Culture of the ethnic Gallente

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The culture of the ethnic Gallente is known for its highly self-expressive nature and artistic quality. Rather than the cultural arts of the ethnic Gallente being something to reinforce the social order, it often challenges it. As a platform for individual self-expression, these practices commonly come with complex and nuanced philosophical implications, designed to progress the status quo from generation to generation. Provocation is a key element, challenging previously established morals and principles with new and fresh ideas, resulting in a vibrant and progressive culture. This is often ridiculed as decadent and hedonistic, but in almost every case, individuals who stereotype ethnic Gallente culture like this have not taken the time to consider the thousands of subtexts involved.

Outside of self-expression, provocation and subtext, neo-classicalism is another unique element of the ethnic Gallente artistic cultures. The most frequent manifestation of this is the revival of pre-modern practices that are updated for the contemporary era, notably using the latest technology, such as stage shows that use extensive holographics. The latter only became prevalent after first contact with the Amarr Empire, whom many ethnic Gallente saw as an anachronistic yet fascinating nation who had somehow managed to carry their ancient culture into the stars.

The non-politicized and individual-focused nature of ethnic Gallente culture has resulted in its ability to influence the cultures of other empires (with the notable exclusion of the Amarr). For example, large portions of contemporary State culture, be it entertainment or fashion, is simply an extension of what both civilizations shared in Luminaire centuries ago, albeit in a notable Caldari flavor and style.

The arts to the Gallente of Luminaire cover the visual, performing and the literary, with the latter (along with music) detailed further on. In complete contrast to the Amarr (for example), the Gallente arts are inclined towards original creations from individual artists, and have not been dictated from the top-down.

Though the Gallente are innovators in many artistic endeavors, one particular aspect merits mentioning, if for no other reason than that it often serves as a convenient emblem of the Gallente mindset. Due in no small part to Luminaire’s proclivity for pushing the boundaries, experimental Gallente artistry has become so elaborate that, to much of the unacquainted, it seems virtually unintelligible.

As an example, in many avant-garde Gallente narratives, the story is embedded within layers of satire-upon-meaning-upon-satire and predicated upon subtle movement and form; as a result, the whole endeavor of the audience becomes less about following plot and more about how to interpret the piece based on the nuanced complexity and convolution of its presentation as seen through its relevance to the individual viewer.

For this reason, while a typical Gallente fan of this particular branch of art may sit rapt, a non-Gallente might watch an entire stage performance where nothing appears to have happened at all. Furthermore, in many Gallente works these convolutions will turn in on themselves several times, creating meta-layers of meaning that Gallente critics and academics love to mull over endlessly, but which seem like vacuous and pretentious maneuverings by those less interested in the intricacies of narrative analysis.

Actual practices vary from ancient to contemporary, to anything in between, drawing from all nations and cultures across Gallente Prime (extinct or otherwise). Though Garouner arts are particularly commonplace on the interstellar scene, there are plenty of other practices from the homeworld that are popular, primarily from cultures that did not have to endure any hardships due to a harsh climate and/or ecology. With plenty of spare time, many activities were indulged in, which developed the high arts within those nations.

Theater is popular, a vehicle for philosophical playwrights to express their ideas to a wider audience, through multiple genres including dance and opera. Some stage plays have been so provocative in the past, that they have precipitated entire revolutions within ancient and early modern nations. Even in the modern Federation, several plays have challenged the current social order on multiple occasions. The arts is often its own platform for activists, playing its role in the progressive political scrutiny that the Federation is known for.

The traditional Gallente performing arts have many stylistic similarities with the Amarr, but to contrast, there are many fundamental differences. For starters, philosophy within Amarr arts almost universally represent the same, long-established truths around the Scriptures, with ideas descending from the top in this regard. Gallente artistic representation is the opposite, ascending from the individual’s own creativity to explore anything from political corruption to racism. Much of modern Gallente politics has roots in these arts, whereas Amarr arts comes from its politics. Another difference is the aesthetic. Gallente performing arts favor all different colors and tonalities, versus the Amarr preference to keeping within a particular shade.

There are plenty of Gallente arts, however, which are more indulgent and less inclined to exploring philosophical concepts. This is particularly true of artistic products which are made for the purposes of exporting to the wider New Eden market, for two main reasons. The first is that if the product was politically provocative, it may prove culturally offensive and may be rejected from foreign distribution. The second is that the product may simply prove nonsensical to the wider market.

Some artists have been critically scathed for ‘dumbing down’ certain works for foreign consumption, with accusations of selling out for the profit opportunity. A collection of these critics believe it is imperative for the integrity of a work to remain as it is whenever it is exported, in order to demonstrate Gallente cultural superiority to other peoples, or at least influence them in this regard.

Gallente visual and performing artists have proved, by far, the most receptive to integrating modern technology within their works, often to the gripe of the more classically-minded. Holographics is used extensively within modern music and theater, though plenty of traditionalists seek to carry out a stage show with as little modern technology as possible, which in turn has its own charm to specific audiences.

These holographics can be so advanced that they are capable of changing the environment of the stage, or even the entire venue, depending on the song or scene. Even the costumes of the performers can be changed seamlessly, to the point that some theater productions can be conducted without a single physical prop. Musicians are particularly fond of holographics, creating illusions to surround the audience and drum up collective effervescence.

Architecture is another avenue for artists to explore using modern techniques. The Gallente are the masters of civil engineering and city-building in many respects, seeing architecture as the marriage of art and engineering, as opposed to simply building something to serve a specific purpose (though the Amarr have their own understanding of this concept as well).

A Gallente architect sees the construction of a building as their own blank canvas, with their purpose ranging from expressing an idea through a design, or simply to build the most extreme or grandest construct ever devised. This practice is ancient, with the most well-known testament to this being the Sanctuary of the Seventh Goddess in the city of Caille on Gallente Prime, one of the panoply of gods from an ancient era. Historians remain baffled as to how primitive technology was able to construct what remains to be the tallest structure in the city. As a nod to cultural history, the Caille authorities have made it illegal to construct any building which may match or exceed the height of the Sanctuary’s spire.

Many architects who wish to escape cultural conservatism on Gallente Prime migrate elsewhere to explore their own ideas. As a result, there are cities in the Federation with bizarre and even downright alien architecture, sometimes with questionable structural integrity. The Gallente cultural favoring of gems has spawned the very unique creation of crystalline cities, that can be found in richer parts of the Federation[1]. These massive, multi-tiered conglomerations often fuse the local flora in their designs, in a way that no matter what tier one is on, the illusion of always being at ground level is projected. Though these cities appear crystal (the color of which depends on the local environment), they are still very much built on solid foundations of brickwork and steel.

Preserving the local flora and fauna is very important when the Gallente construct their cities, as is matching the architecture to the environment the settlement finds itself in. For example, some indulgently-constructed cities on magmatic worlds incorporate lava streams and pools seamlessly within public thoroughfares, often to the great concern of Federal health and safety officials. More famous examples of bold Gallente architectural endeavors include Gallente underwater cities and the former Seyllin I. Overall, as the Gallente see architecture as yet another platform for individual artistic expression, the cities of the Federation vary immensely from place-to-place.

Literature is an often overlooked foundation of Gallente culture to those both inside and outside the Federation.

The value of knowledge to Gallente citizens contributes to the tendency of them generally being more politically aware than citizens of other nations, with many devoting their efforts to one or more of a multitude of causes that suit their ambitions. Gallente literary works are almost endless, stretching back many hundreds of years and covering countless different authors. Ranging from fictional epics to poetry, the Gallente have many great thinkers (such as Fouel and Geremande[2]) who have been credited with laying down the foundations for contemporary political and philosophical thought, both on Gallente Prime and across the wider Federation.

Many of the modern concepts of human rights, libertarianism, the rule of law and good governance traces back to both ancient philosophers, who explored the metaphysical world and its implications for free will, destiny, and the individual spirit, and early modern academics who were at the forefront of the enlightenment that brought about the homeworld’s globalization of democracy.

As mentioned previously, the comfortable nature of Gallentia (the Garoun continent primarily) meant that hardships were not as extreme as they were on other worlds, so there was plenty of free time for the populace as a result. This allowed the development of a cultural elite who would undertake a variety of intellectual pursuits, laying down the framework for the future Gallente.

The Gallente cultural idea that anyone can be immortalized through literature, regardless of occupation or background, is why it is often the case that conscientious objectors and altruists earn just as much respect as those of famous leaders or war heroes. Great human feats, whether spectacular military victories or tremendous acts of kindness, can be romanticized through novels and poems, with no bias to a certain kind of deed in particular.

The hunger for knowledge amongst the Gallente is why they are often known for their inquisitive nature, though the widespread consuming of academic literature (be it political journals or university publications) tends to make them highly opinionated. The pursuit of objective truth, as well the focus on impartiality amongst Gallente education systems, means that honesty has become a highly valued virtue to the Gallente. Similarly, historical epics have influenced the popular mindset to the point that Gallente individuals are widely recognized for their selflessness and valor, particularly when they sense the freedoms of others are threatened. In living up to the literary legacy of King Rouvenor, many Gallente men seek to be generous in their friendships, while being ardent adversaries.

