on 31 January 2012, hosted by the Malaysian Minister of International Trade and Industry, Dato' Sri Mustapa Mohamed. The JTC provided an opportunity for the Ministers to review the progress of MAFTA negotiations. The Ministers discussed opportunities for new and ongoing cooperation in logistics, economic reform, Islamic finance and sustainable and green construction and signed a Summary Record [DOC 19 KB]. The next JTC is expected to be held in Australia.
Australian Trade Commission (Austrade)
Austrade has identified potential opportunities for Australian suppliers of goods and services in a number of sectors. Austrade's Malaysia country page supplies general information on doing business and on specific export opportunities. The Austrade website has a database that can be searched by industry. The Austrade office in Kuala Lumpur can also provide advice on accessing opportunities in Malaysia. They can be contacted at firstname.lastname@example.org.
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Syria (Aleppo) - The American- Dutch archaeological expedition working at the site of Tal Om al-Mara, 50 kms to the east of Aleppo, has unearthed two archaeological tombs dating back to the Ancient Bronze Age 2800 B.C.
Several archaeological artifacts, a golden coin and ten skulls dating back to the same era were uncovered inside one of the tombs during the current season.
Chairman of the Excavations Directorate at Aleppo Department of Antiquities and Museums Yusuf Kinjo said that the unearthed tombs are located in the main area of tombs in Tal Om al-Mara, adding that they are the most important findings among the ten tombs discovered by the expedition up till now.
Kinjo said the tombs indicate that the city of Om al-Mara was part of the Methanic Empire that was destroyed by the Hittites later on. The expedition started to work at the site in 1994 where it has discovered four skeletons for animals similar to the zebra inside the central tombs.
The animals are thought to be hybrid about which Ebla inscriptions talks. The animals' skeletons indicate that they were only used for transportation and later in agriculture.
The American-Dutch expedition started its excavations for the current season on May 27 and finished its work on Wednesday. The findings will be displayed in Aleppo Museum. (SANA)For More Archaeological News click HERE
Global Arab Network
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Child identity theft occurs when a minor’s identity is used by another person for personal gain. The perpetrator may be a family member or someone known by the family. It could also be a complete stranger who purposely targets children. Because of the lengthy time between the theft of the information and the discovery of the crime, children are a primary target for identity thieves. The period between malicious use of the identity and discovery of that use can be many years, usually happening when the child reaches eighteen and starts to establish their own credit file.
There are multiple ways in which the identity of a child may be stolen. The most likely targeted areas for thieves stealing children identities are medical offices and schools. You take your child to the dentist or the pediatrician. The records created by those visits are now being stored on a computer hard drive. The same applies to the schools your children attend. Their information will be in a computer system on a hard drive.
Additionally, many records are now being stored in an electronic format. This opens the door to a thief if any office is using an unsecured wireless network. There are times when those records may be accessed remotely by the office staff. It is hoped that every office has a secure network and that anyone who accesses that network from the outside does so with a secure VPN tool. If they don’t understand how secure their network is, then they are gambling on when the system might be hacked into.
There are some cases that appear to be identity theft but are not. Receiving a pre-approved credit card offer in your child’s name might upset you as a parent. However, it might only be an innocent marketing tool sent by an affiliate of your bank because you opened a college fund for your child. A quick check of credit reports will help you sort out the truth. Currently, all three reporting agencies are automated systems. You should contact them and request a credit report for your child. If you are told that there is no credit report, that is good news. The reality is that a credit report should not exist until that child’s first credit application as an adult. Minors cannot legally establish credit, and so there should be no supporting credit file for a child.
Parents or relatives of child/victims are usually the first to notice something is not quite right. Discovery often comes:
- When attempting to open a savings account or college fund for the child. In this scenario, a parent discovers that there is already an account with that Social Security number or that the new account is denied due to a bad check record
- When numerous credit cards, checks, pre-approved credit card offers or bank statements are received in the name of the child
- When collection agencies call or send letters about accounts supposedly opened by the child
- When a teen is denied the right to get a driver’s license because DMV records show that another person has a license with that SSN as ID.
- When law enforcement comes to the door with a warrant for an arrest of the child
Child victims who have now reached adulthood typically find out in the same manner as parents of child victims of identity theft, when they:
- Are denied credit, mortgage or loan for a vehicle or college tuition
- Receive collection notices in the mail or by telephone
- Are denied tenancy, utility or phone service
- Are denied driver’s license renewal
- Have been receiving bills or credit cards they never requested, perhaps for years
- Are arrested for an activity they never committed
- Are denied SSI or welfare services
If you suspect there is a child identity theft case in progress, and you are the child’s parent or court-appointed guardian, you may write the three Credit Reporting Agencies (CRAs) to see if there are credit reports in that child’s Social Security number. When you write to the agencies, place the following items in your cover letter:
- Child’s full name
- Child’s Social Security number
- Your name
- Your address
- Your relationship to the child or children in question
- Request for a search for a credit report in the child’s Social Security number. Remember – the imposter may be using a different name and most definitely a different birthdate.
- A copy of the credit report, if one exists, be mailed to you immediately
You should also include any documentation showing that you have legal custody of the child if you are divorced or have legal guardianship of the child. Each Credit Reporting Agency has its own guidelines as to what must be included along with your request. These guidelines can be found here. Do not order a report on a child unless you have a reason to do so. If you have no reason to suspect child identity theft, you may cause problems by creating a new report due to your multiple inquiries.
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Historically the federal government has been a small investor in the nation's education system. With the recent economic stimulus bill, however, this changed virtually overnight.
There is great danger in the sudden and massive amount of funding -- nearly $100 billion -- that the federal government is throwing at the nation's schools. District by district, the budgetary crises into which all schools were plunging created the impetus for long-needed changes.
The most likely result of this stimulus will be to give our schools the luxury of affording not to change. This is borrowed money that we're pumping into our schools, and it comes at a price. Charging education isn't changing it.
That our schools need to change should not be surprising. Just walk into your local school and enter a classroom. Odds are high that it won't look too different from a classroom from a generation or two ago.
Sure, there might be some computers in the back of the room and perhaps an interactive white board instead of a chalkboard, but chances are high that students will still be sitting at desks lined up in neat rows with a teacher at the front delivering the same lesson on the same day to all the students. This might be acceptable if society and the skills many people need to succeed in today's economy hadn't changed either, but they have.
While U.S. schools stand still, the rest of the world is moving forward, and this has a price tag -- not just for individual children, but also for the nation.
We urge the federal government to consider four criteria when creating new programs or grants for states and districts to help transform an outdated educational system into one fit for the 21st Century.
First, don't fund technology that simply shoves computers and other technologies into existing classrooms. We've spent well over $60 billion in the last two decades doing just that, and there is now overwhelming evidence that when we do it, the current unsatisfactory system co-opts the technology to sustain itself.
We should instead use technology funding to bolster new learning models and innovations, such as online-learning environments, to level the playing field and allow students from all walks of life -- from small, rural communities to budget-strapped urban schools -- to access the rich variety that is now available only to children in wealthy suburban districts.
Second, don't fund new school buildings that look like the existing ones. If the architecture of new buildings is the same as that of existing schools -- designed around teachers delivering monolithic, one-size-fits-all lessons to large batches of students -- it will lock students into another century in which the physical infrastructure works against the flexibility needed for student-centric learning.
Instead, invest in bandwidth as an infrastructure of change. The government has a productive history in investing in infrastructure that creates change and innovation -- from allocating land to those building the transcontinental railroad and the land-grant colleges in 1862 to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency funding the creation of the Internet.
To allow all districts to realize the power of online learning to advance us toward a student-centric system, the federal government should help deliver broadband capabilities necessary not just for today's needs, where schools already lag, but also in anticipation of tomorrow's.
Third, don't fund the institutions that are least likely to change. Our research shows that institutions are good at improving what they are structured to do, but that transformative innovations that fundamentally change the trade-off between cost and quality -- disruptive innovations -- come from start-up institutions.
This means that there is a high probability that spending money on existing schools of education will only result in their doing more of the same, for example. Meanwhile, there are a host of disruptive training organizations that are providing comparable educators at lower cost, such as Teach for America, the American Board for Certification of Teacher Excellence, and New Leaders for New Schools.
Alternative certification, including alternative programs from existing schools of education, has grown at a 29 percent compound annual growth rate since 1997. The government must embrace this and back the winners, not defend the old institutions.
Fourth, direct more funds for research and development to create student-centric learning software. Just a fraction of 1 percent of the $600 billion in K-12 spending from all levels currently goes toward R&D.
The federal government should reallocate funds so we can begin to understand not just what learning opportunities work best on average but also what works for whom and under what circumstance. It is vital to fund learning software that captures data about the student and the efficacy of different approaches so we can connect these dots.
Transformation of any existing system isn't an easy process, but ignoring the laws of innovation, although it may be perhaps politically expedient in the short run, will only make it more difficult.
When the federal government directs future funds toward education, having these principles in place will go a long way toward making sure we're not simply charging education, but that we have a fighting chance of changing it.
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Revised August 2011
The principles listed below are the result of long-term research studies on the origins of drug abuse behaviors and the common elements of effective prevention programs. These principles were developed to help prevention practitioners use the results of prevention research to address drug use among children, adolescents, and young adults in communities across the country. Parents, educators, and community leaders can use these principles to help guide their thinking, planning, selection, and delivery of drug abuse prevention programs at the community level.
Prevention programs are generally designed for use in a particular setting, such as at home, at school, or within the community, but can be adapted for use in several settings. In addition, programs are also designed with the intended audience in mind: for everyone in the population, for those at greater risk, and for those already involved with drugs or other problem behaviors. Some programs can be geared for more than one audience.
NIDA's prevention research program focuses on risks for drug abuse and other problem behaviors that occur throughout a child's development, from pregnancy through young adulthood. Research funded by NIDA and other Federal research organizations - such as the National Institute of Mental Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - shows that early intervention can prevent many adolescent risk behaviors.
Principle 1 - Prevention programs should enhance protective factors and reverse or reduce risk factors (Hawkins et al. 2002).
- The risk of becoming a drug abuser involves the relationship among the number and type of risk factors (e.g., deviant attitudes and behaviors) and protective factors (e.g., parental support) (Wills et al. 1996).
- The potential impact of specific risk and protective factors changes with age. For example, risk factors within the family have greater impact on a younger child, while association with drug-abusing peers may be a more significant risk factor for an adolescent (Gerstein and Green 1993; Dishion et al. 1999).
- Early intervention with risk factors (e.g., aggressive behavior and poor self-control) often has a greater impact than later intervention by changing a child's life path (trajectory) away from problems and toward positive behaviors (Ialongo et al. 2001; Hawkins et al. 2008).
- While risk and protective factors can affect people of all groups, these factors can have a different effect depending on a person's age, gender, ethnicity, culture, and environment (Beauvais et al. 1996; Moon et al. 1999).
Principle 2 - Prevention programs should address all forms of drug abuse, alone or in combination, including the underage use of legal drugs (e.g., tobacco or alcohol); the use of illegal drugs (e.g., marijuana or heroin); and the inappropriate use of legally obtained substances (e.g., inhalants), prescription medications, or over-the-counter drugs (Johnston et al. 2002).
Principle 3 - Prevention programs should address the type of drug abuse problem in the local community, target modifiable risk factors, and strengthen identified protective factors (Hawkins et al. 2002).
Principle 4 - Prevention programs should be tailored to address risks specific to population or audience characteristics, such as age, gender, and ethnicity, to improve program effectiveness (Oetting et al. 1997; Olds et al. 1998; Fisher et al. 2007; Brody et al. 2008).
Principle 5 - Family-based prevention programs should enhance family bonding and relationships and include parenting skills; practice in developing, discussing, and enforcing family policies on substance abuse; and training in drug education and information (Ashery et al. 1998).
Family bonding is the bedrock of the relationship between parents and children. Bonding can be strengthened through skills training on parent supportiveness of children, parent-child communication, and parental involvement (Kosterman et al. 1997; Spoth et al. 2004).
Parental monitoring and supervision are critical for drug abuse prevention. These skills can be enhanced with training on rule-setting; techniques for monitoring activities; praise for appropriate behavior; and moderate, consistent discipline that enforces defined family rules (Kosterman et al. 2001).
Drug education and information for parents or caregivers reinforces what children are learning about the harmful effects of drugs and opens opportunities for family discussions about the abuse of legal and illegal substances (Bauman et al. 2001).
Brief, family-focused interventions for the general population can positively change specific parenting behavior that can reduce later risks of drug abuse (Spoth et al. 2002b).
Principle 6 - Prevention programs can be designed to intervene as early as infancy to address risk factors for drug abuse, such as aggressive behavior, poor social skills, and academic difficulties (Webster-Stratton 1998; Olds et al. 1998; Webster-Stratton et al. 2001; Fisher et al. 2007).