In the modern era, concepts such as interstellar existentialism and secular ethics have roots in Gallente Prime literature, while constitutional law and other legal matters in the Federation (and, to a lesser extent, the CONCORD Assembly) are influenced by early modern and contemporary Gallente academics. The Servant Sisters of EVE and countless third sector organizations in other empires have adopted values of charity and humanitarianism similar to those of altruistic Gallente beliefs that stretch back as early as the Garoun era, where the Rouvenor dynasty upheld the beliefs of having an ethical and moral ruler that would champion themselves as the defenders of the downtrodden, all of which are documented in literary works written by the monarchs themselves. The social policies and high moral standards of the Federal government are influenced by these ideas.

Some Luminaire cultures has very defined concepts of masculinity and femininity (despite its potential contradiction with the concept of individualism), with both genders being equal and having their own unique strengths that must be utilized to the full. These thoughts originate from feminist works that stretch back to the end of the Industrial Age on Gallentia, continuing to influence the behaviours and cultures of ethnic Gallente women in the Federation. This influence is directly felt in Gallente matters of state, with the Federation having a much larger ratio of female heads of state and government than other empires, particularly in peacetime.

It is often the ethnic Gallente woman that is commonly invoked as a symbol of the modern Federal citizen, all because of the role of feminist Luminaire literature generations prior (as well as the lack of gender-inhibiting religious institutions in more archaic times). Extremely confident models of self-empowerment, they are known for their hard work ethic balanced with a strong pursuit of leisure. Both fiction and non-fiction espouse the ideal woman as being very creative and resourceful, to be known for their assertive yet kind nature, with an outgoing and lively spirit. This “contagious zest for life” belief has been at the forefront of the emancipation of women in many societies, most notably the Jin-Mei, which has caused some tension in the past.

In all the above instances, poetry has played a key role. Though many cultures in New Eden have poetry in their traditions, it is widely regarded as a modern form of commercial entertainment in the Federation, to the point that many colonial projects (government or otherwise) seek to fulfill a quota on the amount of poets alongside other occupations such as doctors or engineers[3]. The Gallente poetic scene is, like with music, constantly evolving through the cross-cultural interaction that the modern era permits. While there are millions of poems that emerge from the homeworld and many other Gallente planets, it is one of the very few entertainment sectors in the Federation where foreign penetration can sometimes be greater than the domestic output, as there is far less opportunity for consumption and profit opportunities for poetry in other empires.

The Gallente consider the preparation and cooking of food and drink as a form of high art. It is for this reason that Federation-based megacorporations have been able to dominate the food services industry across New Eden[4], to the point that even if a restaurant appears to follow one cultural origin, it is often Gallente chefs that run things from behind the scenes.

The Gallente Prime homeworld is biodiverse, resulting in a great many amount of animal and plant species that has created millions of different recipes from that single planet alone. Similarly, more ecologically homogeneous worlds such as Caldari Prime or Intaki have their own unique produce which cannot be found anywhere else, interacting with recipes from Gallentia and other worlds the ethnic Gallente have settled, creating an even larger encyclopedia of foods. To the Gallente, a specific recipe of food or drink does not hold any binding cultural significance (such as Caldari kresh tea), so as a result, cuisine is seen as only limited by the amount of biological life in the universe, which is quite possibly near-infinite.

Overall, Gallente cuisine seeks to combine as many different ingredients from across New Eden as possible, cycling through endless different recipes as a result. Though there are some Luminaire traditionalists who prefer recipes specific to the homeworld, this is generally a niche market. To some observers, food and drink has been a very effective vehicle of Gallente cultural projection, mustering its influence onto worlds and amongst peoples in what is perceived as an extremely unthreatening form of encroachment (particularly when considering there are much harsher methods of cultural warfare).

There are some well-known recipes and traits of Gallente high cuisine amongst the citizens of New Eden, variety aside. For meals, the meat and vegetable balance is important, as is the general health and nutritional content, while appearance is just as key to a fine dish as taste. Salads are thus quite popular, with the ability to combine vegetables from hundreds of different worlds to create unique dishes and pieces of edible artwork.

Desserts, sweets and other confectioneries provide another avenue of creating extravagant and flamboyant dishes, using natural ingredients where possible to cover every color imaginable. There is generally a social stigma against using cloned, genetically modified or otherwise synthetic foodstuffs, as consumers do not believe the food to be genuinely ‘authentic’. That said, various Gallente megacorporations, particularly Quafe and its legion of subsidiaries, are known to mass-produce ‘fast food’ on an industrial scale, which has seen great success on space stations and similar arcological constructions. Such food is generally looked down upon by Gallente chefs and the more well-off public.

Other than soft drinks, a major Luminaire contribution to the New Eden beverages market is wine made from berries and grapes found within medial climate zones on a variety of different worlds. Before water purification techniques came about on the homeworld, wine was consumed widely, as well as lily and marshland tea to a lesser extent. Amongst the Rouvenor and some Ancient peoples, wine was a cultural symbol that was consumed for the same reasons as tea or psychoactive stimulants amongst other ethnicities, either recreationally or for ‘encouraging’ philosophical thought. However, it is often stereotyped as being a hedonistic drink of decadence by other cultures, and in some practices, this is not far from the truth.

The Gallente have a unique contribution to the interstellar wine market (of which the Federation dominates by far) through the production of champagne, which is a form of sparkling wine that requires a very specific climatic zone, estimated to be present on less than twenty temperate worlds in the Federation. A bottle of champagne is thus rare and expensive, and so it is a status symbol amongst many Gallente peoples. There is much reverence to connoisseurs who have been successful in not opening a bottle that is over a century old. A notable producer of champagne is Feille d’Marnne from Egghelende III[5], the drink being impossible to cultivate anywhere else in the Federation. Each case is worth an interstellar fortune as a result.

Gallente fashion accounts for a leading portion of contemporary New Eden clothing, with areas such as the Coriault constellation being at the forefront of the industry[6]. Styles range from casual and functional to wild and eccentric. Fashion is seen as an avenue of self-expression to the Gallente, who seek to communicate their personalities and preferences in life through the clothes they wear. It is said that if one walks down the street of a town on any modern Federation world, a thousand different clothing styles will be on display[7]. These styles vary further depending on the climate and/or ecology of a world, the Gallente having proven adept at creating fashionable clothing for even harsh desert or arctic environments.

Influences and proliferation

As with many aspects of contemporary Federal culture, Gallente fashion has incorporated elements and motifs from other cultures, blended together and reproduced into new styles every month of the interstellar year. There are, however, plenty of standalone and unique contributions the Luminaire peoples have granted to clusterwide fashion, particularly amongst cultures who lacked any concepts of casual clothing.

The polytextile t-shirt is one such contribution, notable for its functional and comfortable design that allows it to be easily mass-produced on a wide-scale across New Eden. Caillean leather and synth-leather is another, more readily identifiable in its Gallente origins than the t-shirt, which has become somewhat universal in the current day. It is widely imitated both inside and outside the Federation, being found in places as far as Dam-Torsad on Athra[8]. It is quite common for tourists to explore remote communities on farflung worlds, to discover certain inhabitants wearing items of Gallente clothing that are hopelessly out-of-date, depicting brands or celebrities who died out many years ago.

Mannar, one of the oldest members of the Federation, has always had a strong influence on Gallente style and trendsetting[9]. Much of the eccentric tailoring favored by society’s elite and decried as immodest and inappropriate by the other empires has its roots in pre-Federation Mannar culture, which included different concepts of modesty and etiquette. Massive hairstyles and elaborate body- and face-painting still feature prominently in addition to semi-opaque fabrics which respond to a variety of programmable stimuli.

So much of high Gallente fashion has been lifted from the Mannar peoples, that the connection to its origins in the latter culture is no longer made, used as a stereotype Federal culture as a whole. In truth, only the upper echelons of society can hope to afford the extravagant fashion styles that the wider nation is ridiculed for, though the average Gallente is nonetheless quite fashion-conscious, seeing clothing as an important representation of self-identity. In terms of the melting pot culture, the influence of Gallente trendsetting on New Eden fashion can be seen both inside and outside the Federation

For men, the modern day ‘business suit’ has its origins amongst the Garoun nations during Gallente Prime’s late Industrial Age, tracing back to tri-corner hats and tailcoats worn by the nobility and gentry. Said suit originally involved a blazer, tie and felt hat for males (amongst other things), before it was adopted by several other cultures after first contact, most notably the Caldari. The usage of hats and ties has mostly been dropped in the contemporary era, particularly after wealthy Minmatar began to wear business suits not long after the Republic was founded.

Much of Minmatar non-tribal wear is Gallente in origin, with some notable styles being inspired by the clothing of engineers and aviators from the Gallente industrial era, though recent cultural revivals under Shakor’s Republic seek to look at similar fashions during the ancient Minmatar Empire. Both have proven quite popular amongst the Gallente in the Federation, as well as the ‘punk’ look which dominates several Minmatar/Gallente subcultures. The Amarr, being their own cultural bastion that has existed in space for thousands of years, was never really influenced by Gallente fashion, excluding the introduction of casual clothing amongst poor Commoners and slaves.

For females, a popular source of trendsetting is from legacy states on Gallente Prime that still retain a ceremonial monarchy. Queens, princesses, and other female members of royalty are hounded by culture journalists, reporting their findings to interplanetary fashion houses, who will then seek to reproduce ‘authentic’ copies for the mass market. Some of these designs have not changed in centuries, or even thousands of years, though many monarchies have updated their range of fashionable royal robes and dresses according to contemporary tailoring techniques. Particularly popular female and relatively younger members of the Federal Senate are also scrutinized for their choice of senatorial garments, which is also another source of trendsetting for the upper class consumer.