Principle 7 - Prevention programs for elementary school children should target improving academic and social-emotional learning to address risk factors for drug abuse, such as early aggression, academic failure, and school dropout. Education should focus on the following skills (Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group 2002; Ialongo et al. 2001; Riggs et al. 2006; Kellam et al. 2008; Beets et al. 2009):
- emotional awareness;
- social problem-solving; and
- academic support, especially in reading.
Principle 8 - Prevention programs for middle or junior high and high school students should increase academic and social competence with the following skills (Botvin et al. 1995; Scheier et al. 1999; Eisen et al. 2003; Ellickson et al. 2003; Haggerty et al. 2007):
- study habits and academic support;
- peer relationships;
- self-efficacy and assertiveness;
- drug resistance skills;
- reinforcement of anti-drug attitudes; and
- strengthening of personal commitments against drug abuse.
Principle 9 - Prevention programs aimed at general populations at key transition points, such as the transition to middle school, can produce beneficial effects even among high-risk families and children. Such interventions do not single out risk populations and, therefore, reduce labeling and promote bonding to school and community (Botvin et al. 1995; Dishion et al. 2002; Institute of Medicine 2009).
Principle 10 - Community prevention programs that combine two or more effective programs, such as family-based and school-based programs, can be more effective than a single program alone (Battistich et al. 1997; Spoth et al. 2002c; Stormshak et al. 2005).
Principle 11 - Community prevention programs reaching populations in multiple settings - for example, schools, clubs, faith-based organizations, and the media - are most effective when they present consistent, community-wide messages in each setting (Chou et al. 1998; Hawkins et al. 2009).
Principle 12 - When communities adapt programs to match their needs, community norms, or differing cultural requirements, they should retain core elements of the original research-based intervention (Spoth et al. 2002b; Hawkins et al. 2009), which include:
- Structure (how the program is organized and constructed);
- Content (the information, skills, and strategies of the program); and
- Delivery (how the program is adapted, implemented, and evaluated).
Principle 13 - Prevention programs should be long-term with repeated interventions (i.e., booster programs) to reinforce the original prevention goals. Research shows that the benefits from middle school prevention programs diminish without followup programs in high school (Botvin et al. 1995; Scheier et al. 1999).
Principle 14 - Prevention programs should include teacher training on good classroom management practices, such as rewarding appropriate student behavior. Such techniques help to foster students' positive behavior, achievement, academic motivation, and school bonding (Ialongo et al. 2001; Kellam et al. 2008).
Principle 15 - Prevention programs are most effective when they employ interactive techniques, such as peer discussion groups and parent role-playing, that allow for active involvement in learning about drug abuse and reinforcing skills (Botvin et al. 1995).
Principle 16 - Research-based prevention programs can be cost-effective. Similar to earlier research, recent research shows that for each dollar invested in prevention, a savings of up to $10 in treatment for alcohol or other substance abuse can be seen (Aos et al. 2001; Hawkins et al. 1999; Pentz 1998; Spoth et al. 2002a; Jones et al. 2008; Foster et al. 2007; Miller and Hendrie 2009).
- Aos, S.; Phipps, P.; Barnoski, R.; and Lieb, R. The Comparative Costs and Benefits of Programs to Reduce Crime. Vol. 4 (1-05-1201).Olympia, WA: Washington State Institute for Public Policy, May 2001.
- Ashery, R.S.; Robertson, E.B.; and Kumpfer, K.L., eds. Drug Abuse Prevention Through Family Interventions. NIDA Research Monograph No. 177. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1998.
- Battistich, V.; Solomon, D.; Watson, M.; and Schaps, E. Caring school communities. Educ Psychol 32(3):137-151, 1997.
- Bauman, K.E.; Foshee, V.A.; Ennett, S.T.; Pemberton, M.; Hicks, K.A.; King, T.S.; and Koch, G.G. The influence of a family program on adolescent tobacco and alcohol. Am J Public Health 91(4):604-610, 2001.
- Beauvais, F.; Chavez, E.; Oetting, E.; Deffenbacher, J.; and Cornell, G. Drug use, violence, and victimization among White American, Mexican American, and American Indian dropouts, students with academic problems, and students in good academic standing. J Couns Psychol 43:292-299, 1996.
- Beets, M.W.; Flay, B.R.; Vuchinich, S.; Snyder, F.J.; Acock, A.; Li, K-K.; Burns, K.; Washburn, I.J.; and Durlak, J. Use of a social and character development program to prevent substance use, violent behaviors, and sexual activity among elementary-school students in Hawaii. Am J Public Health 99(8):1438-1445, 2009.
- Botvin, G.; Baker, E.; Dusenbury, L.; Botvin, E.; and Diaz, T. Long-term follow-up results of a randomized drug-abuse prevention trial in a white middle class population. JAMA 273:1106-1112, 1995.
- Brody, G.H.; Kogan, S.M.; Chen, Y.-F.; and Murry, V.M. Long-Term Effects of the Strong African American Families Program on youths' conduct problems. J Adolesc Health 43:474-481, 2008.
- Chou, C.; Montgomery, S.; Pentz, M.; Rohrbach, L.; Johnson, C.; Flay, B.; and Mackinnon, D. Effects of a community-based prevention program in decreasing drug use in high-risk adolescents. Am J Public Health 88:944-948, 1998.
- Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group. Predictor variables associated with positive Fast Track outcomes at the end of third grade. J Abnorm Child Psychol 30(1):37-52, 2002.
- Dishion, T.; McCord, J.; and Poulin, F. When interventions harm: Peer groups and problem behavior. Am Psychol 54:755-764, 1999.
- Dishion, T.; Kavanagh, K.; Schneiger, A.K.J.; Nelson, S.; and Kaufman, N. Preventing early adolescent substance use: A family centered strategy for the public middle school. Prev Sci 3(3):191-202, 2002.
- Eisen, M.; Zellman, G.L.; and Murray, D.M. Evaluating the Lions-Quest "Skills for Adolescence" drug education program: Second-year behavior outcomes. Addict Behav 28(5):883-897, 2003.
- Ellickson, P.L.; McCaffrey, D.F.; Ghosh-Dastidar, B.; and Longshore, D. New inroads in preventing adolescent drug use: Results from a large-scale trial of project ALERT in middle schools. Am J Public Health 93(11):1830-1836, 2003.
- Fisher, P.A.; Stoolmiller, M.; Gunnar, M.R.; and Burraston, B.O. Effects of a therapeutic intervention for foster preschoolers on diurnal cortisol activity. Psychoneuroendocrinology 32(8-10):892-905, 2007.
- Foster, E.M.; Olchowski, A.E.; and Webster-Stratton, C.H. Is stacking intervention components cost-effective? An analysis of the Incredible Years Program. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 46(11):1414-1424, 2007.
- Gerstein, D.R., and Green, L.W., eds. Preventing drug abuse: What do we know? Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1993.
- Haggerty, K.P.; Skinner, M.L.; MacKenzie, E.P.; and Catalano, R.F.A. Randomized trial of parents who care: Effects on key outcomes at 24-month follow-up. Prev Sci 8:249-260, 2007.
- Hawkins, J.D.; Catalano, R.F.; Kosterman, R.; Abbott, R.; and Hill, K.G. Preventing adolescent health-risk behaviors by strengthening protection during childhood. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 153:226-234, 1999.
- Hawkins, J.D.; Catalano, R.F.; and Arthur, M. Promoting science-based prevention in communities. Addict Behav 27(6):951-976, 2002.
- Hawkins, J.D.; Kosterman, R.; Catalano, R.; Hill, K.G.; and Abbott, R.D. Effects of social development intervention in childhood 15 years later. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 162(12):1133-1141, 2008.
- Hawkins, J.D.; Oesterle, S.; Brown, E.C.; Arthur, M.W.; Abbott, R.D.; Fagan, A.A.; and Catalano, R. Results of a type 2 translational research trial to prevent adolescent drug use and delinquency: A test of communities that care. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 163(9):789-798, 2009.
- Ialongo, N.; Poduska, J.; Werthamer, L.; and Kellam, S. The distal impact of two first-grade preventive interventions on conduct problems and disorder in early adolescence. J Emot Behav Disord 9:146-160, 2001.
- Institute of Medicine. Preventing mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders among young people: Progress and possibilities. National Academies Press, Washington DC, 2009.
- Johnston, L.D.; O'Malley, P.M.; and Bachman, J.G. Monitoring the Future National Survey Results on Drug Use, 1975-2002. Volume 1: Secondary School Students. Bethesda, MD: National Institute on Drug Abuse, 2002.
- Jones, D.E.; Foster, E.M.; and Group, C.P. Service use patterns for adolescents with ADHD and comorbid conduct disorder. J Behav Health Serv Res 36(4):436-449, 2008.
- Kellam, S.G.; Brown, C.H.; Poduska, J.; Ialongo, N.; Wang, W.; Toyinbo, P.; Petras, H.; Ford, C.; Windham, A.; and Wilcox, H.C. Effects of a universal classroom behavior management program in first and second grades on young adult behavioral, psychiatric, and social outcomes. Drug Alcohol Depend 95 (Suppl 1):S5-S28, 2008.
- Kosterman, R.; Hawkins, J.D.; Spoth, R.; Haggerty, K.P.; and Zhu, K. Effects of a preventive parent-training intervention on observed family interactions: Proximal outcomes from preparing for the drug free years. J Community Psychol 25(4):337-352, 1997.
- Kosterman, R.; Hawkins, J.D.; Haggerty, K.P.; Spoth, R.; and Redmond, C. Preparing for the drug free years: Session-specific effects of a universal parent-training intervention with rural families. J Drug Educ 31(1):47-68, 2001.
- Miller, T.R., and Hendrie, D. Substance abuse prevention dollars and cents: A cost-benefit analysis. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Center for Substance Abuse Prevention. Rockville, MD: DHHS Pub. No. (SMA) 07-4298, 2009.
- Moon, D.; Hecht, M.; Jackson, K.; and Spellers, R. Ethnic and gender differences and similarities in adolescent drug use and refusals of drug offers. Subst Use Misuse 34(8):1059-1083, 1999.
- Oetting, E.; Edwards, R.; Kelly, K.; and Beauvais, F. Risk and protective factors for drug use among rural American youth. In: Robertson, E.B.; Sloboda, Z.; Boyd, G.M.; Beatty, L.; and Kozel, N.J., eds. Rural Substance Abuse: State of Knowledge and Issues. NIDA Research Monograph No. 168. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, pp. 90-130, 1997.
- Olds, D.; Henderson, C.R.; Cole, R.; Eckenrode, J.; Kitzman, H.; Luckey, D.; Pettit, L.; Sidora, K.; Morris, P. and Powers, J. Long-term effects of nurse home visitation on children's criminal and antisocial behavior: 15-year follow-up of a randomized controlled trial. JAMA 280(14):1238-1244, 1998.
- Pentz, M.A.; Costs, benefits, and cost-effectiveness of comprehensive drug abuse prevention. In: Bukoski, W.J., and Evans, R.I., eds. Cost-benefit/cost-effectiveness research of drug abuse prevention: Implications for programming and policy. NIDA Research Monograph No. 176. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, pp. 111-129, 1998.
- Riggs, N.R.; Greenberg, M.T.; Kusche, C.A.; and Pentz, M.A. The mediational role of neurocognition in the behavioral outcomes of a social-emotional prevention program in elementary school students: Effects of the PATHS curriculum. Prev Sci 7(1):91-102, 2006.
- Scheier, L.; Botvin, G.; Diaz, T.; and Griffin, K. Social skills, competence, and drug refusal efficacy as predictors of adolescent alcohol use. J Drug Educ 29(3):251-278, 1999.
- Spoth, R.; Redmond, C.; Shin, C.; and Azevedo, K. Brief family intervention effects on adolescent substance initiation: School-level growth curve analyses 6 years following baseline. J Consult Clin Psychol 72(3):535-542, 2004.
- Spoth, R.; Guyull, M.; and Day, S. Universal family-focused interventions in alcohol-use disorder prevention: Cost effectiveness and cost benefit analyses of two interventions. J Stud Alcohol 63:219-228, 2002a.
- Spoth, R.L.; Redmond, C.; Trudeau, L.; and Shin, C. Longitudinal substance initiation outcomes for a universal preventive intervention combining family and school programs. Psychol Addict Behav 16(2):129-134, 2002b.
- Spoth, R.L.; Redmond, C.; Trudeau, L.; and C.S. Longitudinal substance initiation outcomes for a universal preventive intervention combining family and school programs. Psychol Addict Behav 16(2):129-134, 2002c.
- Stormshak, E.A.; Dishion, T.J.; Light, J.; and Yasui, M. Implementing family-centered interventions within the public middle school: linking service delivery to change in student problem behavior. J Abnorm Child Psychol 33(6):723-733, 2005.
- Webster-Stratton, C. Preventing conduct problems in Head Start children: Strengthening parenting competencies. J Consult Clin Psychol 66:715-730, 1998.