Gallente fashion designers also take from Amarr women’s wear, particularly dresses worn by Holders and nobles, and then repurpose such designs for the Federation’s market, varying the original’s levels of modesty. Many Amarr consider this insulting, and sometimes blasphemous depending on the design in question, but it remains a simple fact that many Gallente are more than happy to brush shoulders with the slavery-endorsing Empire at every opportunity.

Despite the lifting of women’s wear from the Amarr, there are plenty of indigenous designs that are organic and contemporary progressions from clothing worn on the homeworld, and are not simply reproductions of royal fashion. There can be simple, thin dresses made from a single rime of fabric, modern updates of flowing historical garments, to outlandishly elaborate designs that would require a small army of personal assistants and/or drones if one hopes to slip in and out of the implement without damaging it.

Luminaire fine jewelry stands out for its inclusion of gemstones, with emerald having a particular cultural significance in the history of the Garoun Empire. Gemstone embroidery in robes and dresses are popular, the exact mineral in question varying depending on the overall color of the design, and whether or not it matches. Gallente gemstone-based jewelry often competes with Amarr gold-based designs for interstellar market dominance, though the combining of both materials has hardly proved offensive.

The Gallente regard music as key to their culture of self-expression, and since every individual in the Federation express themselves their own way, the music likewise varies between many different genres, then again from planet to planet. The domination of the Gallente entertainment industry clusterwide means that mostly all forms of contemporary music are based off of Gallente genres.

While every culture retains their traditional styles, the prevalence of Gallente music within the interstellar industry meant that the only way for others to stand a chance of competing was to adopt the musical standard that the Federation had set. Even then, the musical divergences over time has made some genres perceived as more associated with one particular culture, with its Gallente origins long forgotten.

Genres of Gallente popular music (and thus New Eden popular music as a whole) are seemingly endless, ranging from folk to heavy metal, electronic to symphonic. These genres can often incorporate the traditional instruments of other cultures, with Minmatar tribal pop or Amarr religious rock being two of hundreds of subgenres. The combinations constantly change and evolve as the market shifts, and only a handful of musicians and groups are able to persevere in the spotlight for more than a few years. AI musicians provide a cheap way for music companies to keep on top of the ever-changing market, forgoing the burdens of a human musician.

Certain genres of music have come about as a direct response to certain cultural changes on Gallente Prime and beyond, representing a sandbox for individual or collective voices to express their personal and political ideologies. Heavy metal and other rawer genres of rock developed as a form of social rebellion against governments that were perceived as repressive or authoritarian, and it is for this reason that the genre has proven immensely popular amongst the Minmatar, who now have their own homegrown variations.

Folk music has persisted in retaining the cultures and practices of tribal groups from Gallentia that have since been assimilated over the centuries, as well as championing environmentalist thought. On the other end of the sociocultural ladder, orchestral music’s continued prevalence is important to cultural traditionalists for maintaining the legacy of the Rouvenors and other pre-industrial states (though they are plenty of heavy metal and rock groups who base their orchestration and lyrics off of ancient legends and myths). Finally, of course, electronic music always evolves alongside corresponding developments in digital technology.

Modern musicians have been able to combine traditional instruments with the advanced domestic and lifestyle technology that the Gallente are known for, or even completely original instruments based off of this tech. Dance suits that are programmed to play music to the wearer’s movements is a notable example, with groups being able to rival the orchestration of a classical symphony with their dance numbers alone.

The manipulation of holographic interfaces is another popular form of musical composition, ranging from spheres that surround the entire user to more standard shapes such as handheld cubes and surfaces. Depending on how the interface is struck, whether with a punch or sweep, the sound and tonation varies. Certain musical genres that use holoinstruments can be quite physically demanding for this reason, though there are other genres that rely on a more gentle playing style.

Gallente classical music was primarily influenced by the Garoun Empire in the latter years of the Rouvenor era, and was carried on by all successor states and Garoun-influenced cultures since. In keeping with the sometimes extravagant nature of the Gallente, classical music is composed of large orchestras that include (but are not limited to) brass, string, woodwind and percussion instruments. Smaller assemblies include string quartets and brass bands, while there are numerous folk groups that utilize lesser instruments such as fiddles, guitars and bagpipes.

The Gallente orchestra format has been adopted by other cultures while using their own unique styles of composition, such as the Caldari not long after first contact, and later the Jin-Mei. In the modern era, there has been a lot of cultural exchange between Luminaire and Amarr composers and musicians. Classical vocal work, meanwhile, is much more diverse than Gallente orchestral, ranging from operatic sopranos and tenors accompanying theatrical performances, to gentle choirs of feminine voices designed to be set to scenic planetary locales or stellar nebulae. In contrast with Amarr classical music, female choirs (both contemporary and classical in style) are notably more common than male groups.

There are two main branches of modern ethnic Gallente folklore. The first is based on ancient Rouvenor legend, particularly around the philosopher-king Doule dos Rouvenor III and the Garoun Empire. To many ethnic Gallente, he is considered one of the few sincere statespeople in human history, as well as the so-called ‘grandfather of democracy’, making his name and legend timeless. The second major branch lacks a tangible definition, but generally covers the cultures of ethnic Gallente who are no longer tied to their ancestral homeworld, having been settled on other planets for many generations now. Anything from stellar anomalies to unique planetary features can be the starting point for these particular pieces of folklore.

Rouvenor legend

Rouvenor legend includes the characters and mythology surrounding the days of the Garoun Empire. These tales, which includes monsters and magic, can be fictional, or at least fictional takes on historical facts. Some of the details have become so blurred that, over the centuries, certain fantasies are interpreted as reality, and a handful of realities seen as myth.

The character of Rouvenor and other parts of the folklore has been carried across space in some areas, the king being immortalized as an interstellar spirit that encourages Gallente to venture to new frontiers, as seafaring explorers once did on the homeworld. It is rumored that artifacts of Rouvenor and the Garoun Empire have been scattered across the Federation. Capsuleers are often contracted out to recover these items (which are almost universally replicas or fakes[10]).

In modern entertainment, there are many products that are based off of Garoun history and legend. Rock bands, fantasy or historical holoreels, novels, and games are just some mediums based off of the folklore. Traditionalists may prefer theater or opera, either contemporary stories or exact reenactments of ancient plays.

Of note, production companies and writers of Jin-Mei animation have taken up a strong following of Garoun tales, as well as the Gallente's industrial era. The hundreds of serials created do not always relate to Rouvenor politics and history directly, and may follow an individual character’s adventure in another land during the same time period. These productions tend to be significantly more fantastical than classical Gallente versions, or otherwise quite romanticized.

Other developments

The other branch is not associated with Luminaire mainstream culture. The lack of enforced social and cultural compliance or conformity has allowed extreme divergences to take place in the area of folklore (as with Gallente culture overall). In space settlements, local stellar phenomena might be the foundation for folklore (such as the Lutin lights). On planets, folklore will vary from place to place, though there may also be Federation-wide beliefs adapted to the local environment. Gallente that have encountered indigenous peoples may pick up the beliefs of those groups, or may have blended with them over time until the lines between the two groups have blurred beyond previous definitions.

See Also

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The Art of Maurice Sendak

Here are unforgettable images that Sendak has created over his long career, with much that has never bene seen before including early sketches and dummies for published books, ideas that were never developed, and penned fantasies created while listening to music. Perfect for the entire family.


New tales told by old infections

Retroviruses are important pathogens capable of crossing species barriers to infect new hosts, but knowledge of their evolutionary history is limited. By mapping endogenous retroviruses (ERVs), retroviruses whose genes have become part of the host organism’s genome, researchers at Uppsala University, Sweden, can now provide unique insights into the evolutionary relationships of retroviruses and their host species. The findings will be published in a coming issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). All retroviruses, including HIV in humans, must become part of the host cell’s genome in order to produce new viruses. When a germ line cell is infected there is a chance for the virus to be passed on to the host organism’s offspring, and for millions of years retroviruses have colonized vertebrate hosts, leaving traces in their genetic make-up as endogenous retroviruses (ERVs).

The genomic record provided by ERVs offers improved knowledge of the evolution and frequency of past retroviral spread to evaluate future risks and limitations for horizontal transmission between different host species. This is relevant given the emergence of prominent diseases linked with retroviral infection, such as HIV, which switched hosts to humans from monkey species.

The findings are now being published in PNAS.

Source: Uppsala Universitet

Source: eScienceNews – Biology


Even when you practice regular, responsible birth control, sometimes mistakes happen. You forget. The form of birth control you usually depend on fails. Things can happen. An alternative now exists, and it can be taken a full five days after unprotected intercourse in order to prevent an unplanned pregnancy. When your normal form of birth control has an unexpected lapse, now you have a backup plan.

When a woman does not wish to become pregnant yet is exposed to the possibility of becoming pregnant by engaging in unprotected sex or the failure of a barrier form of birth control, one option is Ella. Ella has been shown to be effective at preventing pregnancy when taken within 120 hours (five days) of having unprotected sex or the failure or suspected failure of a barrier form of birth control

Ella works by preventing a fertilized egg from implanting to the uterus, by preventing an egg from being released into the uterus or by helping to prevent a sperm from fertilizing an egg. There are a few possible side effects experienced by women who take Ella for the prevention of pregnancy. Most commonly, abdominal pain, headache and nausea may be experienced. Ella should not be taken after five days of the possibility of an egg becoming fertilized (sexual intercourse), and should never be taken by women who desire to become pregnant.