- Webster-Stratton, C.; Reid, J.; and Hammond, M. Preventing conduct problems, promoting social competence: A parent and teacher training partnership in Head Start. J Clin Child Psychol 30:282-302, 2001.
- Wills, T.; McNamara, G.; Vaccaro, D.; and Hirky, A. Escalated substance use: A longitudinal grouping analysis from early to middle adolescence. J Abnorm Psychol 105:166-180, 1996.
Information in this DrugFacts can also be found in Preventing Drug Use among Children and Adolescents, A Research-Based Guide for Parents, Educators, and Community Leaders, Second Edition, National Institute on Drug Abuse, 2003.
As a result of scientific research, we know that addiction is a disease that affects both brain and behavior.
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No Wake Zones
Did you know that Louisiana’s average shoreline erosion rates have increased from about 19 feet per year to over 32 feet per year? This is mostly due to impacts from storms and man-made alterations along the shoreline.
Viewer Tip: Protect estuary shorelines by refraining from boating in no-wake zones. The waves created by your boat that break along the shoreline can cause erosion.
(Source: US Geological Survey: Surficial Sediment Character of the Louisiana Offshore Continental Shelf Region: A GIS Compilation. http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2006/1195/htmldocs/images/pdf/report.pdf.; US EPA Office of Wetlands Oceans and Watersheds. http://www.epa.gov/owow/oceans/tenways.pdf.)
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Today I'm going to show you some best practices for cleaning your computer. We need a 6 pack of compressed air. 90% or higher isopropyl alcohol, paper towels and cotton swabs for cleaning in tight spaces.
Other than for cosmetic reasons you need to keep your case clean to promote good ventilation and cooling. When your computer is running, it is continuously bringing in cool air from outside of the case and exhausting the hot air, the components generate, out the back. When dust and hair build up on the outside and inside of the case, it keeps the air from getting to those heat producing components. This makes your components get hot and heat is one of the biggest causes of component failures.
I've taken the computer outside to clean it. Once you start using the compressed air to blow away the dust, it goes everywhere.
If we did this inside, all of the dust would contaminate the air inside, getting breathed in, settle on flat surfaces, or getting sucked back into the computer when we turn it on.
I'm going to start on the inside of the case.
There is a lot of dust and pet hair on the outside of the case, but it will mostly fly off when we start using the compressed air inside the case.
I'm removing both sides of the case to give the dust plenty of ways to leave the case.
You should begin at the top of the case since some of the dust and hair that gets blown around will settle lower in the case.
When using the compressed air, do you best to keep the can upright. If you turn it too far the liquid inside will spray out.
Always keep in mind that the gas and liquid inside the can is flammable.
There's a 120mm fan at the back of the case. When you blow any fan with compressed air, it's important to hold onto the blades to keep them from spinning. If you don't hold on and use a sustained blast of air, you can make the fan spin faster than it's intended to. This can wear out the barrings in the fan and in extreme cases cause it to fail. More often, over spinning the fan will cause it to make more noise when it's running.
Next we'll clean around the DVD drive and the hard drives. The can of air is starting to loose it's strength. You'll notice that the can gets colder the longer you use it. It will get to the point where the liquid inside freezes up and it only puts out a small amount of air.
When the can starts to loose it's strength, get another can from your six pack and continue with it.
The CPU fan and especially the heat sink has a large amount of dust build up. The metal fins on the cooler have air sucked through them and the closeness of the adjacent fins makes the perfect conditions for trapping dust. Remember to hold onto the fan's blades to keep them from spinning and use your can of air to blow through the fins.
The add-on cards, especially the video cards, collect a lot of dust.
For the video cards we'll angle the can up so we can get into the cooler. Again, reaching in to hold the fan blades.
The power supply has a lot of dust in it as well. I can't reach the fan in the power supply with my fingers so I'll use one of the cotton swabs to get through.
The front cooling fans have a good coating of dust. We'll hold onto the fan blades and blow out the dust.
If you can't easily get to a fan to hold it you should use very short burst of air to clean it. This will keep the fan from over spinning.
From the outside of the case we're going to blow into the rear fan, all around the external connectors and through the 5.25" bays and the front fan.
Now most of the dust has been dislodged, but some of it is still loose in the case. We'll start back at the top and give everything a good once over.
That takes care of all the large collections for dust, but there is still a light coating on the surfaces.
To make it look its' best and improve cooling even more we can use the paper towels and 90% or higher isopropyl alcohol to clean most of the rest.
Just upend the bottle onto a folded paper towel and start wiping all the surfaces down. Stay away from the chips and capacitors with the paper towel.
If you want to do a complete cleaning job you can now use the cotton swabs to go after the smaller parts and tight spaces.
Once you have everything as clean as you want, you need to push in on all the data and power cables, add-on cards and memory. They may have come loose while we cleaned.
You should clean your computer this way once every six to twelve months. If you have pets that shed a lot of fur or dander you really should do this every 3 months to keep your computer well ventilated.
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Marsala Sister (ca. 240 BCE)
Less than one percent of the hull and no cargo was found on this wreck, located close to the Punic ship above. Its dating comes solely from that proximity. It is generally assumed that this was part of a merchant galley or warship. The outstanding features of these remains are the two tusk-like timbers that curved upward beyond the stem. They were probably part of a very elaborate bow structure for a ram or cutwater. 1
1. Richard Steffy, INA Shipdata Project, Texas A&M University.
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Healthy Living Tips
Calcium and Your Health
New Research Challenges Old Recommendations
Doctors and prestigious national organizations routinely recommend taking calcium supplements to support good bone health. In fact, the Centers for Disease Control reports that 60% of American women over age 60 take them. But based on recent research, experts now question whether these recommendations are a good idea. Confirming two meta-analyses published in 2010 and 2011, Dr. Kuanrong Li and colleagues recently reported an association between calcium supplementation and heart attacks. After following 24,000 Germans for 11 years, researchers found heart attacks increased by 86% among people taking supplements including calcium, and increased by 200% among people who used calcium as their only dietary supplement.
Admittedly, there were several problems with this study:
- Because only a small number of people experienced a heart attack, a small change in the number would dramatically increase or decrease the reported 'risk'.
- It did not demonstrate similar findings for stroke and cardiovascular death, which share similar intermediate pathways; thus, the strength of the association is not robust.
- Only 55% of the participants reported the names of the supplements, and only 3.6% reported 'taking calcium supplements.'
- Surveys did not ask for information on calcium dosage, type, or whether it was taken with Vitamin D, magnesium, or Vitamin K – all useful factors to provide the public with more specific recommendations.
Despite this study's limitations, the totality of research published suggests similar findings. Therefore, I have changed my perspective: I now recommend people obtain their recommended daily calcium intake from dietary sources and take supplements only on days when diet does not achieve these goals.
How much calcium is enough to prevent fractures?
The National Osteoporosis Foundation and National Academy of Science recommend:
- For women under age 50 and men under 70: 1,000 mg of calcium daily
- For women over 50 and men over 70: 1,200 mg of calcium daily
However, other research has found that 700 mg of calcium may be sufficient, and higher doses do not necessarily provide additional bone health benefits. Remember, calcium must be consumed with adequate Vitamin D in order to confer bone health protection.
What are calcium-rich foods?
Most individuals can obtain a significant portion of their daily calcium needs from calcium-rich foods like low-fat and fat-free dairy products, green vegetables such as collard greens and broccoli, and calcium-fortified foods.
How do I choose the right calcium supplement formulation?
If you do not get enough calcium from your diet, discuss with your physician whether taking calcium supplementation is right for you. Note also:
- 1. Research has not determined if different calcium supplement formulations (such as calcium carbonate, calcium citrate, coral calcium) have distinct health effects or risks.
- 2. Research has determined that:
- – Calcium carbonate requires an acidic environment in the stomach for proper absorption and is better absorbed when taken with a meal.
- – Calcium citrate is the preferred calcium supplement formulation if you are elderly, taking proton pump inhibitor or H2 blocker medication, have inflammatory bowel disease or absorption disorders, or have difficulty taking calcium supplements with a meal.
- 1. Get your calcium needs met by eating calcium-rich foods.
- 2. Limit your consumption of calcium supplements to avoid increasing your heart attack risk.
- 3. Discuss your specific daily calcium requirement with your physician: you may need less than previously thought. Although U.S. organizations currently recommend 1000-1200 mg daily, the British National Health Service, based on high quality research, recommends only 700 mg.
- 4. If your calcium intake must be supplemented to achieve your daily needs, evaluate which type of calcium is best for you.
- 5. Take at least 800 IU daily of Vitamin D3 in combination with adequate calcium intake. Have your physician check your Vitamin D blood level to ensure your level is adequate to promote strong bones and prevent fractures.
- 6. Eat dark, leafy greens for sufficient amounts of Vitamin K, which also promotes good bone health. Men need 120 mcg and women need 90 mcg daily.
- 7. Exercise for bone health. Weight-bearing exercise strengthens bones. Strength training improves balance and prevents falls that can cause fractures.
- 8. Avoid certain foods. Research suggests that excessive animal protein, coffee, cola soda, and high dose Vitamin A may weaken bones.
Q. "I have a very hectic schedule. What's the best way to unplug?"
Here are a few tips on creating a weekend that will leave you feeling refreshed:
- Turn off as many electronic communication devices as possible.
- Sleep in.
- Make a big breakfast, put your feet up and read the paper.
- Listen to music and/or dance.
- Relax amongst friends/family and laugh.
- Get a foot massage.
- Spend time in nature whether it be a walk, hike, the zoo, or playing in the park. You'd be surprised how revitalized you will feel!
- Take a walk with a friend and without your phone, blackberry or iPod.
For those of you who feel anxious at the thought of 'unplugging' for the weekend I recommend setting aside just one hour on Sunday, preferably in the early evening, to scan your email. Do your best to limit your responses to only the most critical messages. By setting aside time to check-in but not fully engage, you'll feel less anxious about Monday. You can then fall asleep Sunday evening feeling refreshed and prepared for the week ahead. For the rest of you, give yourself one hour first thing Monday morning to review emails before you get to work so you have time to prepare. Remember, three nights living 'unplugged' can make a world of difference!
Are You Getting Enough Vitamin D?
Depending on age and gender, 30 to 70 percent of Americans are deficient in vitamin D. While most people don't have any symptoms, some experience muscle pain or general muscle weakness.
Vitamin D improves muscle strength, bone health, immune function, and reduces inflammation. Scientists are just beginning to appreciate the importance of adequate levels of vitamin D. Current recommendations of 200 to 600 international units (IU) are woefully inadequate. A growing community of scientists is recommending 1,000 to 2,000 IU as a safe and necessary amount to ensure adequate blood levels for good health.
What can you do to get more vitamin D?
Sunshine is the best natural solution. In addition, supplements and dietary forms of vitamin D can help you maintain adequate levels. Fatty fish, such as salmon, mackerel, and tuna are great sources; as is cod liver oil. For example, 1 tablespoon of cod liver oil provides 1360 IU Vitamin D and 3 ounces of Salmon (cooked) provides 447 IU Vitamin D. Foods which are fortified with vitamin D have lower quantities; for example, 8 ounces of milk and 8 ounces of orange juice provide 120 IU and 137 IU of Vitamin D, respectively.
Typically, I grimace when hearing about 'cure-alls'. While not yet conclusive, vitamin D may confer health benefits for a broad range of conditions, including cancer, heart disease, depression, falls, chronic pain. Vitamin D affects immunity, inflammation, cell growth and cell death – each are critical functions across the human system. As such, it comes as no surprise that some research has shown that Vitamin D decreases cancer cell growth and promotes cell death of cancer cells. Some studies have shown vitamin D reduces breast and colon cancer risk in humans.
Given the range of health issues vitamin D may affect, I recommend the following:
1. Obtain routine annual laboratory testing to ensure serum levels of vitamin D3 are adequate (30 ng/mL minimum, and ideally > 50 ng/mL).
2. Get 15 minutes of sunshine each day and, if necessary, use food sources or dietary supplements to reach adequate blood levels.
Deciphering Food Labels
An essential aspect of good health is understanding what's in the food you eat. Excellent ways to do this are to carefully read labels of the food you buy at the grocery store and to go to restaurants that list nutritional facts and ingredients.
Top 8 Things to Look for on a Food Label:
Whether it's listed as "High Fructose Corn Syrup," "Concentrated Sugar," or any ingredient that ends in "-ose," there's sugar in what you're eating. Try to find products with less sugar or lower it yourself.
- Drinks – Did you know there is almost as much sugar in orange juice as soda? Unlike soda, you can add 1 part water to 2 parts juice, reduce the sugar by 1/3, and still have a delicious and nutritional drink!
- Desserts – When it comes to desserts, choose fruit or use a baby spoon. You'll eat just as many bites, keep the sensational flavor of the dessert, but eat fewer additional calories.