Ella has been approved for taking at any point during a woman's menstrual cycle in order to prevent pregnancy. Ella is also known as an emergency contraceptive, and should not be used by women for the regular prevention of pregnancy.

Ella does not protect the user from sexually transmitted disease, such as HIV, AIDS, Herpes, Syphilis or other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). It is not known whether or not Ella is transmitted through the breast milk, so it should never be taken by women who are currently breastfeeding babies.

If you vomit within three hours after taking Ella, it may not be effective and the woman should consider taking a second dose in order to prevent pregnancy. Ella is also not effective when the woman takes it along with some other drugs, such as barbiturates, carbamazepine, phenytoin, rifampin, and St. John's Wort. If you are currently taking any of these other drugs, discuss your possibilities with your doctor.

Ella is not intended to be used in girls before the onset of menarche or for women past menopause. There has been no noticed difference in the effectiveness of Ella in women under the age of 18 as in women over the age of 18.

Ella is a brand name of the drug ulipristal acetate. This drug is also available in a generic form, and is marketed as ulipristal acetate. If a woman is pregnant and wishes to remain so, she should not take Ella or its generic version, ulipristal acetate.

For the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases and for the prevention of pregnancy, doctors recommend using another form of birth control regularly. Ella is intended for emergency use only, and should only be used on very rare occasions when another form of birth control, regularly used, has failed or might have failed. Discuss with your doctor what form of regular birth control might work best with your lifestyle.

Ella is effective for two days longer than the “Morning After Pill”. It is available only by prescription. To get Ella online, visit a reputable online pharmacy with doctors on staff who can take an accurate medical history and will be aware of any potential side effects or drug interactions. Getting your drugs online is quicker and easier than a wait in the doctor's office, and can prevent unnecessary embarrassment when discussing sensitive problems with the family physician.

Online Prescriptions Online Prescriptions


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Introduction And Basic Facts About Pneumatic Actuators

There is a lot to be said about pneumatic actuators in general, but this article will concentrate solely on pneumatic cylinders. And since you are reading this I’ll assume that you have a general idea about pneumatics, and do know what is pneumatic cylinder and how does it work.

Pneumatic market constantly evolves offering different kind of pneumatic cylinders, which at the moment are fairly significant group of pneumatic actuators used in various industries. There are many different types of them, and they can be distinguished by various criteria.

Lets start from piston rod. Usually when thinking about pneumatic cylinders you imagine cylinder with rod on one side, but there are also other types. There are cylinders with double sided rod, which work basically very similar to traditional cylinders. Take a look at this shop, they have wide range of pneumatic products.

pneumatic cylinder

Of course rod movement is bilateral, when it hides on one sides it extends on the other. Most least known group of pneumatic cylinders are rodless cylinders. In those cylinders piston is connected to external carriage and no piston rod extends outside it.

Rodless cylinders is ideal solution when there is a need for really long stroke, they can have strokes up to 8000 mm which is unlivable in any traditional cylinder because of rod overhang and bending. Interesting choice especially in narrow spaces.

Other way to group cylinders is their ISO standard. From that point of view we can differentiate few types. First of all there is ISO 15552, which is round or flat (square shaped) cylinder, probably most common cylinder type around the world, there is also or ISO 21287 known as compact cylinder, and there are also mini cylinders.

Mini cylinders (standard ISO 6432) are most interesting since there are extremely effective in various high-end applications like advanced machinery or robotics. Compact cylinders are common whenever space is requirements since they are slightly smaller then ISO 15552 alternatives.

Most popular are round and flat cylinders. In round cylinders tie rods are visible on the outside, and in square (or flat) cylinders everything is contained inside special housing. Square cylinders seems more robust and solid choice, and additionally you can easily mount piston position sensor on it.

Since I mentioned mini cylinders I have to mention so called cartridge cylinders which are tiny cylinders with bore size and stroke even below 10 mm (up to 16), those cylinders are specifically designed for very sophisticated applications.

There are various special variants available for pneumatic cylinders, sometimes available as standard, but most likely optional. Those functions are usually needed for special applications.

Extended piston rod is relatively popular one. In this case cylinder stroke stays the same, but piston rod extends more on the outside compared to default norms described by ISO standard.

Other popular choice is so called amortization which can be mechanical or pneumatic. Amortization provides smooth contact of the piston at the end cylinder position – there is no collision. In some types of actuators amortization can be regulated.

Piston rod can rotate around its own axis during move, this is normal thing, and it usually doesn’t cause any problems in most applications. But it is possible to order cylinder with so called anti-rotation feature.

Very popular variant is so called tandem. Its solution which uses two cylinders connected in series which share same piston rod and have two pistons. When compressed air simultaneously enters to cylinders the force of both cylinders is added together, so that the final strength of the front piston rod is almost twice as high.

Pneumatic cylinder types, and variants mentioned above are only most popular ones, there is more to be said about them and other types. There are for example UNITOP cylinders, ISO 5211 rotary cylinders and much more. I am aware that not exhausted the subject, but at least something left for later. This introduction should give you general idea about cylinders, and I hope it did. If you have any questions feel free to ask them in the comment section.


Requires Photography

Shawabty of Queen Maleteral II

Napatan Period, reign of Amani-natake-lebte
538–519 B.C.

Findspot: Nubia (Sudan), Nuri, Found in Pyramid 24 but originally in Pyramid 25

Overall: 11.3 x 5 cm (4 7/16 x 1 15/16 in.)

Accession Number

Medium or Technique

Not On View

The Ancient World

Shawabties and shawabty boxes

This is a shawabty of Queen Maleteral II. The female figure wears the queen’s vulture headdress over the tripartite wig. The arms are not crossed, the hands are positioned right above left. In each hand the figure holds a hoe. In addition the left hand holds a cord to a seed bag which is slung over the left shoulder. There are four horizontal lines of incised text encircling the body. The text is framed and there is a single vertical line up the center of the back dividing the back of the text. This mummiform shape does not have a back pillar or base. The object was broken in two pieces and is mended. The lower half of this figure is mising. The face, vulture head, lappets, implements and right hand are worn. There is a hole on the back of the left shoulder. The text is well-incised. “XXIV” is written on the back of the figure in black ink.

From Nubia (Sudan), Nuri, found in Pyramid 24, but originally from Pyramid 25 (tomb of Queen Maleteral II). 1917: excavated by the Harvard University–Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition; assigned to the MFA in the division of finds by the government of the Sudan.

Credit Line

Harvard University—Boston Museum of Fine Arts Expedition


The UK's leading custom cycle clothing suppliers

Pixel Technology

To make it safer to cycle during the dark winter months, Bioracer has developed a technology that combines the heat retaining properties of a normal winter fabric with the visibility of reflective safety clothing.

What makes these fabrics special is the use of Pixel, a technology that incorporates a matrix of printed reflective glass pearls on our fabrics. We use this technology in our PXL75 and PXL100 winter fabrics which we implement in highly reflective, wind and waterproof jackets for winter riding in dark circumstances.

For 2016, we will incorporate this technology in some of our lightweight summer materials for clothing you use during your summer evening rides. This technology provides every team with the opportunity to be able to train and ride safely, and is proven to be a potential life saver.

What is it?
The Pixel Fabric is actually comprised of three different layers:

Layer #1 – is a breathable inner layer that wicks moisture away from the body.

Layer #2 – the central layer provides a shield against cold, wind and rain.

Layer #3 – is the outer layer that uses small dots, or pixels, to provide super reflectivity for maximum visibility in the dark.

How is it used?
It can be used in any number of garments from cycling jackets to gilets to bib tights & shorts to arm warmers. Best of all it can be printed on like normal fabric so can be easily combined with custom team-wear.


Media: TIME

Are nine Bay Area tech billionaires worth the same as 1.8 billion of the world's poorest people?

The Oxfam report, released in mid-January before the annual Davos conference, finds the $426 billion controlled by a group of the planet's eight richest people is equal to the wealth of 3.6 billion people, or about half of the world's population.

"It is obscene for so much wealth to be held in the hands of so few when 1 in 10 people survive on less than $2 a day," Oxfam executive director Winnie Byanyima said. "Inequality is trapping hundreds of millions in poverty; it is fracturing our societies and undermining democracy."

Two Bay Area residents are among these eight Oxfam billionaires: Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Oracle's Larry Ellison. And if you add up the worth of the top nine richest people in the Bay Area, it comes to roughly $213 billion, according to a recent Forbes report. That's more than the net worth of the poorest quarter of the world's population.

Zuckerberg, Ellison and other local billionaires are part of the "Giving Pledge," where wealthy individuals promise to give away the majority of their wealth to charitable causes in their lifetimes or upon their deaths. Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan have already been very active donating their wealth in the Bay Area and beyond.

In the above gallery, see the nine Bay Area billionaires whose wealth adds up to a quarter of the world's population.


CCT 224
Performance Assessment
A 3rd year course in the CCIT Program of University of Toronto at Mississauga

ASSIGNMENT 2 - Financial Ratios

This assignment requires you to
(1) obtain information about a topic in the course
(2) in an ordered way, write out the information you research
(3) submit the information to the professor by Oct 19
(4) present a summary of the information to the rest of the class, in class Oct 21
Procedure and Organization In class Oct 7th the professor will divide the class into 5 groups according to the alphabetical order of the class list.
If you did not attend this Oct 7th class, you will still be held responsible for contacting the other members in the group.
If group members are not able to contact a particular group member, or that person does not respond to emails or phone calls, the group is welcome to continue the project on without that person(s).
When you submit the work Oct 19 and make your presentation on the 21st, it is presumed that if a name is on the cover page as a group member, then that person participated (so do not put someone's name on the cover if they did not equally contribute to the work)
see this video on group work  youtube.com/watch?v=ybZbld2gyLI

The Financial Ratios that are most commonly discussed in business are those listed below

 o Leverage Ratios (also called Debt Ratios)(Leverage Ratios are also referred to as a type of "Solvency Ratio"), including
            o Capital Acquisition Ratio
            o Capital Employment Ratio
            o Capital Structure Ratio
            o Long-term debt/capitalization Ratio
            o Debt-to-equity Ratio
 o Liquidity Ratios, including
            o Current Ratio
            o Quick Ratio (or "Acid Test"
 o Efficiency Ratios (also known as Operating Financial Ratios),
   (also sometimes titled Asset Utilization Ratios or Asset Management Ratios)

            o The Days Sales Outstanding Ratio
            o Inventory Turnover Ratio
            o Accounts Payable to Sales (%)
            o Total asset turnover (TAT) Ratio
            o Fixed asset turnover (FAT) Ratio
            o Sales Revenue per Employee
 o Profitability Ratios, including
            o Gross Profit Margin
            o Operating Profit Margin
            o Return on capital employed ("ROCE")
 o Investor Ratios (also known as Market Value Ratios), including
            o Earnings per share ("EPS")
            o Price-Earnings Ratio ("P/E Ratio")
            o Price / Cash Ratio
            o Dividend Yield
            o Book Value per Share
            o Market Value per Share
            o Market / Book Ratio

Your group will be assigned a particular ratio

You will deal with the following questions / issues
1 Summary of what this ratio is commonly used for
eg. "Liquidity ratios are used to determine a company's ability to pay off its short-terms which...."
Include a brief explanation of any formulas or equations
eg. Acid Test Ratio = (cash + marketable securities) / current liabilities
2 Why is this ratio important in terms of needing to know "performance assessment" of companies,
     ie what does it tell you that is important to know
3 Did you come across any "media stories" in which this ratio was mentioned in the context of talking about how well or poorly a company is performing
- which is a test to see if you can appreciate that the use of these terms is known among business people and applied to discuss how well a company is doing
4 What are some of the useful and helpful resources you accessed to learn about this ration - list them, including URLs
it is presumed some students may find URLs among various Canadian financial services companies and industry associations
5 What was something "interesting and useful" you learned about this ratio(s)

Compose your answer in a word.doc and submit this to me electronically, if your work is of sufficient quality that it could be used (with our without minor corrections) in the CCT224 course materials, then I will make a PDF of your word.doc and add it to the CCT224 webpage - in such case, you will be obliged to give your written consent for that - you can does this my simly signing it "we.... names.... give consent to this being used in the CCT224 website for teaching/learning purposes"

some sources to get you started
- don't just use these, find your own, when looking, think of corporate web pages that contain education sections or industry associations, also leading business news sites

Ratios - Alberta Govt Source
Financial Ratios
Tutorial Online
by Richard Loth


Happy people make the world better

Dennis Prager
Posted: Nov 08, 2005 12:05 AM

 Of course not.

 Those on the left are far more likely to inquire about the economic state of those individuals and groups involved in anti-social behavior ("poverty causes crime"). And those on the right are more concerned with determining the moral and ethical values held by people engaged in bad behavior.

 In my view, values are more determinative than economics. But few people have values that are so strong that those values will always overcome the individual's unhappiness and lead him to act according to those values.

 Moreover, happy people with weak characters or who possess an underdeveloped code of values are still not likely to engage in cruel behavior or join evil movements. But unhappy people who lack strong character or who have not adopted a code of moral values are very likely to act out their unhappiness in anti-social ways.

 This is particularly true in the personal realm where unhappiness can be so powerful that it regularly overwhelms a person's value system. I suspect that most readers of this column know someone with generally good values and good character who nevertheless acts indecently toward some member(s) of his/her family: a parent, a child, a spouse, a sibling.


Tag Archives: variable elimination

Why it’s hard to eliminate variables

What needs to be done, at first sight

At first sight, variable elimination is easy. We just:

  1. Build occurrence lists
  2. Pick a variable to eliminate
  4. Add newly resolved clauses into the system
  5. Remove original clauses.
  6. Goto 2.

Building occurrence lists

Picking a variable to eliminate

Resolving clauses

Adding the newly resolved clauses

Removing the original clauses

The untold horrors

On variable renumbering

Variable renumbering in SAT solvers keeps a mapping between the external variable numbers that is visible to the users and the internal variable numbers that is visible the to the system. The trivial mapping that most SAT solvers use is the one-to-one mapping where there is no difference between outer and internal variables. A smart mapping doesn’t keep track of all data related to variables that have been set or eliminated internally, so the internal datastructures can be smaller.

Having smaller internal data structures help in achieving a lower memory footprint and better cache usage.

The memory savings are useful because some CNFs have tens of millions of variables. If the solver uses the typical watched literal scheme, it needs 2 arrays for each variable. If we are using 64b pointers and 32b array sizes, it’s 32B for each variable, so 32MB for every million variable only to keep the watching literal array(!). I have seen people complaining that their 100M variable problem runs out of memory — if we count that right that’s 3.2GB of memory only to hold the watching literal array pointers and sizes, not any data at all.

As for the CPU cache benefits: modern CPUs work using cache lines which are e.g. 64B long on Intel Sandy Bridge. If half of the variables are set already, the array holding the variable values — which will be accessed non-stop during propagation — will contain 50% useless data. In practice the speedup achieved can be upwards of 10%.

The simple problems

One problem with having a renumbering scheme is that you need to keep track of which datastructure is numbered in which way. The easy solution is to renumber absolutely everything. This is costly, however, as the mapping has to change every once in a while when new variables have been set. In this case, if everything is renumbered, then the eliminated variables‘ data needs to be updated according to the new mapping every time. This might be quite significant. So, it’s best not to renumber that. Similarly, if disconnected component analysis is used, then the disconnected components’ saved solutions need to be renumbered as well, along with the clauses that have been moved to the components.

An approach I have found to be satisfying is to keep every dynamic datastructure such as variable states (eliminated/decomposed/etc.), variable values (True/False/Unknown), clauses’ literals, etc. renumbered, while keeping mostly static datastructures such as eliminated clauses or equivalent literal maps non-renumbered. This works very well in practice as it allows the main system to shuffle the mapping around while not caring about all the other systems’ data.

The hard problem

The above is all fine and dandy until bounded variable addition (BVA) comes to the scene. This technique adds new variables to the problem to simplify it. These new variables will look like new outer variables, which seems good at first sight: the system could simply print the solution to all variables except the last N that were added by BVA and are not part of the original problem. However, if the caller adds new variables after the call to solve(), what can we do? The actual variables by the caller and the BVA variables will be mixed up: start with a bunch of original variables, sprinkle the end with some BVA, then some original variables, then some BVA…

The trivial solution to this is to have another mapping, one that translates variable numbers between the BVA and non-BVA system. As you might imagine, this complicates everything. Another solution is to forcibly eliminate all BVA variables after the call to solve(), let the user add the new clauses, and perform BVA again. Another even more complicated solution is to keep track of the variables being added, then re-number all variables inside all datastructures to move all BVA variables to the end of the variable array. This is expensive but only needs to be done once after the call to solve(), which may be acceptable. Currently, CryptoMiniSat uses the trivial scheme. Maybe I’ll move to the last (and most complicated) system later on.

Variable renumbering is not for the faint of heart. Bugs become significantly harder to track, as all debug messages need to be translated to a common variable numbering or they make no sense at all. It’s also very easy to introduce bugs through variable renumbering. A truly difficult bug I had was when the disconnected component finder’s sub-solver renumbered its internal variables and when I tried to import some values from the sub-solver back to the main solver, I used the wrong variable numbers.

A note on learnt clauses

A bit of terminology

The distinction

An observation about glues

Some speculation about glues

Locking clauses

End notes

A variable elimination improvement

Lately, I have been thinking about how to improve variable elimination. It’s one of the most important things in SAT solvers, and it’s not exactly easy to do right.

Variable elimination

Variable elimination simply resolves every occurrence of a literal v1 with every occurrence of the literal \neg v1 , removes the original clauses and adds the resolvents. For example, let’s take the clauses

v1 \vee v2 \vee v3
v1 \vee v4 \vee v5
\neg v1 \vee v10 \vee v11
\neg v1 \vee v12 \vee v13

When v1 gets eliminated the resolvents become

v2 \vee v3 \vee v10 \vee v11
v2 \vee v3 \vee v12 \vee v13
v4 \vee v5 \vee v10 \vee v11
v4 \vee v5 \vee v12 \vee v13

The fun comes when the resolvents are tautological. This happens in this case for example:

v1 \vee v4
\neg v1 \vee v5\vee \neg v4

The resolvent is the clause

v4 \vee \neg v4 \vee v5

Which contains both a literal and its negation and is therefore always true. It’s good to find variables we can eliminate without and side-effects, i.e. variables that eliminate without leaving any resolvents behind. However, it’s not so cheap to find these. Until now.