Most people get their sodium from processed foods, not from a salt shaker. Read the food label. You should aim for less than 2,500 milligrams of sodium per day, which breaks down to less than 600 milligrams for main dishes. As a general rule, avoid foods where the number of milligrams of sodium is higher than the number of calories. Read "Hold the Salt" on pilladvised.com
3. "GOOD" FATS
Polyunsaturated and monounsaturated are healthy forms of fat. Cooking with olive oil instead of butter or eating a handful of nuts are great ways to get these 'good fats'. Omega-3 fatty acids are a particularly healthy type of these 'good fats' which you can get from walnuts, soy, flax, fatty fish like salmon, as well as health bars and drinks. Try to get 1/2 gram of omega-3 fatty acids each day – and if you have heart problems, double up to 1 gram. Learn more: Read "Supplement Your Knowledge of Omega Fats" on pilladvised.com
4. "BAD" FATS
- Trans Fats Avoid trans fats whenever possible. They cause 10 times the damage to the heart as saturated fats, and have no nutritional value. Anything that says "partially hydrogenated" or "hydrogenated" on the food label means it contains trans fats, even when the package says "No trans fats". Food companies are permitted to say "No trans fats" if the food has less than 0.5 grams trans fats per serving. While that might not seem like much, most people use several servings of Coffee-mate (non-dairy coffee creamer) each day. Although manufacturers can say "No trans fats", did you know that the first ingredient in the ingredient list is 'vegetable oil containing partially hydrogenated coconut or palm kernel oil and hydrogenated palm oil'? All trans fats! If you drink 2 cups of coffee each day and put two packets (two tablespoons) in each cup, you could theoretically find yourself drinking up to two grams of trans fats every day.
- Saturated Fats Primary sources of these fats are from animal products such as meat and dairy. As a general rule, you want to eat less than 10% of your calories from saturated fats – this equals about 27 grams of saturated fat in a 2100 calorie diet. For example, a 10 oz prime rib has 45grams, a 20 oz filet mignon has 22grams, 9 oz chicken breasts has 6 grams, and 7 oz grilled salmon has 2g
Look for products that have fiber, in general more is better. Aim to get at least 20 grams of fiber a day. Read "A Tale of Two Fibers" on pilladvised.com
Products list wheat products in many ways (enriched, unbleached, wheat, etc.). However, unless it says "whole wheat", the grain in the product is a white grain and is not as good for you as whole grain.
7. SERVING SIZE
Often your idea of a serving size isn't the same as the manufacturer's. For example, if you drink 12 ounces of juice every morning, but the serving size is 8 ounces, then every number on the label needs to be adjusted accordingly –thus, multiplied by 1.5.
Depending on whether you are trying to maintain your weight, lose or gain weight, keep an eye on the number of calories you eat – and keep a running tally on the calories you consume in a day. Your daily calorie needs should dictate how many calories you take in over the course of a day.
Bitters & Carminatives for Indigestion
As we age, many people have indigestion or feel bloated after meals. Thankfully most traditional cultures offer effective remedies. You may recall your grandparents bitter-tasting appetizers or drinks 20-30 minutes before their meal. These "bitters" prime the gastrointestinal tract for the upcoming meal by stimulating gastric acids and pancreatic enzymes that digest food and aid digestion. Examples of bitters include dandelion, gentian, yarrow, artichoke, and orange peel. A wonderful and effective herbal bitter formula that helps with digestion before meals is Flora Gallexier Herbal Bitters.
Other remedies to consider are carminatives, which include culinary spices like cinnamon, caraway, peppermint, fennel, and dill. These herbal spices relax smooth muscles, thereby reducing bloating, cramping, and gas pain that people may experience after eating large meals. In many cultures, carminatives are often ingested as an 'after-dinner drink' in the form of 'digestifs'. Examples include crème de menthe and Campari, which contains 50-80 undisclosed ingredients. For those who prefer a less intense, non-alcoholic beverage after dinner, you might consider peppermint or mint tea, or the East Indian tradition of chewing on fennel seeds (with or without candy coating).
Finally, there are many dietary supplement formulations designed to reduce indigestion and bloating. I have had great success recommending enteric-coated preparations that contain peppermint oil combined with caraway seed oil.
What are the health benefits of Green Tea?
At the 6th Annual International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research, Rutgers investigators announced that rats fed a diet equivalent to 4–6 cups of Green Tea, in humans, were 55% less likely to develop colon cancer and among those that did, the tumors were 45% smaller compared to the control group. Researchers have published conflicting research on the specific health benefits of green tea; however, the number of studies showing promise is impressive across a number of conditions, including:
- prostate cancer
- breast cancer
- pancreatic cancer
- heart disease
The exact mechanism of potential benefit remains unclear. Given that green tea is safe and likely has a range of health benefits, the next time you are considering grabbing something to drink... consider green tea!
Your Attitude Can Affect Your Health
Research suggests that your attitude can actually influence your health – and it's not just your emotional well-being that is at stake. A study among 3000 British adults found attitude affects stress hormones and inflammatory markers. An earlier study found pessimistic men have twice the risk of developing heart disease; another study showed pessimists recovered more slowly after heart bypass surgery than their optimistic counterparts. In a long-term study among people with HIV, people who had a more positive attitude lived longer than those who did not.
Good News: Beyond our genes, our attitude is influenced by our patterns of thinking, social relationships and life fulfillment. That is why programs like Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction and Reflective Happiness have been so successful for participants. Not only do people begin to view the world with a "cup half-full" attitude, but research using MRI brain scans find more activity in areas of the brain associated with an optimistic worldview, thus providing objective evidence to support the survey findings.
Take Action: Enroll in one of these programs or join one of my 3-Day Health Retreats. Together we can learn to reframe our perspective, manage stress better, and focus on things that make us feel good and truly satisfied.
Good Oral Health
Is there a relationship between good oral health and good health overall? Have you heard about a lollipop and chewing gum that fight cavities?
The health of your oral cavity – mouth, teeth and gums – plays an important role in your overall health. For example, studies have shown a correlation between dental health and heart attacks. One proposed explanation is that poor dental hygiene causes chronic inflammation, which in turn has harmful effects on the entire body. In addition to brushing your teeth twice a day and regular flossing, what else can you do to maintain good dental health for your and your family? Here are two additional suggestions:
- Dr. Wenyuan Shi at the UCLA School of Dentistry developed a sugar-free herbal lollipop called Kavidy Kops. The orange-flavored lollipop contains an all-natural extract from the root of the licorice plant (Glycyrrhiza uralensis) that has been shown to kill cavity-causing bacteria called Streptococcus mutans in the laboratory. Diabetic friendly and gluten free, the lollipop helps maintain healthy teeth and fight cavities, which affect people of all ages. Just think, this lollipop could improve your dental health and by doing so, help prevent heart attacks!
- In addition, research has shown that chewing gum containing xylitol is an effective strategy for fighting tooth decay. Xylitol, a sweetener used as a naturally occurring sugar substitute, reduces acidity and Streptococcus mutans in the mouth, whereas gum containing sorbitol, for example, increases acidity and promotes tooth decay.
Taming Seasonal Allergies
It seems like everyone I know is suffering from seasonal allergies, also called hay fever. Roughly 40 million people suffer each year from seasonal allergies – and suffer they do. Runny nose, itchy and watery eyes, sneezing, head congestion and fatigue are just a few of the seasonal allergy symptoms that people experience.
There are some great allergy survival tips worth considering. To reduce the allergen count in your home and your body, I am a big fan of keeping a clean home including a HEPA filter, and using a netti pot to wash out the nasal passages. Butterbur has been getting a lot of press lately; Dr. Guo published a review showing that the Butterbur herb was better than placebo, or as good as non-sedating antihistamines, in 6 randomized trials. You also might try a homeopathic preparation called Galphimia glauca, and keep an eye out for a new Chinese herbal formula called Biminne which looks promising.Wishing you an active and hay fever-free spring season!
Integrative Medicine & Alternative Medicine
Q. "What is the difference between Integrative Medicine and Alternative Medicine?"
Alternative Medicine is a term used to describe over 100 healing therapies not traditionally taught in medical school. Integrative Medicine, on the other hand, is a rapidly expanding field with the primary mission to restore the soul of medicine.
Whether you are pregnant, scheduled for heart surgery, experiencing depression, or have diabetes, Integrative Medicine couples the best of conventional scientific medicine with a broader perspective on the nature of illness, healing, and well-being.
When receiving Integrative care, you will experience a provider who is focused on healing the whole person and actively encourages you to participate in improving your health. In addition to training in conventional scientific medicine, they are open-minded and knowledgeable about:
- Alternative therapies or health systems such as Ayurveda, Chinese medicine, acupuncture, chiropractics, yoga, massage, meditation or other mind-body practices
- Appropriate use of dietary supplements including herbs and vitamins
- Healthy aging practices such as fitness, movement therapy, stress management practices, healthy eating and smoking cessation
- Activating the body's innate healing response
- The healing potential of meaningful patient-provider relationships
- The importance of empowering patients and helping them navigate through the maze of therapies available today
- Serving as role models and guides to their patients
With the holidays coming, there's one thing you can count on – eating so much festive food that your stomach aches. Did you know the average American consumes 3,000 calories during Thanksgiving dinner alone? So it's no surprise that many people experience indigestion and/or heartburn.
Make your holiday guests (and their tummies) more comfortable – plan ahead and have some simple home remedies on hand. They'll feel better and you'll get bonus points for being a terrific Thanksgiving host! Here are a few suggestions:
- Serve dinner in courses. It takes the stomach 20-30 minutes to signal the brain that it's had enough food. This will help avoid over-eating.
- Take a 20-minute stroll after your meal to help with digestion.
- Serve peppermint tea after a meal. It reduces cramping and discomfort by relaxing smooth muscles that line the intestine.
- For those with stomach indigestion and bloating, try STW 5 herbal formula. This remedy contains a mix of herbs that include bitter candy tuft, matricaria flower, peppermint leaves, caraway, licorice root and lemon balm.
- Try Artichoke leaf extract. Take 320 mg of a standardized artichoke extract three times daily.
If anxiety is disrupting your sleep, you'd be surprised how effective relaxation techniques can be. I suggest doing one of the following techniques for 10-30 minutes daily or whenever you are feeling particularly anxious:
- Guided Imagery
- Breathing exercises
- If you have problems sleeping after eating a large meal, consider taking herbal remedies such as Valerian, milky oats, and/or Hops one hour before bedtime.
Bradly Jacobs, MD, MPH – Cavallo Point Healing Arts Center & Spa
601 Murray Circle | Fort Baker | Sausalito, CA 94965
Phone: 415.339.2692 | Email: email@example.com
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Posted 2 years ago
Around 1853, after two centuries of a policy of national seclusion under which no foreigner could enter Japan, nor could any native leave under penalty of death, foreign merchant ships again began to visit Japan. After the Meiji restoration in 1868, Japan began to receive foreign imports, and in return began to send its products to markets abroad, especially Europe and America. These products and styles became wildly popular, and by 1880 Japanese decorative themes were highly influential to the pioneers of Art Nouveau, notably Emile Galle, Ernest Leveille, Auguste Jean to name a few. These motifs also spread to the glass houses of Bohemia, and enameled glassware bearing Japanese motifs were produced by Harrach, Moser, and others.
The example shown here is most probably French, from the Clichy area north of Paris, by one of the makers mentioned above. It is unsigned and unmarked, circa 1880.
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Rubber Seals for Fluid and Hydraulic SystemsBy
- Chellappa Chandrasekaran, Can C Consulting, Chennai, India
Rubber Seals for Fluid and Hydraulic Systems is a comprehensive guide to the manufacturing and applications of rubber seals, with essential coverage for industry sectors including aviation, oil drilling and the automotive industry.
Fluid leakage costs industry millions of dollars every year. In addition to wasted money, unattended leaks can result in downtime, affect product quality, pollute the environment, and cause injury. Successful sealing involves containment of fluid within a system while excluding the contaminants; the resilience of rubber enables it to be used to achieve these two objectives and create a tight sealing effect. A sound understanding of the complex factors involved in successful fluid sealing is essential for engineers who specify, design, operate and maintain machinery and mechanical equipment.
This book focuses on the characteristics of rubbers as seals, their manufacturing procedures, the implications of their physical and chemical characteristics for the sealing function in the fluid and hydraulic systems, how rubbers seal and prevent leaks, what properties are required for sealing function, and how they change before and after installation.
The chapter on Manufacture of Seals and ORings includes approximately 25 workable starting point formulations based on different rubbers, with cure and property data of those formulations as guidelines for technologists and engineers.