A fast procedure for calculating the no. of non-tautological resolvents

The method I came up with is the following. For every clause where v1 is inside, I go through every literal and in an array the size of all possible literals, I set a bit. For every clause, I set a different bit. When going through every clause of every literal where \neg v1 is present, I calculate the hamming weight (a popcount(), a native ASM instruction on modern CPUs) of the array’s inverse literals and substruct this hamming weight from the number of clauses v1 was inside. I sum up all these and then the final count will be the number of non-tautological resolvents. Here is a pseudo-code:

I think this is pretty neat. Notice that this is linear in the number of literals in the clauses where v1 and \neg v1 is present. The only limitation of this approach is that ‘myarray’ has to have enough bits in its elements to hold ‘num’ number of bits. This is of course non-trivial and can be expensive in terms of memory (and cache-misses) but I still find this approach rather fun.

Using this procedure, I can check whether all resolvents are tautological, and if so, remove all the clauses and not calculate anything at all. Since this happens very often, I save a lot of calculation.

Why programs fail

I just bought the book with the title of the blogpost by Andreas Zeller. Essentially, it’s about debugging, where the author analyses the chain of program defect leading to infected program state, finally leading to program failure. I bought the book because while working with CryptoMiniSat, I have encountered so many bugs that they could fill a book.

The problem with chasing bugs in CryptoMiniSat is that SAT solvers employ a very optimised algorithm that makes a lot of decisions per second, so recording all interesting events makes for a very big dump file. I have per-module verbosity settings, so if I can narrow down what module(s) are causing the failure, there is less debug output to go through, but sometimes I still have to wade through 10-20GB dumps to see how the program state got infected.

While going through such large dumps, the following occured to me: what if we loaded all this data into a MySQL database? Some 8 years ago I had a job where I processed a large chunk of the data on all of Hungary’s phone conversations on a daily basis. Essentially, data on your phone calls are recorded in many different databases, and these must be merged to calculate your bill and to provide statistical feedback to the company. I wrote a program that processed 3million records in about 1 hour using MySQL and a number of SQL statements that spanned approx. 2-3000 lines. In other words, I am not afraid of large databases, and I think such multi-gigabyte data could easily be loaded into a MySQL database.

The goal of loading a SAT run into a MySQL database is the following: once the MySQL data is ready, a bit of PHP, graphviz and gnuplot will plot any relevant information at any point in time about the solving. In other words, we could dig this data visually, with some very interesting effects.

For example, I have been lately having problems with clause strengthening interfering with variable elimination. The idea is in theory quite simple. Variable elimination eliminates a variable and adds clauses that represent the original clauses the variable was present in. These clauses are sometimes trivial, such as:
a or b or c or !c = true
which is never added since it is satisfied whether c is true or false. So far, so good. Clause strenghtening is a method whereby clauses are shortened. For example, if there was a clause:
e or b or c = true
the solver might discover that in fact it is also true that:
e or b = true
and replace the original clause with this, since this clause is “stronger”: it poses a more stringent requirement. The way variable elimination and clause strenghtening interact is as follows. Let’s suppose we eliminate on varible e. If the above clause is strenghtened before elimination, then instead of:
a or b or c or !c = true
we might have got:
a or b or !c = true
which must be added. We actually have more clauses because of clause strenghtening! I believe nobody ever found this anomaly. To properly quantitise how this affects solving, we need to know all states of a clause, and a web interface with a MySQL backbone could help a lot with that.


Dirrane Cove

Executive Director

Dirrane is the Executive Director of the Work First Foundation, a workforce innovation laboratory dedicated to the belief that employment is the most important first step towards lifting people out of poverty. As the daughter of social entrepreneurs, Dirrane has seen first-hand the positive impact of work throughout her life.  She fundamentally believes that employment promotes upward mobility, reduces poverty, and fosters positive mental health and overall stability.

In her role as Executive Director, she overseas all programs operated by the organization, including ensuring ongoing programmatic excellence, rigorous evaluation, and consistent quality of finance and administration, fundraising, communications, and systems, while recommending timelines and resources needed to achieve strategic goals.


Tag Archives: soil

Don’t treat soil like dirt!

Check out my new blog here

Soil is a precious resource, yet most of us pay little attention to the stuff under our feet.  It is the medium in which we grow our food and the foundation on which we build our cities. Soils filter our water, detoxify our pollutants, decompose our waste and hold vast reserves of the nutrients required for life. Soils are also fragile, taking thousands to million of years to develop but destroyed in minutes by human development.

For the past three years, myself and my fellow soil enthusiast Aurora have spent our Saturdays in December showing kids how awesome soil and the microbes that inhabit it actually are. We’ve developed a number of soil and microbiology activities to teach kids of all ages what soil actually is, who lives in it, and why we should value it. The take-home message? Don’t treat soil like dirt! Human beings (and nearly ever other species on earth) depend on soil for our very survival.

Here are some highlights from the last two weeks of the workshop:

Checking out some protozoa under the microscope!
Making a hypothesis before conducting an experiment!
Making a hypothesis before conducting an experiment!
MAKING SOIL! This is always a favorite. Want to make soil at home with your kids? Check out my homebrew recipe below...
Probably the coolest thing I've ever made in photoshop.
Probably the coolest thing I’ve ever made in photoshop.

We are even participating in an international, crowd-sourced science experiment known as the Tea Bag Index experiment to measure rates of decomposition in different soil types! This is a fun and easy experiment you can do in your backyard. All you need is a few teabags and a scale.  Decomposition, the breakdown of once-living organic matter and conversion into soil organic matter, is an important step in the global carbon cycle that is driven primarily by soil microorganisms. Ultimately, decomposed carbon is respired back to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. Scientists are currently trying to understand how global climate change will affect decomposition and the microbial “respiration” of CO2 from soils. Projects such as the Tea Bag Index experiment provide scientists with valuable data that can be used to inform predictions about changes to the global carbon cycle. For more information on the Tea Bag Index experiment check out the website:

Or click here to access the protocol and get involved directly!

Most importantly, our workshop strives to underscore the importance of soils in our everyday lives.  Kids (and parents) often come unsure of what exactly soil is or why it should matter to them, and often enjoy the experience so much that they return week after week.

Live in the Philly area and got kids? Check us out, every Saturday for the rest of the month!

And since I can’t seem to stop geeking out about this stuff, here are some more cool resources to check out on soil science education:

USDA NRCS Healthy Soil Fact Sheets

Reconstructing the proteome of ancient peoples in soils

The history beneath your feet

In an unpredictable environment, trees network for stability

In the highly variable ridge, slope and valley mosaic that forms the Luquillo Mountains of northeastern Puerto Rico, Dacroydes excelsa, commonly known as Tabnuco, dominates the landscape. Though tropical forests are generally quite diverse and seen as ideal environments for plant growth, life in this rainforest can actually be quite challenging. Powerful hurricanes pass through the Caribbean annually and hit the Puerto Rican mainland every few years. Large swatches of the Luquillo forest were flattened several years back when hurricane Hugo struck in 1989.  Aside from directly damaging or wiping out forest stands, hurricanes cause landslides that severly erode the already shallow, nutrient depauperate soils.

On steep, harsh slopes that experience such frequent disturbance, what allows one tree species to gain a competitive advantage over the hundreds of others struggling to survive? Rather than compete fiercely for limited resources only to be at the mercy of the next devastating hurricane, Tabunuco trees have adopted an alternative strategy- cooperation and resource sharing through root grafting.

Root grafting, the joining of neighboring tree roots to produce a network, is a phenomenon that scientists have been aware of for decades, though the extent of its occurrence and the benefits that it provides trees are largely unknown. In Tabunuco forests, however, root grafting is widespread and many of its benefits obvious.

Tabunuco trees grow in dense stands and will graft roots with neighboring trees as they mature, forming unions that comprise anywhere from two to over a dozen trees. A clear advantage of this strategy in an environment that experiences powerful storms is structural stability. Trees that have entered unions increase their base of support and are less likely to be uprooted during a wind event or landslide. In increasing their wind-firmness, individual trees boost their survival chances during a storm. Fewer uprooting events also reduces the probability of a major landslide and helps ensure the retention of the surface organic matter that contains most of the forest’s available nutrients.

Root networks can also improve soil conditions during the off-season. Densely packed surface roots form “organic benches” which trap leaves and other decaying plant matter rather than allowing these important nutrient sources be washed downslope. Roots aerate the soil, facilitating decomposition and nutrient flow. They also “prime” the surrounding soil for productivity by releasing sugary compounds that stimulate beneficial microbial activity (the interaction between plants and microbes in the root zone known as the “rhizosphere” is another fascinating topic entirely, which I will do attempt to do justice to in the future).

Scientists are now discovering previously undetectable advantages of Tabunuco grafting that underscore the high degree of sophistication and evolutionary purpose in the development of these networks. It is now known that root networks can actually serve as conduits for the transfer of carbon and essential nutrients between trees. This can provide an immense competitive advantage over non-networked trees. Tabunuco trees that receive the most sunlight and produce the most carbon through photosynthesis can transfer carbon to neighboring Tabunucos to ensure the long-term health and survival of the community. Individuals of less common species, such as the Caribbean palm and Colorado tree are excluded from Tabunuco networks and must compete for growth given only the resources available in the vicinity of their roots.

Though in Tabunucos root grafting precludes the need for inter-tree competition, it is theoretically possible that trees could use grafting for more selfish purposes. Ecologists have speculated whether trees can gain a competitive advantage over their neighbors by leeching a neighbor’s nutrients, much as the fungal organisms that associate symbiotically with plant roots can become greedy and actually sap nutrients from their host under stressful conditions. Root networks may even serve as a conduit for disease or herbicide transfer, allowing trees that produce or tolerate a harmful compound to efficiently clear out their competitors.

Basnet, K., F.N. Scatena, G.E. Likens, and A.E. Lugo. 1992. Ecological consequences of root grafting in tabonuco (Dacryodes excelsa) trees in the Luquillo Experimental Forest, Puerto Rico. Biotropica 25:28-35.

enzymes in the environment

Maybe we should reconsider raking our leaves

I recently learned a fascinating fact about leaf raking that should be painfully obvious to a forest ecologist- it’s bad for trees! Every spring, deciduous trees produce leaves that they use throughout the growing season for photosynthesis and sugar production.  Plants concentrate essential nutrients such as nitrogen, potassium, calcium and magnesium in their leaves, as these nutrients are all required in relatively high amounts to perform photosynthesis.

As winter approaches and the growing season ends, trees withdraw many of the proteins and nutrients they have stockpiled in leaves back into their woody tissue, so that these nutrients can be recycled to make new leaves the following year. However, most trees are able to do even better than this- after their leaves have fallen, the nutrients that couldn’t be recaptured in time are decomposed into the surface soil surrounding the tree, and will be available for uptake through the roots several years later. This regular flux of plant essential nutrients back to the soil through leaf litter means that plants depend on those same nutrients, year after year, to grow new leaves.

In fact, if you look at the typical architecture of a deciduous tree, it is no accident that probably appears like two umbrellas attached together at their handles. The top umbrella is the above ground parts of a tree from the base of the trunk to its canopy. The bottom umbrella is inverted and planted into the ground. It is composed of a main taproot that drives straight down into the earth, and lateral roots that branch out horizontally. Of these lateral roots are branching networks of finer and finer “root hairs” and associated fungi that are able, through their enormous surface area, to mine the soil underneath a tree for nutrients. Everything that is dropped from the top umbrella should theoretically be recoverable by this root system.

I’d imagine most of you can already see where this is going, but I find that sometimes simple truths are quite elusive. When we rake our leaves in the fall to maintain our clean, grassy lawns, we are removing loads of nutrients that our trees are expecting to get back! We are creating an artificially open, leaky system, that trees have spent millions of evolutionary years refining. A recent paper in a relatively esoteric research journal, “Nutrient Cycling in Agroecosystems” (who reads that??) attempted to quantify the impact of historic leaf raking on old agricultural towns in central Europe. The fascinating bit of historical information in this paper is that centuries ago, medieval farmers actually knew that leaves were a great nutrient source- farmers removed leaves from nearby forests specifically to use as fertilizer on their fields. This paper claims that the result of historic leaf raking is that the “majority of central European forests were severely depleted of nutrients…when modern long-term rotation forestry became the dominant form of forest land use”.

So next fall, when you’re pulling out your rakes or enlisting your kids to do so for a few dollars, think carefully about your trees. In all likelihood, the average patch of suburban lawn is already so nutrient depauperate from numerous land use changes (deforestation, asphalt paving, over-fertilization, the cultivation of a monoculture of non-native grasses, to name a few) that removing a few leaves isn’t going to make a big difference. But if I’ve learned anything from Malcom Gladwell, it’s that little changes that add up to produce big effects, and if medieval Europeans were knowingly removing nutrients from their forests, I figured modern suburbanites should at least be aware.


Legendmaker is 10-sided dice based, although any method of random percentile generation will work. Your character's abilities are based on his Proficiencies- a set of skills learned from an apprenticeship with an elder. Each Proficiency has a Percent Chance to Achieve associated with it. You roll percentile dice under these Percent Chances to Achieve to accomplish your task. Very easy.
The magic system for both Mages and Clerics is based on the same formula with adjustments based on the difficulty of the spell. In addition to this, spellcasters are limited to a certain umber of Spell Points per day. They regain these spell points through either prayer (in the case of a Cleric) or rest (in the case of a Mage). The really fantastic part of the magic system is the Unleveled spells, a set of spells that can be cast at any level, depending upon the number of Spell Points used during casting.
Legendmaker is written for anyone to understand, from beginner to battle-scarred veteran. Its simplicity is obvious. Its nuances are numerous. Its elegance is unparalleled.
Diarrah, Morris, Mycroft and an unknown dwarf are ready to take on anything... until the dice start falling wrong.


The Cube Sequencer

The Rubik’s Cube Sequencer

A camera and led lights are mounted over a game board painted in matte black.
A color recognizing algorithm built in a web sequencer for Chrome playing back sounds. Each color represent one musical instrument, totally 6 diffeent instruments. Each position horisontally represents a beat in a 4/4 loop. Each position vertically represents a key from low pitch closesnt to the player and high pitch further up.

The setups can be any sound you put into the sequencer but in the demo film, this is the set up: White is drums, green is bass, orange is percussion, red is synth 1, yellow is synth 2, blue is synth 3.

In order to compose, the played have to place the right cube in the right box and then twist the cube to get the desired combination. This is quite complicated as it is but when changing one instrument it effect other instruments. So composing music becomes a puzzle. A very difficult puzzle. But why does it have to be easy? Most of today’s electronic music tools have a low learning curve. But the Cube Sequencer is not easy. Just like learning how to play the violin or chess – or to solve the Rubik’s Cube, this takes time to master.
What is the difference between playing a game and playing music?
And who is the winner?
At the Daily Planet Show, Discovery Channel:

The Rubik’s Cube Sequencer was made by Håkan Lidbo (concept and sound design), Per-Olov Jernberg (programming & visual design) and Romeo Brahasteanu (game board).


Our Service at HSS

Limb lengthening has proven to be a very powerful and effective procedure.

Limb lengthening is possible and has been performed successfully for about 50 years in Kurgan, Russia. Gavriil A. Ilizarov developed the concept in 1951 after seeing many WWII veterans who had leg fractures that had not healed (non-unions).

Ilizarov first developed an external fixation frame that was placed around the leg. Knowing that compression of the fracture would help stimulate bone healing, he built a frame that had this capacity. He instructed a patient to gradually compress the non-union by turning a rod. However, the patient turned the rod the wrong way and caused distraction (separation) of the fracture. Ilizarov noticed that new bone had formed in the gap between the bone ends. This was the beginning of much research and development that showed that limb lengthening was possible, safe and effective.

Ilizarov and his colleagues performed thousands of limb lengthening procedures in Kurgan, Russia. Russian politics, however, made education and communication with the Western world very difficult. Finally, Italian surgeons started performing and improving the procedure in the early 1980s and a large center soon developed in Lecco, Italy. The first limb lengthening case in the United States was performed in 1988. At first, there was much resistance and skepticism from the U.S. orthopaedic community, but limb lengthening has proven to be a very powerful and effective procedure.

We provide opportunities for individuals who previously had no treatment alternatives.

The regenerated bone is normal and does not wear out. The muscles, nerves and blood vessels grow in response to the slow stretch like they do during a growth spurt or in pregnancy. The actual procedure is minimally invasive and requires only one or two nights in the hospital. Patients aren’t in much pain since the distraction is so gradual and patients can continue to walk during the treatment.

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The oldest ceramic shards to be found in be found in the world were discovered in Japan and date back some 12,400 years. That was the pottery of the Jomon (12400-250BC) culture, followed by the Yayoi (250BC-250AD) culture, which was open pit-fired, porous, and made without a potter’ s wheel. In the fifth century potters and other technical experts were invited to Japan from what is now Korea Inception of technically advanced Sue ware took place at that time bringing to Japan the potter’s wheel and anagama tunnel kiln. Sue ware was made throughout Japan and is the origin of Bizen ware. Sue pottery is characterized by having a sharp, fine, delicate, form, thin walls, and a light blue-grayish color. It was made throughout the Heian period (794-1185AD) and used mainly in religious ceremonies and by the aristocratic society.

The end of the12th century also marked the end of the Heian period, and of its court aristocracy, and the beginning of the Kamakura period (1185-1338) with its feudal system of government. The Kamakura society required more utilitarian ceramics for everyday living rather than of artistic value. At this time six large pottery production centers came into prominence in Japan evolving to produce rougher, heavier, higher fired, more durable pottery and Bizen was one of those centers. From the Kamakura period the pottery made in Bizen began to have unique qualities such as reddish or brownish color surface and melted ash resembling sesame seeds and so is called Bizen ware.

In the Muromachi period (1338-1573) Bizen became the most popular ceramic in Japan because of its superior clay, quite atmosphere, durability, and water preserving qualities. The next period, Momoyama (1568-1600), was the golden age of art in Japan. During this period giant 5 x 50 meter tunnel kilns were made in Bizen. The great lord Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the great tea master Sue no Rikyu both loved Bizen ware and greatly supported it. Many tea ware masterpieces were made during this period.

In the Edo period (1603-1868) porcelaine was introduced to Japan and became very popular. The feudal lord of the Bizen area Ikeda Mitsumasa, began to protect Bizen but even so, popularity continued to steadily decline. The roof tiles of the shizutani school, Which Ikeda Mitsumasa created for the purpose of educating common people, were made of Bizen pottery and the lecture hall has been designated a national landmark.

With the Meiji restoration (1868) Japan opened its doors to west and the public lost interest in Japanese traditional arts. This was disastrous for Bizen but even so small individual kilns began to be fired, though drain pipes and refractory brick production was the main industry.