Hardbound, 160 Pages
Published: September 2009
Imprint: William Andrew
Introduction; Rubber Properties for seal functional requirements; Seals for Radioactive media Nuclear plants; Airborne Rubber seals; Rubber seals for oil field service; Rubbers chemical and compounding for O rings & seals; Rubber expansion Joints; Swelling Aspects of Rubber related to seal performance; Rubber to Metal bonding; Manufacture of seals & O rings; Storage and service life of rubber seals
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- Year Published: 1866
- Language: English
- Country of Origin: Russia
- Source: Dostoyevsky, F. (1866). Crime and Punishment. Moscow, Russia: The Russian Messenger.
- Flesch–Kincaid Level: 7.2
- Word Count: 4,888
Dostoyevsky, F. (1866). Part 3, Chapter 2. Crime and Punishment (Lit2Go Edition). Retrieved May 22, 2013, from
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor. "Part 3, Chapter 2." Crime and Punishment. Lit2Go Edition. 1866. Web. <>. May 22, 2013.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky, "Part 3, Chapter 2," Crime and Punishment, Lit2Go Edition, (1866), accessed May 22, 2013,.
Razumihin waked up next morning at eight o’clock, troubled and serious. He found himself confronted with many new and unlooked-for perplexities. He had never expected that he would ever wake up feeling like that. He remembered every detail of the previous day and he knew that a perfectly novel experience had befallen him, that he had received an impression unlike anything he had known before. At the same time he recognised clearly that the dream which had fired his imagination was hopelessly unattainable—so unattainable that he felt positively ashamed of it, and he hastened to pass to the other more practical cares and difficulties bequeathed him by that “thrice accursed yesterday.”
The most awful recollection of the previous day was the way he had shown himself “base and mean,” not only because he had been drunk, but because he had taken advantage of the young girl’s position to abuse her fiancé in his stupid jealousy, knowing nothing of their mutual relations and obligations and next to nothing of the man himself. And what right had he to criticise him in that hasty and unguarded manner? Who had asked for his opinion? Was it thinkable that such a creature as Avdotya Romanovna would be marrying an unworthy man for money? So there must be something in him. The lodgings? But after all how could he know the character of the lodgings? He was furnishing a flat… Foo! how despicable it all was! And what justification was it that he was drunk? Such a stupid excuse was even more degrading! In wine is truth, and the truth had all come out, “that is, all the uncleanness of his coarse and envious heart”! And would such a dream ever be permissible to him, Razumihin? What was he beside such a girl—he, the drunken noisy braggart of last night? Was it possible to imagine so absurd and cynical a juxtaposition? Razumihin blushed desperately at the very idea and suddenly the recollection forced itself vividly upon him of how he had said last night on the stairs that the landlady would be jealous of Avdotya Romanovna… that was simply intolerable. He brought his fist down heavily on the kitchen stove, hurt his hand and sent one of the bricks flying.
“Of course,” he muttered to himself a minute later with a feeling of self-abasement, “of course, all these infamies can never be wiped out or smoothed over… and so it’s useless even to think of it, and I must go to them in silence and do my duty… in silence, too… and not ask forgiveness, and say nothing… for all is lost now!”
And yet as he dressed he examined his attire more carefully than usual. He hadn’t another suit—if he had had, perhaps he wouldn’t have put it on. “I would have made a point of not putting it on.” But in any case he could not remain a cynic and a dirty sloven; he had no right to offend the feelings of others, especially when they were in need of his assistance and asking him to see them. He brushed his clothes carefully. His linen was always decent; in that respect he was especially clean.
He washed that morning scrupulously—he got some soap from Nastasya—he washed his hair, his neck and especially his hands. When it came to the question whether to shave his stubbly chin or not (Praskovya Pavlovna had capital razors that had been left by her late husband), the question was angrily answered in the negative. “Let it stay as it is! What if they think that I shaved on purpose to…? They certainly would think so! Not on any account!”
“And… the worst of it was he was so coarse, so dirty, he had the manners of a pothouse; and… and even admitting that he knew he had some of the essentials of a gentleman… what was there in that to be proud of? Everyone ought to be a gentleman and more than that… and all the same (he remembered) he, too, had done little things… not exactly dishonest, and yet…. And what thoughts he sometimes had; hm… and to set all that beside Avdotya Romanovna! Confound it! So be it! Well, he’d make a point then of being dirty, greasy, pothouse in his manners and he wouldn’t care! He’d be worse!”
He was engaged in such monologues when Zossimov, who had spent the night in Praskovya Pavlovna’s parlour, came in.
He was going home and was in a hurry to look at the invalid first. Razumihin informed him that Raskolnikov was sleeping like a dormouse. Zossimov gave orders that they shouldn’t wake him and promised to see him again about eleven.
“If he is still at home,” he added. “Damn it all! If one can’t control one’s patients, how is one to cure them? Do you know whether he will go to them, or whether they are coming here?”
“They are coming, I think,” said Razumihin, understanding the object of the question, “and they will discuss their family affairs, no doubt. I’ll be off. You, as the doctor, have more right to be here than I.”
“But I am not a father confessor; I shall come and go away; I’ve plenty to do besides looking after them.”
“One thing worries me,” interposed Razumihin, frowning. “On the way home I talked a lot of drunken nonsense to him… all sorts of things… and amongst them that you were afraid that he… might become insane.”
“You told the ladies so, too.”
“I know it was stupid! You may beat me if you like! Did you think so seriously?”
“That’s nonsense, I tell you, how could I think it seriously? You, yourself, described him as a monomaniac when you fetched me to him… and we added fuel to the fire yesterday, you did, that is, with your story about the painter; it was a nice conversation, when he was, perhaps, mad on that very point! If only I’d known what happened then at the police station and that some wretch… had insulted him with this suspicion! Hm… I would not have allowed that conversation yesterday. These monomaniacs will make a mountain out of a mole-hill… and see their fancies as solid realities…. As far as I remember, it was Zametov’s story that cleared up half the mystery, to my mind. Why, I know one case in which a hypochondriac, a man of forty, cut the throat of a little boy of eight, because he couldn’t endure the jokes he made every day at table! And in this case his rags, the insolent police officer, the fever and this suspicion! All that working upon a man half frantic with hypochondria, and with his morbid exceptional vanity! That may well have been the starting-point of illness. Well, bother it all!... And, by the way, that Zametov certainly is a nice fellow, but hm… he shouldn’t have told all that last night. He is an awful chatterbox!”
“But whom did he tell it to? You and me?”
“What does that matter?”
“And, by the way, have you any influence on them, his mother and sister? Tell them to be more careful with him to-day….”
“They’ll get on all right!” Razumihin answered reluctantly.
“Why is he so set against this Luzhin? A man with money and she doesn’t seem to dislike him… and they haven’t a farthing, I suppose? eh?”
“But what business is it of yours?” Razumihin cried with annoyance. “How can I tell whether they’ve a farthing? Ask them yourself and perhaps you’ll find out….”
“Foo! what an ass you are sometimes! Last night’s wine has not gone off yet…. Good-bye; thank your Praskovya Pavlovna from me for my night’s lodging. She locked herself in, made no reply to my bonjour through the door; she was up at seven o’clock, the samovar was taken into her from the kitchen. I was not vouchsafed a personal interview….”
At nine o’clock precisely Razumihin reached the lodgings at Bakaleyev’s house. Both ladies were waiting for him with nervous impatience. They had risen at seven o’clock or earlier. He entered looking as black as night, bowed awkwardly and was at once furious with himself for it. He had reckoned without his host: Pulcheria Alexandrovna fairly rushed at him, seized him by both hands and was almost kissing them. He glanced timidly at Avdotya Romanovna, but her proud countenance wore at that moment an expression of such gratitude and friendliness, such complete and unlooked-for respect (in place of the sneering looks and ill-disguised contempt he had expected), that it threw him into greater confusion than if he had been met with abuse. Fortunately there was a subject for conversation, and he made haste to snatch at it.
Hearing that everything was going well and that Rodya had not yet waked, Pulcheria Alexandrovna declared that she was glad to hear it, because “she had something which it was very, very necessary to talk over beforehand.” Then followed an inquiry about breakfast and an invitation to have it with them; they had waited to have it with him. Avdotya Romanovna rang the bell: it was answered by a ragged dirty waiter, and they asked him to bring tea which was served at last, but in such a dirty and disorderly way that the ladies were ashamed. Razumihin vigorously attacked the lodgings, but, remembering Luzhin, stopped in embarrassment and was greatly relieved by Pulcheria Alexandrovna’s questions, which showered in a continual stream upon him.
He talked for three quarters of an hour, being constantly interrupted by their questions, and succeeded in describing to them all the most important facts he knew of the last year of Raskolnikov’s life, concluding with a circumstantial account of his illness. He omitted, however, many things, which were better omitted, including the scene at the police station with all its consequences. They listened eagerly to his story, and, when he thought he had finished and satisfied his listeners, he found that they considered he had hardly begun.
“Tell me, tell me! What do you think…? Excuse me, I still don’t know your name!” Pulcheria Alexandrovna put in hastily.
“I should like very, very much to know, Dmitri Prokofitch… how he looks… on things in general now, that is, how can I explain, what are his likes and dislikes? Is he always so irritable? Tell me, if you can, what are his hopes and, so to say, his dreams? Under what influences is he now? In a word, I should like…”
“Ah, mother, how can he answer all that at once?” observed Dounia.
“Good heavens, I had not expected to find him in the least like this, Dmitri Prokofitch!”
“Naturally,” answered Razumihin. “I have no mother, but my uncle comes every year and almost every time he can scarcely recognise me, even in appearance, though he is a clever man; and your three years’ separation means a great deal. What am I to tell you? I have known Rodion for a year and a half; he is morose, gloomy, proud and haughty, and of late—and perhaps for a long time before—he has been suspicious and fanciful. He has a noble nature and a kind heart. He does not like showing his feelings and would rather do a cruel thing than open his heart freely. Sometimes, though, he is not at all morbid, but simply cold and inhumanly callous; it’s as though he were alternating between two characters. Sometimes he is fearfully reserved! He says he is so busy that everything is a hindrance, and yet he lies in bed doing nothing. He doesn’t jeer at things, not because he hasn’t the wit, but as though he hadn’t time to waste on such trifles. He never listens to what is said to him. He is never interested in what interests other people at any given moment. He thinks very highly of himself and perhaps he is right. Well, what more? I think your arrival will have a most beneficial influence upon him.”
“God grant it may,” cried Pulcheria Alexandrovna, distressed by Razumihin’s account of her Rodya.
And Razumihin ventured to look more boldly at Avdotya Romanovna at last. He glanced at her often while he was talking, but only for a moment and looked away again at once. Avdotya Romanovna sat at the table, listening attentively, then got up again and began walking to and fro with her arms folded and her lips compressed, occasionally putting in a question, without stopping her walk. She had the same habit of not listening to what was said. She was wearing a dress of thin dark stuff and she had a white transparent scarf round her neck. Razumihin soon detected signs of extreme poverty in their belongings. Had Avdotya Romanovna been dressed like a queen, he felt that he would not be afraid of her, but perhaps just because she was poorly dressed and that he noticed all the misery of her surroundings, his heart was filled with dread and he began to be afraid of every word he uttered, every gesture he made, which was very trying for a man who already felt diffident.
“You’ve told us a great deal that is interesting about my brother’s character… and have told it impartially. I am glad. I thought that you were too uncritically devoted to him,” observed Avdotya Romanovna with a smile. “I think you are right that he needs a woman’s care,” she added thoughtfully.
“I didn’t say so; but I daresay you are right, only…”
“He loves no one and perhaps he never will,” Razumihin declared decisively.
“You mean he is not capable of love?”
“Do you know, Avdotya Romanovna, you are awfully like your brother, in everything, indeed!” he blurted out suddenly to his own surprise, but remembering at once what he had just before said of her brother, he turned as red as a crab and was overcome with confusion. Avdotya Romanovna couldn’t help laughing when she looked at him.
“You may both be mistaken about Rodya,” Pulcheria Alexandrovna remarked, slightly piqued. “I am not talking of our present difficulty, Dounia. What Pyotr Petrovitch writes in this letter and what you and I have supposed may be mistaken, but you can’t imagine, Dmitri Prokofitch, how moody and, so to say, capricious he is. I never could depend on what he would do when he was only fifteen. And I am sure that he might do something now that nobody else would think of doing… Well, for instance, do you know how a year and a half ago he astounded me and gave me a shock that nearly killed me, when he had the idea of marrying that girl—what was her name—his landlady’s daughter?”
“Did you hear about that affair?” asked Avdotya Romanovna.
“Do you suppose——” Pulcheria Alexandrovna continued warmly. “Do you suppose that my tears, my entreaties, my illness, my possible death from grief, our poverty would have made him pause? No, he would calmly have disregarded all obstacles. And yet it isn’t that he doesn’t love us!”
“He has never spoken a word of that affair to me,” Razumihin answered cautiously. “But I did hear something from Praskovya Pavlovna herself, though she is by no means a gossip. And what I heard certainly was rather strange.”
“And what did you hear?” both the ladies asked at once.