After 1945 there were cultural revival movements in Japan. Kaneshige Toyo was successful in attempts to make wares of Momoyama period quality and was designated a living national treasure. His efforts are largely responsible for the present day prosperity of Bizen ware.


Only Three EU Countries On Track To Meet Paris Climate Agreement Targets

The EU is often seen as a leader in climate action, but it isn't actually doing that well itself. European Parliament/Flickr/ CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

A new report has found that only three European countries are currently on track to meet their Paris agreement targets. Sweden currently tops the list, followed then by Germany and France, but all of the other 27 nations – which account for 60 percent of the continent's emissions – are not doing nearly enough.

When the Paris climate talks took place at the end of 2015, Europe pledged to cut carbon emissions by 40 percent by 2030. Yet the report, compiled by the Carbon Market Watch, has found that many nations are using loopholes to avoid this. They are now calling on these countries to close those loopholes and produce yearly reports on their progress.

Despite often being seen as progressive and a world leader, Europe has been slipping down the table when it comes to climate action. In the last few years, countries traditionally seen as “developing” have been overtaking Europe in terms of investment and commitments. China and India, for example, are now some of the largest investors in renewable energy in the world, with China in particular pulling far ahead of the rest.

This is a trend that has been going on for a few years now. In 2015, developing nations outpaced those in the west in terms of investment for the first time. While the developed world was found to have invested $130 billion in renewables in 2015, down 8 percent on the year previous, those nations in the developing world invested $156 billion, an increase of 19 percent.

And little has changed. China, for example, has announced that it will pump $361 billion into renewable power generation by 2020, an astonishing commitment to push away from their reliance on fossil fuels such as coal – consumption of which in the country has slumped in recent years.

“EU politicians portraying themselves as climate leaders should put their money where their mouth is by closing loopholes in the EU’s key climate law and pushing for more ambition,” Femke de Jong, the EU policy director of Carbon Market Watch, says in a statement. “Only with determined climate action will lawmakers ensure that European citizens can enjoy the significant benefits of a decarbonised society, such as clean air.”

While Europe is seemingly falling behind the pack, recent events in the United States suggest that it will not be alone. By tearing up the Clean Power Plan and removing regulations for fossil fuel extraction, President Trump is trying to stimulate the coal industry while ignoring the consequences this would have for their own commitments to the Paris climate agreement.

Ironically, despite this report showing that the EU isn’t doing too great itself, Europe led in the criticism against Trump when news broke about the rollback of the climate policies put in place by Obama.

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I observed what was going on, the hearing loss and the Tinnitus

When I came up again my hearing in the right ear was reduced to almost nothing. I observed what was going on, the hearing loss and the Tinnitus. Tinnitus is sometimes the first sign of hearing loss in older people. It also can be a side effect of medications. Researchers have observed hyperactivity in neural networks after exposing the ear to intense noise. Just about anything that can cause hearing loss can also cause tinnitus. Some people do not appear to be too bothered by their tinnitus, but most would wish it would go away. Any reduction in tinnitus, when it is observed, is short-lived.

I observed what was going on, the hearing loss and the Tinnitus 2This type of tinnitus is annoying, but, usually goes away after a few hours. Permanent hearing loss, and tinnitus is frequently observed with the Administration of ototoxic chemotherapeutic agents such as the various heavy metal platinum compounds. It can cause problems with hearing and balance, and also ringing in the ears (tinnitus). About 7 in 10 people with an acoustic neuroma have tinnitus in one ear. If they do happen, it is due to hydrocephalus (see above). If you have a very small acoustic neuroma, your doctors might decide that the best way to treat you is just to observe and monitor it closely. Typically, three cycles are performed just prior to going to sleep.

In the remaining third, the next most common observation is hearing loss at low frequency (which would be more typical of Meniere s disease). Tinnitus is very common in acoustic neuroma, and is usually unilateral and confined to the affected ear. The symptoms of individuals with postexposure tinnitus or hearing loss should be taken seriously. Occasionally, a work environment results in asymmetrical noise exposure, as seen in tractor drivers with ONIHL in which the left ear is more frequently affected than the right ear. Competition document: detect and treat hearing loss and tinnitus. This challenge is seeking potential novel solutions that go beyond current options to stop further hearing loss and, potentially, restore hearing function.

Tinnitus Hear Md

I observed what was going on, the hearing loss and the Tinnitus 3Noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) is hearing impairment resulting from exposure to high decibel (loud) sound that may exhibit as loss of a narrow range of frequencies, impaired cognitive perception of sound or other impairment, including hyperacusis or tinnitus. By the age of 60, this number goes up to 70. It had been observed that noise conditioning (i.e. exposure to loud non-traumatizing noise) several hours prior to the exposure to traumatizing sound level, significantly reduced the damages inflicted to the hair-cells. Observation (non-treatment) over time also usually results in hearing loss in the affected ear. Since the incision goes directly through the inner ear, this results in permanent and complete hearing loss in that ear. Normal hearing thresholds can also be accompanied by impaired function of efferent fibers that project from the brainstem to the cochlea (Kim et al. In addition to providing physiological evidence for deficits in cochlear processing in tinnitus patients with a normal audiogram, our results go one crucial step further by demonstrating that the putative deafferentation of AN fibers is associated with increased neural gain at the level of the brainstem. Hearing worsens, symptoms of disequilibrium worsen, and tinnitus becomes louder. So along with hearing loss and disequilibrium, patients may experience difficulties breathing and numbness of the face if the tumors grow too large. The patient was fitted with a hearing aid but a year later still wondered what was going on, so the patient sought the advice of a physician. Treatment by observation means that we obtain serial MRI scans for those patients who are relatively asymptomatic and over the age of 65. Patients may experience severe hearing loss (either suddenly or progressively over a period of years) or balance problems. The patient is observed for hearing, balance, tinnitus, and facial nerve function. Sudden hearing loss (SHL) is a significant hearing loss that occurs in 72 hours or less. Thus people who already have ear damage — are more likely to have more hearing loss documented going forward. Also supporting the idea that vascular causes are important, is the observation that SHL following surgery outside the inner ear, is most commonly associated with cardiopulmonary bypass surgery (Page and Peters, 2015).

Acoustic Neuroma

It also affects hearing, with tinnitus (usually a buzz or hum) and hearing loss (usually of low tones). As an illustration of what happens with unilateral vestibular damage, let’s consider the effects of sudden loss of the right labyrinthine system, for example, as in vestibular neuronitis (a common affliction, presumably viral in origin). An excellent example of the suppression of nystagmus and vertigo is seen in the figure skater who is subjected to marked acceleration and deceleration of the horizontal endolymph-cristae systems during every spin. If you experience a sudden hearing loss in one ear, this is considered a medical emergency. Close-up view of the bony canal thru which the hearing nerve goes thru to get to the ear. At that time, i observed that i can hear properly for 10-20 mins and then again my ear goes deaf. I have my hearing back and very low residual tinnitus. A lady reported, I just took Augmentin and the volume of my tinnitus went up. Her infection has improved considerably since then but off late I have observed that she is having a slight hearing loss. Similar observations have been made in other areas of the brain that are involved in the processing of sound as well. However, cutting the auditory nerve leads to complete deafness and therefore is not a desirable therapy. If you’ve got questions about tinnitus go to our tinnitus section to find out more.

Exposure to loud sounds is the main cause of hearing loss. Until 30 years ago, most harmful noise exposures took place at the workplace. 9.3 Is tinnitus more frequent among users of personal music players? A small notch at 4 kHz (2-3 dB on average, no more than 15 dB) was observed after exposure to pop music with moderate use of percussion instruments, while significantly more TTS was observed with the pop music extensively using percussion instruments. Over time the tumor can cause gradual hearing loss, ringing in the ear, and dizziness. Treatment options include observation, surgery, and radiation. The most common first symptom is hearing loss in the affected ear, which often goes unrecognized or is mistaken for a normal change of aging. Facial numbness or tingling can be constant or it may come and go (intermittent). Over time hearing loss and tinnitus may become permanent. Observation This option may be preferred in affected individuals where no associated symptoms are present or where a small tumor is not growing or growing at a slow rate. Characteristics of tinnitus with or without hearing loss: clinical observations in Sicilian tinnitus patients. OBJECTIVE: To analyze the clinical characteristics of tinnitus both in normal hearing subjects and in patients with hearing loss.

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Sample Branch Chief Responsibilities and Duties

Posted in Job Responsibilities

Supervise and plan all market operations and surveillance programs for all Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization.
Perform regular inspection on branch to identify all trends and recommend new methods if required.
Design and oversee all policies and recommend appropriate actions for all studies and surveys.
Coordinate with various offices to ensure effective implementation of all branch activities for administrative and human resource department.
Oversee efficient working of all attorneys and security examiners.
Develop appropriate assignments and allocate work to staff and ensure compliance to all NRSRO and evaluate all programs and procedures to ensure smooth functioning of branch.
Evaluate all working of staff members for general office and prepare all FCB plans and perform agricultural economic research and perform analysis on all branches within ERS.
Disseminate all statistics and data, gather all research findings for various clients and prepare various reports and design required briefs and speeches.
Provide required consultation on various economic functions associate with FCB area.
Provide all required technical assistance to various government agencies and provide subject matter expertise as per requirement.
Ensure usage of appropriate test methodologies to resolve all issues and analyze various market and price activities and modify all research programs to suit requirements.
Perform and identify all appropriate research activities and allocate all required resources for all FCB activities and validate all results and assist to collect all data and publish all results.