“Well, nothing very special. I only learned that the marriage, which only failed to take place through the girl’s death, was not at all to Praskovya Pavlovna’s liking. They say, too, the girl was not at all pretty, in fact I am told positively ugly… and such an invalid… and queer. But she seems to have had some good qualities. She must have had some good qualities or it’s quite inexplicable…. She had no money either and he wouldn’t have considered her money…. But it’s always difficult to judge in such matters.”
“I am sure she was a good girl,” Avdotya Romanovna observed briefly.
“God forgive me, I simply rejoiced at her death. Though I don’t know which of them would have caused most misery to the other—he to her or she to him,” Pulcheria Alexandrovna concluded. Then she began tentatively questioning him about the scene on the previous day with Luzhin, hesitating and continually glancing at Dounia, obviously to the latter’s annoyance. This incident more than all the rest evidently caused her uneasiness, even consternation. Razumihin described it in detail again, but this time he added his own conclusions: he openly blamed Raskolnikov for intentionally insulting Pyotr Petrovitch, not seeking to excuse him on the score of his illness.
“He had planned it before his illness,” he added.
“I think so, too,” Pulcheria Alexandrovna agreed with a dejected air. But she was very much surprised at hearing Razumihin express himself so carefully and even with a certain respect about Pyotr Petrovitch. Avdotya Romanovna, too, was struck by it.
“So this is your opinion of Pyotr Petrovitch?” Pulcheria Alexandrovna could not resist asking.
“I can have no other opinion of your daughter’s future husband,” Razumihin answered firmly and with warmth, “and I don’t say it simply from vulgar politeness, but because… simply because Avdotya Romanovna has of her own free will deigned to accept this man. If I spoke so rudely of him last night, it was because I was disgustingly drunk and… mad besides; yes, mad, crazy, I lost my head completely… and this morning I am ashamed of it.”
He crimsoned and ceased speaking. Avdotya Romanovna flushed, but did not break the silence. She had not uttered a word from the moment they began to speak of Luzhin.
Without her support Pulcheria Alexandrovna obviously did not know what to do. At last, faltering and continually glancing at her daughter, she confessed that she was exceedingly worried by one circumstance.
“You see, Dmitri Prokofitch,” she began. “I’ll be perfectly open with Dmitri Prokofitch, Dounia?”
“Of course, mother,” said Avdotya Romanovna emphatically.
“This is what it is,” she began in haste, as though the permission to speak of her trouble lifted a weight off her mind. “Very early this morning we got a note from Pyotr Petrovitch in reply to our letter announcing our arrival. He promised to meet us at the station, you know; instead of that he sent a servant to bring us the address of these lodgings and to show us the way; and he sent a message that he would be here himself this morning. But this morning this note came from him. You’d better read it yourself; there is one point in it which worries me very much… you will soon see what that is, and… tell me your candid opinion, Dmitri Prokofitch! You know Rodya’s character better than anyone and no one can advise us better than you can. Dounia, I must tell you, made her decision at once, but I still don’t feel sure how to act and I… I’ve been waiting for your opinion.”
Razumihin opened the note which was dated the previous evening and read as follows:
“Dear Madam, Pulcheria Alexandrovna, I have the honour to inform you that owing to unforeseen obstacles I was rendered unable to meet you at the railway station; I sent a very competent person with the same object in view. I likewise shall be deprived of the honour of an interview with you to-morrow morning by business in the Senate that does not admit of delay, and also that I may not intrude on your family circle while you are meeting your son, and Avdotya Romanovna her brother. I shall have the honour of visiting you and paying you my respects at your lodgings not later than to-morrow evening at eight o’clock precisely, and herewith I venture to present my earnest and, I may add, imperative request that Rodion Romanovitch may not be present at our interview—as he offered me a gross and unprecedented affront on the occasion of my visit to him in his illness yesterday, and, moreover, since I desire from you personally an indispensable and circumstantial explanation upon a certain point, in regard to which I wish to learn your own interpretation. I have the honour to inform you, in anticipation, that if, in spite of my request, I meet Rodion Romanovitch, I shall be compelled to withdraw immediately and then you have only yourself to blame. I write on the assumption that Rodion Romanovitch who appeared so ill at my visit, suddenly recovered two hours later and so, being able to leave the house, may visit you also. I was confirmed in that belief by the testimony of my own eyes in the lodging of a drunken man who was run over and has since died, to whose daughter, a young woman of notorious behaviour, he gave twenty-five roubles on the pretext of the funeral, which gravely surprised me knowing what pains you were at to raise that sum. Herewith expressing my special respect to your estimable daughter, Avdotya Romanovna, I beg you to accept the respectful homage of
“Your humble servant,
“What am I to do now, Dmitri Prokofitch?” began Pulcheria Alexandrovna, almost weeping. “How can I ask Rodya not to come? Yesterday he insisted so earnestly on our refusing Pyotr Petrovitch and now we are ordered not to receive Rodya! He will come on purpose if he knows, and… what will happen then?”
“Act on Avdotya Romanovna’s decision,” Razumihin answered calmly at once.
“Oh, dear me! She says… goodness knows what she says, she doesn’t explain her object! She says that it would be best, at least, not that it would be best, but that it’s absolutely necessary that Rodya should make a point of being here at eight o’clock and that they must meet…. I didn’t want even to show him the letter, but to prevent him from coming by some stratagem with your help… because he is so irritable…. Besides I don’t understand about that drunkard who died and that daughter, and how he could have given the daughter all the money… which…”
“Which cost you such sacrifice, mother,” put in Avdotya Romanovna.
“He was not himself yesterday,” Razumihin said thoughtfully, “if you only knew what he was up to in a restaurant yesterday, though there was sense in it too…. Hm! He did say something, as we were going home yesterday evening, about a dead man and a girl, but I didn’t understand a word…. But last night, I myself…”
“The best thing, mother, will be for us to go to him ourselves and there I assure you we shall see at once what’s to be done. Besides, it’s getting late—good heavens, it’s past ten,” she cried looking at a splendid gold enamelled watch which hung round her neck on a thin Venetian chain, and looked entirely out of keeping with the rest of her dress. “A present from her fiancé,” thought Razumihin.
“We must start, Dounia, we must start,” her mother cried in a flutter. “He will be thinking we are still angry after yesterday, from our coming so late. Merciful heavens!”
While she said this she was hurriedly putting on her hat and mantle; Dounia, too, put on her things. Her gloves, as Razumihin noticed, were not merely shabby but had holes in them, and yet this evident poverty gave the two ladies an air of special dignity, which is always found in people who know how to wear poor clothes. Razumihin looked reverently at Dounia and felt proud of escorting her. “The queen who mended her stockings in prison,” he thought, “must have looked then every inch a queen and even more a queen than at sumptuous banquets and levées.”
“My God!” exclaimed Pulcheria Alexandrovna, “little did I think that I should ever fear seeing my son, my darling, darling Rodya! I am afraid, Dmitri Prokofitch,” she added, glancing at him timidly.
“Don’t be afraid, mother,” said Dounia, kissing her, “better have faith in him.”
“Oh, dear, I have faith in him, but I haven’t slept all night,” exclaimed the poor woman.
They came out into the street.
“Do you know, Dounia, when I dozed a little this morning I dreamed of Marfa Petrovna… she was all in white… she came up to me, took my hand, and shook her head at me, but so sternly as though she were blaming me…. Is that a good omen? Oh, dear me! You don’t know, Dmitri Prokofitch, that Marfa Petrovna’s dead!”
“No, I didn’t know; who is Marfa Petrovna?”
“She died suddenly; and only fancy…”
“Afterwards, mamma,” put in Dounia. “He doesn’t know who Marfa Petrovna is.”
“Ah, you don’t know? And I was thinking that you knew all about us. Forgive me, Dmitri Prokofitch, I don’t know what I am thinking about these last few days. I look upon you really as a providence for us, and so I took it for granted that you knew all about us. I look on you as a relation…. Don’t be angry with me for saying so. Dear me, what’s the matter with your right hand? Have you knocked it?”
“Yes, I bruised it,” muttered Razumihin overjoyed.
“I sometimes speak too much from the heart, so that Dounia finds fault with me…. But, dear me, what a cupboard he lives in! I wonder whether he is awake? Does this woman, his landlady, consider it a room? Listen, you say he does not like to show his feelings, so perhaps I shall annoy him with my… weaknesses? Do advise me, Dmitri Prokofitch, how am I to treat him? I feel quite distracted, you know.”
“Don’t question him too much about anything if you see him frown; don’t ask him too much about his health; he doesn’t like that.”
“Ah, Dmitri Prokofitch, how hard it is to be a mother! But here are the stairs…. What an awful staircase!”
“Mother, you are quite pale, don’t distress yourself, darling,” said Dounia caressing her, then with flashing eyes she added: “He ought to be happy at seeing you, and you are tormenting yourself so.”
“Wait, I’ll peep in and see whether he has waked up.”
The ladies slowly followed Razumihin, who went on before, and when they reached the landlady’s door on the fourth storey, they noticed that her door was a tiny crack open and that two keen black eyes were watching them from the darkness within. When their eyes met, the door was suddenly shut with such a slam that Pulcheria Alexandrovna almost cried out.
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Cipolla dorata di Parma
Pistacchio di Bronte
Pomodoro di Pachino IGP
Pomodoro San Marzano DOP
Radicchio di Treviso IGP
The “cipolla dorata” (or golden onion) was brought to Parma by a seed salesman from Pavia in 1896.
Tags: Autumn, Fruits and vegetables, Winter, Emilia Romagna
The Patata Quarantina bianca genovese (white potato of Genoa) is the most well known of the traditional potatoes grown in the Apennine Mountains in Liguria.
Tags: Summer, Fruits and vegetables, Liguria
The city of Bronte is perched at the top of slope of volcanic rock, located about half a mile northeast of Etna. The Arabs, who once controlled the region, are ...
Tags: Spring, Summer, Autumn, Fruits and vegetables, Winter, Sicilia
Pachino tomatoes have been grown since the 1920s in the coastal area of Pachino and neighboring territories. Initially, the tomato crops had to fight for space with the grape vines.
Tags: Summer, Fruits and vegetables, Sicilia
The tomato, originally from Central America, arrived in Europe during the 16th century. At the time, the plant had primarily an ornamental value.
Tags: Summer, Campania, Fruits and vegetables
Radicchio is a member of the composite family, and is a type of subspecies of chicory. Over time and thanks to the work of botanists and farmers, many different types ...
Tags: Autumn, Fruits and vegetables, Winter, Veneto
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| 2.828125
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1. Carnival- Brazil
Brazil’s most popular and festive holiday is Carnival. In fact, many people consider Carnival one of the world’s biggest celebrations. Each spring, the streets of Brazil’s largest city, Rio de Janeiro, come alive with wild parties, festivals and glamorous balls.
2. Chinese New Year- Hong Kong
Chinese New Year is the longest and most important celebration in the Chinese calendar. During Chinese New Year celebrations, people wear red clothes, give children “lucky money” in red envelopes and set off firecrackers.
3. Oktoberfest- Germany
Every year in Munich, people drink German beer and eat lots of Pretzeln (a special cake), weiss wurst bratwurst (white sausage), and sauerkraut. Oktoberfest is one of the most famous events in Germany and is the world’s largest fair, with more than 5 million people attending every year.
4. Lantern Festival - Taiwan
During the Lantern Festival, thousands of sky lanterns light over Pingxi District in Taiwan. In Yanshui District, the firecrackers ceremony of Wumiao Temple is also one of the important activities. The Tainan Yanshui Fireworks Display (“beehive of fireworks”) was originally celebrated to ward of evil and disease from the town. The Taipei Pingshi Sky Lanterns were released originally to let others know that the town was safe.
5. Dia de los Muertos - Mexico
Dia de los Muertos is celebrated on November 1 in Mexico, Ecuador, Guatemala and other parts of Central and South America. People decorate altars in their homes and grave sites with food, candles, candy skulls and marigolds to welcome the souls back to earth.
6. Hina Matsuri- Japan
Each year, Japanese girls eagerly await the third of March, called Hina Matsuri, or Doll’s Festival. Girls display their most precious dolls on a seven-tiered platform in their home.
7. Diwali- India
Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, is the best known of Hindu celebrations and certainly the brightest. Families get together and celebrate with gifts and feasts. Many families decorate their homes with flowers.
8. Trung Thu- Vietnam
Trung Thu is a mid-fall festival commemorating the moon at its brightest and most beautiful. The children wear colorful masks and dance in the streets with star lanterns that are illuminated by candles. The lanterns, which are made out of bamboo and plastic, represent the moon. Children also feast on moon cakes. Shaped like fish or flowers, the sweet cakes are filled with sugar and meat or eggs.
9. Esala Perahera- Sri Lanka
Every July or August, thousands of Sri Lankans travel to the hill city of Kandy to watch dancers, acrobats, drummers, whip crackers, flame throwers and more than 100 elegantly decorated elephants parade through the streets during Esala Perahera. This is a 10-day festival in honor of the country’s most prized possession, the Tooth Relic of Lord Buddha.
10. Çocuk Bayrami- Turkey
On April 23, Turkey celebrates Çocuk Bayrami. Turkish leader Mustafa Kemal Atatürk declared the holiday in 1920, as Turkey was becoming an independent nation after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. Every year on this day, children all over Turkey dress up in special outfits or the national costume for Çocuk Bayrami.
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Status and Trends of Biodiversity
Botswana is made up of seven distinct eco-regions, of which four are vulnerable i.e. South African Bushveld (deforestation, overgrazing, range degradation and veldt fires), Zambezia Baikiaea Woodlands (cattle and overgrazing and change in vegetation communities), Zambezia Halophytics (mining, rangeland degradation, fires, wind erosion, fires, water extraction, fencing, increased salinity of surface water, decreased surface fresh water, overgrazing, lack of protection for critical avian breeding sites, uncontrolled tourism/ disturbance and wildlife conflicts) and Kalahari Acacia (increased cattle ranching, land transformation and degradation, fires, fences, climate change, poaching and invasive alien species)... More »
Number and Extent of Protected Areas
18.2% of the total land area of Botswana is protected either by National park, Game reserve or Forest Reserves. A further 23% falls under Wildlife Management Areas.
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Then Again Maybe Don't Be My Valentine
There are more tales of the "origins" of Valentine's Day than arrows in Cupid's quiver. As expected, most have something to do with pagan ritual (pretty much every holiday—from Christmas to Mother's Day—has something to do with pagan ritual). Four centuries before Christ, Romans had a day called Lupercalia. Without going too much into it, I'll sum it up as a sexual lottery. Pull names out of a box at random and couple with a young member of the opposite sex. After a year, you get to pick another name.
But apparently Christians didn't think the practice was all bad. They (Pope Gelasius, according to my source) liked the box idea, and so initiated a custom of drawing saints names out of a box. Whoever's name you drew, you were supposed to emulate for the year. Pity the poor person drawing Simeon Stylites, who spent his life on the top of a pillar, never leaving it for any reason.
But who is this Valentine guy, anyway? Probably he was a martyr buried on February 14 with little or no connection to the dispersal of romantic love. Nevertheless, there are legends.
One story is that Valentine was a priest who secretly performed marriages when Emperor Claudius II reportedly forbade marriage (in an effort to ensure he had soldiers without family ties). Another story says that he was a Christian imprisoned for his faith, and cured his jailer's daughter of blindness. The day before his execution (supposedly Feb. 14, 269), he sent a farewell message to the daughter signed "From your Valentine."
True or not (skeptics are forgiven), Valentine's Day has been a big deal at least since the Middle Ages. In his Pariliament of Foules, Geoffrey Chaucer adds another legend: "For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne's day / When every foul cometh ther to choose his mate." About that same time, the first modern valentines were produced. The first card was sent by Charles, duke of Orleans, to his wife in 1415 when he was a prisoner in the Tower of London. It's still on display at the British Museum. But as both stories demonstrate, even by the Middle Ages, the church's hope for a more spiritual, saint-centered Valentine's Day was lost. And eventually, the idea that Valentine was actually the name of a person disappeared. By 1450, a valentine was the name of one's sweetheart. In 1533, it was a folded piece of paper. In 1610 "valentines" were gifts given to sweethearts. In the 1800s it again meant messages exchanged by couples.
With so many definitions of the word, the next time someone asks you to be their Valentine, you might want to be sure they don't want you to be their martyr.
This article originally appeared in the February 12, 1999 issue of the Christian History newsletter. The newsletter, which celebrates its second anniversary this week, also includes a listing of events that occurred this week in the church's past. You can subscribe to the free weekly newsletter—or to the quarterly magazine—at ChristianHistory.netFor more on the history of Valentine's Day, see The History Channel's look at the subject and a related article on Beliefnet.
Copyright © 2000 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.
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October 24, 2003 10:26 AM PDT
Solar flare may zing satellites, wireless networks
A report issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a unit of the U.S. Department of Commerce, said that researchers at its Space Environment Center in Boulder, Colo., observed increased activity in two areas of the sun Wednesday morning.
NOAA warned that a storm of this magnitude could disrupt satellite and other spacecraft operations, as well as power systems, high-frequency communications systems and navigation systems. Among the potential effects could be intermittent performance of high-frequency radios, which could interfere with some of the world's wireless communications networks.
The storm could also compromise satellite and low-frequency radio navigation systems and cause surface changes on satellite components that could increase drag on low-Earth-orbit spacecrafts. Some satellites may also experience orientation problems, and false alarms could be triggered in protection devices built into some of Earth's power systems.
A NOAA researcher said the volatile area of the sun has developed rapidly over the last three or four days. Typically, solar activity cycles of varying size occur about every eleven years, said Larry Combs, a forecaster with the NOAA Space Environment Center?s Space Weather Operations. Combs said another, similar area of activity could be increasing in size on the other side of the sun.
According to NOAA, similar eruptions could occur in the nearby regions of the sun over the next two weeks. The so-called sunspot cluster is roughly 10 times larger than Earth. The same area, located near the center of the sun, produced a major flare in October that caused a radio blackout on Earth. NOAA said the region continues to grow, and it reported that additional flare activity is likely.
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At a cost of $200,000 a seat, a ticket on Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic may not seem cheap. But consider two things.
First, look how much space travel used to cost, according to Space Florida:
Only about 500 people have traveled to space, and few have traveled to space commercially . The vast majority were professional astronauts and cosmonauts on government missions . A small number of industrial researchers,a Japanese journalist, and a chemist from the United Kingdom (who won a contest to fly to Mir in 1991) have flown on a paid basis on U.S. (NASA) or Russian government flights . The last decade has seen the first leisure travelers to space . Since 2001, seven individuals have purchased eight orbital flights (one passenger flew twice) for approximately $20 to $35 million per flight.
The price has fallen by over 99 percent in a decade.
Second, look how much cheaper it will get in the future, at least according to Branson:
"I think in your lifetime, space travel could be nearly as commonplace as, say, traveling to another continent is," Richard Branson told Business Insider's Aly Weisman. "I'm sure that your children will definitely be able to think: I'd love to become an astronaut, maybe I'll go up next weekend. That will enable us to then push space travel forward."
Here's a look at your options for the next decade, according to Space Florida:
Also see how suborbital flight compares to terrestrial competition, according to another chart from Space Florida. Orbital flight is still far from competitive, costing around $50 million for a multi-day stay aboard the International Space Station:
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Born: March 12, 1922
Jack Kerouac was born Jean-Louis Kerouac, a French-Canadian child in working-class Lowell, Massachusetts. Ti Jean spoke a local dialect of French called joual before he learned English. The youngest of three children, he was heartbroken when his older brother Gerard died of rheumatic fever at the age of nine.
Ti Jean was an intense and serious child, devoted to Memere (his mother) and constantly forming important friendships with other boys, as he would continue to do throughout his life. He was driven to create stories from a young age, inspired first by the mysterious radio show 'The Shadow,' and later by the fervid novels of Thomas Wolfe, the writer he would model himself after.
Lowell had once thrived as the center of New England's textile industry, but by the time of Kerouac's birth it had begun to sink into poverty. Kerouac's father, a printer and well-known local businessman, began to suffer financial difficulties, and started gambling in the hope of restoring prosperity to the household. Young Jack hoped to save the family himself by winning a football scholarship to college and entering the insurance business. He was a star back on his high school team and won some miraculous victories, securing himself a scholarship to Columbia University in New York. His parents followed him there, settling in Ozone Park, Queens.
Things went wrong at Columbia. Kerouac fought with the football coach, who refused to let him play. His father lost his business and sank rapidly into alcoholic helplessness, and young Jack, disillusioned and confused, dropped out of Columbia, bitterly disappointing the father who had so recently disappointed him. He tried and failed to fit in with the military (World War II had begun) and ended up sailing with the Merchant Marine. When he wasn't sailing, he was hanging around New York with a crowd his parents did not approve of: depraved young Columbia students Allen Ginsberg and Lucien Carr, a strange but brilliant older downtown friend named William S. Burroughs, and a joyful street cowboy from Denver named Neal Cassady.
Kerouac had already begun writing a novel, stylistically reminiscent of Thomas Wolfe, about the torments he was suffering as he tried to balance his wild city life with his old-world family values. His friends loved the manuscript, and Ginsberg asked his Columbia professors to help find a publisher for it. It would become Kerouac's first and most conventional novel, The Town and the City, 'which earned him respect and some recognition as a writer, although it did not make him famous.
It would be a long time before he would be published again. He had taken some amazing cross-country trips with Neal Cassady while working on his novel, and in his attempt to write about these trips he had begun experimenting with freer forms of writing, partly inspired by the unpretentious, spontaneous prose he found in Neal Cassady's letters. He decided to write about his cross-country trips exactly as they had happened, without pausing to edit, fictionalize or even think. He presented the resulting manuscript to his editor on a single long roll of unbroken paper, but the editor did not share his enthusiasm and the relationship was broken. Kerouac would suffer seven years of rejection before 'On The Road' would be published.
He spent the early 1950's writing one unpublished novel after another, carrying them around in a rucksack as he roamed back and forth across the country. He followed Ginsberg and Cassady to Berkeley and San Francisco, where he became close friends with the young Zen poet Gary Snyder. He found enlightenment through the Buddhist religion and tried to follow Snyder's lead in communing with nature. His excellent novel 'The Dharma Bums' describes a joyous mountain climbing trip he and Snyder went on in Yosemite in 1955, and captures the tentative, sometimes comic steps he and his friends were taking towards spiritual realization.]
His fellow starving writers were beginning to attract fame as the 'Beat Generation 'a label Kerouac had invented years earlier during a conversation with fellow novelist John Clellon Holmes. Ginsberg and Snyder became underground celebrities in 1955 after the Six Gallery poetry reading in San Francisco. Since they and many of their friends regularly referred to Kerouac as the most talented writer among them, publishers began to express interest in the forlorn, unwanted manuscripts he carried in his rucksack wherever he went. 'On The Road' was finally published in 1957, and when it became a tremendous popular success Kerouac did not know how to react. Embittered by years of rejection, he was suddenly expected to snap to and play the part of Young Beat Icon for the public. He was older and sadder than everyone expected him to be, and probably far more intelligent as well. Literary critics, objecting to the Beat 'fad,' refused to take Kerouac seriously as a writer and began to ridicule his work, hurting him tremendously. Certainly the Beat Generation was a fad, Kerouac knew, but his own writing was not.
His sudden celebrity was probably the worst thing that could have happened to him, because his moral and spiritual decline in the next few years was shocking. Trying to live up to the wild image he'd presented in 'On The Road,' he developed a severe drinking habit that dimmed his natural brightness and aged him prematurely. His Buddhism failed him, or he failed it. He could not resist a drinking binge, and his friends began viewing him as needy and unstable. He published many books during these years, but most had been written earlier, during the early 50's when he could not find a publisher. He kept busy, appearing on TV shows, writing magazine articles and recording three spoken-word albums, but his momentum as a serious writer had been completely disrupted.
Like Kurt Cobain, another counter-culture celebrity who seemed to be truly (as opposed to fashionably) miserable, Kerouac expressed his unhappiness nakedly in his art and was not taken seriously. In 1961 he tried to break his drinking habit and rediscover his writing talents with a solitary nature retreat in Big Sur. Instead, the vast nature around him creeped him out and he returned to San Francisco to drink himself into oblivion. He was cracking up, and he laid out the entire chilling experience in his last great novel, 'Big Sur.'
Defeated and lonesome, he left California to live with his mother in Long Island, and would not stray from his mother for the rest of his life. He would continue to publish, and remained mentally alert and aware (though always drunken). But his works after 'Big Sur' displayed a disconnected soul, a human being sadly lost in his own curmudgeonly illusions.
Despite the 'beatnik' stereotype, Kerouac was a political conservative, especially when under the influence of his Catholic mother. As the beatniks of the 1950's began to yield their spotlight to the hippies of the 1960's, Jack took pleasure in standing against everything the hippies stood for. He supported the Vietnam War and became friendly with William F. Buckley.
Living alone with his mother in Northport, Long Island, Kerouac developed a fascinating set of habits. He stayed in his house most of the time and carried on a lifelong game of 'baseball' with a deck of playing cards. His drink of choice was a jug of the kind of cheap, sweet wine, Tokay or Thunderbird, usually preferred by winos. He became increasingly devoted to Catholicism, but his unusual Buddhist-tinged brand of Catholicism would hardly have met with the approval of the Pope.
Through his first forty years Kerouac had failed to sustain a long-term romantic relationship with a woman, though he often fell in love. He'd married twice, to Edie Parker and Joan Haverty, but both marriages had ended within months. In the mid-1960's he married again, but this time to a maternalistic and older childhood acquaintance from small-town Lowell, Stella Sampas, who he hoped would help around the house as his mother entered old age.
He moved back to Lowell with Stella and his mother, and then moved again with them to St. Petersburg, Florida. His health destroyed by drinking, he died at home in 1969. He was 47 years old.
A site that let you hear Kerouac's voice is here.
An interesting Kerouac tribute CD called 'Kicks Joy Darkness', featuring musical experiments by people like Lee Ranaldo, Patti Smith, Robert Hunter, Joe Strummer and many others can be sampled here.
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Check Your Steps: Chill: How to Pack a Cooler to Prevent Food Poisoning
By Diane Van, Food Safety Education Staff Deputy Director, USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service
This summer has been a scorcher! So this week’s Check Your Steps blog focuses on a timely food safety step—Chill. You may feel like this guy, but we recommend other techniques to keep your food cold and safe – no fans necessary.
Bacteria grow rapidly between 40 °F and 140 °F, and when it’s above 90 °F outside, cold food heats to those temperatures much faster. Portable coolers can be your best friend during outdoor summer activities or grocery shopping, but pack them correctly to keep food at 40 °F or below so it doesn’t spoil or make you sick.
You’ll need a cooler:
- If your grocery store is more than a half hour away from home
- When transporting food on roadtrips
- While boating, camping, or visiting the beach
- At cookouts
Make sure you have:
- Plenty of ice or frozen gel packs
- Preferably more than one insulated cooler
- An appliance thermometer
Keep these tips in mind:
- Pack perishable foods directly from the refrigerator or freezer into the cooler. Meat and poultry may be packed while still frozen—it will stay colder longer.
- A full cooler will maintain its cold temperatures longer than one that is partially filled. If the cooler isn’t completely filled, pack the remaining space with more ice.
- Keep raw meat, poultry, and seafood in a separate cooler or securely wrapped at the bottom of a cooler so their juices won’t contaminate already prepared foods or raw produce.
- Store food in watertight containers to prevent contact with melting ice water.
- Reserve one cooler just for beverages (which will be opened frequently), so that your food coolers will stay cold longer. Limit the times the food cooler is opened, and open and close the lid quickly.
- An appliance thermometer takes the guesswork out of knowing your food is safe to eat. So put one in your cooler, and make sure it reads 40 °F or below.
- When the temperature outside is above 90 °F, put perishable food back in the cooler within 1 hour after eating. Otherwise, cool it within 2 hours.
- For long trips, take along two coolers — one for the day's immediate food needs, like lunch or snacks, and the other for perishable foods to be used later in the vacation.
- At the beach, partially bury your cooler in the sand, cover it with blankets, and shade it with an umbrella for extra insulation.
FoodSafety.gov has more information on safe food storage temperatures. This concludes the Check Your Steps blog series, but you can follow #checksteps on Twitter for updates on the Food Safe Families campaign.
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An Octopus SuccessAuthor: Zyan Silver
It started as a project during my senior year in high school. I was at school in southern Oregon and needed a project to fulfill the new graduation requirements set forth by the state. I was interested in marine biology and decided that raising an octopus species would be a challenging educational experience. With my father as my mentor, I did my homework and researched octopuses, and I quickly learned that they are fascinating animals.
Octopuses are part of a mysterious and misunderstood group of invertebrates called cephalopods, which includes squid, cuttlefish, and nautiluses. Cephalopod means “head-footed,” and when you look at an octopus you can immediately appreciate why. Octopuses are efficient predators living almost exclusively on live foods. They are active hunters that stalk and ambush crustaceans and gastropods, their favorite foods. They are fast-growing and short-lived, most surviving less than two years.
Octopuses have eight limbs with suction discs. The body, or mantle, contains all the organs and is without an internal or external shell. At the base of the tentacles is a parrot-like hard beak. These animals hunt using their excellent vision; their well-developed eyes come complete with iris, lens, and retina, similar to vertebrate eyes, in an example of convergent evolution.
An usual aspect of their biology is the fact that they have three hearts. Their gills receive water by the pumping action of the mantle drawing water in, and a funnel-like tube (siphon) squirts water out of the gill cavity when the body is contracted. They can aim this in different directions and use it for jet propulsion. They can also produce a black ink as a method of defense. This ink can be squirted as a visual screen, or to distract predators. As it forms a cloud, the octopus then will turn pale and jet away.
Part of the octopus’s secretive nature is its complex skin. They are masters of rapidly changing color and shape, and they can use these abilities for camouflage, mimicry, alarm display, and communication. Special color structures called chromatophores are responsible for this incredibly rapid response. There are millions of these special cells that can be turned on and off in a fraction of a second. The texture of the octopus’ skin can change to form flaps and spikes, and their free-flowing body allows them to squeeze through the tiniest openings.
Armed with all of this knowledge, I picked Octopus bimaculoides as the species to study and raise. Affectionately known as bimacs, these medium-size octopuses reside in southern California coastal mudflats and tidal pools. Most octopuses are nocturnal, but these are active during the day. They have two ocelli (eye spots) and are often called the two-spot octopuses. We know little about their mating habits, but the female lays eggs once at the end of her life. This species lays large eggs measuring about ½ inch in length. Because its eggs are so large in size and so few in number (about 100 to 200), this is an ideal octopus to raise. The hatchling octopus must have live food the size of the octopus itself at birth. This type of food was available to me locally—another reason why this was such an ideal specimen for me to study.
In contradistinction, most octopus species lay thousands of tiny eggs which hatch into an initial planktonic lifestyle. These almost-microscopic newborns spend their early days in the water column eating zooplankton; this makes captive-raising them problematic.
A few other behaviors make captive husbandry of octopuses difficult as well. They are asocial animals, loners that only get together to mate. They also tend to be cannibalistic, requiring isolation in closed aquarium systems.
Octopuses seem more like higher life forms with an innate intelligence approaching that of animals like cats and dogs. Each individual has its own temperament and can learn rudimentary behaviors. These creatures are masters of disguise, putting the chameleon’s legendary skills of camouflage to shame. In captivity they quickly learn to recognize and interact with their keepers.
With the goal of maximizing my chance to achieve success in captive husbandry, I set up my temperate saltwater aquarium system. I assembled a 500-gallon seawater system in my garage. Although my parents live on the ocean, I used artificial salt for the water. I plumbed three large tanks together with a commercial chiller and oversized protein skimmer. I had a functioning biological filter consisting of live rock and live sand. Aware that water quality was crucial to success, I wanted pristine, highly oxygenated water.
Octopuses have transparent blue blood due to a copper-based pigment that is less efficient at carrying oxygen than the iron-based hemoglobin in our red blood. The water parameters in the tank were a specific gravity of 1.026, with ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels undetectable. The water temperature was kept at 60° to 68°F with the use of the chiller. Octopuses are notorious escape artists, so their enclosures must be escape-proof. Nothing is sadder than finding your beloved pet dried up and dead on the floor or behind a nearby piece of furniture. Fortunately for me, bimacs seem to have less inclination to leave their watery homes. They will, however, explore every nook and cranny in the aquarium and can squeeze thru the smallest openings—their beak is the only part of their body that is not compressible.
I had several circulation pumps to ensure adequate movement of the water. I had to be certain that all pipes and tubes that led to the pumps were adequately covered or screened. The dim fluorescent light in the garage was ideal, as these animals shun the bright lights commonly found in tropical reef aquariums.
It was June 2006 and my system was now ready and awaiting an octopus. From southern California via overnight courier came an adult female with a clutch of eggs in a clay pot. For the next two months this mother octopus tended to her eggs inside a den, never leaving her lair. The elongated ½-inch eggs were clustered like grapes hanging from the roof of the clay pot. Although I offered her food, I never saw her eat. She constantly aerated and caressed the eggs, oxygenating them with jets of clean water. This loving care is necessary to ensure the viability of these developing eggs. She cleaned the egg cases with her suckers to prevent buildup of bacteria and algae, and also protected them from possible predation. Eventually I could see the black eyes peering from the translucent eggs—it was a sign that the hatch date was near.
On August 5 it happened. A baby octopus appeared and was swimming free in the aquarium. It was a miniature version of the adult, and it was able to crawl, jet, ink, and change color and shape. Suddenly there was another, then another, and even more. Over the next seven days 125 babies hatched. Beyond hatching there is no care provided by the mother and they must fend for themselves immediately. My work was just beginning. The mother, her work done, died 10 days later. This is the norm with these animals, and this semelparous nature is yet another fascinating fact about octopuses.
I didn’t know how many eggs were glued to the roof of that clay pot, hidden by the mother octopus, but I certainly didn’t have 100 containers. I collected the babies, isolating them in 2- to 4-liter plastic bottles inside the large tanks. The tops and bottoms of the bottles were cut off and replaced by mesh screen for adequate water flow and circulation. Initially I housed the juveniles in groups of three to five per container, and over the next weeks I was able to collect enough containers to separate each one. I flushed the containers daily to keep the water clean and clear. I supplied them with little shells for dens and toy blocks for entertainment.
My secret to success was being able to supply the juveniles with live foods of the appropriate size. I collected this food from the nearby local tide pools. I had previously traveled to the area just south of Los Angeles to view their natural habitat; I explored the tide pools and scuba dived along the rock coastline, and I decided that the tiny intertidal snails, crabs, and hermit crabs would be an excellent initial food source. Octopuses eat gastropods, crustaceans, and fish. Although their favorite food is crabs, snails are a bigger part of their diet due to their relative abundance. I collected hundreds of 1- to 4-mm black turban snails from the higher intertidal zone by simply brushing them off the rocks into my collection bucket. I made certain that the captives had these varied foods available to them at all times.
The once-tiny octopuses grew quickly. I would be entertained for hours just by watching them explore their small spaces, crawl over the surfaces, and occasionally jet with their siphons. I had been told that I would be lucky to raise four or five babies out of a clutch. Over the months as the bimac babies grew I realized that there were only a few deaths. I kept their containers clean and flushed. Bigger food items replaced the smaller as the young grew.
Their absolute favorite food was the shore crabs, which—though armed with sharp pincher claws—were no match for the guile of the octopuses. They delighted in subduing two or more at one time. Then, holding the crabs under their umbrella-like webbing at the base of their arms, the octopus would slink back to their hideout for a tasty treat. The empty shells would pile up around the dens. In the wild, when these middens are encountered, it is a sign to an astute observer that an octopus lives nearby.
It was fun playing tug-of-war with the octopuses; they could exert quite a force with their twin rows of suction discs. The more you pull, the more they pull. You can definitely feel their power when they draw your fingers into their eight-arm embrace. Often the young would hide, with their arms placed around their mantle, covered with empty shells.
With more than 100 young octopuses in my possession, I started contacting others who were interested in keeping these animals as pets. Finding the Internet site tonmo.com, The Octopus News Magazine Online, was truly an inspiration. Interacting with like-minded fans of cephalopods was a complete joy. After I was approved as a shipper, I began sending octopuses around the country.
When I initially contacted the carrier and told them I wanted to ship live octopuses, I was told that it sounded dangerous. The staff person said they needed to contact their legal department and would get back to me. This is the common response of the uninitiated. Octopuses seem to be eerie, mysterious denizens of the deep, often described in literature as dangerous and monstrous beasts. I suppose that an animal with eight arms that glides through inner space, doesn’t have a backbone, is secretive, and can alter its appearance in the blink of an eye may seem frightening. However, those that take the time to get to know them realize they are unique, misunderstood pets that are hard to forget. When you look at them and they look back at you, you can tell there is a true intelligence there—you realize that they are wondering and thinking about you, just as you are wondering about them.Only those lucky enough to spend time with octopuses can fully appreciate these beautiful creatures. I continue to observe the 50 octopuses I have at my home. I’ve set up some room-temperature tanks and am experimenting with group assemblies of bimacs. They seem to at least tolerate each other as long as they are provided plenty of food and spaces to hide in. I am hopeful that I will be able to captive-breed this species as they move into adulthood. It may be time for you to check out a pet octopus like O. bimaculoides—you will be rewarded with the experience of a lifetime!
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It is decades since I've done math, so please forgive the lack of correct terminology and lack of latex etc. I'm endeavoring to write a simple CAS calculator that can handle structures that undergraduates could run into.
Thanks to wikipedia, I've found that the way of adding a multiplicative inverse to a ring to create a field is called 'localization' - where R is the ring, S = R - zero divisors of R,
the new field is basically an ordered pair (S, R), with the meaning S^-1 * R I guess there is an implied cancellation law added so that (x,x) => (1,1), along with standard rules for rational addition, multiplication, and inverse.
Have I got this right so far?
Anyway, I figure that creating an additive inverse for a semiring is R[n], where n^2 = 1, and x+xn=0, n is the symbol for negative. Is this the quotient group R[n]/(n^2 - 1, 1 + n)?
Is there any proper name for this process, and do I have it correct?
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